35005 Canadian Pacific DVD

Description

Merchant Navy Class 35005 Canadian Pacific – The Story of the Oldest Surviving Bulleid Pacific

The story of this remarkable surviving member of the wartime-built Merchant Navy Class. No. 35005 Canadian Pacific was constructed at nearby Eastleigh Railway Works during the middle of hostilities in World War Two.

No. 35005 emerged from the Works in late December 1941 looking very different from today as it was in O V S Bulleids original design with flat side boiler casing and all the valve gear from its three cylinders contained within an oil bath between the frames.

During the mid-1950s it was decided to rebuild the whole class with a more traditional look and outside valve gear and many other improvements.

Canadian Pacific would receive that rebuild in mid-1959.

With the demise of steam on the Southern Region beckoning, the locomotive was withdrawn from service just six years later from its final depot at Weymouth in 1965.

Luckily for this and nine other members of the merchants, they would end up at Barry in South Wales and a scrapyard that held onto most of its rows of engines.

The engine was bought and moved to Lancashire in 1973 and then re-sold privately for restoration at the Great Central Railway.

A term of operating at the GCR and then on the main line in blue livery followed until it was moved to the Mid-Hants Railway for more main line work.

In 2006 the locomotive was sold to the MHR and withdrawn for overhaul two years later.

In 2025 Canadian Pacific was re-launched following an extensive overhaul costing over £1.2m involving heritage lottery and some match funding.

This programme looks at the early life in preservation of 35005 and the latest overhaul in detail with exclusive footage of the boiler overhaul and re-introduction to service.

Approx 50 minutes.