Rob, not to be confused with Robin is a tender engine.
Rob is a Somerset and Dorset 7F 2-8-0 tender engine who made an apprentice in Festive Spirit at Christmas time in 1963 he arrives for Christmas at the sheds after bringing the circus train into London.
Trivia
- Rob was named after Dcg12b's YouTube user friend, Robtheredengine.[1]
- The engine carrying Rob's number, 53809, is currently preserved at the Midland Railway in Butterly.
- Rob was involved in an accident in 1959 at Two Tunnels, Bath, where he crashed into the back of a freight train after his crew passed out from lack of sufficient ventilation, and part of this was due to him being fitted with a larger boiler when built for unknown reasons, but re-entered traffic with a standard Midland Railway boiler like that of Midland Railway no. 1000, and the rest of the five Newcastle built 7Fs were modified to prevent accidents like 53809's ever again.
- Rob was one of two SDJR 7Fs bought from Barry scrapyard, the other 7F being his 'predecessor' of sorts, 53808.
- In real life, Rob was mainline certified in the 1980s, being the first 7F to be used for such a duty since the last of his brothers were condemned for scrap in 1964.
- Rob's brothers were said to do sixty miles per hour in service days.
- The 7Fs were often used for piloting the 'West Country'/'Battle of Britain' Pacifics of the Southern Region over the Somerset & Dorset Region with such trains as the 'Pines Express' in the 1950s, as their adhesion wasn't very great for hill-climbing below twenty mph.