GWR King class 4-6-0 No 6018 King Henry VI departs from Kings Cross with its first familiarisation run on the 1.10pm Leeds express on May 18, 1948 during the 1948 Locomotive Exchanges. The Western Region was represented by 6018 in the express passenger category in the Exchanges organised by the newly nationalised British Railways. The engines were to be worked in normal service on existing timings over selected routes, with dynamometer cars attached to the trains to record speeds and other essential data. Unfortunately, the King’s participation was limited to the Western and Eastern Regions because it could not work on the London Midland and Southern Regions, its width over cylinders being too great for their platform clearances. The engines running on “foreign” lines firstly worked pre-test familiarisation runs and then the following week, the actual test runs with dynamometer cars attached.
Photo: John P. Wilson/Rail Archive Stephenson