Overview Between 1962 and 1965, 117 engines were built by Clayton Equipment Company and Beyer, Peacock and co. These were known as the BR Class 17 (or Clayton Type 1). Operations Once built, they were sent to the Scottish region depots at Polmadie and Haymarket, before beginning ot migrate down ot the London Midland, North Eastern and the Eastern regions. Two of these engines (D8501 and D8536) were moved to Tyne Dock where they were tested on the Consett iron ore trains. They were proved to be underpowered, hence why they are a type 1 as each engine had two Paxman 450hp engines, while the last two class 17s built each had a pair of Rolls Royce Type D 450hp engines. These engines undertook a variety of freight either as one unit or in pairs. Eventually, they were all transferred back up to Haymarket for freight traffic between southern Scotland and northern England. Issues The BR Class 17 is probably the least successful diesel engine on British Railways, behind the BR Class 28s. The twin Paxman engines were prone to camshaft and cylinder head problems. Another issue was the visibility. Because the cab is designed in the centre of the locomotive, the drivers didn't have good visibility due to part of it being blocked by the the locomotive itself. Therefore, BR began to dispose of the locomotives and place in an order for 100 class 20s to replace the 113 locomotvies. Withdrawal and Preservation The class 17s began to be withdrawn from service in July 1968 and finishing in December 1971 meaning that the class 17s had between 5 to 10 years of service. However, D8568 was give a second chance and was seen at Hemelite and Ribblesdale Cement. After that, she was secured for preservation, while currently at the Chinnor and Princes Risborough Railway in Oxfordshire. Liveries The BR Class 17s were only seen to have worn BR Green and BR Blue in either half or full yellow warning panels and Ribble Cement (only worn on D8568). Previous models Back in the early days of Train Simulator, the BR Class 17 was created by Iron Horse House, before being taken down in in 2013. In 2014, when DTG were known as RSC, they announced that they would be creating a BR Blue class 17 for the marketplace, however this was never released, even after 4 years. Hopefully, the BR Class 17 does become available again in the near future.
Someone used to make a Clayton for TS because there's video of it on YouTube- Iron Horse was it? Someone who closed down under cloudy circumstances. Some of their models have been acquired and developed by others but not the Class 17. They're nice looking little loco's and nice to drive by all accounts (when they're working properly) but they were dogs. There were a couple in use at the Old Dalby test track after withdrawal and Kit Spackman told me about an occasion when one was being used to drag the APT E-Train back to shed after a test run. Kit was riding with the driver when smoke started billowing out from one of the bonnets. The driver sighed and said, "hold on to this will you," meaning the throttle to prevent the DSD engaging the brakes. Once free he got a fire-extinguisher, leaned out of the window as far as he could, aimed at the air-intake and emptied the extinguisher into the engine. He then resumed his place at the controls and carried on driving. "Aren't you going to stop?" Kit asked. The driver said, "If I stopped every time this bloody thing caught fire we'd never get anywhere!"
An interesting story I must say. And yes, Iron Horse House was the one that made it and closed down at the end of 2013. The backstory is that Iron Horse House's products were given over the DTG so they own the rights to his products and have the right to re-release and modify any of his products. This is why models such as the class 20,35 and 52 were released not long after IHH shut down. Hope this helps.
