Are any A60/A62 Units being preserved?

Alan Williams has been coming up with fanciful ideas for years. Anything is 'technically possible' but it doesn't make it remotely practical! The 'Pacers' have been falling apart since they were built so no change there. The thought of replacing 1980s built 'Pacers' with 1960 built A stock would be politically disastrous. Then there are, of course, the loading guage issues that A stock have.

As for hauling them around with class 60s..... I would imagine that most of the network that is frequented by 'Pacers' is out of bounds to class 60s due to weight issues. The 130 tonne class 60 has a route availability figure of 8 whereas I would imagine that most of the lines that 'Pacers' call their own have a route availability less than that. Adding a feed from the alternator to power the electrical stuff required to haul A stock (doors, lights, etc.) would add even more weight. Then there is the issue of control. Presumably Mr Williams would see them used in 'Push-Pull' mode as few run-round facilitues have been retained. More mods and more weight.

There is also the issue of why the 60s are being withdrawn in the first place. The 60 is a classic case of a design not learning the lessons of history. In terms of British Loco engineering it was revolutionary in its day as it was intended to be a British answer to the class 59. Sadly, BR saw fit to forgo the usual prototype testing and ordered 100 off of the drawing board. That was the first lesson of history ignored! The second was the lesson from the class 31s. The 31s were built with Mirrlees power units. Within four or five years of the last one being delivered the decision was made to re-engine the entire 263-strong fleet with English Electric units as the Mirrlees ones were not up to the rigors of railway use. It is therefore puzzling that the decision was made to equip the class 60 fleet with Mirrlees engines that had been untried in the railway environment. The result was a loco that, once it had seen a decade or so in service, became unreliable. In these days of penalty clauses for all traffic flows including freight this could not be tolerated. The few in regular use are being utilised on the handful of trains that DBS has that are beyond the haulage capability of a 66. The decline of the class is a pity but it is inevitable. A shame as they are a real pleasure to drive. Smooth riding, quite in the cab. Not like a modern loco at all.......!

Operationally there would also be problems. The 'Pacers' are 75mph units and are timed accordingly. The class 60 is a 60mph loco. They are geared accordingly and any increase in speed would involve expensive modification. Even if the class 60 was allowed to go faster I would imagine that the Civil Engineer would have kittens at the thought! Quite a number of companies operate 'Pacers' These would have to retrain their fitting and operations staff on the class 60. This would be a huge amount of staff and would, therefore, be prohibitively expensive. Refurbishing the stored examples to traffic would also be expensive. They are not 'relatively new' any more. It is over twenty one years ago that 60001 came out of the Brush factory.

The simple answer is, yes, in my humble opinion Alan Williams is talking rubbish!