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Ladies and Gents, Sorry for the grief caused by my last and I promise to stay on topic[:)] michaelstevens asked for more on my namesake loco which he correctly identified as a Sulzer-engined 1-CoCo-1. There are a couple of reasons for my choice - firstly I grew up in Nuneaton (Near to Birmingham) and the Midland Main Line from St Pancras to Sheffield is not so far away. This was the main stamping ground for class 45 in the late 70's. Their other main axis was the North East - South West passenger service through Birmingham. I have a lot of happy miles behind them. They were quite an early design and a little underpowered (2500hp/138tons)for their weight but very impressive. There were 2 subclasses 45/0 (Steam heat fitted) and 45/1 (Hence 45144) which carried ETH equipment (Head End Power). the 50 45/1 were converted from the standard 45 in the early 70's. 45/0 in particular also spent a lot of time dragging heavy freight for which they were admirably suited despite having a fine turn of speed on passenger work. The final nail in the coffin for the class was 'Sprinterisation' where we, or at least our political masters, took the crazy decision to replace 8 coac loco-hauled trains with 2 coach Sprinter units (Modern DMUs) The MML workings were lost to the superb HST which beleive it or not has been running 125mph services for 27 years now. On to the other reason for my choice of loco, the first 10 Peaks (Class 44) were named after English mountains - pretty much what you guys would call molehills but... The 45 and the later 46 classes inherited the nickname but the named examples carried Regimental names taken from LMS steam locos. I spent 15 years serving the Queen so, if I tell you that 45144 was called Royal Signals, I guess you can work out which branch of the military that was. There were some stirring names 5th Royal Inniskilling dragoon Guards being the first named example I saw and that was one hefty nameplate. The Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment (TA) wasn't small either. 46026 (The only named 46) was known to all and sundry as LADY as her name was' The Leicestershire and Derbyshire Yeomanry'. Nicknames for the class were Peaks, if you liked them, or Wagons if you didn't. I liked them and try to ride behind the preserved examples as often as I can. All the best - firmly on topic this time '
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