The Jubilee line trains are being refurbished at the moment, and some bits of the old trains are coming up for sale.
First up is a collection of door buttons — the one’s you never pushed to open the doors but were added anyway as people get weirded out about being inside trains with doors that don’t have buttons.
OK, even for a transport nerd, it’s a bit odd and you’ll probably need to explain what it is if buying one as a gift, but it’s a talking point to have on the mantelpiece, or converted into a working button for something in the house.
They’re also a bit of a bargain price, being just £10 each.
You can have a look here.
The London Transport Museum is also selling off other chunks of discarded Underground, albeit for rather higher prices.
There’s also usually sales at the Acton Depot weekends, and I personally was very tempted by the idea of buying a length of tube carriage door footplate to use on the front-door step at a future home I might possibly one day win enough money to own.
I got mine today, unfortunately it was swimming in water, so no chance of using the light now
Hi, my partner and I were bought one of these each for Christmas and both were swimming in water. My partner eagerly took his apart, cleaned it, dried it and (being a former electrician) wired up the lights to a battery (NOT mains electricity) – the lights still worked. So please don’t lose heart because of the water, it should still be a functioning item 🙂
I purchased one of these back in September and have collated some information on the internal circuitry here: https://github.com/futureshape/jubilee-line-button
And a photographic teardown of the internals on this twitter thread: https://twitter.com/IgnoredAmbience/status/1032254978373640192
I’m yet to finish restoring or putting a use to my two. 🙁
For anyone interested in this kind of stuff, have a look at transport auctions of London, they have quarterly auctions of transport stuff and you can bid online too!
I think this idea of buying London underground bits &Babs is Totally Crazy it’s not For me I was Annoyed when the spice girls bus was sold it should have went to a Museum where is it now The Island of Arran I love being things I would go to the Christmas market in glasgow
Of course the reason for the buttons was to give passengers control and stop people freezing on winter days when no-one needed to get on or off, and to remove guards. They were used in the 90s. But I gather ‘dwell times’ were too long and so they were switched off and then removed. But buttons stay on many other lines.
Most tube train doors will open automatically by the driver pressing the button to open the doors and to close the doors. When the train departs from the station. Without holding up other trains and causing severe delays.
Hello Ian – My brother Nic in Ottawa, and me, Rodney, on Vancouver Island, are ex-Londoners and follow your excellent weekly sites. You cover every angle with a thorough but gentle touch, so needed in this crazy world.
This is a congratulatory note to you and your colleagues. Well done, and keep up the challenging work!
Rodney