McIntosh 812

0-6-0 Steam Locomotive

CR 812, BR 57566

BR Black Late Crest

18pin DCC Sound

The locomotives were produced during the time that John McIntosh was Chief Mechanical Engineer of the Caledonian Railway (1895 -1914). The first 17 locomotives were built at the Caledonian’s St. Rollox works during 1899 (Nos. 812 – 828). A further 12 were built at St. Rollox later that year.

At the turn of the last century the Caledonian found itself to be short of engines suitable for mineral traffic. With St. Rollox fully committed to other work, it turned to three outside contractors (Neilson Reid, Sharp Stewart and Dübs) to build 50 more engines between them using the Class 812 drawings, orders being placed on December 29th 1898. The engines from the outside contractors differed from the original batch only in having Drummond style number plates (the originals having the McIntosh type) and three link couplings.

The first 17 locomotives were officially mixed traffic locomotives but were turned out in the distinctive Caledonian blue livery. Some had Westinghouse pumps and screw link couplings to enable them to be used on passenger services. The remaining members of the class spent much of their time working coal and other mineral trains around Scotland. Under LMS ownership after 1923, the class were painted in black livery and lost their Westinghouse pumps.

The first of the class was withdrawn in 1946 and the last in 1963. No.828 is the sole survivor having been earmarked for preservation by the Caledonian Railway 828 Trust for display at the Glasgow Museum of Transport then located in a former Glasgow Corporation Tram Depot. It was restored at Cowlairs Works during 1966 and painted in Caledonian Railway blue.

It was the long-term ambition of the owners to restore the locomotive to full working order and in October 1980 it was moved to the Strathspey Railway where it was rebuilt. Returning to steam in 1992 and to operational traffic in 1993 where it is currently in use.

The locomotive is due major works attention in 2020. Bachmann and Rails of Sheffield would like to thank The Caledonian Railway 828 Trust, the owners of No. 828, for providing facilities and encouragement to turn this project into reality.

Scottish Class Locomotives

Until this sentence is removed, consider this page to be a work in progress.

In attempting to meddle with model rail, I’ve realised that it can be quite a task to keep track of what locomotives and rolling stock were in use north of the border in the Scottish Region (ScR). Sure, typical of nerds providing information for nerds and not being mindful of newcomers, there are online resources which will provide the lower level detail of what loco number was assigned to what region/shed between what dates. However, at this point in the journey, I only require the higher level view of what type of loco was ever present in the ScR region before I get down to the lower level of details and make a purchase decision!

This is my attempt at an aide memoir (when gawping at adverts, web sites etc!) of what I could utilise in any semi-realistic ScR based layout.

Class	ScR	Notes
21	✔️	See Class 29
22	❌	Western Region, nicknamed Baby Warships due to the similarities with the D600 Warship which would eventually usurp them.
24	✔️	This class was largely concentrated in ScR between 1960-76. For detailed info about this class is available @ www.derbysulzers.com
25	✔️	Nicknamed Rats due to them being spotted almost everywhere on the network
26	✔️	Info about all the class histories etc is available @ https://6lda.wordpress.com/
27	✔️	By the end of the 60s, the entire class had become concentrated in Scotland
28	❌	Banished to north England, based at Carnforth and Carlisle Upperby
29	✔️	Originally these were class 21. In attempt to address reliability issues modifications were carried out between 1963 and 1965, mainly at the Polmadie Traction & Rolling Stock Depot in Glasgow to install Paxman engines.
31
33	❌	Southern Region (SR) designed locomotive.
35	❌	Western Region. The non-standard hydraulic transmission meant they were withdrawn from service by 1975

A list of locomotive classes applicable to ScR layouts

Rolling Stock

Not suitable Blood & Custard Maunsell – these were SR region

Classification of UK Trains

Below is a table of the different classification of operational trains, and their speed limits.

Note that whilst postal trains are technically freight (unless carrying Royal Mail staff on board) they tend to be class “1” trains, which are signalled as Express Passenger.

The full classification of trains in the UK is…….

Class	Type	Max MPH
0	Light engine	60 _{Unless line speed 90mph or more, in which case 75mph}
1	Express passenger or Postal
2	Local Passenger
3	Parcels train
4	Fully fitted freight train	75
5	Empty coaching stock
6	Fully fitted freight train	60
7	Fully fitted freight train	45
8	Fully fitted freight train	35
9a	Partially fitted freight train	35
9b	Unfitted Freight Train	25

Table of UK Train Classifications

In the modern era, Class 9 trains do not run anymore (e.g. every freight train is fully fitted), and with very few, if any vacuum braked wagons around, class 8’s may now only exist in the history books.

I only drive 1’s, 2’s and 5’s these days, but i have driven them all throughout my career, and i can say that on a class 9b, 25mph seems very fast indeed when approching a red signal downhill with 1500 tons pushing you, with only the locomotive brakes!

Model Rail Useful Links

Retailers

Hattons

Rails of Sheffield

Producers of Rolling Stock

Clubs

Greenock Model Rail Club

Forums

RMweb

Scenics

Brassmasters Suppliers of kits, accessories and detailing kits, as well as parts which complement the Scalescenes range of buildings

Dart Castings – manufacture and supply miniature figures and scenic accessories, made from etched brass and cast white metal, in the Dart Castings, Monty’s Models and Shire Scenes product ranges along with model railway vehicle detailing parts in the MJT Scale Components range.

Foamex Apparently very good for building scenic buildings etc

Fox Transfers – waterslide transfers, etched products and vinyl stickers.

Harburn Hobbies –

Lanarkshire Models & Supplies

Precision Labels – a similar offering to Fox Transfers above.

Scalescenes Downloadable, printable, and customisable kits of a variety of buildings for use on many scales of layout.

Shawplan – locomotive names plates and etching details

Skytrex

Ten Commandments –

West Hill Wagon Works – suppliers of Hunt couplings, as well layout accessories, scenics for workshop & depot, lineside, station platform, figures, locomotive drivers and parts.

DCC Digital Decoders

DCCex Homespun DCC using Raspberry Pi and Arduino

DCC with Python DCC automation with Python – RPi – Hornby Elite

ESU DCC and Loksound decoders

Trains Specific Information

Rail Online – the UK’s largest online railway photograph library for your prototype photographs

Class 24/25/26 – DerbySulzers (also includes pics and info of other classes here)

BR Database