Re: Lilydale (and Macleod)

["Exnarc" <gwrly@netspace.net.au>]

MarkBau1 <markbau1@aol.comQQQQyuk> wrote in message
19990821004403.23425.00002223@ng-ff1.aol.com">news:19990821004403.23425.00002223@ng-ff1.aol.com...
> <<<<<Not always we use to remove the half pilot staff at Bayswater
sometimes
> then use
> caution orders for each train often at night when the ATC system went
down.>>>
>
> Hang on a minute,
> Was the pilot staff removed because you had no other way of securing the
signal
> to stop? Removing the pilot staff at your end didn't acheive much, it was
the
> pilot staff at the other end that you needed to worry about as that pilot
staff
> secured the signal toards you. Pleses explain a bit more.
>
> Question for David, I always assumed that withdrawl of the pilot staff
only
> secured the signals at that location, NOT the signals at the other end of
the
> single line section, is that correct?
>
> I think the whole idea of pilot staffs was a transitional thing from good
old 2
> position to more modern signalling. The thought being, I'm sure, that if
the
> new fangled electric systems screwed up you just turned the section into a
good
> old staff section and what better way to do that than to have as the staff
two
> "things" that when withdrawn secured the signals to stop, very definately
> cancelling the CTC or ATC.
>
> I wonder if at the start of ATC/CTC days they were thinking that the
trains
> could just run through the section with both pilot staffs, (no pilotman)
till
> it got fixed, hence the term "staffs"
>
You could be right Mark, I recall in my CR days, that when we learnt
Automatic and Semi Automatic signals, West Kalgoollie to Kalgoolie (I think
that was the name of the system), the rules allowed for the two pilot staffs
to be screwed together to form a staff in the case of a system failure.

So long ago I could be wrong but I think that was how it went?

Bob.