I realised the other day that I haven't written about the State railways of Thailand on this forum since 2008! Over the last couple of days I have been re-mastering all of my original footage of Thai railways from 2005 to 2009 . My plan is to present restored footage in longer movies on my youtube channel. I decided to pick a station and one particular year and include every train I captured in the period I was there with a view to adding a new one every couple of weeks or so I started with Khon Kaen in 2009. The last occasion I was there. Khon Kaen is a regional city in North East Thailand and is the capital city of the province of Isan. The high plateau of Khorat is quite arid compared to a lot of the rest of Thailand Khon Kaen station I'll explain later on how much this has changed since I was last there I got quite adept at working out the timetables One thing that evaded me on previous visits was the missing roundhouse dating from the steam days. Good old Google maps found it. This was before smart phones became common place and I found it by wandering around with my laptop open using the station wifi I stayed away from the stagnant pond in the turntable pit. The shed was in use as the caddy shack for the adjoing railway owned golf course The local passenger services were in the hands of the venerable RHN railcars As you can tell by the guy on the roof, Health and safety wasn't of the highest priority The fast cross country trains were in the hands of the THN Stainless steel railcars. In both cases I never saw a window closed on these ever. Alston ALS class Co-Co no, 4125 waits for the THN to depart south before it follows with a empty Cement train. The front tanks are fro loose cement powder and the Containers behind carry bagged cement Anotheer ALS, this time 4152, heads south with empty Propane tankers with the mandatory barrier wagon between them and the Loco. The metre gauge track shows up well in this photo Not so common are the HID class Co-cos. Class leader 4501 waits to take the bogie oil tankers back from the fuel terminal First video. Khon Kaen in January 2009 More soon Kev
If it is in original condition it probably has a Pielstick in it (I've never heard of them) but over the last few years all four classes are getting fitted with either MTUs or Cat engines I know quite a bit about CAT engines as DRS Class 68 and 88s had them and I had a bit of expereience with them before I retired I was always an English Electric of Sulzer man myself Kev
Seems Pielstick were a big diesel engine manufacturerwith close links to Alsthom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEMT_Pielstick Kev
So, where next? Thonburi, of course. the Thai railway depot on the West side of the Chao Praya river in Bangkok where the SRT active steam loco fleet is based. The first time I went there I got a Taxibike from Hua Lamphong ( Rules of using Taxi bikes 1..trust the rider 2...keep your eyes firmly shut 3 hold your breath ) Sohe dropped me off at Bangkok Noi station and I walked the 200 metres to the depot.Wow! So far, so good. a yard full of G.Es and Alsthoms and a 2-8-2 950 was one of the ones waiting to be returned to operational service one of the operational Japanese C56 2-60s. used during the River Kwai festivals. 713 still carries its JNR numberplate on the smokebox with its original number C56 15 Not many places in the world where you can see main line diesels and steam locos undergoing maintenance side by side In the depot, none of the staff paid any attention to the Farang (Me) wandering around with a camera More,lots more, Tomorrow Kev
One, of my main reasons for visiting Thonuri, apart from the steam locos, was my hope of finding one of the increasingly rare Krupp B-B diesel hydraulics. these are non standard now but are retained because of their ability to plough the floods in the south unharmed ( The diesel electrics have a tendency to blow their traction motors ) I was in luck 3118 was out the back of the shed in 2007 3121 trundled passed me heading off the shed The other Hydraulics are the ,always busy, Henschel built, HAS diesel shunters.scurrying about marshalling the passenger trains for the Southern services No. 79 These trains were being assembled in Bangkok Noi station. This replaced the magnificent original Thonburi station by the riverside and was built on the site of the Thonburi Goods Station. The new station is not inspiring Functional, just 4515, an Hitachi HID Co-Co waits to leave with a train for the South Back in the yard active Kawasaki 4-6-2 no 824 had been shunted outside Video from May 2005 and May 2007 The next location is a bit of a beast.Bang Sue Junction and depot.To give you an idea, when I added them up, I had taken 535 photographs in the station, depot and surrounding area there Kev
I recognize that locomotive. Years ago I bought two N scale models of the Japanese National Railway issue from Kato to use the Mikado mechanisms to power North American prototypes that I was working on. They had disk drivers but otherwise were pretty close.
A vast area of marshalling yards including a hump yard, diesel maintenance depot, Carriage sidings and the two stations 100 metres apart Alsthom Co-Co 4124 pauses on a Bangkok bound cross country train When British railways commisioned the Class 158 Super sprinter DMUs with their extruded all aluminium construction SRT ordered some metre gauge variants. Painted in the same UK regional railways colour scheme they were built on two parralel production lines at the main works in Derby The first time I saw one of these in the midday heat in Thailand I was astonished, Had no idea they even existed A British standard gauge one More soon
The other classes of express railcars were common Daewoo 2527 heads north And the venerable THN cars, 1220 is bound for Bangkok there were quite a few empty coaching stock workings Alsthom ALS 4125 brings a rake back to Bang Sue for servicing
Bang Sue depot can keep you busy for hours. Nobody bothered about the 'Farang' with the camera wandering around and just let me get on with it GE Built GEK Co-Co 4025, Alsthom AHK Co-Co 4207, Henschel built HAS 0-6-0DH no 77 and Krupp B-B diesel hydraulic 2111 GE Built GEK 4018, AHK 4219, Hitachi Built HID 4503 Onh the cripple road I found one of the rare Henschel B-B diesel hydraulics. 3025 has seen better days but apparently was still a runner in 2009 I'd been looking for one of these for ages far less likely to be a runner. Fire damaged Alsthom ALS 4141 had been stripped of most major components Engines that had come off the Bangkok bound expresses often ended up coming onto the depot in pairs GEK 4011 hauls ALS 4121 back to the depot. The shovel nose G.Es are an iconic loco in Thailand More soon Kev
G.E GEA 4537 Heads back to Bangkok after servicing. These 2.500 HP Co-Cos are very reliable GEA 4544 also comes off the depot but seems to avoided the wash plant Back in the depot in 2006 a pair of Alsthoms get maintained ADD 4403 and ALS 4129 ALS 4129 with GEA 4525 More soon
in the surrounding area in Bang Sue are some random preserved rail items The library train comprises an ancient 4 wheel coach built by Metroplitan in Birmingham, England A bogie coach built by the Major car works in the USA and a redundant BV 4 wheel brake van A stiff walk away was the Bang Sue Golf course owned by the railway and an early bogie coach was in the trees more soon about the goodies in the golf course Kev
An old 2ft gauge quarry loco now used as a shrine 2-8-2 943 nestles amongst the trees It shows its Japanese heritage quite well At the entrance of the depot is MRC 2-4-0T no 5 ( or 4 there was some doubt) It appears there was a lot of plate swapping going of in those days Down on Kaemphang Phet Road was sister engine ( Also listed as No 5!) Sat behind it was an equally derelict Rhaetian Bahn 2-8-0 tender for no obvious reason So here is the Bang Sue video. There is quite a bit of noise coming from a Tamper and a Ballast reguator at work in the 2009 part Kev
Next up, Nakhon Ratchasima ( Also known by its old name Khorat) This is the gateway to the province of Isan and is also on the North East line. Although the area is quite rural the place is very busy with lots of freight activity in the yard The size of the station bears witness to its importance Plinthed outside is a fine Hanomag 4-6-2 no 261 These locos were introduced between 1928 and 29 and totalled 22 in all The extensive marshalling yard stretches out way past the station in either direction Some interesting stuff in there A very American looking bogie reefer van More soon Kev
A Kawasaki pacific. Thank God she's not painted that awful shade of green they used to put on their racing bikes.
