GWR 4079 Pendennis Castle 'Coaling' at Night, Didcot Railway Centre, Oxfordshire

            Here is another taken after dark at the Timeline Events photo shoot at Didcot Railway Centre. I had just purchased the Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 and this was my first time of using. All images that evening were taken hand held and I am really pleased with the results, even when, on some of the shots, I pushed the ISO to 12800! This image really does not give an inkling of exactly how dark this scene actually was.

Pendennis Castle (4079); The Castle Class 4-6-0 is one of the most celebrated locomotive types of the former Great Western Railway. The prototype, No.4073 ‘Caerphilly Castle’ rolled out of Swindon Works in August 1923, the first of a series that remained in production right up to 1950.

No.4079 ‘Pendennis Castle’ was the seventh of 171 Castles built and was completed at Swindon in February 1924.

‘Pendennis Castle's’ claim to fame dates from 1925 when the GWR lent the locomotive to the London & North Eastern Railway for trials against Sir Nigel Gresley's mighty new Pacifics exemplified by No.4472 ‘Flying Scotsman’. Working 16-coach trains on the East Coast main line from Kings Cross, the stalwart Castle covered itself in soot and glory, thoroughly out-performing its larger competitors. Her exploits were the talk of every schoolboy in Britain and the GWR rather cheekily sent ‘Pendennis Castle’ to stand alongside ‘Flying Scotsman’ at the 1925 British Empire Exhibition at Wembley with a notice proclaiming her to be the most powerful passenger express locomotive in Britain.

Taken on: February 15, 2025

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coaling

steam locomotive

loco shed

night shift

night photography

steam engine

night shoot

night

nighttime

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pendennis castle

4079

nikon d850

Nikon

d850

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Oxfordshire

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timeline events

great western railway

gwr

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scdronemedia

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Sets appears in: • Steam Locomotives

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Camera: Nikon D850, f/2.8, 1/100 sec, 36mm, ISO 12800 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Nikon D850
Lens:	24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture:	f/2.8
Exposure Time:	0.01 sec (1/100)
Focal Length:	36mm
ISO:	12800
Exposure Bias:	-1 EV
Flash:	No Flash
Exposure Program:	Manual
Exposure Mode:	Manual
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Gain Control:	High gain up
Color Space:	Uncalibrated
Software:	Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 14.2 (Windows)
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