Taff Vale No. 85
No. 85 was on hire from the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway, but has now returned to the KWVR.
No. 85 was built in 1899 by Neilson Reid for the Taff Vale Railway, which connected the Cardiff area with the coal mining industry located a few miles to the north. When the Taff Vale Railway was taken over by the GWR in 1922 the engine soon became surplus to requirements as the GWR had a policy of standardisation. In 1927 the engine was withdrawn and in 1929 the engine was sold to the Lambton, Hetton & Joicey Colliery Co. in County Durham to haul coal trains between the inland collieries and the coast.
When the coal industry was nationalised in 1947 it became NCB No. 52 and remained in service there until 1968 and following withdrawal arrived on the Worth Valley Railway in December 1970.
lt was re-built to its original outline by a group of Worth Valley volunteers in the 1990’s and gave good service until withdrawal in 2010. Seen as an ideal locomotive for the branch line, TVR No. 85 entered the workshops at Haworth and re-entered service at the 2016 Winter Steam Gala in its original fully lined out Taff Vale Railway livery.
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Steam: Operational fleet
Steam: Pending restoration
Steam: Since departed
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