2014

IMLEC was back at Bournemouth for the fourth time in 2014 and the second time at their track in Littledown Park. For this IMLEC Bournemouth made their own dynamometer car using the Station Road Steam system as Leyland had in 2013. They also were lent the Birmingham car to act as a back up and a comparison, during tests it was found that the new digital dynamometer car produced remarkably similar results to the Birmingham car.

Taking home the title for the first time was John Cottam with his LNER P2 "Wolf of Badenoch", now complete with a matching tender after appearing at IMLEC 2013 attached to John's Merchant Navy tender. Mick Baker gives us the details of the winning entry:

"The third representative of the Chesterfield Society, John Cottam brought his LNER P2 2-8-2 locomotive which he built over seven and a half years to the drawings of Michael Breeze but with his own interpretations. The boiler has a larger combustion chamber like the original No. 2006. The engine was finished last year in time to run in the IMLEC at Leyland, where it gained third place. The tender was not finished at that time so a Merchant Navy tender in blue was substituted. The locomotive, complete
with its new green LNER tender was exhibited, to much acclaim, at the Harrogate Show in May. If the adjective 'beautiful' can be applied to a model steam locomotive it would not be out of place here. A load of nineteen passengers on six cars was chosen, the heaviest of the weekend, and with a slight slip a clean start was achieved, the steel tyres no doubt having something to do with it. Ten laps were completed, non-stop, at an average speed of almost eight miles per hour, the whole operation, both for the locomotive and the driver seemed effortless. With an efficiency of 2.38% this run went to the top of the leader board and was not displaced".