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Description
The British Rail Class 87 was a later development of the standard AC locomotives on the West Coast Main Line, the Class 86s, and was produced by BREL from 1973 - 1975. 36 locomotives were produced in total, and all were destined for express passenger work on the Intercity routes from London to the north west of England and Scotland. They were the flagship engines of the WCML until the late 1980s when the Class 90 started to appear.

All the locomotives had the standard system of tap changer converter with rectifiers, however the final loco produced was given a thyristor power control system, and due to this was numbered as 87101, the only /1 Class 87 there ever was. This passed to EWS after privatisation, and due to a major failiure in 1999 was withdrawn, and sold to Alstom for spares, eventually being scrapped by the HNRC at Barrow Hill in 2002.

The remaining locomotives remained on the WCML with Virgin, until 2005 with the advent of the Pendolino, and the class was withdrawn completely by Virgin. Upon withdrawal, the locos passed to various operators, including DRS (who have 4 in storage), Cotswold Rail (who had up to 8 in service for charter services, of which only two ran, all the locomotives then went off lease shortly afterwards) and First GBRf (who used the 4 strong fleet on express parcels services and as thunderbird units for the Class 325 mail unit fleet, all have now been withdrawn).

In 2006, under a negotiation between Porterbrook and Romic-Ace International PTE Ltd, 87012 and 87019 were sold to a Bulgarian operator, the transfer taking place after Bulgaria's accession into the EU to avoid customs issues. Following successful trials with these two locomotives, the entire inactive fleet (not including preserved locos) was transferred to Bulgarian Railroad Company (BRC) over a period between 2008 and 2009, with the reactivation process taking place at Long Marston by Electric Traction Ltd.

Three locomotives have however been preserved in the UK, 87001 "Royal Scot" was preserved as part of the National Collection of locomotives, and is currently on static display in the NRM at York. A further locomotive, 87035 "Robert Burns" is based at The Railway Age in Crewe, after being handed over by former owners Porterbrook at the Crewe Works open day on 10th September 2005. And then there's the locomotive we see here stabled in Prestons platform 4C, 87002 "Royal Sovereign", which is owned by the AC Locomotive Group and is leased to First GBRf for use on the mail duties during the festive period, and the run up to it, along with the ETL Class 86s. In fact, while it was sat here the word was going round she had failed, when that very evening she raised her pantograph to the overhead wires and moved to the front of a mail service from Sheildmuir in Scotland to Warrington RMT, and hauled the three Class 325 EMUs forming the service onward to Warrington where she is normally based.

Description
The British Rail Class 87 was a later development of the standard AC locomotives on the West Coast Main Line, the Class 86s, and was produced by BREL from 1973 - 1975. 36 locomotives were produced in total, and all were destined for express passenger work on the Intercity routes from London to the north west of England and Scotland. They were the flagship engines of the WCML until the late 1980s when the Class 90 started to appear.

All the locomotives had the standard system of tap changer converter with rectifiers, however the final loco produced was given a thyristor power control system, and due to this was numbered as 87101, the only /1 Class 87 there ever was. This passed to EWS after privatisation, and due to a major failiure in 1999 was withdrawn, and sold to Alstom for spares, eventually being scrapped by the HNRC at Barrow Hill in 2002.

The remaining locomotives remained on the WCML with Virgin, until 2005 with the advent of the Pendolino, and the class was withdrawn completely by Virgin. Upon withdrawal, the locos passed to various operators, including DRS (who have 4 in storage), Cotswold Rail (who had up to 8 in service for charter services, of which only two ran, all the locomotives then went off lease shortly afterwards) and First GBRf (who used the 4 strong fleet on express parcels services and as thunderbird units for the Class 325 mail unit fleet, all have now been withdrawn).

In 2006, under a negotiation between Porterbrook and Romic-Ace International PTE Ltd, 87012 and 87019 were sold to a Bulgarian operator, the transfer taking place after Bulgaria's accession into the EU to avoid customs issues. Following successful trials with these two locomotives, the entire inactive fleet (not including preserved locos) was transferred to Bulgarian Railroad Company (BRC) over a period between 2008 and 2009, with the reactivation process taking place at Long Marston by Electric Traction Ltd.

Three locomotives have however been preserved in the UK, 87001 "Royal Scot" was preserved as part of the National Collection of locomotives, and is currently on static display in the NRM at York. A further locomotive, 87035 "Robert Burns" is based at The Railway Age in Crewe, after being handed over by former owners Porterbrook at the Crewe Works open day on 10th September 2005. And then there's the locomotive we see here stabled in Prestons platform 4C, 87002 "Royal Sovereign", which is owned by the AC Locomotive Group and is leased to First GBRf for use on the mail duties during the festive period, and the run up to it, along with the ETL Class 86s. In fact, while it was sat here the word was going round she had failed, when that very evening she raised her pantograph to the overhead wires and moved to the front of a mail service from Sheildmuir in Scotland to Warrington RMT, and hauled the three Class 325 EMUs forming the service onward to Warrington where she is normally based.