60007 Sir Nigel Gresley (LNER 4498, LNER 600, LNER 7 & BR 60007)

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4498 Sir Nigel Gresley was the 100th Gresley Pacific built by the Great Northern Railway / London and North Eastern Railway. It was officially named in a ceremony at Marylebone station in November 1937. Among those present was Bullied who had been brought back to Doncaster by Gresley as his assistant in 1923 and who left to become the Chief Mechanical Engineer (CME) on the Southern Railway in 1937. Bullied had joined the GNR at Doncaster in 1901 as an apprentice under Ivatt, the CME. After a four-year apprenticeship, he became the assistant to the Locomotive Running Superintendent, and a year later, the Doncaster Works manager until he left in 1908.

The locomotive was built at Doncaster and entered service in 1937 following a naming ceremony at Marylebone station in November of that year. The locomotive was mainly based at London King’s Cross with a spell at Grantham during World War II. The locomotive was briefly re-numbered 7 before becoming 60007 when the LNER was merged into British Railways.

Motive power depot allocations.

Date ArrivedDepot
November 1937Kings Cross
April 1944Grantham
June 1950Kings Cross
June 1963New England
October 1963St Margarets
July 1964Aberdeen Ferryhill

On 3rd June 1956 Sir Nigel Gresley had the honour of hauling the Royal Train from King’s Cross to York with H.M the Queen on board.

The ‘Stevenson Locomotive Society Special’ on the 23rd May 1959 was the first train in the UK with a booked or advertised schedule of over 100 mph. and on that trip 60007 set the official post-war speed record for steam traction of 112 mph which is recorded on a plaque carried on the locomotive. Interestingly the tender attached to 60007 then was the one that had been attached to 60103 Flying Scotsman when it achieved the first officially recognised speed of 100mph.

In 1963 the locomotive moved to Scotland and was used on express services between Aberdeen and Glasgow.

The A4 Preservation Society was formed in 1964 and saved Sir Nigel Gresley for posterity in 1966. After an overhaul at Crewe (where it was given the wheels from 60026 Miles Beevor as they were in far better condition than those on 60007) the locomotive returned to steam in 1967 with the organisation becoming The A4 Locomotive Society Ltd. In 1999 the organisation became the registered charity The Sir Nigel Gresley Locomotive Preservation Trust Ltd which was simplified to The Sir Nigel Gresley Locomotive Trust Ltd in 2014.

In preservation the locomotive initially ran in LNER Garter blue as 4498. A number of railtours in 1967 were followed by a period at Philadelphia in County Durham during the time when privately owned steam locomotives were not permitted on the British mainline network. This prohibition was lifted in 1972 and in 1977 the locomotive’s base moved to Carnforth.

In January 1985 Sir Nigel Gresley launched the Famous trains stamps at Marylebone station and in so doing became the first steam locomotive to work from London since the return of mainline steam operations. Now carrying BR blue livery as 60007 the locomotive spent a time based at the East Lancashire Railway before moving to its present home on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway in 1995.

60007 continues to be certified for mainline operation and over the years has been fitted with a range of modern safety and signalling equipment including the fitting of Air-Braking, On Train Monitoring and Recording equipment and Train Protection & Warning System. On 5th July 2008 the locomotive hauled a 510ton load up the 1 in 200 / 1 in 178 of Stoke Bank with a minimum speed at the summit of 69.75 m.p.h., and in so doing achieved an output power of around 2500 IHP, considered an equal of some of the finest performances of the A4 class locomotives throughout their lives.

60007 was taken out of service in September 2015 for overhaul which is expected to see the locomotive return to steam in 2018. In March 2016 the boiler was lifted off the frames at the National Railway Museum at York.

The driving wheels were sent to the South Devon Railway Engineering at Buckfastleigh in August 2016 and are expected to be returned to York in January 2017.

The boiler was moved in November 2016 to the Llangollen Railway for overhaul. The overhaul is anticipated to take a year to complete and cost about a third of the £750,000 overhaul budget.

Work at the National Railway Museum at York focused on the frames which were stripped, cleaned and examined. By the end of 2016 re-assembly had commenced.

During 2017 the driving wheels had been fitted with new tyres at the South Devon Railway and returned to York. Whilst the boiler received attention at Llangollen work continued at York on other parts of the locomotive.

It had been expected to return to steam in late 2018. Although all the major work on the frames and wheels had been completed at the NRM at York work on the boiler and ashpan at Llangollen was still ongoing at the end of the year.

In January 2019 it was anticipated that the locomotive will be back in steam in 2019 and return to main line running in 2020. Although it will retain strong links with the North Yorkshire Moors Railway it will be based at Crewe for the next ten years.

In October 2019 the boiler passed an out-of-frames steam test at Llangollen whilst the overhaul of the locomotive continued at the National Railway Museum at York.

In November 2019 the boiler was lifted back onto the frames at York.

In July 2021 the National Railway Museum at York disclosed that the locomotive would have to leave the workshop at York by 20th August 2021 as the space was required for other projects. The original agreement for the locomotive to be overhauled at York was due to end in November 2018 but this date was extended on a number of occasions.

The overhaul will be completed at Crewe where it arrived at in September 2021. The plan is to have the locomotive in service in the Spring of 2022 and it will run in BR Express Blue livery.

Once the overhaul of the locomotive is completed it will be run in on the Severn Valley railway before returning to main line operations.

At the end of January 2022 the boiler underwent a successful hydraulic test which enabled the boiler certificate to be reset to this later date rather than start from the test at Llangollen in November 2019.After completing an overhaul which took six years and £1m the locomotive returned to revenue earning in April 2022 on the Severn Valley Railway where it had undergone running in trials.

Home BaseCurrent StatusOwner
CreweOperationalSir Nigel Gresley Locomotive Trust
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley in LNER days as 4498 at Newcastle
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Newcastle – Circa 1937
60007 Sir Nigel Greseley at Doncaster heading the train it achieved a recorded speed of 112mph - May 1959.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Greseley at Doncaster heading the train it achieved a recorded speed of 112mph – May 1959
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Kings Cross - September 1961.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Kings Cross – September 1961
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley on Kings Cross shed – April 1962
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley on New England shed – July 1962
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley on the New England shed at Peterborough – August 1963
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley on the New England shed at Peterborough next to classmate 60017 Silver Fox – August 1963
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley leaves Stirling with an express from Glasgow Buchanan Street to Aberdeen – August 1964
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Perth - June 1965.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Perth – June 1965
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Stirling – June 1965
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley (in front of 92220 Evening Star) inside the new paint shop at Crewe Works – January 1967
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley backs the train down to Carlisle Kingmoor shed – April 1967
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley on Carlisle Kingmoor shed next to Standard 9F 92056 – April 1967
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley ready to leave Carlisle – April 1967
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley in Clapham Cutting - June 1967.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley in Clapham Cutting – June 1967
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley on display at Chester station – July 1967
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Carlisle Kingmoor - August 1967.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Carlisle Kingmoor – August 1967
60007 Sir Nigel Greseley at Fenny Compton - July 1973.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Greseley at Fenny Compton – July 1973
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Colton - September 1975.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Colton – September 1975
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Settle – February 1982
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley passing Neville Hill on its way out of Leeds to Scarborough – September 1984
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Buckley Wells shed at Bury on the East Lancs Railway – February 1996
60009 Union of South Africa, 60007 Sir Nigel Gresley and 60019 Bittern on Grosmont shed on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway – April 2008
60007.jpg
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Grosmont on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway – 2013
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Grosmont on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway – May 2013
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley & 60008 Dwight D Eisenhower in the National Railway Museum at York – July 2013
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley & 60009 Union of South Africa at Bury on the East Lancashire Railway – October 2014
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley under overhaul at the National Railway Museum at York -January 2016
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Bridgnorth on the Severn Valley Railway – April 2022
60007 Sir Nigel Gresley at Bradford South Junction – December 2022

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