Rapido Trains UK MR-309B Class 16xx 0-6-0PT National Coal Board NCB Green 1607 Steam Locomotive

The Model Rail 16xx features a die-cast metal body and chassis with plastic detail fittings. A powerful five-pole can motor with flywheel drives the leading axle and the model is DCC ready with a Next18 decoder socket and a factory fitted speaker for those who want to add sound. There is also an illuminated firebox glow effect. 

• Five-pole motor and flywheel
• Heavy die-cast chassis
• Next18 decoder socket and factory fitted sound speaker
• Firebox glow
• NEM couplings
• Sprung Buffers
• Separately supplied etched spare lamp irons – enabling a variety of prototypes to be modelled
• ‘Busby’ spark arrestor chimney fitted to selected models

PROTOTYPE HISTORY

Looks really can be deceiving: these handsome little pannier tanks may look like they date from a time when Queen Victoria sat on the throne but they were actually one of BR’s newest locomotives. Newest doesn’t necessarily mean most modern, however.

The ‘16XX’ was designed by Frederick Hawksworth and his team as a post-war replacement for the ‘2021’ 0-6-0PTs, built introduced in 1901. They kept the 4ft 1 1/2in diameter wheel diameter but were fitted with the Standard No. 16 boiler and other contemporary fittings. Swindon built 70 ‘16XXs’ in three batches between 1949 and 1955, and despite their GWR looks, were 100% BR locomotives.

Lightweight and low height made the ‘16XX’ perfect for many a backwater branch line and industrial location. Beautifully bucolic by-ways, such as the Tanat Valley and the Forest of Dean became favoured ‘16XX’ haunts but the little panniers were also kept busy on short-haul goods working in South Wales and Cornwall, as well as in the main London, Bristol and Birmingham Divisions.

The most curious event in the ‘16XX’ took place in 1957 when No. 1646 was transferred from South Wales to Scotland. The two ex-Highland Railway 0-4-4Ts that worked the Dornock branch had failed - somewhat catastrophically in one case - and the ‘16XX’ was the only locomotive light enough to work the line. No. 1646 was joined by classmate No. 1649 and the pair remained in Scotland until 1962, two years after the branch closed.

Like their post-war ‘15XX’ and ‘94XX’ pannier counterparts, the reduction in rural branch lines and increased dieselisation meant that the ‘16XXs’ were withdrawn with many years of life left in them. No. 1652, for example, entered service in December 1954 and was withdrawn in January 1960.

No. 1628 was the last ‘16XX’ in BR service and was withdrawn in September 1966. Two ‘16XXs’ would have further careers. No. 1607 was withdrawn from Llanelly in August 1965 but was sold to the National Coal Board and would continue to work until 1969.

No. 1638’s outcome was much better. It was bought by the Dart Valley Railway and would work the Totnes-Buckfastleigh line until it was sold to the Kent & East Sussex Railway in 1992. No. 1638 has been on the KESR ever since.