BR Class 55's - the Deltics

Introduction

The class 55 "Deltics" were introduced to replace steam on the East Coast Mainline between Kings Cross and Edinburgh and were the mainstay of the East Coast mainline operations for 20 years. At the time they were the most powerful and fastest diesel locomotives in Europe breaking all records for speed and reliability. It must be mentioned that this couldn't have been achieved without the dedication and expertise of the technicians and fitter who maintained these complicated machines. With the introduction of full High Speed Train services on the East Coast Main Line in the 1978/79 timetable the early demise of the Deltics became a near certainty, as there were no longer enough high profit earning trains left to justify the very costly maintenance of these exceptionally powerful and complicated machines. Their final years of service were spent mainly on Hull, Liverpool and York semi-fasts, overnight sleeping-car trains, and some trains to and beyond Edinburgh. By the end of December all the Deltics had been withdrawn with the exception of the four "railtour" locos. These were 55002, 55009, 55015 and 55022 which survived until January 2nd 1982 for the "Deltic Farewell" railtour.

Please note some of these details on this page have come from various websites and books along with the ever helpful "wikipedia" website. I hope I am not breaking any copyright with this! If I am please contact me so I can correct the situation

Details of My Deltic Fleet

I have, over the last few years, collected together 24 Deltic locos in various liveries. My plan was to get an example of all the class 55 locos and to cover as many of the livery options these great locomotives ran in during their 20 years in use by British Railways.

To achieve this ambition I will have to re-number & re-name quite a few locos and also make some slight alterations to the livery on some. For example D9010 was the only Class 55 to have the new BR "Double Arrows of Indecision" insignia while in Two-Tone Green so that will, in addition to renumbering, have the BR crests removed and the later Double Arrows applied. I will also exchange the headcode windows, on 55015 for example, so I can have some options not on the locos I have collected together or covered by bachmann. And one Two-Tone Green loco will have full yellow ends painted on. There will be a few options I won't end up with as there are just too many to accomodate in such a small fleet but I will cover all of the common ones.

This is D9006 in original BR Two-Tone Green livery before application of yellow warning panels on the ends and before the loco was named as "Fife & Forfar Yeomanry". Just one of the various liveries used on the class 55 Deltics in their 20 years of service.

Below is my intended fleet details, although some might get swapped around in the end. I have added a couple of photos of part of the fleet below.

All will be fitted with decoders and 55016 will probably retain the sound facility. I may also fit lights to the earlier models not so equiped. More photos will be added as the work progresses and once I get them all finished I will post one of the full fleet which I think will be quite impressive and something BR was never able to do, for obvious reasons.

Brief History of DP1 the prototype "Deltic".

"DELTIC"

English Electric No. 2007.

Built at Dick Kerr Works, Preston.

Entered Service in October 1955.

Original Allocation was London Midland Region (LMR).

Named "DELTIC" from new (a derivative of the power unit's triangular cylinder arrangement being in the form of the Greek letter "DELTA").

Withdrawn in March 1961 - Preserved as part of the National Collection.

Locomotive was ordered in 1951, and the frames were laid in 1954. Original livery EE green-and cream 'house colours' applied at Dick Kerr works. Moved by road to EE works, Netherton, Liverpool, for static tests. Repainted into powder-blue and completed Autumn 1955...

On 24th October 1955 it was allocated to 8C, Speke shed, for trials (close proximity to Netherton Works). and on the 7th November 1955 it pulled a 12-coach test train between Liverpool and Preston.

On 28th November 1955 it started night-time acceptance trials. Beginning that night DELTIC began work on alternate nights with an express freight between Edge Hill (19:30) and Camden Town, London, (03:07). The locomotive stabled at Willesden and returned 19:35 to Edge Hill (01:07) being then stabled at Speke. During the period 29th December 1956 to 9th March 1957 "DELTIC" worked Anglo-Scottish services between Euston & Carlisle stabling at Carlisle Upperby and refuelling at Kingmoor.

The locomotive was then constantly in traffic until 24th November 1960 when a severe oil leak in the phasing gear cover was discovered. The locomotive was sent to the English Electric Company’s Works at Newton-le-Willows on 25th November for repair but no repairs were sanctioned and the locomotive was withdrawn in March 1961.

On 28th April 1963 it was moved by road, to Science Museum (officially handed over 17th May 1963 to Science Museum by Lord Nelson of Stafford). After 20 years on display at the Science Museum in London, the prototype DELTIC was moved to the National Railway Museum at York in October 1993. Normally on display in the main hall, the loco is unlikely ever to work under its own power again. In December 2001, the National Railway Museum agreed to allow the DPS to undertake an engineering survey on the loco. 15th July 2004 it was moved from NRM York to Locomotion, Shildon.

A "Very" Drief History of The Class 55 Deltics

Following trials with a prototype locomotive, DP1 Deltic, an order was placed with English Electric for a production fleet of twenty-two units. They were intended to replace more than twice that number of Gresley Pacifics. A first was that the locomotives were purchased under a service contract, EE agreeing to maintain them, especially their engines and generators, for a fixed price. More Deltic engines were produced than needed for the locomotives, for the plan and practice was to swap out engines regularly for overhaul while keeping the valuable locomotives in service.

The locomotives were delivered in 1961/2 and assigned to three different locomotive depots, Finsbury Park in London, Gateshead over the Tyne from Newcastle, and Haymarket in Edinburgh. They came from the manufacturer painted in two-tone green, the dark BR green on top, but a narrow strip along the bottom a lighter, grass green. Again, this concealed the bulk of the locomotive body. Although delivered without it, they soon sported the bright yellow warning panel on the nose that all British diesel and electric locomotives were painted with, for visibility. Very soon, all were named; the Gateshead and Haymarket locomotives were named after regiments of the British Army, while the Finsbury Park locomotives followed the grand LNER tradition of naming locomotives after winning racehorses. In 1979 the Finsbury Park depot chose to paint the window surrounds of its Deltics white, making them distinctive, but repainted them back in Blue prior to the transfer to York in 1981.

By 1966 they began to be painted in corporate Rail Blue with full yellow ends, this generally coinciding with a works repair and the fitting of air brake equipment, the locomotives originally having only vacuum braking. In the early 1970s they were fitted with Electric Train Heating (ETH) equipment to power the new generation of air-conditioned coaches, while a couple of years later, with the introduction of BR's TOPS computer system, they were renumbered in Class 55, as 55 001 to 55 022. Later, from approx 1975, the headcode box glass was covered on the inside with black film with two translucent white dote in line with the teo outer headcode lamps. This was also carried out on all loco classes and was to become known as the "Domino" style of headcode. Later still, after 1977, the headcode boxes were completely plated over and painted yellow with two headlamps fitted into them. This also included the plating over of sand-box fillers, cab quarter light windows. All the class were eventually treated but two, 55008 & 55022, kept the "Domino" style headcodes till withdrawn.

In the late 1970s the Deltics began to be supplanted by the next generation of express trains for the East Coast route, the Class 254 High Speed Train (HST), branded as InterCity 125, and the Deltics began to take on secondary roles. However, it was soon realised that the class had a limited future; it was not considered economic to maintain such a small and totally non-standard class of locomotive for secondary services, and the end of the decade saw the first withdrawals from service. More were withdrawn, and 1981 proved to be the last service year of the Deltics, the final service run taking place on December 31, 1981, hauled by 55 022 Royal Scots Grey, followed by the last enthusiast special, the "Deltic Farewell" on January 2, 1982.

At that point, few would have imagined that for six fortunate locomotives of the twenty-two, life was only half over.

The Six Deltics That are Preserved

• D9000 - 55022 - "Royal Scots Grey" - BR blue (9000 at one end) also one of only two Deltics to retain the "Domino" headcodes
• D9002 - 55002 - "Kings Own Yorkshire Light Infantry" - BR two tone green (55002) - now owned by the Railway Museum, York
• D9009 - 55009 - “Alycidon” - BR blue white surrounds
• D9015 - 55015 - "Tulyar" - BR blue
• D9016 - 55016 - "Gordon Highlander" - BR blue
• D9019 - 55019 - "Royal Highland Fusilier" - BR blue

Some Photos of My Class 55 Deltics

Here are a couple of photos of some of my Deltics lined up on my layout. Only 20 at the moment as I am still waiting for the others to arrive. Sorry about the quality, but I was having trouble holding the camara in the right place to get a good image of the whole lot together. The loco shed has been removed for now so that all the locos can be seen.

Here is a photo showing most of my fleet of Deltics. I have tried to cover as many livery options without having to resort to repainting any.

And this one is from a lower more side on position. The two class 20's are permanently coupled together when on the layout as in real times on BR. Also note the slightly modified Lima cleaning plant in the foreground.

And one more this time showing all of D9006, on the left, in original Two-Tone Green livery before it was named as "Fife & Forfar Yeomanry" at Cupar on the 5th Dec 1964.

And then there were twenty two, only two more to come. Then once the nameplates arrive were will be a big renumber/rename session. Looks like the recent gales have lifted the roof off the warehouse in the back corner, better get on to the insurers!

And here, at last, are all twenty four Deltics in my collection. The nameplates have also arrived so the next job is to renumber and rename the ones needing to be changed. Just click on this image to see a larger version. Note that some of the headcodes on the BR Blue locos have been reverted back to the original 4-digit type to increase the variety of iveries.