 Poster: A snowHead
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The Coire Cas t-bar on Cairngorm - maybe the most steadfast and snow-reliable ski lift ever built on the Scottish slopes - has been upgraded with new electronic ticket-checking barriers, familiar to any international skier.
Almost exactly 50 years to the lift's birthdate - it opened for business in late December 1963 - the Cas t-bar started a new chapter yesterday, no doubt to the delight of its bean-counters (Cairngorm now has electronic ticketing across the mountain).
http://www.winterhighland.info/publicreports/displaypic.php?id=27089,3648#start
Photo by Hilly, hotlinked from Winterhighland.info. Hilly's full set of photos from yesterday Boxing Day on Cairngorm ... [see Public Reports if this link doesn't go direct] ...
http://www.winterhighland.info/publicreports/index.php?50,3648
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If you have happy, interesting or bizarre memories of riding the Cas t-bar please report them here. Especially if you did it in 1963!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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It didnt get going until 3pm. I left at 2.50  . The queue for the train was too long then.
Had a great day. Fell once on an easy slope. Ha ha. Better get my technique sorted for Arabba.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Comedy Goldsmith, Very happy memories of the Cas and the other lifts and runs from the early days, courtesy of school trips - and still so up to the present time. In those early days it seemed the snow cover was always/generally complete across the whole mountain with frequent huge drifts. These would dwarf the ski coaches on the road section up above the old Ciste car park - as per the old CML photos. The ski instructors were of course Austrian then, and perhaps a little less than fully enamoured with us hapless beginners. I sooooo appreciate the vast improvements in equipment since then! Some modest techique gains also! From the Cas to Cham and back ... 
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| Comedy Goldsmith wrote: |
| If you have happy, interesting or bizarre memories of riding the Cas t-bar please report them here. Especially if you did it in 1963! |
All I remember from my season up there and many subsequent trips, were the tell-tale blood stains up at the return wheel end where people hadn't fed the T-bar back in and just let it go. I was always ready for it and have had to fend off a few flailing T-bars but others not so lucky. Also saw plenty of peeps wiped out on the track. A good half of my BASI training and assessments were done on that lift too.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I remember the Coire Cas T-bar well but my main memory is of having my face sand-blasted on it. But it wasn't always like that. There were also beautiful days when the lift kept running till six o'clock, with superb views over Loch Morlich (where we camped).
My first visit to Cairngorm was at Easter 1962, when my second ever day skiing started by going over the traverse to Coire Cas. We had the original chairlift (in its first year) to get us up the mountain - here's a photo from one of those early years, showing the lift and the White Lady...
If the T-bar was only built in 1963, was there any other lift in Coire Cas before it?
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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espri, brilliant photo.
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I'd forgotten about that chairlift 
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I'll never forget it. Bloody freezing nearly every time I went on it as a kid......
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Were those chairs really traveling sideways?
That must have made getting on and off a bit tricky (even with skis off)
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I remember deliberately throwing myself off just after a mid twenties blonde skied past me with her ski jacket open, wearing nothing else up top. As a pubescent boy I soon got very embarrassed at my blatant following/lusting. Her boyfriend winked at me and my mate who I had shipped on and missed everything was PO'ed.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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That and also the phrase " because the cas is open we can charge for a full area pass"
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Sorry that should read full price for a day ticket
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You know it makes sense.
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espri, yes, the mid-station of the chairlift operated so you could get on or off at that point, or stay on the chair for the full ride up. However, there were persistent problems of snow drifting to huge depths into the exit of the chairs before they climbed the White Lady ... so in the mid-1970s the mid-station was rebuilt, with the exit station raised up high. At that point the chairlift operated as two separate lifts - bottom section and top section.
The lift (and the original t-bars I think) was built by the Swiss firm Mueller. It probably wasn't the first detachable chair in the world - the design of sideways-on chairs was common to lifts in Zermatt (Sunnegga - preceded the underground funicular) and the Grindelwald (Firstbahn).
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Thanks for the further details and correction, C G. You're right about the Müller clamps. This site gives further details (in German) about the Müller lifts. There they say that first couplable lift was built 1950 in Sattel-Mostelberg (in Switzerland) - they seem to be an innovative lot there, for they now have the world's first rotating gondola in that area.
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Poster: A snowHead
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The White Lady Chairlift chairs came to a complete stop for loading and unloading, so getting on and off was as easy as any lift yet invented. The side on chairs were partly due to a condition of a large donation to the project that stipulated the lift be as easy to use for walkers and climbers as skiers, another factor was the lift run perpendicular to prevailing South Westerly winds. The line gauge was the same as forward facing GMD Mueller chairs, so this gave them greater clearance from the towers in the prevailing cross winds, and meant the lift was virtually immune to headwinds (been on the Carpark Chairlift when the Carpark T-bar had to close because the strength of the headwind was snapping the ropes on the t-bars when the spring box fully extended at the load point  ) . If you find some old video footage on youtube, you will sometimes see sandbags slung under the seats to reduce swing on empty chairs!
The Funicular operating limits were specified by HMRI and it's permitted to uplift skiers and boarders up to 80mph across the line at the tunnel mouth.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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We used that chairlift many times in the 90's when our two boys learned to ski. Also used to take both of them on the Ptarmigan t-bar with the younger one between my legs - the only advantage I can think of for t-bars.....
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FAQ
