125 Group’s three MkIII coaches have spent the past two months under the care of Wabtec Rail Scotland at Kilmarnock Works, where they have been professionally repainted using state of the art equipment. Tomorrow the vehicles are planned to return home to Great Central Railway (Nottingham) to be reunited with our matching Prototype High Speed Train Power Car 41001.
First Open 11074, Restaurant First Modular 10206 and Tourist Standard Open 12092 are all owned by 125 Group. The coaches are booked to be hauled south on Friday 12th February by locomotive 37884 under the charge of Rail Operations Group, with schedule 5Z37 0630 Kilmarnock Works – Hotchley Hill, via Carlisle 0846-51, Preston 1122-1204, Crewe 1343-1350, Nuneaton 1518-27, Leicester 15/54, Loughborough South Jn 16/10, continuing onto GCR(N). On arrival at Hotchley Hill / Rushcliffe Halt GCR(N) at 1651, the class 37 should hand over the shiny Mk3s to our power car 41001 for the last leg of the journey home to Ruddington. This is a link to the full live schedule, courtesy of our friends at: Realtime Trains . These are the planned timings, routing and traction, all of which can change at short notice on the day subject to operational constraints, and the train may run early or late!
This Saturday 13th and Sunday 14th February on GCR(N) will be the first workings of the historic power car and coaches together in matching 1970s livery, recreating the overall look of the original Prototype HST. For more details and to book tickets see www.gcrn.co.uk . We are most grateful to the skilled team at Wabtec Rail Scotland Kilmarnock Works for their expert services, thank you also to ROG for their timely assistance!