More research into the Nord Express 232s

Beginning to make a little  progress on pinpointing which 232 locomotive I want for my layout.

Basically, there are green ones and black ones. For two reasons, I want a black one: a) because they look more brutal and b) because they seem to have been the ones that definitely pulled the Nord Express out of France, through the Low countries , Germany and on to Copenhagen.

At first, I wasn't sure whether any of the 232s were actually black because there were only monochrome photographs available. And, the Tin Tin magazine cover shows a green one and the Jouef model is also green.

But, this morning I came across a website devoted to the HO scale 232s built by the now (I presume)  defunct French toy manufacturer, JEP.

 

 

The article makes it clear that they were painted in both green and black. These beasts crop up on eBay every now and again at approx £250 which I think is very reasonable. But, I think they are for 3-rail tracks.

There is a model available made by Jouef - I think only second hand - and it's more expensive. But look closely at it:

Firstly, the faring at the front is different on the Jouef from the JEP. The JEP is just a straight slope at the front. The Jouef model is based on the loco at Mulhouse museum:

232 U1 in action

232 U1 at the Mulhouse museum

.Secondly, the white flashing on the Jouef and its real counterpart 232 U1 is more complex than on the JEP. The reason for that is that the rail company knew that the 232 was on its way out and so they adapted the white flashing to look like a stylised Swan as in its swan song.

But to confuse things, here is a 232 which is black, has the basic white flashing but has a faring at the front which is a cross between the JEP and the Jouef.

It's something to do with the letter designations which can be seen on the front of the locos:

232 R; 232 S or 232 U.

Some more photos.



The JEP model.

 

 

232 S 001

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Last night's dinner:

 



Vegetable pakora followed by chicken curry.

 

Pakora

That's coconut sprinkled over it, that is.

 

Been going regularly to this restaurant since 1972 and their basic chicken curry is what I always order.

 

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Peter Grimes:

 

Spent the morning listening to the first half of Benjamin Britten's opera Peter Grimes. Second time of listening and am hugely enjoying it.

 

 

Must find out what it's about!

 

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Life of Pi:

 

Went to cinema last night to see Ang Lee's Life of Pi.

 

Stayed awake but have never seen such a lot of cinematographic effort spent on such a feeble tale.