BACHMANN 32-817K Class 47/7 47778 ‘Duke of Edinburgh’s Award’ In EWS Livery

Etched nameplates are included, and the model also features a driver figure, NEM coupling pockets and an accessory pack comprising full buffer-beam pipework, snow ploughs and dummy screw-link couplings.

 MODEL FEATURES:

• Bachmann Branchline OO Scale
• Era 9
• Pristine EWS Livery
• Accessory Pack Including ‘Duke of Edinburgh’s Award’ Etched Nameplates
• NEM Coupling Pockets
• Sprung Buffers
• Interior Cab Lighting
• Directional Lighting
• Speaker Fitted
• Fitted with a Driver
• Equipped with a 21 Pin DCC Decoder Socket
• Recommended for use with Decoder 36-557
• Length 255mm
• 504 Certificated Pieces

HISTORY

Brush Sulzer Type 4 No. D1666 was built by British Railways’ Crewe Works, one of a Class of 512 locomotives – the most numerous class of British mainline diesel locomotive. Entering service on 5th March 1965 at Landore Depot, Swansea (87E), on 12th March 1965 D1666 became the first of the Class to be named when it received the name ‘Odin’ at Cardiff Canton TMD – a name which it carried for several periods until 1990. With the introduction of TOPS, the locomotive was renumbered to No. 47081 in February 1974, before work to fit Electric Train Heating (ETH) in February 1984 which saw it reclassified as a Class 47/4 and a further number change to 47606. In 1990 the locomotive was fitted with long-range fuel tanks which resulted in another number change to 47842 whilst allocated to the InterCity pool, but in February 1993 the number reverted to 47606 when it was allocated to Parcels traffic. Our locomotive received its final identity of No. 47778 in December 1993 following transfer to Rail Express Systems (RES) – formerly the BR Parcels sector – and during this period the name ‘Irresistible’ was carried. 

Ownership of No. 47778 transferred from RES to EWS in 2002, following which the locomotive was repainted into EWS’s familiar Maroon and Gold livery and named ‘Duke of Edinburgh’s Award’. Some 40 years after it first entered traffic, No. 47778 was finally withdrawn in 2005 and was cut up at EMR Kingsbury in early 2006. Named after the youth initiative scheme established by HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, in 1956, the name ‘Duke of Edinburgh’s Award’ had previously been carried by classmates Nos. 47716 and 47727 before being applied to No. 47778 in 2002.