Tilmanstone Colliery to Dover Harbour Aerial Ropeway

Colin Varrall  Addelam Books  2020

Softback , 76 pages  £10

Engineering Richborough

Colin Varrall  Addelam Books  2022

Softback , 180 pages  £20

the history and development of Richborough, from pre-history, to the events at Richborough Port during world wars, until more recently  B/W and colour photos

BR Swindon Type 1 0-6-0 Locomotives - Class 14 - British Railways

Anthony P Sayer  Pen & Sword  2022

Hardback , 296 pages  £30  Members  £28

In 1957 the Western Region of BR identified a need for 400 Type 1 diesel locomotives for short-haul freight duties but it was 1964 before the first was introduced. General-purpose Type 1s were being delivered elsewhere but WR management regarded these as too expensive for their requirements. After completion of design work on the ‘Western’ locomotives, Swindon turned to creating a cheap ‘no-frills’ Type 1. At 65% of the cost of the Bo-Bo alternative, the Swindon 0-6-0 represented a better ‘fit’ for the trip-freight niche. Since 1957 the privatised road-haulage industry had decimated BR’s wagon-load sector; whilst the 1962 Transport Act released BR from its financially-debilitating public-service obligations, the damage had been done, and the 1963 Beeching Plan focused on closing unprofitable routes and associated services. By 1963 the original requirement for 400 Type 1s had been massively reduced. Fifty-six locomotives were constructed in 1964/65. Continuing traffic losses resulted in the whole class becoming redundant by 1969. Fortuitously, a demand for high-powered diesels on the larger industrial railway systems saw the bulk of the locomotives finding useful employment for a further twenty years. This book covers the life of these locomotives on British Railways; a companion volume will provide an extensive appraisal of "Their Life in Industry" for the forty-eight locomotives which made the successful transition after withdrawal from BR

BR Swindon Type 1 0-6-0 Locomotives - Class 14 - Life in Industry

Anthony P Sayer  Pen & Sword  2022

Hardback , 296 pages  £30  Members  £28

In 1957 the Western Region of BR identified a need for 400 Type 1 diesel locomotives for short-haul freight duties but it was 1964 before the first was introduced. General-purpose Type 1s were being delivered elsewhere but WR management regarded these as too expensive for their requirements. After completion of design work on the ‘Western’ locomotives, Swindon turned to creating a cheap ‘no-frills’ Type 1. At 65% of the cost of the Bo-Bo alternative, the Swindon 0-6-0 represented a better ‘fit’ for the trip-freight niche. Since 1957 the privatised road-haulage industry had decimated BR’s wagon-load sector; whilst the 1962 Transport Act released BR from its financially-debilitating public-service obligations, the damage had been done, and the 1963 Beeching Plan focused on closing unprofitable routes and associated services. By 1963 the original requirement for 400 Type 1s had been massively reduced. Fifty-six locomotives were constructed in 1964/65. Continuing traffic losses resulted in the whole class becoming redundant by 1969. Fortuitously, a demand for high-powered diesels on the larger industrial railway systems saw the bulk of the locomotives finding useful employment for a further twenty years. This book covers the life of these locomotives on British Railways; a companion volume will provide an extensive appraisal of "Their Life in Industry" for the forty-eight locomotives which made the successful transition after withdrawal from BR

The Rise and Fall of King Coal

Nick Pigott  Mortons Books  2022

Hardback , 264 pages  £29.99  Members  £28

Deep-mined coal is no longer produced in the United Kingdom – the last of the country’s collieries was closed at the end of 2015, causing the sun to set on a vast industry that at one time boasted 3,000 mines and employed well over a million workers. The Rise and Fall of King Coal tells the fascinating story of coal… from its origins in prehistoric swamps to its early primitive mining methods and to its role as the mineral that fuelled the Industrial Revolution and put the ‘Great’ into Britain. It explores the history and operation of the collieries and their railways, explains the location of the coalfields and examines the hazards, hardships, disputes and tragedies that were part of every miner’s life. Finally, with Britain now possessing only a handful of opencast and tiny drift mines while still importing millions of tons of coal from overseas, the UK’s energy policy is examined at a time when many Britons are worrying whether it is sufficiently fit for purpose

Swanscombe Cement Works and its Railways

Chris Down   Industrial Locomotive Society 2022

Hardback 424 pages, 375 photos  £36

Swanscombe cement works operated for nearly 165 years, one of the longest-lived cement works in the world and, for many decades, also one of the largest. For a hundred years from about 1826 until 1929 it employed a unique narrow gauge railway using outside-flanged wheels, with over thirty steam locomotives, many also unique. When modernised in the 1927-29 period, its new standard gauge railway was one of the busiest and most efficient in the industry. This remarkable book tells the story of these railways, in the context of the history of the factory as a whole and the lives of those who worked here.

Contractor's Steam Locomotives of Scotland

   Russell Wesr and Michael Cook   ILS 1990

Softback , metal clip bound  £6

Pit to Power Station - a personal recollection of Coal Trains in the 1990s

   Chris Booth   Fonthill Media 2022

Softback   £20

A History of the Central Ammunition Depot Military Railway, Bramley, Hampshire

308 pages

Aberllefeni Slate Quarry

Jon Knowles 2023

 278 page hardback, many illustrations £35

IRS Members: £33