NZ_pics

Here's my chance to bore you with my holiday snaps.

I'll start with why I was in New Zealand. My day job involves designing Traction Power Systems for electric railways with a particular specialisation in computer modelling of the power supply. In Wellington they have a 1500v DC suburban network that they are about to spend a load of money on to upgrade it and add new trains to.

To support that process I was out there to model the power supply as it is now, add the new trains and then expand the power supply to cope with them. The first two pictures are the apartment where we were staying - they're trolley bus wires - and then view from the office window. The window was in the left hand side of the building in the back ground of the picture on the right.

Both sorts of the existing trains can be seen in this next picture. The red one is a 1952 built English Electric unit. This particular one is tarted up to make something off it being the last one built but there are plenty of them still running. Passenger growth has been such that some have even been fetched back from museums.

The other train is a Ganz Mavag built unit dating from the 80's and allegedly paid for with sheep! Of course playing with these is perfectly acceptable as they are narrow gauge as all the main lines are 3'6" gauge!

This graph to the left is just a small example of the sort of thing I do. It shows the simulated output of one of the sub stations. It shows the peak and average loads

That's enough of the boring work stuff. Whilst in Wellington I managed to spend some of each weekend exploring railway stuff locally. Towards the end of my stay Annie came out to join me and then we managed a two week holiday and did a week on the south island before returning to tour the north - we barely scratched the surface and want to go again.

The first bit of touristy stuff I did was a trip up the cable car which runs from quite close to where we were staying up the very steep hill at the back of the Wellington.

The view from the top is well worth the trip as are the cable car museum and the botanic gardens.

The next outing was to the tramway museum located in the Queen Elisabeth Country park on the Kapati coast. To get there you take one of the electric trains to Paraparaumu and then get a taxi.

The museum has quite a collection and a line that gives rides through the country park to the seaside.

Mainline Steam NZ

On the way back from the tramway we passed this shed that was all closed up but it was ripe for some investigation. A Google found the website and found that they are usually there on Saturdays so the following weekend Chris and I went check it out. [Chris is a work colleague and also a fireman on the FR but is currently based in Oz and NZ

When we went back we snuck in but were welcomed with open arms. They have a website but I'll put the link further down rather than distract you now.

The first thing that greets you as you sneak in is a very familiar site. Sitting there on blocks are four ex Virgin MK2's that had recently arrived for conversion to 3'6" gauge.

There are actually quite a lot of MK2's in NZ. More on them later on.

Inside the shed was full of toys. There are only a few of them featured here.

This first engine is an Ab class 4-6-2 #663. In application these engines were the NZ equivalent of the Black Five in that they pretty well went anywhere and did anything.

Despite its appearance here this one is operational and as I write is hauling sections of a 7 day tour of NZ.

This beast is an example of the biggest steam locos built in New Zealand.

This is a Ka Class 4-8-2 #942 and it is nearing completion of a long overhaul. It should have been taking part in the tour but wasn't quite ready in time.

The electric is an EW class 1800hp Bo-Bo-Bo electric loco. This dates from 1952 when a horsepower came in a big box

Having walked through the shed above we were taken in to the back shed and mess room where we found these. Frankly I would have been bloody impressed at just finding these had I not just walked through a shed full of big toys. These both 7 1/4 gauge models but done to different scales. The green one is an NGG16 2-6-2 2-6-2 Garret, a two foot gauge prototype, and the other is a NZ Ja class 4-8-2.

Whilst we were at Mainline Steams base at Plimmerton there was a space in the shed. One of the engines was out a play on the mainline and was due to return on the Monday. Using contacts in the office I was working in [it was the main control office for NZ railways] I found out what time it was due and took a long lunch to get some pictures

This is Gloria

Gloria is a J class 4-8-2 oil fired loco and is semi streamlined.

It was built by North British in 1939. The tankers are additional water capacity and are piped through to the tender. Sometime they also go out with an oil tanker along for additional fuel

That's the end of page one. I just thought I'd finish with these two. Wish we had shunters like the one on the right! I guess you could say it does what it says on the tin!

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