Allthough the South Tyneside EMU under restoration by SERA is the only example of Tyneside electric passenger stock in preservation, there are two other traction units that saw use on non-passenger duties on the North Eastern electric suburban lines in preservation. They are described thus:
The Following Text Has Been Provided By Bill Donald
North Eastern Railway Motor Luggage Van No.3267
This vehicle was one of the original stock built for the 1904 Newcastle to Tynemouth electrification scheme. It's design used the distinctive matchboard sides, then in vogue for NER coach construction. Motor Luggage Vans (MLVs) served three purposes during NER/LNER days - they were used for newspaper/parcels distributions around the North Tyneside loop line, for fish traffic between Tynemouth/North Shields and Newcastle, and for motive power for the "Control Set". At the time, the Control Set was unique in railway operating practice. Originally made up of six-wheeled coaches, the set was fitted with electric cabling end-to-end. This allowed an MLV coupled at each end of the Control Set to be driven from any one of the four available MLV cabs. The Control Set was primarily used for excursion and workmen traffic, with the latter predominating for the Riverside Branch traffic. Although on busy occasions in the summer months, it was pressed into ordinary passenger service. In the 1930's the six-wheel coaches were replaced by six conventional bogie coaches which survived until 1962. MLV 3267 was used as such until 1938 when it was displaced into departmental use by the 1937 Metro-Cammell MLVs.
Its new function was that of de-icing duties for the Tyneside Electrified Area. A fundamental weakness of operating an electric railway dependent on conductor rails, was that of snow and ice interfering with power collection. The Tyneside area was the most northerly in the UK using this type of power collection, and from the beginning had suffered badly from snow and ice. By the 1930's, the solution to the problem was mainly chemical rather than mechanical brushing and scraping. Spraying the top surface of the conductor rail helped mitigate the worst of the insulating layer of ice, and the resultant subsequent arcing. Two de-icing vans were used - one for the North Tyneside lines, the other for the Newcastle to South Shields branch, which had been electrified in 1938 by the LNER. They were towed by steam locomotive around a set sequence of electrified running lines and sidings. Maximum operating speed during spraying was 15 mph, thus operations were restricted to the night hours - this explains the dearth of photographs of the de-icing vans in operation. The cessation of electrifically operated trains on the North Tyneside lines in June 1967 - the South Shields branch had sucumbed in January 1963 - made de-icing operations redundant and 3267 languished for many years in Heaton Carriage Sidings, and latterly Monkseaton, until restoration came about. The vehicle is now part of the National Collection, and is located at the Stephenson Railway Museum on North Tyneside. It is well worth visiting and is an absolute tribute to its restorers, both inside and out.
North Eastern Railway Bo-Bo Electric Locomotive No.1
This locomotive was one of two built for the North Eastern Railway's Newcastle Quayside branch in 1905. They were a standard design by General Electric USA, dating from the early 1890's. The original motors for the Tyneside EMU's had come from the GE factory in America, and the NER needed a solution to the uniquely awkward operating conditions pertaining to the Quayside branch. In the absence of any electric locomotive expertise in the drawing office of the NER's Gateshead Works, GE were able to offer an "off the peg" design. The original GE drawings were passed to Gateshead and were amended for NER requirements, viz. bogies, drawgear, headlights, and power collection equipment. The electrical items such as motors and control gear were shipped from GE in America to Brush Engineering in Loughborough, who were sub-contracted by the NER to erect the two locomotives, using the amended drawings. The bogies and other running gear were supplied by the NER Gateshead Works.
The Quayside branch had opened in 1879, ran from Trafalgar South yard - about 0.5 miles east on Manors station on the East Coast main line - down an average gradient of 1 in 27 for one mile to the Newcastle Corporation-owned lines on the riverside in the shadow of the Tyne bridges. Operating conditions were a nightmare under steam traction. Extremely bad ventilation through the series of three tunnels which comprised most of the branch, together with poor adhesion in the tunnels themselves, limited the scope of the ever-growing freight traffic to and from Newcastle Quayside.
Electrification was proffered as an answer to improve the throughput of traffic, and the NER took the opportunity in 1905, following on from the sucessful Tynemouth scheme of 1904. The Quayside branch was reopened for traffic on June 1 1905. By using conductor rail in the tunnels, and overhead line equipment in the upper and lower yards, steam locomotive workings were eliminated completely from the branch. Steam was still used for shunting duties on the Newcastle Corporation lines, and the steam locomotives were coupled to the electric locomotives which controlled the ascent/descent. In the upper yard at Trafalgar South, the electric locomotives perfomed the shunting. Steam locomotives were used for inter-yard transfers to Trafalgar North Yard, or New Bridge Street Goods depot. Generally only one electric locomotive was used at a time, the branch operating from 06:00 to 22:00 most days of the week, with the two locomotives changing over each weekend. The second locomotive was held spare at Walkergate Car Sheds, and after 1923 at South Gosforth Car Sheds. At night, the working locomotive was steam-hauled to Heaton Shed by one of the Quayside shunters.
By the early 1960's the freight traffic on the branch had fallen dramatically from its WW2 peak, and given that the two locomotives were more than 50 years old, and were somewhat lacking in modern safety features - there was no "Dead Mans Handle" which necessitated a secondman to the driver, and there was a considerable amount of exposed live metal around the cab. This, together with the running costs in terms of specialist maintenance at South Gosforth Car Sheds, spelled their demise. In the early afternoon of Saturday 29 February 1964, as the Class ES1 locomotive made its way back to South Gosforth Car Sheds after nearly sixty years of electric duty, the traction power to the Quayside branch was finally switched off at Pandon Dene substation, . BR No.29500, formerly NER No.1, survived to become part of the National Collection, and after some nomadic years now resides at York. Unfortunately, its sister locomotive did not survive.
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