Going for a trip?

JR East has a number of party trains that are in regular demand for company outings and the like. Most of them are built on the 'mechanics' of 485 EMU tokkyu express units. Here's one of them in delightful honeymoon style pink - at this end trailer 484-3.

Hard to imagine six or eight car EMU trains making a revenue earning living like this anywhere else in the world. But in Japan company and other group outings are popular and you go with colleagues, not you wife or husband. The trains usually are fitted internally with long tables and chairs both sides, and en route revellers are served with bento and beer. Also there are plenty of nice locations that can be reached 'under the wire'

Well, I'm off on a trip myself now, no 'Railway Roundabout' from me for a day or two although I see Norman is back now. My next entries will be from Lancashire. Maybe I'll be gricing Preston or Durham station at the weekend!

Oil Movement

Japanese railways have a lot of 'block movements' but of course the trains are tiny compared with North America, typically around 20 or 30 vehicles. Oil and fuel distribution in this way is very common.

Here are two class EF64 Co-Co-Co locomotives with a load of fuel for central Japan, I'd guess probably headed for Matsumoto. They are on the Chuo Line at Hachioji, waiting 'in the hole' for a passenger train to pass. If you are a driver working these diagrams I'd guess that patience is definitely a virtue! But I've never noticed a JR driver reading a book in such situations.

This train will have come from Chiba Prefecture - the big refineries along the east side of Tokyo Bay at Ichihara then via the Keio Line to Shin-Koiwa marshalling yard and around the north side of Tokyo. Now the driver can look forward to a pretty run through the mountains to Kofu.

Flight of the Bumble Bee

Don't know why I should think of that music but maybe because these trains are about the same colour and also make a buzzing bee kind of noise as they lurch by. These Tokyo inner suburban units are all a bit of a blur to me, you need to be a specialist to identify them but I'm pretty sure this is a 201 Class. The yellow colour says 'Chuo Line' and in fact this is a crossing in Hachioji about 30 miles west of Tokyo. If you go to platforms 1 and 2 in Tokyo station there's one leaving about every two minutes

These trains have evolved in design over fifty years and are amazingly robust and reliable. If they aren't speeding up or slowing down they bucket along at 62 mph and in the rush hour each of the ten coaches probably has 350 people aboard. So this is a 'ten Jumbo train' in areonautical terms! An experience worth missing as you might imagine.

Locomotive Archaeology

Well, almost. I'm not literally digging this one up but I have been digging in my Japanese railway history books the last couple of days and I've discovered that this 4-4-2T I found at Go-i on Wednesday is a pretty interesting beast. I can't wait to get back and take photos and dimensions for a plan of her.

It seems that this B10 class were not originally built in Saitama and Shizuoka in the 1920'a but rebuilt there. They were previously 4-4-0 tender engines! They were built in 1895 for the Nippon Railway - a major private line that ran from Tokyo (Ueno) to the far north of Japan. When the line was nationalised in 1906 they were classified as the 5500 Class by the Imperial Japanese Railways. Later, as the need for elderly 4-4-0 express engines evaporated, they were rebuilt as tank engines for brach line service by tacking a bunker on the back, adding to the frames and adding an extra axle under the coal. Some foind their way latyer to small private railways - including this one to the Kominato line

So everything behind the cab - and the side tanks - in this picture is added around the original 4-4-0 engine 25 years after she was first built!

And now here's the thing that really tickled me. Guess where the Nippon Railway bought these engines from back in 1895. Beyer Peacock in Manchester! Yes - this is a Lancashire built locomotive - isn't that amazing!