There used to be an electric railway between Manchester and Sheffield. Then railways were rationalised and modernised and the redundant electric locomotives were shipped off to the Netherlands where they were used for a further number of years.

On 14th June 1986 - that's 40 years ago - a final tour was run to bid them farewell. That tour is recorded at https://www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk/80s/860614em.htm

 
There were only a small number of those Class 77s (EM2's) built, which were sent to the Netherlands long before that farewell tour and were used on passenger trains for only a few years until the late 1960s with the passenger service stopping very shortly after. 

The real purpose of the line was freight, which was in the hands of a much larger batch of Class 76s (EM1's), largely successfully, for several decades until the turn of the 1980s when dwindling traffic led to the line closure.

If I could go back in time 50 years and visit one railway line as it was then, it would be The Woodhead Line.  It was so unique.

 
Thanks for that rather nostalgic - and informative - post, II. 

 
The first locomotive was built in 1941 prior to the electrification of the Woodhead Route which was put on hold due to WWII. The prototype was lent to the Dutch Railways from 1947 until the completion of the electrification in 1952. The Dutch railwaymen gave it the name of "Tommy" after the British soldiers that served in the Netherlands during the war.

 
I don't have a source for the following obscure 'Possible fact' - I recall reading somewhere, something about an overbridge way down south on the GCR route to Wales/the South West/London: it may have been the one on the following link - and there's no opportunity to check on the ground as its deck will have gone for scrap.

If, in 1971, as teenagers, we hadn't reneged on an ambition to leave the skiff by the site of the (span lifted) bridge taking the GCR across the Grand Junction Canal to walk south to Catesby Tunnel and hopefully back, it would have been the first bridge that we would have passed beneath and we could have checked the following factoid first-hand.

https://www.railwayarchive.org.uk/record?rnum=L2330&os=1

... by the mid 1950s that bridge's steel deck needed replacing - and the replacement included Woodhead-style supports for the overhead electrification that would surely be making its way south.

Mark

 

It would also be my choice, but perhaps I'm disqualified as I visited the line several times between 1978 and its closure in 1981. Part of the aura surrounding the line was that the locomotives, and chances to travel over the routes, were elusive. My first journey through Woodhead tunnel was on an excursion, but most of my journeys were on the Sundays-only St Pancras-Manchester Piccadilly, which I was able to board at Derby. This enthusiast's delight of a train would be hauled by a class 45 locomotive. Sometimes it ran the normal route to Sheffield Midland; sometimes it would go via Barrow Hill.

Leaving Sheffield Midland, it would join the GC line at Nunnery Junction and trundle down that line in an easterly direction for some distance. The train would come to a stand (was it by Orgreave Colliery? - certainly not at a station). Sometimes the loco would run round; sometimes a new loco would be on the other end.

So far, the anticipation. Now the train rolled through the ghostly remains of Sheffield Victoria before heading through urban and then increasingly green surroundings. Thurgoland Tunnel... then Barnsley Junction where the line from Wath trailed in and the vista opened up to a surprisingly wide set of tracks; at least five under huge electrification portals, plus sidings.

Huddersfield Junction, with the line to Huddersfield curving off sharply to the right over an impressive viaduct. The sad remains of the Manchester platforms at Penistone, with the electric control room on the right.

Penistone Goods signal box, then the scene opening wide with typical scenery of fields and stone walls.

Woodhead Tunnel; then a graceful snake along curves down the Longdendale Valley; beautiful apart from the National Grid intrusion.

More excitement at Dinting, with its triangular junction, a (now gone) preservation centre and a high vista from the viaduct.

Guide Bridge... crashing over the junctions. I reflect that this Sunday train was probably the fastest one over said junctions at the time.

... and arrival at Piccadilly. Time for a jaunt to Buxton (which still had a loco depot at that time); or perhaps somewhere towards Chester or Liverpool? - on one Sunday, I recorded ten instances of diversion or traction substitution - and no replacement buses.

Of course, on Sundays there was no freight on the Woodhead line (and nothing Saturday afternoons, either), which meant that seeing the elusive class 76s at work was difficult. Most I saw stationary at Guide Bridge or Rotherwood Exchange Sidings (on the Sheffield-Retford line); these were the two locations accessible by passenger train.

I never had the opportunity to travel on the Wath-Silkstone Junction section.

I was up there, at Penistone, Hadfield and Dinting, on the last day of operation in 1981. It's hard to describe how I felt. In those pre-internet days, I just waited, expectantly, for a train to turn up. Several did. There was no special send-off. I had to leave late afternoon as I had a long journey home. Few enthusiasts stayed for the very last train, which was in the early hours of the following day (a Saturday).

With the electric trains gone, the section between Sheffield and Penistone was still used for a couple of years by the DMU service to Huddersfield. It provided a melancholy experience as the electrification stayed in place for some time before being progressively undone. The DMU service itself was under threat. Eventually it was re-routed between Sheffield and Penistone to travel via Barnsley and Silkstone Junction.

The memory of Woodhead haunts me to this day.

 

A lovely recollection!  Thank you

It's a line I wish I'd visited, too.  Could have done it on a Priv, very cheaply too.  When I was at Witham, my shift-mate Colin at Clink Road Jcn had moved there from Torside Crossing on the Woodhead Route.  His dad had come to Cranmore to look after the site for David Shepherd, and they lived in the station house.   We went to Dinting and back from Manchester on those old electric units , and visited the 'box there - a great fascination for this dyed-in-the-wool Western and semaphores man

 

A lovely recollection!  Thank you

It's a line I wish I'd visited, too.  Could have done it on a Priv, very cheaply too.  When I was at Witham, my shift-mate Colin at Clink Road Jcn had moved there from Torside Crossing on the Woodhead Route.  His dad had come to Cranmore to look after the site for David Shepherd, and they lived in the station house.   We went to Dinting and back from Manchester on those old electric units , and visited the 'box there - a great fascination for this dyed-in-the-wool Western and semaphores man

 

It was also technically unique, the power supply 1500 Volts DC, which from the 1930's until the late 1950's was the UK railway overhead electrification standard Voltage. 

The Woodhead route which had many steep gradients the coal trains were at best partially vacuum braked, the EM1's (class 76) had regen braking, the substations were fitted with resistor banks to dissipate the energy not used by other trains, a very cleaver system for something designed in the 1930's

 

 

I recall a journey, at that time, on a "classic" DMU from Sheffield to Huddersfield, reversing somewhere between stations before it headed up to Penistone.  Memories have dimmed over much of it; also very sad at a number of closures including some of electric services - others such as Lancaster to Morecambe and Tyneside electrics

 
That short well-used electrified section from Southport, part of the line to Preston. Very careless admin to close that just because BR were pulling the plug on the rest of the line. Crossens: I should think they *were*.

 
It's instructive to take a Streetview ramble around the station at Dinting. Are those 1954-era headspans from 1500 volt days?

https://maps.app.goo.gl/zsEeJEdnxxLUwUPg6

 

I think they would be called portals; not headspans, but yes, the structures are from the original electrification. Even the characteristic inverted-A that holds the registration arms for the catenary.

The lines from Liverpool Street to Shenfield were electrified around the same time as Woodhead and also at 1500V DC. Although the li.nes have been converted (twice! - to 6.25kV AC in 1960/61 and then 25kV in 1979/80) the original design of overhead is still evident. E.g this photo of Romford that appears on the Wikipedia page for that station:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ab/Romford_railway_station_MMB_10_315802.jpg

 

Yes, constructed by BICC (British Insulated Callender's Cables / Construction Company Limited)


The LNER (the "big four" version) electrification choice was 1500 V DC for a mainline (intercity) railway they were ahead of the other 3. 

When the Liverpool St to Shenfield was converted to AC overhead electrification it was at 25kV AC.  It was done by changing the insulators from the DC type to AC type in stages the 1500V DC could still function using the AC insulators; however the insulator technology at the time meant at low bridges they could not achieve the 8 inch (200mm) dynamic electrical clearance, so there were 25kV to 6.25kV transformers and 6.25kV circuit breakers installed to feed these short sections a 25kV cable was used to feed around these 6.25kV short sections.
The 6.25kV was decommissioned in the late 1970's early 80's due to the testing and development by British Rail, BICC and Pirelli of fibreglass bridge are insulators which allowed a significant reduction of the dynamic electrical clearance.

The problem with the 1500V DC OLE the contact wire and catenary used a larger cross section of wire and was fixed tension, this limited the max speed to 80mph.  Conversion was done on plain line to wire tension by counter balance weight which allowed the line speed to be increased to 100mph; curved sections were later converted to small 25kV contact wire with counter balance weights allowing line speed increases. 

 
ET, thanks for the additional technical insights. Did you mean to suggest that the 6.25kV was just for individual bridges? (as that's the impression I got).

Was 6.25kV employed anywhere else? (e.g. the Glasgow network).