The South West Railfreight Preservation Groups fleet grows again, BR 20t brakevan B954673 has, today, left its old home of the Helston Railway to head to Marsh Mills at the Plym Valley Railway to join the rest of the fleet. Requires a lot of work so will be a long term project!

Mazey Day 2025 sees D1015 "Western Champion" and LSL 43055/43049 making a trip to Penzance. Seen here near Redruth and Par. 28/06/25 Richard Clinnick

50021 arrived today from Accurascale. Now, I wouldn't of bought a second one if I didn't like these models. They're really nice BUT, these steps coming off is a right pain in the butt! So niggly to get back on, buffers won't come off easily on this one so leaving it off I shall!

Oh how coal haulage changed from the HEAs of the 80s to the HTAs of the 00s....

Accurascale 50021 "Rodney" takes charge of a service off Polcarne....

GB Railfreight will haul Belmond Britannic Explorer — the UK’s first luxury sleeper across England & Wales. Launching summer 2025, with Class 99 bi-mode locos joining in 2027. Read more here; gbrailfreight.com/gb-railfreight… #GBRf #BritannicExplorer #Class99 #RailFreight

A really simple rebrand and weathering jobs but still one my of favourite models to run. 150248, one of two ex-Reggie railways Class 150/2s in the fleet. Cab window details like the non multi sticker and new destinations really give the unit a unique look.

First post! We're the SWRPG (for short) doing our bit to preserve the ever changing face of RailFreight in the South West. We currently have three vehicles in our fleet: CDA 375030 OCA 112010 CAR B954673 All three are current on-going projects! Come on our journey with us!

If you could go follow our little preservation group on X I'd love you forever!

Withdrawn in 2023, CDA 375030 was the first item of rolling stock we purchased. Bought direct from DB Cargo UK it was moved by rail to Par Docks and then by road to Marsh Mills where restoration work started a month or two later. First job was cleaning A LOT of clay off!

May 2024 saw the first sightings of ECC blue on the wagon. The first job was to replace the easysheet on the roof. We opted for a ECC blue sheet to replace the faded EWS era one. Not something you can see at eye ground level but it had to be done!! Paint followed shortly after!

The next few working sessions on 375030 were mainly removing rust, clay and parts to then prime and paint ECC blue! At this point we were getting very excited for graphics and the reveal on the 11th August 2024, a year since the CDAs withdrawal from the mainline.

3rd August saw CDA 375030 receive some of the new graphics. The ECC logo not seen on a CDA wagon since the 80s. We spent the day applying to the two large logos, new TOPs codes, new ID numbers, new easysheet instructions and overhead warning flashes! T-minus 8 days until reveal

New addition to the fleet arrived today - Mainline 09019, this 09 shunter was based at St Blazey for a while in a faded Mainline blue. Weathering experts, how is paint fading done?

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Then came 11th August 2024. One year after the CDAs took their last trip on the mainline we unveiled 375030 in it's full cosmetically restored look. We took the opportunity to take the wagon up to Plym Bridge for the first time before the days timetable started up.

The next project for our group wasn't on a wagon we owned! Dogfish DB992730 is a PVR owned wagon but after 13+ years in primer it definitely required some TLC. As part of the agreement of calling the PVR our home, we were asked to work on some home fleet vehicles too!

Once work started it continued at a nice pace. DB992730 was a nice wagon to work on owing to all the large flat sides, the less we say about the framework on the ends the better... We grinded the sides, removing any old paint and green! Then repainting in a new fresh primer

Well thats not gone well. Return it is!

A fascinating follow of some quite frankly very important preservation projects. There’s a lot going on care of Redwater Train Care Depot #TMRGUK 👍🏻