Today is revealed another part of the Basilica Fields story; a small corner of questions, puzzles and conundrums which have arisen during our researches into the prototype whilst joining up the dots of Adrian’s alternative world. If it helps, consider Quirky Queries as a visit to an Antiques Roadshow event just after the presenters have gone to lunch… lots of interesting objet d’art to discuss and no explanations forthcoming. In truth, Quirky Queries may be just a name on the bottom drawer of a filing cabinet where an unfinished thread dillies and dangles whilst we delve for the light at the end of the tunnel….
For those who have followed the Basilica Fields journal over the last fifteen months or so then you may have noted the occasional Quirky Query in some of our earlier posts… for example: Why did the GWR send examples of the ‘633’ class with condensing gear to Wales whilst at the same time requiring condensing engines for the goods service to Smithfield Market?
So make this part of the Basilica Fields journal your space, where your contributions provide the answers to our questions and you shed light on our confusion.
Thank you and please continue to add to history.
Graham Beare
Basilica Fields 
April 23, 2011 at 4:00 pm
633 class
How about the GWR found the Metro tanks were capable of hauling 10 x 4-wheel coaches full of commuters round the north part of the Circle line, so decided/found that they could also haul the goods trains during the night hours, thus the 633 class were not needed in London. Only supposition, mind, not fact.
April 28, 2011 at 9:32 pm
Thank you John for contributing to a discussion on this question.
Adrian’s original post contains what information I could extract from the GWR Engine Allocation Registers and from the Great Western Railway Journal. The picture which emerged is one of the ‘633’ class being “put out to pasture” in South and West Wales until circa 1900 when those engines with condensing apparatus were recalled to the London Division, presumably for working over the ‘Main Line’ of the Metropolitan Railway.
Now if the ‘Metro’ tanks were capable of working the passenger services over the Metropolitan lines, were those engines capable of working the goods services to Smithfield and capable of working those services to timings required by the Metropolitan Railway? Maybe the ‘633’ engines were needed to work the goods services whilst the ‘Metro’ tanks worked the passenger services.
If the ‘633’ engines were transferred to Wales because the ‘Metro’ engines could manage the services through the tunnels towards Moorgate, what interpretation should we place upon the post-1902 Engine Allocations for the ‘633’ class. After 1902, the only ‘633’engines which were recalled to the London Division were those fitted with condensing gear and those engines were allocated to sheds where one could expect to find allocations of ‘Metro’ tanks. Further, some of the sheds which received the condenser-fitted examples of the ‘633’ clas are not likely to have operated the goods services over the Metropolitan lines, ie. one can infer that the condensing-fitted ‘633’ engines were working passenger services turn and turn about with engines from the ‘Metro’ class.
Of course, resolving this “Quirky Query” is not necessarily going to advance the cause of Basilica Fields. However, trying to understand which engine classes worked what services over the Metropolitan lines is a fascinating subject and warrants space in the journal.
Thank you John for providing the copies of the GWR registers and thereby shedding some light on the questions raised here.
regards, Graham