BR Period Locomotives: lnwrbns_br1979

British Railways Type 4 1Co-Co1 D292 is seen being detached from the Southbound Pines Express on Saturday 23rd December 1961. Based at Crewe North at the time of the photograph D292 had been built in September 1960 and remained in service until November 1982 when it was withdrawn from Longsight shed in Manchester and after storage at Swindon works was scrapped in March 1986. British Railways originally ordered ten Class 40s, then known as "English Electric Type 4s", as evaluation prototypes.

They were built at the Vulcan Foundry in Newton-le-Willows, Lancashire and the first locomotive, D200, was delivered in March 1958 making its passenger debut on an express train from London Liverpool Street to Norwich on 18 April 1958. After the success of the prototypes, another 190 locomotives were ordered by British Railways, and were numbered from D210 to D399. All were built at Vulcan Foundry, except a batch of twenty (Nos. D305–D324) which were built at Robert Stephenson and Hawthorns factory in Darlington. All the locomotives were painted in the British Railways diesel green livery, and the final locomotive, D399, was delivered in September 1962.

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