6. BRUSH TYPE 2, CLASS 31

The Brush Type 2, though it underwent extreme tribulations –the very engines having to be replaced by a completely different design from a different manufacturer and more than 250 of them didn’t come cheap – was nevertheless at the heart of dieselisation on one BR Region, the Eastern. They were long-lived too (a prolonged survival owed much to the programme of replacement engines) in stark contrast to many other types deriving from the mis-firing Pilot Scheme of November 1955.

The prospective rewards from economy of working with the new traction and its higher availability for work, by comparison with steam, were glittering. The Great Eastern section of the Eastern Region, for instance, intended by 1962 to replace its near-700 steam engines for all its main line passenger and freight services with just 250 main line diesels. In this it succeeded, along with the remarkable accomplishment of reducing the motive power arrangements to just four depots – Stratford, Ipswich, March and Norwich. The diesels sallied forth on five day cyclic diagrams, punctuated by routine daily inspection/refuelling while away before a ‘return to base’ for maintenance. Central to all this, and on the Great Northern section of the Eastern Region too, was the Brush Type 2s, or Class 31s as they came to be better known – all 263 of them.

By 1950, before BR’s programme of Standard steam locomotives had even begun, the construction of steam locomotives had effectively ceased in the United States. That country’s vast system of railroads was all but wholly dieselised. By contrast the British had just two main line (Type 4) units and it was five years before the decision suddenly came to move ‘rapidly’ to diesel and electric traction. The Modernisation Plan announced in 1955 the complete replacement of steam and there was a lot to do; by this time the BR Type 4 fleet had grown to just five...

With no home market, the UK diesel locomotive construction industry was on the back foot; it had little in the way of a ‘shop window’ to display its wares to the world and only a few Empire markets were responding. Brush was somewhat to the fore or at least working to that end, enlarging its works to see through a 1950 order for 25 5ft 6in gauge diesel electric A1A-A1A locomotives at 1,250 ordered by Ceylon Government Railways. They were shipped out from 1953 and though various problems including engine overheating were reported, these appear to have been overcome, because the locomotives were in use for some twenty years. Brush thus had demonstrable overseas success with main line diesels and were more or less guaranteed a slice of the infamous Pilot Scheme, detailed before in earlier books in this series. It (sensibly) foresaw some 170 locomotives, mainly ten or twenty of each, for evaluation. Various manufacturers were invited to tender to supply locomotives incorporating their design and equipment for evaluation. There were three distinct power ranges, freight Type A – Locomotives 800-1,000hp; mixed traffic Type B –locomotives, 1,000-1,250hp and heavy duty Type C – locomotives 2,000hp and above. The designations A, B and C were later amended to Type 1, 2 and 4, with an intermediate power range 1,500-2,000hp to cover Type 3. In the Pilot Scheme twenty Brush (Type 2, ‘Type B’ in the original classification) D5500 locomotives were slated, amid five other Type 2 efforts, from English Electric (D5900), BRC&W (D5300), North British (D6100, D6300) and Metropolitan Vickers (D5700).

The home locomotive building industry would at last have a showcase for exports to the world. As is well known, sadly, the Pilot Scheme, sensible as it was, soon crumbled as pressure grew to replace steam by diesel as soon as possible, whatever the consequences. The clamour went up for dieselisation ri h away; instead, opening the floodgates to deliveries, it was felt, would cure BR’s declining economic position. Diesels were so much cheaper to operate than steam and the position would only worsen as the price of good steam coal continued to rise amid ever worsening labour shortages. No one thought the cost of oil would ever be a problem. The new locomotives, in great part untried, duly flowed out, and the notion of patient, measured evaluation of prototypes went by the board. Many tears and much waste would flow from this failure to adequately evaluate prototypes before embarking on mass production. An ironic outcome was that the disappointing performance of many types meant Britain never did get that ‘showcase’ for world sales.

Above and left. D5500 new, ushered inside for everyone to have a good look. The antiquity of the far crane suggests it could be one of the shops in the original Stratford Works. Contemporary comment was positive; the Trains Illustrated correspondent writing: Liveried green with broad white bands, it is about the most pleasing in outline of any of the British Railways diesels to date, its only defect in this respect being the ‘snub nose’ necessary to provide doors for inter-locomotive communication when running multipleunit, which breaks up the lower window line of the cab fronts at each end. That reduction gear shaft is probably a spare for the overhead cranes – definitely not a part from the new Brush!

Right. Advert from The Railway Gazette of 11 January 1963. Brush had come up with this picture, using unpainted locomotives with gangway connections, in a way they never appeared during the operational life of the class.

Brush Traction Ltd, as the company was then named, duly won a tender on 22 November 1955 to supply those twenty mixed traffic ‘Type B’ locomotives of 1,250hp for the Eastern Region – the first stage in the elimination of steam engines in the London Area of the Great Eastern Section.

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Construction commenced in the spring of 1956 with the heavy running frames, contracted out to Brush associate W.G Bagnall of Stafford. Castings and other ironmongery came from Beyer Peacock at Gorton, Manchester. Mirrlees supplied the power unit and these were shipped to Loughborough on BR Weltrol wagons from the firm’s Hazel Grove Stockport factory at the rate of two per week. The power unit itself was a 12 cylinder four stroke design of V formation incorporating

Brown Boveri turbochargers, designated type JVS12T. The power rating output was set at 1,250hp at 850rpm for these twenty Pilot Scheme locomotives although D5507 was up-rated to 1,450hp, by increasing the engine rpm to 900, soon after delivery. The power unit was coupled to a Brush TG16048 main generator and TG69-41 auxiliary generator which fed the four Brush TM7368 traction motors, geared at 60:19.

Building of the Brush Type 2s was conducted under eight contracts to a total of 263 locomotives over a five year period. The Brush Falcon Works at Loughborough saw to the completion of every locomotive and upon final release all went to Doncaster Works for commissioning and load testing. Any defects were then rectified on site by the resident Brush Traction engineers who were also responsible for artisan training and the production of the BR maintenance manuals. Usually the locomotives were delivered to Doncaster in pairs, to enable the ‘multiple unit’ (MU) equipment to be fully tested and utilised. Occasionally a single locomotive would be delivered out of sequence due to prolonged fault rectification or even three would be formed up together to keep the supply constant. It is known that Brush and BR formed an excellent working relationship during the manufacture and delivery of these locomotives and this was surely a factor in the longevity of the class.

The 104 ton Brush Type 2 had a separate mainframe, the body superstructure being built up of individual panels mounted on a framework, thus making the repair to such items less time consuming as spare panels could be manufactured separately and kept in stock. This and the heavy A1A-A1A commonwealth one piece cast steel bogies contributed to the increased weight (all the early diesel electrics had a poor power/ weight ratio) but on the plus side this gave improved braking and adhesion – especially when compared to some other diesel types.

The twelve wheels gave the locomotives a good route availability with low axle loading and they were favoured by drivers on unfitted freight work, to which they were well suited. The middle wheels were smaller and were not powered.

The look of what we came to know as the Brush Type 2 came about in a curious way, or at least in way hitherto unknown. The ‘Ceylon’ locomotives, naturally enough formed the firm’s starting point and a flatfronted version was sketched out, first with prominent gangway doors, then without.

The ‘Ceylons’ had two big ‘frowning’ front windows (rather like the NBL Type 2s and D600s) and these ‘frowned’ even more on the first drawings which, overall, imparted a gloomy, almost doleful look. Dated porthole windows along the flanks didn’t help. George Toms in r sh iesel ives (Turntable Publications, 1978) with some understatement called the appearance ‘fairly depressing’. The British Transport Commission, with some foresight, desired ‘the highest possible appearance design’ in all its new diesel locomotives and a Design Panel was appointed which then employed the private consultancy Design Research Unit. The boys at the cutting edge of design got to work and the early ‘Ceylon’ bodywork disappeared, transformed into the Brush Type 2/Class 31 familiar to us all for so long. The broad blank front, most notably, had gone with three windows at the front and three either side. The gangway doors were topped by a smaller rectangular window. The distinctive ‘stepped’ front of the new Brush locomotives owed everything to the presence of the gangway doors, a fortuitous outcome. In the days before computers Brush had to rely on clay and plywood and a perfect mock-up (numbered D505) appeared early in November 1956, a year after the order was placed and a year before the first one went into service.

The initial batch of twenty was numbered D5500-D5519 and the first entered service in October 1957, concluding with D5519 in December 1958, works numbers 71-90. The batch began building as part of the Pilot Scheme but as with other types, further orders were placed even before delivery of the initial twenty was complete.

D5500 made its first running-in trips, in undercoat (though with the top white band) on the Loughborough-Manchester line in the first fortnight of October 1957. Many new diesels first went out like this in the coming years, though exactly why they were sent forth in undercoat is a minor served mystery – it would just mean a further clean when back at the works for the proper livery, elegant green with broad white bands, to be applied. Running in, D5500 was reported as coping ‘satisfactorily’ with thirteen coaches amounting to some 400 tons up and down the steep grades between Derby and Chinley.

D5500 on its inaugural arrival at Clacton, 13 November 1957, after running round. The old boys used to J15s, B17s and the rest must have been dumbfounded at the cleanliness, comfort and sheer ease of operation and not least this feature, noted by the Trains Illustrated correspondent – he too was somewhat incredulous: D5500 also has a refinement which looks like becoming standard on the larger BR diesels, an electric grill for the crew’s cooking tucked away in the alcove just behind one of the driving cabs. As ‘common user’ grills, they rapidly fell into a malodorous state; never properly clean, they were largely ignored by the men. The first twenty, D5500-D5519, had the running numbers placed (oddly) under the cab windows at No.1 (boiler) end only and the ‘D’ was initially without the serif, as here. The serif appeared soon after to be able to distinguish the ‘D’ from a ‘0’ and the running numbers were amended and added to No.2 end as well.

D5500 was officially handed over at a ceremony at the Brush Loughborough works on 31 October 1957. Many later diesels were presented for inspection by the brass at Marylebone station, on a little-used track at the west side. It was convenient for the nearby BR Board HQ – known across the railway as the Kremlin – and also handy for the usual ‘trial trip’ with the press, fuelled by drink and sandwiches.

D5500 was completed five weeks ahead of schedule with delivery of the rest D5501D5519 expected to continue at a nominal rate of one every three weeks.

D5500 went next to Doncaster for trials, finally working up to its intended home, Stratford (via March and Cambridge) by 11 November 1957. It duly appeared that day at Thorpe-le-Soken and on 13 November worked the 10.36am Liverpool StreetClacton. The Editor of Trains Illustrated enjoyed the singular privilege of a cab ride on D5500’s initial GE run of 13 November 1957: It was purely a proving run and nothing startling was intended or achieved. With a 302 ton train D5500 accelerated smartly out of Liverpool Street and tipped Brentwood bank at 38mph reaching Shenfield four minutes early at 11.4 but from there to Colchester it suffered checks from the preceding 10.30am Liverpool Street-Norwich. The return to Liverpool Street was made on the 3.52pm from Clacton. The only troubles we noticed were experienced with the train heating boiler which was doing its job too well and had to be allowed to ‘blow’ at intervals to keep the pressure down – in fact, we gathered that one of the major problems associated with BR diesel traction is still that of efficient passenger train heating equipment. [This really, and unknowingly, was predicting the future...]

Asked the general feeling of Stratford crews at their pending conversion to diesels, the engineman of D5500 considered that 80 per cent were delighted, not only because the new locomotives would make for a cleaner job, but because at last they would have machines capable of maintaining the timetable without difficulty, and they would be rid of the frequent and unpredictable troubles experienced with steam. D5500 came up light from Doncaster via Spalding and Ely on 12 November and returned to Doncaster on the day following its Clacton trip, heading the 12.48pm parcels from Stratford as far as Whitemoor. D5500 began trials with passenger and fitted goods stock between Stratford and Southend Victoria on 25 November.

D5500 went back to Doncaster and a variety of work followed. It returned to Stratford on 22 November 1957 and began crewtraining runs on the Southend Victoria line or to Palace Gates (deserted during the day) a few days later. Crews needed experience of both goods and passenger working with the new diesel and for a while the training was based on two runs SouthendShenfield with 25 empty wagons on Tuesdays and Thursdays and three runs with eight corridor coaches in 37 minutes on Wednesdays and Fridays. D5500 was joined by D5501 on 9 December, just in time to be observed running coupled to D5500, due to it failing at Wickford on one of the crew training workings. D5502 was already at work, being noted on the morning freight to Niddrie. Over several days from 21 January 1958 the new locomotives were working Liverpool StreetNorwich. D5500 worked through one day to Sheffield with the Harwich-Liverpool boat train and return; by mid-March Stratford had six going-on seven of the new locomotives and they were involved in several freight workings – the Brush age on the GE Section was under way. Brief contemporary reports give a mixed picture. The Railway Observer for May 1958 for instance tells us of D5505 in two contrasting lights: The Easter Monday excursion from Enfield Town to Southend Victoria was hauled by D5506 and arrived at Southend seven minutes early, despite two signal stops at Shenfield and a number of checks along the branch. On the return working, D5505 was unable to start after a five minute stop at South Tottenham home signal and a further delay of some fourteen minutes ensued while some setting back took place and a further train from the Woodgrange Park line was allowed to cross. On getting the road for a second time, D5505 managed to lift the train (nine corridors) and completed the trip without further trouble.

D5507 was delivered in April 1958 with its engine up-rated to 1,450hp to serve, it was said, as a ‘standby’ to the EE D200 Type 4s then in the course of delivery, in the all-too likely circumstance of failure or unavailability for some reason. This would only work, you’d think, if D5507 was diagrammed with the Type 4s; it seems unlikely. It turned out, unsurprisingly, to be impractical. The Brush after all could not sit somewhere ‘spare’ but would instead be out on the road on one of the many Type 2 diagrams then being taken up. It would rarely if ever be in the right place when a D200 suddenly required replacement. A correspondent in The Railway Observer opined that D5507 could not recover time on Type 4 diagrams; Brush Type 2 performance generally was ‘comparable to a B1 but far inferior to a Britannia’.

The first batch D5500-D5519 was complete by December 1958 – all were based at Stratford, looked after in a modern three road shed opened itself that year. It had been designed for DMUs but it was found convenient to deal with these in the open and use the building for diesel locomotives. In this way it was to be designated ‘A’ shed, the back-to-back four road ‘B’ and ‘C’ shed opening a year or so later for the burgeoning locomotive fleet.

D5500-D5519

The Pilot Scheme Batch

The frames for the first six locomotives (D5500-D5505) were thought to have been fabricated at the Beyer-Peacock works at Gorton. These were shipped to Brush Falcon works Loughborough at the end of 1956 being laid down and assembly started for the initial contract. Further frames were built by W.G.Bagnall at Stafford.

To re-cap a bit, the first locomotive, D5500, was completed one week early and was trialed on the Derby-Buxton-ChinleyChesterfield circuit ready for official handover, as mentioned, on 31 October 1957. On this very day D5501 was also complete and was available for test runs and thus the beginning of what was a transformation for BR Eastern Region had begun.

D5500 was sent to Stratford; a return to Doncaster works followed and then back to Stratford for what was going to be its twenty year home. D5501 was available for crew training at Stratford during December 1957 and D5502 and D5503 were at Doncaster for commissioning mid-January 1958. As previously noted D5507 began trials in April 1958 temporarily up-rated to 1,450hp. This had merely involved up-rating the engine rpm by increasing the fuel delivery so that the locomotive could attain 90 mph, as against the maximum speed of 80mph set for the remainder of the batch. D5507 was reset back to 1,250hp before too long but the results were obviously held on record for the next contract.

D5511 was released by Doncaster works on 14 June 1958 and went on loan to the Scottish Region, to be tried out in several areas. At the end of June it was on trial with an eight-coach train ‘including a 12 wheel sleeper’ between Aviemore and Inverness. On 10 July it was reported on the West Highland working through to Fort William, returning with the 9.31am to

Glasgow Queen Street next day; on 17 and 18 July it was on freights ‘over the steeply graded Edinburgh Suburban line.’ On 25 July it visited Aberdeen, working out on the 8.15pm Aberdeen Guild Street to Edinburgh freight. On 31 July it travelled from Inverness to Wick with a nine coach Army officers special. All this involved spells at both Eastfield and St Margarets – from the latter it was put on coal trains locally and then came some runs to Carlisle over the Waverley route on passenger workings. Return to Stratford, without any reported failures, via Doncaster, was accomplished in early September 1958.

D5516, on completion in September 1958, was subjected to British Transport Commission controlled testing, which involved some London-Norwich high speed runs as well as heavy un-braked coal trains between Temple Mills and Whitemoor with various loadings of 9001100 tons. Results indicated that 1,250hp made the locomotives only ‘adequate’ for the work they were subjected to and that more power was required. This was in essence true of all BR’s new main line diesels of the period.

D5517 was noted on Royal Train duties on 6 November 1958 when it was used to convey HRH Princess Margaret to Wolferton for Sandringham with a royal saloon attached to a service train. Presumably this was the first ‘Royal Diesel’. On 3 July 1958 a contract was issued to Brush Traction for a further forty