Tinsley Class 13s
 

Does anyone remember the Class 13 shunters used at Tinsley marshalling yard? They consisted of two Class 08 shunters somewhat modified and permanently coupled together. I believe they were built to cope with the unique hump shunting conditions at Tinsley but I'm not sure about this. For some reason, although I was living quite nearby in Chesterfield, I never went there to see those unique locomotives. Obviously I regret that now as the pictures of them in the Ian Allan books always fascinated me. They were withdrawn in the 1980s. The Wikipedia entry on the Class 13 is quite short so I wondered whether any members had more information or memories of these locomotives?

I too was fascinated with the class 13s. There were only 3 of them and I think one of them was already withdrawn by the early 80s. Just wish I'd visited Tinsley when it was a proper yard and depot. In the 1980s it was (in terms of loco allocation) the 2nd largest depot in the UK after Toton.:)

it would be nice if someone recreated one on a preserved railway. having said that i suppose they havent got the money to buy a loco then chop it up. but i would have thought that there must be some class 08 bodyshells out there that could be cosmetically made to look like a 13

I thought I'd read somewhere (a while ago) that there was a group wanting to re create a class 13.

My Dad was a self employed lorry driver and would often get work to Sheffield, so in the school holidays I would regularly travel with him and get dropped and get dropped at Tinsley. By the time I started getting interested in railways 13002 had already been scrapped but I saw the other two in action (in fact I uploaded a photo of 13003 into the gallery bit last night).

Great, thanks for the photo.

Hi Ive just joined. I used to make the journey from my home town of York to Tinsley many times and regularly saw all three in action. Watching them was a rather surreal experience: they never quite looked right to me but they were great to watch all the same.

Hello Shunterfan and welcome to the Railway Forum.

The Class 13 (A Tinsley TIC CLass which BR Accepted without batting an eye)

two class 08 shunters one with all controls removed and the desk plated over the cab was removed and the loco ballasted to be the same weight

the loco (as a unit) was then controlled from the remaining centre cab

but as far as I am aware there were not independent throttles for each engine
watching these from the bridge was a little daft as they went over the crest of the hump and seeing the wagons running away down different roads

Personally
I would have designed these like a pair of 20's normally ran and left both cabs in place and had separate throttles for the engines

Hello Shunterfan and welcome to the Forum. Very nice to have your memories of these locomotives thanks.

Gray - yes, I always wondered why they chopped the cab off one of the engines but it may have been something to do with centre of gravity or traction? If I remember correctly, the slave unit was additionally weighted with concrete so that the combined unit was something like 120 tons.