Mixing carriages from different eras
Want to mix carriages from different eras on your layout? Chris Leigh shows you how it can be done while maintaining a realistic scenario.
Ibelong to several special interest railway groups on Facebook, including one related to BR coaching stock from the standard Mk 1 of the 1950s up to the present day. It has recently been extended to include the latest imported coaches, the so-called Mk 5. In parallel with this there has been much mourning of the passing of the Mk 3 coach from frontline use, with almost every movement of Mk 3s to the scrapyards logged in detail.
It is sad to see familiar rolling stock consigned to history but the Mk 3s are 40 years old. We would not expect a 40-year-old car to be in daily use or to have racked up hundreds of thousands of miles. My son recently changed his car at less than half that age, knowing it was only fit for scrap. Yet we routinely expect railway rolling stock to last much longer, perhaps because it has a history of being remarkably well built.
The railway has evolved and one of the features which has declined dramatically is the compatibility and interoperability of new and older equipment. Fixed rakes of matching equipment are now the order of the day and complex electronics mean that even swapping vehicles within a rake is time-consuming and complicated. There is simply no role for outmoded coaching stock on today’s railway.
However, that wasn’t always the case. In fact, far from it. Around the turn of the 20th Century, as the Victorian era came to an end, passenger trains were changing every bit as fast as they are today. Non-gangwayed four and six-wheel carriages were being replaced by gangwayed eight and twelve-wheel vehicles, and new services such as dining and even sleeping on board the train were becoming commonplace.
The older vehicles were downgraded for use on rural and secondary services and, because they were physically and mechanically compatible with the newer stock, there were plenty of uses that could be found for them. Once they were too old and decrepit for use in public service they found their way into departmental service where the fact that they were static most of the time ensured their longevity. Or they might become Internal User vehicles, which were much restricted in their movement. They could be allowed to run when necessary or for short distances but mostly they were little more than a shed with wheels.
After the First World War there were
shortages of manpower and the need for quick, easy accommodation led to a demand for old carriage bodies for conversion to dwellings. Old Dan’s home in The Titfield Thunderbolt is a bit extreme, and the film set appears to represent a very early carriage, but it is not so far from the truth. Carriage bodies could be obtained relatively cheaply from the railway companies and ingenious builders could place two or three side-by-side and roof them over to create a perfectly habitable cottage. The use of hardwoods and skilled construction meant that they would last a very long time. By the latter half of the 20th Century such dwellings, replaced on site by ‘proper’ homes, proved a valuable source of well-preserved carriage bodies for restoration projects.
The tradition of passing outmoded passenger stock into departmental service has continued with Network Rail and other railway service organisations acquiring Mk 2 and Mk 3 coaches for conversion to specialised uses. Top of this particular ‘tree’ must surely be Network Rail’s New Measurement Train converted from High Speed Train power cars and Mk 3 coaches. It’s not really a new idea. In the days of
G.J. Churchward on the Great Western, rough track was marked by flushing whitewash down a carriage toilet to mark areas that needed fettling. To make the operation more professional, a comparatively modern ‘Toplight’ brake coach was modified to do the same job more precisely and efficiently. Known forever
as ‘the whitewash coach’ it remained in use on BR long enough to acquire B4 bogies.
To return, however, to the topic under examination, I have long been fascinated by old rolling stock and, in particular, the vehicles which could be found tucked away in yards throughout the UK when I was setting out in this hobby 50-odd years ago. As a member of the (then) Staines Model Railway Society I became acquainted with wagon experts Paul Bartlett and Ian Fyvie. Paul arranged for us to make a couple of Saturday visits to Feltham Yard and while they turned their attention to sidings full of wagons, I went off to the far corners of the yard to find a couple of derelict London & South Western carriages which probably hadn’t turned a wheel in many a long year. From then on I found myself always more attracted to the old, converted, adapted or out-of-use rolling stock than the vehicles which were still earning revenue. After all, the revenue vehicles would be around for a year or two yet, wouldn’t they?
As few of these conversions, if any, followed a standard pattern it is impossible to be specific about when they were done or where, so much of this ‘Masterclass’ will consist of pictures and captions. They show the diversity of types and the many and varied uses to which vehicles were put.
For those who, like me, enjoy seeing lots of explanatory lettering on a vehicle, many of these will be of interest, although one or two carry no lettering at all – not even a number.
From the modelling viewpoint, now is an opportune moment to look at some examples of old coaches still serving a purpose decades after they first entered traffic, for both Hornby and Hattons have launched ranges of ‘generic’ 19th-century coaches which offer a good basis for some modelling repaints and conversions. Let’s take a look at some examples in real life.