THE run down of the Class 50 fleet began in 1987, when No. 50011 Centurion was taken out of traffic for use as a testbed in connection with Class 50 power unit overhauls at Crewe Works.
British Rail had introduced a new Cost Effective Maintenance (CEM) regime, whereby instead of being dispatched to a BREL Works for overhaul, locomotives would undergo a major exam at a depot, with components being sent away for attention. For many years, Class 50s had been traditionally overhauled at Doncaster, but under the new procedure, they would undergo an F-exam at Laira, with power units being sent to Crewe.
By the end of 1989, the fleet had been reduced further, with 13 more ‘50s’ having been withdrawn for various reasons; among these were major failures, the withdrawal of the fleet from parcels use and the loss of Provincial Services work following the continued ‘Sprinterisation’ of many routes.
At the start of the new decade in January 1990, regular passenger diagrams were, in the main, restricted to two routes – Paddington to Oxford (Table 116) and Waterloo to Exeter (Table 145). InterCity work had largely ceased in 1987, but a few Cross-Country services, mainly into and out of Paddington, remained in the hands of 50s, as did some summer weekend workings to/from the West Country.
Other locomotives were allocated to Civil Engineers departmental duties, primarily in Devon and Cornwall.
The writing was already on the wall for the ‘50’ workings on services between Paddington and Oxford. Network SouthEast had already transferred some of its
