RVPT Forum

I thought that some of you may be interested to know that No 5 - our only working PD2 - passed its MOT on Friday 2nd July.
It will -once again - be going to Lathalmond in August. Seats available outward from Leyland on Friday the 13th ( hope that's not an omen!!) and return on Monday 16th. Fix your own accommodation; we can offer advice on this.

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No5 at Martins Test Centre, Middlewich on 02.07.10.

Ex Fishwick PD2 (5) is off to Lathalmond Rally this weekend, proudly displaying a 24C shed code. This was attached to the bus, after it had taken some former British Railways Lostock Hall steam shed employees, on a reunion trip to the Ribble Steam Railway at Preston docks.

For those not into railways, Lostock Hall was one of the last steam sheds on British Railways. All steam locos and some early diesels carried their home depot code on a cast plate at the bottom of the smoke box door. This consisted of a number between 1 and 89 and a letter - 24C being the code for Lostock Hall. When I saw number (5) last Wednesday it also had Lostock Hall on the blind, a place it will have worked through many times when it was owned by Fishwicks.

On Saturday 11 September ex Fishwick PD2 number 5 visited Hoghton Tower near Preston to deliver a party to a Reception there. The occasion was a family wedding involving our member David Powell of Sittingbourne, Kent. David will be known to some of you. He was Ribble's Engineer East Lancashire before transferring to Kent some years ago. More recently he was Managing Director of East Lancs Coachbuilders of Blackburn. David owns a Todmorden PD2 and had been asked to use it at the wedding. Instead of a round trip of over 600 miles with his bus he borrowed number 5 for the day and did just over 30 miles with it instead. The family were happy with the replacement . Members should not get the idea that number 5 is available for wedding hires - this was a private arrangement between friends!



Number 5 stands outside the main gate at the top of the 1 mile long main drive at Hoghton Tower.

Once again Fishwick 5 passed its MOT test at Middlewich today. Thanks again Ian! Incidentally -and it was not planned in detail!- the tester said that the imbalance on the front brakes of only 9% was the lowest he had seen for a long time. Gives us a target for next time! See 1036 thread for a photo.

I thought that Bill was going to upload some photographs of No5 which he took today.
Here are three which I took:

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No5 outside the Test Hall. (NO it is not the same photo as last year!)

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No5 and 1036 outside the Testing Station.

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M6 Northbound on the way home. (Taken from 1036).

(27-05-2011 09:36 PM)geoff@meek Wrote: [ -> ]I thought that Bill was going to upload some photographs of No5 which he took today.
Here are three which I took:

No5 outside the Test Hall. (NO it is not the same photo as last year!)

No5 and 1036 outside the Testing Station.

M6 Northbound on the way home. (Taken from 1036).

Thanks Geoff. I got your message but your computer skills are much superior to mine! You have done the job whilst I am still working out how!! I hope to upload a picture of 1036 on the M6 - my son is now on site!!