Hastings DEMU c1986

Super 8 sound film taken on the Hastings line shortly before the DEMUs gave way to electric traction. Kodachrome film, Canon cine camera.

[@francishuddy9462]

I used to live in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, about half way between Hastings and London Charing Cross. I used to love the roar of those thumpers pulling into Tunbridge Wells Central station, going up to London. Or, the down train roaring through the Mount Pleasant tunnel as it slowed into Tunbridge Wells Central. The trains were extra narrow due to the tunnels; they also had those orange curtains.

[@mattwidermann4806]

I remember these rumbling past our back garden in Petts Wood. I liked the EPBs and my 9 year old self didn’t consider these as proper trains. Little did I know I was witnessing legends.

[@OlafProt]

I grew up in Dorking (born 1972) with the Reading-Redhill-Tonbridge line running behind my house so the sound of the 206 Tadpole Units was as familiar as bread and butter, just like these. Such a wonderful sound. I think when I was very little I found standing on the platform next to the engine room quite scary! I travelled on them right up until they were replaced by the Class 117 DMUs in about 1979-1980. The tadpoles always had one carriage with the orange curtains too! We used to travel to Gomshall quite a lot as kids to see Grandparents and when we were heading home they used to thunder down the hill from Guildford direction and I still have a clear memory of how they rocked from side to side on the tracks as they went over the pedestrian crossing for the staggered platform. Thanks for this - you truly cannot beat Super8 with sound for quality from days gone by!! And the guard and platform staff stuff is priceless!

[@nigelarmstrong252]

Not sure why it suddenly showed up but great stuff none-the-less. Being near East Grinstead, we had the normal width DEMUs and they had a great sound. Travelled them many a time up to London. Also my earliest memory of them is from 1969 when one was going through Grange Road, Crawley Down on the Tunbridge Wells to Three Bridges line. Long since lifted but would be very busy today with Gatwick nearby and the new, massive Railway depot at Three Bridges now. Thanks for the upload.

[@user-wo6qn3vf9n]

Great video, great units, great sound and great memories. I travelled on the last unit from Hastings to London in May 86.

[@hastingsdiesels]

This is great stuff, thank you so much for filming this at the time, and now going to the considerable trouble of getting this transferred at such quality into digital format and sharing it with the world!

[@Southerntrainspotter315]

Wow

[@riverhuntingdon6659]

Saw Gungy Grinham, the Guard, on the High Brooms footage. Wish those old DEMUs were still going. 1011 and 1013 remained for a while on Marshlink and Uckfield line services, 1002 was also truncated and used as Sandite "1066" from memory. Must've been shot about the time we had the Gala Day, for the "new" leccies. Some were older than the DEMUs they replaced haha. There were so many characters then too. Take Sid at Hastings, on the platform, "Put it in the crusher mate !" Harry Stevens and his legendary broom, The Rev, Ernie and his quacking duck over the PA and of course, "Johnson old son". And Barbara, knit one, pearl one, tell one to ring back when you've got more manners, in the TEB. To mention just a few. Glad I'm finished with it, the good days have gone now.

[@prof.hectorholbrook4692]

Just EXCELLENT to hear those wonderful units in full song again! I remember their Buffet Car days - fresh egg on toast & strong coffee between Bo Peep Junction & Tonbridge en-route to Charing Cross! (Seriously). LOVELY!

[@RUOKH]

Commuted on the Thumpers for years. Oh that engine sound! And the Gin & Tonics in the Buffet Car on the 18:00 hours from Charing Cross. Thanks for the memories.

[@tjfSIM]

Forever grateful to dedicated people who took the trouble to capture this, and then transfer it to digital format so we can all enjoy it. Thank you :)

[@noelhass3712]

Love that "English Electric growl" brings back memories of driving 500 & 800 class E.E locos at Port Adelaide, South Australia in 1980's.

[@611unterscharfuhrer]

I remember these, throbbing thro London bridge in the dark winter months, with the orange curtains and the little lamps, windows misted up, brilliant

[@norbertnedsworth7172]

You are Philip Larkin and I claim my £5.!

[@batman51]

Because everything was run off the diesel engine, the lights tented to brighten and fade according to acceleration. There was of course a control mechanism to stabilise the current but I recall on at least one occasion this failed and most of the light bulbs in the train went "pop".

[@1258-Eckhart]

Some excellent catches preserved for all time - particularly the double unit with 12 carriages, thanks!

[@gordy4459]

Some really brilliant clips...made many trips on these old thumpers down to Hastings and up to Charing Cross...great to see my old hometown station Battle on some clips too!!...👍🙂🙂

[@Broadercasting]

I lived in Conqueror Road, St Leonards, and the 12 carriage thrash from Filsham Road bridge through up to Harley Shute Road bridge over the South Saxons was a constant backgound to my Teen years in the '70's along with the seventeen arches, then still extant. Dad commuted to Cannon St. Happier days.

[@Froobyone]

Lived on Station Road in Robertsbridge from 76-79. This was the soundtrack of my youth. I'll never forget it.

[@jasonl4411.]

Something that's long gone. The internal mail bags

[@francishuddy9462]

Really excellent film. Thanks 👍

[@garypollard9736]

Thank you for sharing, these Hastings units were a regular turn for us at Salisbury, working the Saturday Brighton to Exeter service (headcode 11) they managed really well between Salisbury and Exeter. The sounds brought back wonderful memories of my footplate career.

[@Martindyna]

Fantastic footage of these beautiful old trains, i miss them on the Basingstoke to Reading line. Good to see the long train of 12 cars @ 6:47. if I remember rightly the maximum permissable was 15 cars.

[@norbertnedsworth7172]

Glorious. Somehow looks more 'real' than digital. Thanks for posting

[@christopherbraiden6713]

Thanks for a stunning filmed video. Just got to look these old thumpers great old sounding trains😎🚃🚃🚃🇬🇧

[@des_smith7658]

Goodbye to all the "1066 line" trains, and the fun we had

[@LinesideSouthEast]

Very enjoyable watch. Certainly better quality than the amateur video that was available at the time.

[@mattmaz2]

Fantastic footage! Thanks for sharing :-) i remember travelling on the Hastings line on the day of the first EMUs from Tunbridge Wells to Battle. (Complete fluke as it was a day trip out with grandparents lol).

[@ASCIITerminal]

Amazing shots, and just how I remember it from when I was a lad. Amazing how much has changed and how much has stayed the same. Things went downhill once the line was electrified.

[@mattapacca]

Superb quality footage from 8mm film. Excellent!

[@tobysummers471]

Fantastic films on this channel ! and it’s brilliant quality for super 8 ! How things have changed now. Thank you for posting !

[@timothyparsons8327]

Pure magic! Interesting to note, the first few units were shorter in length: 57’ , or so, against the longer wheelbase cars of 64’ (or so) , eg: 1001 of the former length, and, say, 1034 of the latter. In 1979 I started collecting unit SIDE numbers, and copped most of these at Charing Cross. Unfortunately I never rode on one of these units, in their service days, neither have I been to Hastings!

[@fenderac3049]

Yes units 1001-7 were 58' long and the later units were 64' 6" long.

[@NatWhilc1963]

Excellent footage and thanks for sharing it with us. This really brought back memories for me, of great days and happy times on a wonderful Southern Region that has been consigned to history. Thanks again.

[@HSTPaul]

A lot of very good footage there, wish I could go back to those days, as they were before my time. Thanks for sharing

[@AllensTrains]

Excellent suoer 8 footage which is better than the video of that time. Shows the now demolished water tower and platform1 road.

[@EM-yk1dw]

Superb footage. I used to bunk off school and go down to Hastings on these!

[@glenjarnold]

Fabulous memories!

[@grantbeerling4396]

Brings back memories Charing Cross to T/wells...love the engine noise... 1980's Sevenoaks tunnel was always cool and noisy...

[@billcobbett9259]

Did that journey a few times to visit a young lady nr Sevenoaks

[@AndreiTupolev]

Caught the sound very nicely there, particularly good at 3:00 where you can even hear the cooling fans notching up .

[@SussexHistory]

At Hastings, the old west yard signal box, used as a store, is in evidence. The old water tower puts in an appearance as the DEMU pulls out of platform 4. Truly historic footage!

[@strains3551]

Great video , thanks for sharing it . Remember these always coming out in the morning out west marina depot waiting patiently to cross bo peep by west marina station site

[@geoffbarry9540]

I've watched this before but today I realised how deeply I'd absorbed Hastings, Battle, the entire line to London and the Hastings units over the last 50 years generally but also, in terms of the places and the railway, while we were living in St Leonards between 2002 and 2006. I've got a 4-COR ordered from Silver Fox in 2021 but I keep wondering whether I should change it for a Hastings 6L. And I never travelled on one...I was still living in London at the time of the Hither Green derailment, so I suppose it's not surprising that the Hastings units have held the fascination for so long.

[@markslater3842]

A superb film of the old “Thumpers”

[@wilhelmtauber836]

Superb and professional filming, a true delight to watch. These 'first generation' diesels of the BR Modernization Plan all had character and a charm of their own. Sadly missed by us all. In the first shot at Hastings, was that you Dave R hanging out of the window?

[@stephenpowell5912]

Classic Clag there from these Amazing Commuter trains

[@antonydicesare4632]

What a sound

[@simoncatt95]

Actually, the 1st train has a head-code of 23, so it was a Cannon Street to Hastings train, not a Charing Cross to Hastings train.

[@joeking5310]

Only went on these inter city bog carts a few times in the 60's & 70's unfortunately. Great units, but those tiny corridors!

[@AlanAlanAlan161]

I was a local Enthusiast. did the last run from Uckfield to T.wells West in 3H 1125

[@williamradford8817]

1886, the year of the Chernobyl N.P.P disaster, the good old six coach D.E.M.U's we used to have on the Hastings to Charring cross line.

[@grahampearson5670]

The 6B sets from the Hastings profile Diesel Electric Multiple Unit series lost their buffet cars in the early 1980s and were latterly known as 5L sets.

[@justinobrien3593]

I love these they remind me of a chopper as they sound exactly the same as a class 20 loco 😜

[@22pcirish]

Same turbo charger.

[@bingbong7316]

Interesting that the first unit has the motor carriage from a 6S leading and a 6L trailing. Pick'n'mix.

[@blissy1]

Don’t know much about these trains, but have gained some knowledge in the last month or so, is this train at Thumper! Is that right

[@EM-yk1dw]

Yes I was there riding them.

[@CreRay]

Fantastic footage, I'm very impressed with video and audio quality! Nice to hear these units on full song, could they be the biggest 4 cylinder engines ever used in land vehicles of any art?

[@strains3551]

South Saxons fields before they build that school 😮 👍

[@MrEvilproductions]

Were they the best? Probably not. But they had character. All trains did. Nowadays, they all sound the same or just the same thing in a different livery.

[@itsallabouttheclag]

Happy Days Andy 👍

[@grahamroffey1566]

very good, what format was it originally recorded on? Hi8 and SVHS were not out then.

[@itsallabouttheclag]

Graham Roffey cinefilm 8mm or 16 mm

[@gloriouskodachrome]

the format was super 8 cine film, some cameras were able to record sound onto a magnetic stripe on the edge of the film.

[@AndreiTupolev]

The shot at High Brooms is interesting, as these were withdrawn in May '86 weren't they, just before Network Southeast was launched, but there's freshly painted red lamp posts. Getting some stealth repainting in early?

[@toddhunter5257]

I always thought these trains were a bit odd, from the front it looks like the EPBs then some of the cars look like they are from the CEPs and then the whole thing is diesel powered! It's great! 😉

[@batman51]

The first time I saw one approaching, in the mid '50s, I thought it was and electric train on fire !

[@richardclarke376]

super narrow to fit through some medieval tunnel on the line apparently

[@bingbong7316]

Two tunnels; the contractor only used a single brick lining instead of three. Once that was fixed, everything had to breathe in.

[@GreatBarrWolf]

These trains appear a little odd having a flat straight front end, It gives the impression that something is missing, or a loco needs attaching to the front. The primitive aero dynamics must certainly of increased fuel consumption.

[@stevehillier7018]

Anyone know what happened to the crew of the train that crashed at Hither Green in 1967. Seen pictures of Driver Don Purves and Guard John Grey . Did they ever work again after that tragic accident.

[@timratnett4243]

Don Purves continued to drive and later went into the Shunt link at St Leonards depot.

[@stevehillier7018]

@@timratnett4243 thanks for letting me know. That must have been awful to live with even though it wasn’t his fault

[@railwayhonza]

class 201s are the best diesel trains on the southastern mainline

[@bennickss]

Do the 205s have the same engine as the 20/40s, they sound very similar

[@bingbong7316]

Basically the same, 4 cylinder versions vs the Chopper's 8 cylinder.

[@Southerntrainspotter315]

3:57 its 201 001

[@jameshodgson5644]

Ugly, slow, noisy and smelly things but had a certain charm! Used to like traveling on the hourly ‘fast’ service non stop from Tunbridge Wells to Battle thundering through the intermediate stations

[@spiccybaby]

They took a while to wind up to speed, but more power cars were kind of more than the sum of their parts - a "Tadpole" with 500hp was meh; a 6S/6L with 1000hp was ok; two 6-cars in formation with 2000hp, now we're motoring.

[@ianjones4116]

Should have been Refurbished and given to TFW,, Would be fat better than a 2car 158 on the Cambrian . 😁😎👍