"The prototype bogie did not come with the same durability warranty as the production version. For this reason, it was always planned to update the prototype bogies to the ‘passed’ version at an early stage."
Still almost brand new in summer 2000, No. 66220 scales the Lickey Incline with a long rake of loaded coal hoppers, and some distant rear-end assistance from triple-grey 60068.
The arrival of the EWS (history of EWS here) Class 66 locomotives is widely remembered by the UK motive power enthusiast as a launching pad for the biggest cull in the history of British-built diesel freight traction. But for those more focused on the prosperity of the railway, the Class 66’s grand entrance was a bravura performance. From speed of delivery, through whirlwind, pre-approved acceptance, to the unprecedented streamlining of inventory and maintenance, the birth and roll-out of the Class 66 was a masterclass in efficiency.
The £350,000,000 order for 250 brand new freight locomotives was placed almost immediately after the EWS brand came into being in spring 1996. Idealistically, EWS would have bought secondhand to reduce costs, but it’s not an ideal world, and there was no high-quantity secondhand market for a GB-compatible loco with the operational improvements EWS required. So they approached General Motors to talk about an upgrade on the GB-proven Class 59/2, with a modernised engine, ‘self-steering’ bogies, and highly advanced computer control.
In its first summer of operation, 66014 nears journey’s end with a Swindon – Longbridge car parts train. The relatively clean front end shows an absence of the swinghead coupler, which began to appear in 1999. The orange cap in the centre of the yellow cab front is the access point for the multiple working cable, which could interface the 66s with themselves, the 59s, and the forthcoming 67s. The seemingly functionless slanted lugs on the yellow section below that, were for securing the locos to the deck during shipping.
One of the benefits of buying something based on an off-the-peg offering, was that EWS could avoid getting bogged down in design wranglings a la BR, and just let GM furnish the order. In theory, there would be a lot less to go wrong, and that theory held up in practice.
The Class 66s would be assembled in London, Ontario, Canada, to an American design, but with modifications specified by EWS for UK integration. Some of the mods – like the use of some already tested and approved British parts – were made purely to speed up Railtrack’s acceptance process. It can’t be overstated how desperate EWS were to get these things into traffic. Because of the markedly inferior efficiency and much greater maintenance demands of their existing locos, any delay at all in the Class 66’s introduction was going to cost EWS dearly.
The former RfD-operated Longbridge – Swindon trains of Rover KSA wagons were among Birmingham’s early wholesale switches to Class 66 haulage. Until 11th December 1998, the flow had been covered by pairs of 47s, and had thus been crying out for the monumentally improved economy of single 66s – which also cut down on locomotive ‘tag-teaming’ due to their far superior range. Diagrams which had previously required four Brush 4s could be completed with just one GM type 5. Add in the time that the 47/0s and 47/3s could spend unavailable, and replacing them with 66s was a total no-brainer.
The first Class 66 – 66001 – was complete as early as March 1998. That was a full eight months before GM’s original quote for the start of delivery. The very significant expedition had largely been down to EWS’s consumer power on such a large and potentially influential order. The pioneer loco, which in December ’97 had been nothing more than a basic chassis with “#1 England” chalked onto it, was presented to EWS figurehead Ed Burkhardt as a resplendent finished product, at General Motors’ London, Ontario facility on 23rd March ’98.
A new 66085 stamps its presence on the Banbury - Mountsorrel self-discharge train at St Andrews, Birmingham, in spring 1999.
But there then ensued a delay in UK delivery, after EWS withdrew from a fast shipping arrangement due to a sudden and pretty spectacular escalation in cost. A planned seven-day trip was downgraded to a plod of approaching three weeks, and ‘Shed 1’ eventually plonked its wheels onto Immingham dockside at 08:53 on 18th April ’98. Shipping for the rest of the locos would not be subject to the same issue, since forward from the summer, EWS had already chartered a vessel to make faster crossings between Halifax in Canada and Newport in South Wales.
PROTOTYPES
Prototype 66001 had red bodyside grilles, a high-mounted lamp/headboard bracket, and near-vertical shipping lugs - along with a number of other subtle differences as compared with production models.
Both 66001 and 66002 were considered prototypes, and there were indeed some detail differences between the two pre-production 66s and the first production models – both aesthetic and physical.
The prototypes had different bogies from production examples – the bogies having been a main area of deviation between the Class 59 and the Class 66, and thus a very key focus of experimentation for General Motors. Although the bogies on the prototypes looked the same as those on the standardised production machines, the dimensions were a little different, and importantly, the prototype bogie did not come with the same durability warranty as the production version. For this reason, it was always planned to update the prototype bogies to the ‘passed’ version at an early stage. In the case of 66002, before it even crossed to the UK.
In a May 2009 photo, it can be seen that although 66002's lamp bracket has been moved into the standard position, the shipping lugs remain distinct from those on the production locos, and no swinghead coupler has been fitted.
Meanwhile, the cab front lamp mounts were positioned much higher and slightly more centrally on the prototypes. The lamp brackets on the prototypes were subsequently moved – presumably because if a railtour operator had tried to mount a large headboard on them, at least some of the crew’s visibility could have been obscured. The prototypes also differed from production examples in multiple ways at the base of the yellow cab front. The yellow section was actually shallower on the two prototypes, the shipping lugs were set at an obviously different angle, and there were differences on the buffer beam too.
Aesthetically speaking, 66001 and 66002 had red bodyside grille sections, whereas the production locos all came with black.
PRODUCTION MODELS
66004 was the second Class 66 to touch dry land in the UK, and after an appearance at the major Toton open weekend of 29th to 30th August 1998, it was designated as Bescot depot’s trial and crew training loco. 66003 worked similarly off Toton, while 66001 and 66005 were based in South Wales. The first proper duty for 66004 came on 2nd September ’98, when it topped the customary pair of 37s on the Cliffe Vale – St Blazey china clay empties. But after less than a week of service, it had managed to derail.
The arrival of the production batch began with the delivery of 66004, 66003 and 66005, to Newport, on 26th August 1998. This first production trio arrived in the UK long before 66002, which was still undergoing very thorough testing at the Transportation Technology Centre in Colorado (a sort of life-sized ‘train set’). 66002’s long-winded test programme, which had begun on 1st June, would serve the dual purpose of fulfilling Railtrack’s acceptance criteria and providing General Motors with a mass of R&D data. GM detained ‘shop soiled’ 66002 for a full update and overhaul, including a repaint, before it crossed the Atlantic. In the end it didn’t reach the UK until late April 1999, by which time most of the examples up to 66093 were already in service.
66228, like all 662xxs except 66200, arrived as new with swinghead couplers. Just days before this shot was taken in spring 2000, the loco had still been on the boat.
By the time the first production locos were delivered, they’d already been accepted by Railtrack, along with every other production class member up to 66250. They all hit the dockside ready to run, and could be commissioned literally on the spot.
66001 to 66200 were delivered without swinghead couplers. From 66201 onward the locos had swingheads from new. However, by the time 66201, 66202 and 66203 arrived in February 2000, swinghead couplers were already being retrofitted to existing examples – as observed forward from 1999.
Class 66 No. 66185, as it looked in the year 2000.
IMPACT
The Class 66s began revenue-earning service on Tuesday 2nd June 1998, when 66001 topped a dead 58049 on the Bentinck Colliery to Drakelow Power Station coal train. The loco had already worked test trains on Railtrack beginning 27th May. Railtrack approved the production models as an entire fleet in mid August, which meant they could start working as soon as they were delivered. With service scaling up from early September ’98, the majority of the early duties emanated from South Wales, and as boat loads of new diesels came in, ex-BR traction was dumped off the live inventory with haste.
The 07:30 Hull to Baglan Bay vinegar train switched to Class 66 power in mid 1999. 66116 working the train here in the last July of the 20th century came as a disappointment at the time, as the most up to date info still showed the train as being booked for a single Class 37. Today, however, the shot stands as a record of a nearly new 66 on what would have been one of the type's first turns on the diagram. 37s did continue to appear for a while, but by the autumn there were enough 66s in the country to make Type 3 appearances far more unusual.
The 66s brought pronounced increases in availablity, efficiency, range and haulage capability, whilst reducing maintenance requirements. Collectively, all of this meant that one Class 66 could easily replace more than one life-expired loco. Early casualties in the inherited EWS fleet included members of Classes 31, 33, 37 and 73. But the biggest of the early casualties was the Class 47. A standard 47 had low fuel capacity (little over half that of a 66) coupled with comparatively woeful availability. And it also fell short of the 66 on overall power and other haulage criteria.
One might have thought that an infrastructure trip in connection with the major Proof House Junction revisions of summer 2000, would get a Class 37 or a spare 58. But nope, with all EWS Class 66s now in traffic, there was virtually no duty the operator wanted to exclude from the GM regime. This shot was taken from Garrison Street in central Birmingham, looking across the Cue Spedition base towards the Proof House possession, and 66230 with its train of pre-fabricated rail sections. The date was Saturday 12th August Y2K.
Although it had been projected that the EWS 56s and 58s would broadly stay in service (decanting down onto Type 2, 3 or 4 turns after the 66s had taken over their duties), by spring ’99 it was clear that even BR Type 5s were in line for the chop. In the two weeks from late April going into early May, nine Class 56s were taken out of traffic, along with the first Class 58. Although EWS continued to insist they weren’t getting rid of their second gen BR diesels, the compound economy of the 66s made it increasingly difficult to justify keeping the ‘Grids’ and ‘Bones’ in traffic.
The Bescot to Round Oak 'Enterprise' was a good train to cover in the late 1990s, since the motive power varied. But by summer 2000, the inevitable had happened, and the 66s were dominating the trip. This is 66210 doing the honours at Langley Green, on 21st July Y2K.
The pattern between late 1998 and spring 2000 was one of rapid overall reduction in the size of the EWS loco fleet, as more 66s arrived. And that’s a reduction in the whole fleet, including the 66s – not just a reduction in the old stock. At the height of the phase, the withdrawal ratio could be as high as five to one. Five old locos withdrawn for every one Class 66 off the boat.
66057 was one of the five examples designated as a Lickey banker and modified with a remote-controlled/monitored uncouple feature. Here it is on the Cliffe Vale - St Blazey china clay empties, before it even had a swinghead fitted, let alone the banking mod.
EWS remained pathological about reducing its live inventory until around May 2000, when almost all of the 66s and the majority of the 67s were in service. But at that point there were suggestions that the loco withdrawal programme had been too drastic, and was not leaving adequate cover for emergencies. There had also been some severe bottlenecking in the component recovery and disposal system, which had left yards overwhelmed with unserviceable locos - causing another raft of problems. So withdrawals finally cooled off, and some locos were actually reinstated, starting with a small group of six ‘Grids’.
Unlike Virgin with its Voyagers, EWS did not initially try to romanticise the Class 66s. There were no namings upon introduction – and given the locos’ high profile on the event and open day circuit, that wasn’t through lack of opportunity. The EWS 66s were an unbendingly uniform workforce, and yet still managed to stand out in the landscape with an undeniable ability to catch the eye. On 19th July 2000, 66136 runs alongside the M40 at Lowsonford with the 10:10 Toton to Didcot Power Station coal. With the whole fleet in traffic, the chances of seeing a 58 or 56 on these MGR hoppers had reduced to something in the region of nil.
The final batch of eleven Class 66s were Railtrack registered with the usual Toton systemwide allocations between 22nd and 24th June 2000, all having arrived at Newport on Midsummer’s Day. 66250 appeared next to 66001 at the Old Oak Common open weekend – 5th and 6th August 2000. And that weekend was also significant in that it saw the arrival of the last four Class 67s. It was the weekend that, at least in terms of the actual invasion, marked the end of the “Red Death”.
A new precedent had been set. So dramatic were the operational improvements for EWS, that over the next decade even some of the smallest, limited-resource freight operators would see an instant logic in ordering new Class 66s. And that was just in the UK. Internationally, the design has been just as hotly sought after. The locomotive that EWS foresaw as a historic game-changer has been exactly that. In over two decades, the type has not seen any significant challenge to its supremacy. No British Rail freight diesel was ever able to stake that claim.
Any kind of standardisation runs counter to fan culture, and of course we all tired of the new, Class 66-dominated environment. But there’s surely a part of us now, that knows what a landmark we witnessed back in the late 1990s. An international freight traction phenomenon launched in 1998 – and it launched right under our noses.
