Sevens on the “Cobblers” 2004/2005

Silverlink Trains “cobblers” hauled turns, 2004-2005

The September 2004 timetable change saw much change for the Silverlink WCML services. The Birmingham through trains were withdrawn and the Northampton-Birmingham replacement service became a staggering part of the Cov corridor local service. Diagram interworking saw more 321s provided and with ordered 350 Desiro rubbish six months away the interim solution was to hire 5×321/3s from Ilford and 2 rakes of Mk3s from Virgin trains! These were formed up of a DVT, 9 TSO and a FO although the slightly disappointing news that they would be worked by EWS 90s was not surprising. However, all was not lost! These 90s, naturally, broke a lot and sevens would drop out to the rescue (or be blatantly fixed towards the last few weeks!)

Both sets worked simple out and back Northampton-Euston peak hour only turns and returned empty to Wembley each night and called at Leighton, the Keynes, Wolverton and Northampton. Due to late 350 commissioning the trains did survive beyond the planned May finish date, although with the sevens withdrawn it was solid 90, 90034 working the last train on July 15th.

The chance to have sevens off the local shack could not be refused and with most sevens being sporadic drops due to 90 failures the gen could be very short notice or relying on luck if there was the hint of something being up during the day. The very few spells of sevens being out for a few days were always well recieved.

Cobbler 87 roll-call: 001, 002, 004, 010, 012, 015, 019, 026, 030, 034, 033 and 035

Full gen for each phot can be found if you click through on ‘permalink’ as the slideshow feature doesn’t show them…