Birmingham New Street - Southern Approaches: mrbhm_sa1901

British Railways Sulzer Type 2 Bo-Bo No D5228 is seen working a ballast train on the up line on 3rd August 1969. In total 327 locomotives of this type, which were later classified as Class 25 locomotives, were built between 1961 and 1967. The Class 25 locomotives were primarily designed for freight work, but a significant number were fitted with boilers for heating passenger trains. Throughout the 1970s they could be found at work across the whole of the British Rail network although the Eastern and Southern Regions never had an allocation. Though regular performers into the early 1980s on Crewe–Cardiff passenger trains, they are best known in that respect for their use on the summer Saturday trains to Aberystwyth, a task they relinquished in 1984. The final Class 25 locomotive was withdrawn from service in March 1987 with twenty Class 25s having survived in preservation of all sub-types except the original Class 25/0.

back