RUSTON 88DS
TYPE: 0-4-0 DM
BUILT: 1946
WEIGHT: 17tons
ENGINE: Ruston 4VPHL
DRIVE: mechanical
Ruston 0-4-0 88hp 4VPHL 4 cylinder diesel engine with 4 speed mechanical gearbox.
Ordered in 1946 for the gas light and coke company at Southall gas works. The works closed in 1966 and the loco passed into preservation.
The following is further information and photos via Tilly Barker with further additions by NIRT:
Once named “Spitfire” it was apparently owned by a Mr Henry Frampton Jones who loaned it to the Isle of Wight Steam Railway in 1972 and whose ownership it later passed into. It was sold to the Northamptonshire Ironstone Railway in 1980.
Around 2015 the engine appears to have moved from NIRT and was in 2016 renamed “Heather”.
see here:
https://www.railwaymagazine.co.uk/4148/great-central-memories-are-rekindled-at-finmere-station/
and
https://www.youtube.com/post/Ugkxch49NHkDL0Aa-ZPDBzPrgCy1NgKOD80Y
However, there was another tale that says ‘Heather’ was a different engine altogether, but both separate engines owned by the Northamptonshire Ironstone Railway.
“Spitfire” and “Heather” are the same engine, 242868 and it is restored to full operation and fitted with vacuum brakes. Currently the engine is un-named. Here are some early pictures of this engine
(Copyrights:
Andrew Ayling—Charles Truscott—Darren Gibson
Len Pullinger—Simon James—Unknown)
(Copyright Unknown but photo and text from Railway Modeller Web)
Pictured above: 242868 of 1946, about to depart Boultham Works, destined for the Gas Light & Coke Co. at Southall. Note the bulge on the rearmost engine cover side panel – this covered part of the donkey engine that was used for initially charging the main engine starting air receiver. On these early locos this small engine would have been one of Rustons’ own PT 1 1/2HP petrol engines.