Author: Digital Minion

NEWS RELEASE: Embargoed until 31/03/2020 23:59Unique 4VEP converted to Dual Voltage EMU. Strawberry Hill Depot, London.The Southern Electric Traction Group has announced that, thanks to work carried out in strictest secrecy at Bombardier UK's Ilford works three years ago, unique 4VEP No. 423 417 is to become the first Southern Region Mark One EMU to become dual-voltage. As originally built, the 4VEP, currently under restoration by the Southern Electric Traction Group at Strawberry Hill Depot, was built to accept traction power from the 750V DC Third Rail network. However, in the interests of ensuring the long-term operability of the unit, the SETG have masterminded the conversion of the unit to dual voltage, meaning that it will be able to run under its own power on either the 750V DC third…

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Editors Note: Good morning, Followers of the VEP. Apologies for the period of radio silence. As you're all well aware by now, Real Life is a cruel mistress which conspires to keep us railway herberts away from 3417 and dealing with annoyingly grown up things. However, Adulting has once again been put on hold to allow us to continue gainful tinkering with the worlds only working 4VEP. And on that note, I had you over to Chris Buckland, SETG CM&EE, to inform you all of progress and bring all that's newest in news, gossip and abuse aimed at myself. Regards, Potter "It's been a while since the Minions have been at Strawberry Hill; things like holidays, drinking, eating and the like have got in the way (and the Big Railway, as…

And now, the Senior Spanner Monkey Speaks... "TONIGHT WE WAS MOVIE STARS” Turned up at Strawberry in a blaze of sunshine. It’s nice to see the Sun (I'm a frustrated Michael Fish), and proceeded to adhere to Section 4 Sub Section 6 but unfortunately found myself unable to carry out the instruction fully as there was NO MILK. That’s not strictly true, there was milk but it had turned into a rather strange looking cheese that I'm sure anyone would eat. I have an idea; lets cultivate it, sell it to the French, make lots of money and add the profits to the JustGiving site (details below): https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/4VEP3417 Any opportunity to plug the fund!! Back to the job in hand! Emergency text sent to Potter "GET MILK" as the job will fall to…

Good Afternoon, dear reader. As you may or may not be aware, last night we - the humble scrotes of Strawberry Hill - entertained a celebrity for an evening. Mr Tim Dunn, noted railway historian, railway geek and host of the BBC's Transporting Live, joined us for the evening. The idea was to raise awareness of the work we're doing at Strawberry Hill and of course to add some final impetus to the SETG's fund-raising endeavours on behalf of the Bluebell Railway. I could bore you with the ins-and-outs of the evening, but to be honest you're best off watching either the Periscope Feed or Facebook feed and judge our efforts for yourselves. All I can say with any certainty is that we reached 3,000 viewers live; not too shabby…

And now, as promised - it's a report from Trousers! "Chaps, A small update this time as we were unable to do a full days work. I had a date in the evening with a train, on which beer is sold and is hauled by a steam loco to celebrate my advancing years! (Happy Birthday, mate! - Potter) I carried on with the cab restoration in the country end cab. This involved removing some stubborn screws which had probably been in place since the unit was built! They were (eventually) removed and a new panel cut for fitting under the cab window on the second man's side. After much measuring, getting up and down from the unit, trimming bits, swearing and trying not to break the fragile bits, the panel was fitted!…

ood Morning, Friends of the VEP. For those of you that haven't been shamelessly and obsessively following us on Twitter and Facebook (For shame! Naughty you! Hold your head in sorrow & embarrassment and stand in the Naughty Corner), the Bluebell Railway came a'calling on Saturday. To say that we have been nervous about this impending meeting would be an understatement. For myself and Oscar it meant meeting some VIPs, for Bucky it meant meeting the men who were the BR Top Brass when he started as a spotty apprentice in the early 1980s. So where two of us were nervous, one of us was transformed from a confident depot manager in charge of a multi-million pound fleet of machinery into an overawed teenager, but more of that later in Bucky's…

Good morning, Reader! Herein lies the tale of work carried out on 04/03/17, submitted by Trousers himself. Enjoy! Potter "Thin on the ground number wise due to holidays, running errands for fellow preservationists and most importantly running errands for us but I was still able to get a fair amount done. We have received a kind (and large) donation of lighting inverters but were not told if they were any good or not so the first job this morning was to set about testing them to ensure they were suitable for our use. Success! One was tried in the B compartment of 76262 and it worked perfectly. We now have full lighting in this end. As tempted as I was to carry on through the unit and get more lights working…