Glasgow Sleepers

[gswindale]

Quick question about these for an act I'm doing on Glasgow-Carlisle:

According to the information I have found; the lowland sleeper from London - Glasgow/Edinburgh splits at Carstairs and is scheduled to arrive there at 06:20.

Presumably the front portion of the trains heads onto Glasgow whilst the rear does some sort of reversing/shuffle around the station to head to Edinburgh?

What time would the Glasgow portion of the train leave Carstairs as all I can find is an arrival time - I know it should arrive at Motherwell at 07:01 which suggests it should leave about 6:45 (based on my timings in MSTS); however I would be grateful for clarification.

[NiallGray]

Unfortunately getting an act spot on for the sleeper is not going to happen as the track layout at Carstairs is wrong. The Edinburgh portion is timetabled to leave Carstairs around 6.45am (varies depending on day of the week) so I would guess you'd need to leave a few minutes earlier.

I think the top speed of the sleeper is about 75-80mph, so I don't think a 6.45am departure from Carstairs will be enough time.

If you haven't already, every time I see the sleeper it's been in platform 10, and it might be worth sticking a loco on Polmadie depot as around 8.15pm the sleeper is hauled to Polmadie for cleaning. Normally I'd see a EW S67 on the sleeper ECS, but I've also seen 92s, a 66 and the odd occasion the ECS was worked by 37425 (before it was taken out of service).

[NiallGray]

Ignore the bit about sticking a loco on Polmadie, forgot most of the time they'd be working light from Mossend to Central.

[gswindale]

Unfortunately getting an act spot on for the sleeper is not going to happen as the track layout at Carstairs is wrong. The Edinburgh portion is timetabled to leave Carstairs around 6.45am (varies depending on day of the week) so I would guess you'd need to leave a few minutes earlier.

Cheers for that Niall,

Was thinking of leaving about 6:35/6:40 which seems to work OK in my test run last night. I had spotted that the layout is wrong at Carstairs (I may simply omit the Edinburgh portion of the train for simplicity - cancelled due to engineering works maybe?)

[AlistairW]

cancelled due to engineering works maybe?)

Or that portion was diverted by the East Coast

[NiallGray]

cancelled due to engineering works maybe?)

Or that portion was diverted by the East Coast

Very valid suggestion and entirely plausible, and you could get away with a slightly later off time from Carstairs (as longer via East Coast), which might make the morning a little lighter.