Northern Line Stock in about 1996

[camperdown9]

Hi

When I moved to London in 1996 my journey to and from work was Elm Park to Barking on the District and then Barking to Upper Holloway (on the Gospel Oak line). However from time to time if the Barking Gospel Oak train was cancelled or whatever I would use the Northern Line to get to Archway. 

At the time the trains had wooden floors and there was a guard (at least on some of the trains) in the last car.
What stock would this of been?
In 1996 was there a guard on all northern line trains? 
Was this the last line to have guards and at the time did another lines have them?

I just guessing this might of been the oldest underground stock that I even travelled on.

Thanks in advance

Alex

[whistlekiller2000]

Jan 21, 2015 7:46:38 GMT camperdown9 said:

Hi

When I moved to London in 1996 my journey to and from work was Elm Park to Barking on the District and then Barking to Upper Holloway (on the Gospel Oak line). However from time to time if the Barking Gospel Oak train was cancelled or whatever I would use the Northern Line to get to Archway. 

At the time the trains had wooden floors and there was a guard (at least on some of the trains) in the last car.
What stock would this of been?
In 1996 was there a guard on all northern line trains? 
Was this the last line to have guards and at the time did another lines have them?

I just guessing this might of been the oldest underground stock that I even travelled on.

Thanks in advance

Alex

Alex, the stock you travelled on was 1959/62 Tube Stock, previously used on and cascaded from the Piccadilly, Central and Bakerloo lines at various times. The trains consisted of seven cars. They were indeed the last underground trains to feature guards and were finally withdrawn from the Northern Line in 2000 IIRC and replaced with the trains you see on there now.

Rich'

[Tomcakes]

The last one was withdrawn about three weeks into 2000 IIRC, so they just made the new millennium!

Latterly the Northern had used a mixture of 59ts, a few 62ts ex Central (which I believe replaced the 56ts?) and 72 MkI ts. All would have had wooden floors, the 59ts also had wooden window surrounds.

[norbitonflyer]

Here's an account of their last day
www.squarewheels.org.uk/rly/1959final/

1972 Mk 1 stock also had wooden floors and guards: this stock had all left the Northern Line in 1999, although many cars went to a new life on the Victoria Line (masquerading as extra 1967 stock), and alongside their Mark 2 cousins on the Bakerloo, where they can still be found.
www.trainweb.org/tubeprune/72%20tube%20stock.htm

[North End]

Jan 21, 2015 11:14:23 GMT norbitonflyer said:

Here's an account of their last day
www.squarewheels.org.uk/rly/1959final/

1972 Mk 1 stock also had wooden floors and guards: this stock had all left the Northern Line in 1999, although many cars went to a new life on the Victoria Line (masquerading as extra 1967 stock), and alongside their Mark 2 cousins on the Bakerloo, where they can still be found.
www.trainweb.org/tubeprune/72%20tube%20stock.htm

It's worth noting that the 72MkI stock on the Bakerloo and Victoria lines was all removed from the Northern Line by the mid-1990s. Of the four trains on the Bakerloo Line, one was moved in the early 1990s in unrefurbished state, the other three are made up from the three trains refurbished for the Northern Line before the programme was stopped, less 2 collision damaged cars which were scrapped. Likewise, one car excepted all the Victoria Line 72 stock was moved off the Northern Line by the mid 1990s in unrefurbished state.

Of the 72MkI stock which survived on the Northern Line until the final withdrawal programme, (thusfar) only one car has ever again seen passenger service, car 3312, which replaced a 67 stock car damaged in Northumberland Park Depot - 3184.

I have seen proposals to provide some additional trains for the Bakerloo Line, which would utilise two UNDM cars, one from unit 3299 (ex 3439) and, amazingly, the stored UNDM at Hainault 3411. Combined with stored 67 stock cars 2 further trains could be made up. This was some months ago, so I've no idea if this was ever a serious plan, or whether it is still on the books.

[Tom]

I always assumed the 1972 Mk1 stock cars which were transferred to the Victoria Line (as middle DMs) happened in the late 1980s, prior to refurbishment of the 1967TS fleet. Did a further batch get transferred later on?

[philthetube]

I don't think the 62's replaced the 56's there were still 56's on the northern line in 1996. 56's were, as far as I know a prototype anyway and only a few were made.

[astock5000]

Jan 25, 2015 0:58:36 GMT philthetube said:

I don't think the 62's replaced the 56's there were still 56's on the northern line in 1996. 56's were, as far as I know a prototype anyway and only a few were made.

There were three 7-car trains of 1956 stock. According to Wikipedia they were all withdrawn by 1995, but the article doesn't list a source for that.

The 1993 edition of 'London Underground Rolling Stock' by Brian Hardy says some 1962 stock was being transferred to the Northern at that time to replace the 56TS units and to form additional trains. 1956 stock units 1000 and 1004 are listed in the book as withdrawn, it also shows two 4-car and four 3-car 62TS units as part of the Northern line's fleet.

[norbitonflyer]

The three trains of 1956 stock had some differences from the 1959 stock, (they were, for example, the last Tube stock to have five-position headcode lights) and indeed, having been built by three different manufacturers, they even differed from each other. I would except that when the 1962 stock, which was very similar to 1959 stock, became surplus to Central Line requirements it would be an obvious opportunity to pension off the non-standard 1956 stock, along with any 1959 stock which was past its best.
The 1962 stock was certainly compatible with 1959 stock. In the early days, a dire reliability problem with the Central's Standard stock caused LT to divert the Northern's new 1959 stock to the Central, with an extra (1962) car to make up the numbers (rather like the "S7+1"s) requiring the 1938 stock to stay on the Northern, in turn deferring its transfer to the Picc to replace that lines Standard stock which had lasted rather better than the Central's

[philthetube]

The 1956 stock definitely worked into 1996, I worked as a guard starting December 1995 so was not trained until feb 1996 and I remember working them, If I remember correctly one of them was scrapped following an accident in the depot. I am however not sure if that is my memory playing tricks as I do know that the two refurbished 72's on the northern were scrapped after an unfortunate meeting with each other.

[Deleted]

62's had been around on the Northern for quite a few years, we had a few back in the mid 80's when I was a GD/MM running out of Morden having been displaced GD from the District when OPO started. We also had at least 2 sets of 56's running then along with a couple of 38's brought back to cover a stock shortage for a new WTT introduced about '86. Happy days

[whistlekiller2000]

Jan 25, 2015 9:41:44 GMT norbitonflyer said:

The three trains of 1956 stock had some differences from the 1959 stock, (they were, for example, the last Tube stock to have five-position headcode lights) and indeed, having been built by three different manufacturers, they even differed from each other. I would except that when the 1962 stock, which was very similar to 1959 stock, became surplus to Central Line requirements it would be an obvious opportunity to pension off the non-standard 1956 stock, along with any 1959 stock which was past its best.
The 1962 stock was certainly compatible with 1959 stock. In the early days, a dire reliability problem with the Central's Standard stock caused LT to divert the Northern's new 1959 stock to the Central, with an extra (1962) car to make up the numbers (rather like the "S7+1"s) requiring the 1938 stock to stay on the Northern, in turn deferring its transfer to the Picc to replace that lines Standard stock which had lasted rather better than the Central's

The 1959 stock was originally intended for the Piccadilly Line to replace Standard Stock but was transferred to the Central Line temporarily due to the reliability problems with the Central's Standard Stock that you highlight. The 1962 stock purchase for the Central Line (and not the largely aborted 1960/Standard Stock composite plan) then enabled the 1959 stock to go back to the Piccadilly Line where it was supposed to be in the first place. The eventual final transfer of the 1959 stock away from the Piccadilly Line to the Bakerloo and Northern Lines (displacing 1938 and 1972 stock in both cases) didn't happen until well into the 1970's when the 1973 stock became available for the Piccadilly Line in order to prepare for the Heathrow extensions and the increased luggage space therefore required.

[North End]

Jan 25, 2015 0:06:43 GMT Tom said:

I always assumed the 1972 Mk1 stock cars which were transferred to the Victoria Line (as middle DMs) happened in the late 1980s, prior to refurbishment of the 1967TS fleet. Did a further batch get transferred later on?

I think you are right, as only 3 72MkI stock trains were refurbished for the Northern Line, and these are all accounted for on the Bakerloo Line. If someone doesn't beat me to it, when I get a spare hour I will dig out the relevant Underground News magazines and have a look for the exact dates.

Off the top of my head I know that of the four Bakerloo trains, one was definitely transferred pre-refurbishment (3264/3564). The remaining three are the Northern Line refurbished trains, albeit unit 3266 contains two cars from MkII unit 3249 - the unit involved in the first of the (1990s!) Piccadilly Circus derailments (22/04/1994). The remaining two cars of each unit were scrapped, the MkI unit (3224) was involved in a collision in Morden Depot on 24/02/1994 with unit 3204.

[metman]

Don't forget that several 1972mk1 trains on the Northern also received external livery trials. One was in the current corporate livery, however internally they were largely unchanged.

North End is correct, units 3203+3501 Northern -> Bakerloo prior to refurbishment to form 3264+3564. Both units were converted to OPO and had previously been out of service.

Refurbished crew operated units 3218+3507 were also moved Northern -> Bakerloo in Oct 1994 to become 3265+3565

3266+3566 was next formed by taking the remains of refurbished Mk1 unit 4324(4266)-3324(3266)[phone] and adding and turning 4324-3324 to A end cars and adding 4349-3349 to form unit 3266-3566.

The last refurbished Mk1 unit 3210-3512 became 3267-3567 in June 1997 when I'm sure it was realised that if this unit wasn't moved to the Bakerloo it would be scrapped!

Finally....the special train.....

Spare four car unit was created by taking 4257-4357-3357 and UNDM 3439 turning the whole lot to create a four car unit 3299-4299-4399-3399U.

All conversions of Mk1 stock to 67Mk3* stock were to provide middle motors and trailers for the existing trains and indeed many of these cars still exist in storage pending further use.

I wonder how difficult it would be to convert a UNDM from a trailer using parts from spare DMs?

*they were in some circles referred to as 1967 Mk3 stock as the Brixton extension stock was sometimes called 1967 Mk2 stock.