I've always called the HST an HST or IC125- when did people start calling them Class 43? I mean I know the power cars are Class 43 but they've always been HST power cars and when do you see them without the train? It always makes my gears spin for a second before they click I realise that someone isn't writing about a North British built Warship. Am I just old?
Sorry my bad I’m fairly new to the correct names of the trains, I didn’t have a clue until I started using Train Sim World, when I was young I always remember them being called 125s and 225s from what I can remember but I’m still learning
Don't apologise for being young- that's just rubbing it in. The Inter-City 225s were Class 91+Mk4 sets (and that does make sense because they were built as stand alone locomotives with the idea that they'd run parcel trains when not on express turns though I think the parcel traffic pretty much dried up just as they entered service). Trams? Haven't heard that one. "Flying Bananas" was another nickname I remember now specific to the Network Rail track surveying train (a modified HST) but used as far back as the '30s for the GWR's Diesel railcars. No I don't remember them (except on the Severn Valley).
Yes, Flying Bananas was a western region thing for obvious reasons. I heard "Trams" a lot from Northern spotters.
You can see why the marketing folks tried to come up with a name that resonated with the IC125 but I could have told them that wouldn't click. I don't think that many people in Britain have any great problem with metric but it just isn't used to measure speed here.
I think it was in the 80's they were listed as separate loco's. Bear in mind the class 43's (NBL Warships) were long gone by then and 43 would have fitted with the type 4 HP rating. The original prototype HST was class 41 if I recall which was the original tops class of the original Warship diesels. Any number in the type 4 range would have been unsuitable as taken up at some point by another class.