Friends of the Rail Forum

My recollection of them was on the Cape suburban lines. Looking back to the 50s I thought it was a great thing to replace the replacr when colour light signalling came in. On the main single lines the replacer always replaced the outer home signal The distant went back to stop due to that actions of...

Thanks Alan, I missed it when I was ill. Do you happen to know whether there is a feeder substantiation in at Glencairn Now? Fish hoek was a tie station and False bay was the ;last actual substation in my day. It was talked about in 1959 when the sliding door stock was introduced as it consumed more...

Has the line ever reopened?

Hi ashley You are of course correct it is a Hayes derail. Most of the derails were Hayes pattern and we alsways got them in the field with no instructions. PW department mounted them but I never saw any instruictions until I correspoded with ahyes a few months ago. I did find with SAR they were relu...

Hi When I was involved with the lengthening of Muldersvlei up platfporm and loop the Home (Junction) signals and the outer home and distant where electrically controlled by the signabox levers. They were still repeted by the 2 volt repeaters in the signal box. Release or disengagemnt of the signals ...

Dies anyone have a photo of the derailer escapememt crank or can some enlighten me a s to how the broken wire protection works. All cranks I dealt with were staright control bar with no broken wire protection.
That is a good clear photo thanks Aiden

Chris King

Its great to see the line being reopened. Due to the long closure will there be a celebration with marching girls an massed band as they dis when it was first opened,? ( Perhaps not the marching girls then!) Allen you must have got your feet we when taking those photos. I also noted the the overhead...

I have stopped there once. I used the tarin from Cape Town to geotge often in the 50s and 60s and only stopped there once to load a passenger. The timetable had a comment that you had to arrange with the staion amster at worcester to get on there. I think the same arrangements were in force for Over...

Hi I can remember the old Tuinnel Station, with its passing siding remaining level but the mailclimbed at 1 in 40. When crossoing you haeded into one of the level sidings and when it was your turn to go you backed into the sidings on the opposite side of the main and eventually you pulled out. Operw...

Is the track gauge 1065mm or standard guage?

Gouda looks very clinical now. In the 50s ther was a siding to the meat packing plant and a lot more tracks. There were alsways trucks in the station except on some Satudays and Sunday mornings as the meat packing plant close for cleaning over the weekend.

I cannot remeber much about robertson except that I noticed when passing through on the 16:20 Cape Town to George we reached Robertson at about 12:00 ( I think) and the Garret was always detached and took water some where. There waa always a loud crashing of levers and wires rattling and it seemed a...

More Information. The %E was actually a 5 E. It seems that the driver wa nted the same cab on the return trip as it was less draughty! I was using Google Earth street view and looked at the triangle and I was reminded that there are actually 2 track that are on the triangle. This can be seen from Go...

I travelled to Durban once with my Grandfather, It waas an extra fare train but as a kid I did not see much differnce to the other trains I travelled. In later days,after my time in SA, the old blue train oaches formed th orange express. Unfortunately it fell victim to alien transport.

Back in the days when the trains run like trains (1950/60) and not conveyor belts the flags were: Red Stop Green Proceed past signal (In semaphore area Yellow Proceed past signal ( In colur ligh area) White Staion Foreman to Guard , Station is ready for you to depart The guard showed a green Flag to...