Last Pre BR Rolling Stock

[RichmondCommu]

G'day everyone,

I'm interested to know which rolling stock built prior to nationalisation was the last to be withdrawn. Basically anything built by the LMS, LNER, GWR or SR or indeed anything built pre-grouping! Internal Users can also be included!

My vote would go to the ICI hoppers built in the 1930's and which operated from Tunstead in Derbyshire well into the 1980's. Other suggestions would be very welcome!

Thanks in advance,

Richmond Commuter!

 

[Bevan Price]

G'day everyone,

I'm interested to know which rolling stock built prior to nationalisation was the last to be withdrawn. Basically anything built by the LMS, LNER, GWR or SR or indeed anything built pre-grouping! Internal users can also be included!

My vote would go to the ICI hoppers built in the 1930's and which operated from Tunstead in Derbyshire well into the 1980's. Other suggestions would be very welcome!

Thanks in advance,

Richmond Commuter!

Not sure about non-passenger stock, but I think that the last passenger stock would be the SR Class 4SUB emus - I think some of these lasted until the early 1980s.

From memory, the last pre-nationalisation loco hauled coaches were one or two LNER buffet cars that survived into the early 1970s. Other hauled stock had largely disappeared by the late 1960s, displaced by new dmus, emus, or rendered surplus following line closures.

 

[RichmondCommu]

From memory, the last pre-nationalisation loco hauled coaches were one or two LNER buffet cars that survived into the early 1970s. Other hauled stock had largely disappeared by the late 1960s, displaced by new dmus, emus, or rendered surplus following line closures.

Would they have been built to a Gresley design? To be able to travel in something made from teak would have been quite something!

 

[bronzeonion]

SR EPB's that outlasted some of their younger BR brothers and sisters? SR built 1940 stock in service till I think 1994 on the Waterloo & City line?

 

[Royston Vasey]

Would they have been built to a Gresley design? To be able to travel in something made from teak would have been quite something!

They were, and were painted in BR Blue to boot. This in 1976:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/blue-diesels/3852348163

And 1977 with a much older ex-royal GNR BG (maybe early Gresley as well? Looks similar above the sole bar) entering preservation at the NRM. The royal vehicle also survived in the Royal Train until round about this point judging by the description on the photo.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/blue-diesels/8188005094

 

[CatfordCat]

the last 4-SUB units were withdrawn in 1983, although 4-SUBs (to SR design) were built until 1951. I don't have facts to hand to say when the last SR built unit was withdrawn.

the last 4-EPB (built 1951 onwards) was withdrawn in 1995 - some of these units included trailer cars that had been new in 4-SUB units (the easiest to spot were those that had 9 rather than 10 bays, to accommodate what had been designed as first class compartments.) Although I can't say when the last such carriage was withdrawn.

The last 1940 stock on the Waterloo & City Line was withdrawn in 1993

Some SR built EMU cars were retained in departmental use (de-icing trains / stores units etc) certainly into the 80s.

 

[thegrimeater]

Surely there is some still on the network? Are any of the VSOE pullmans pre BR? Or the West Coast Vintage set, which definitely has an LMS coach and a gresley teak vehicle? I know these aren't in normal passenger service though!

Or even the Isle of Wight underground stock as that is running on part of the national network

 

[steamybrian]

Do you include the Vale of Rheidol Railway..?
Locos built around 1923 and still operated by BR until "privatised" in the 1980s.
I am unsure whether the carriages were built when the line opened or later?

 

[eastwestdivide]

On the SR-pattern 4-EPBs, many of the underframes were from even older units. I've a photo of one in the 1980s with an axlebox cover stamped "LSWR", i.e. pre-1923 Big Four grouping.
One of the 4-SUB conversions to a de-icing/sandite unit was still lurking round Derby into the 2000s (out of use though).
On the wagon side of things, the Southern bogie goods brake vans (or "Queen Mary" vans) were air braked and some lasted into the 2000s, in EWS livery, e.g. here and here

 

[Taunton]

A lot of what appeared to be pre-nationalisation stock was actually built after 1947. Existing designs continued in production, at quite a high level (constrained only by periodic national steel shortages) well into the 1950s, and these were all numbered in the pre-nationalisation series.

The Wirral electrics built in 1956, 9 years after nationalisation, were numbered in the pre-nationalisation series, complete with company suffix. Likewise what appeared to be ex-GWR push-pull auto trailers were still being built in 1954 and appeared at the same time as the first dmus which were to replace them within a few years.

 

[DXMachina]

Island Line - Isle of Wight. Still operated by 1938-built EMUs ex London Transport, albeit somewhat rebuilt - edit, beaten to it again!

 

[yorksrob]

the last 4-SUB units were withdrawn in 1983, although 4-SUBs (to SR design) were built until 1951. I don't have facts to hand to say when the last SR built unit was withdrawn.

the last 4-EPB (built 1951 onwards) was withdrawn in 1995 - some of these units included trailer cars that had been new in 4-SUB units (the easiest to spot were those that had 9 rather than 10 bays, to accommodate what had been designed as first class compartments.) Although I can't say when the last such carriage was withdrawn.

Those old SUB coaches (which started off strengthening 1st gen wooden bodied SUB's) I think ended up in COM units and would have gone in the early 90's (sadly I never got the chance to travel in one of these !).

I'm sure I read that during the EPB refurbishment in the early 80's, some of the compartment carriages were substituted with open trailers from newly withdrawn SUB's and facelifted. These would have had more chance of survival into the dark days of 1995.

 

[scarby]

Weren't there all sorts of staff/stores/tools coaches dating from the 1930s in departmental use hanging around on the network until at least the 1990s?

Any survivors still in use?

 

[Taunton]

I'm sure I read that during the EPB refurbishment in the early 80's, some of the compartment carriages were substituted with open trailers from newly withdrawn SUB's and facelifted.

This is correct. Furthermore, a number of the 1950s EPBs were new bodies put onto 1930s underframes. These underframes had been built new but had older wooden bodies mounted on them, which were expired by the 1950s. The Southern had a long tradition of building the underframes and the bodies separately, at different works, and then combining the two.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

LNER buffet cars in service till the early 1970.s and large numbers of parcel vans till later - especially ex SR ones.

 

[Ploughman]

What date are the Inspection saloons still used at odd times?

 

[eastwestdivide]

I think even the older inspection saloons still in use are the BR Mk1-pattern ones (in the DB9995xx number series), apart from Caroline, formerly a BR (SR) Hastings buffet car.

Edit: just found Riviera Trains* 6320, ex DM 395707, LMS-pattern saloon, built Derby 1927 according to my old 1980s departmental stock book, although only the body is original and the underframe is a BR one.
See http://www.departmentals.com/departmental/6320

*sorry, now Princess Royal Class Locomotive Trust - and it's still main line registered, although not many parts are now original.
http://www.prclt.co.uk/New_6320_preservation.htm

 

[The Crab]

The Wirral electrics built in 1956, 9 years after nationalisation, were numbered in the pre-nationalisation series, complete with company suffix.

I'm pretty sure that the 1956 stock did not have the M suffix.

 

[zn1]

not strictly stock but when in maintrol records, I recall Mike welch and roger cruse examining the bogie record cards and found a bogie truck from early 1930's, now if memory serves correctly it was still in traffic under a wagon...this was 20 odd years ago when we were clearing out...

now when it comes to last operational pre BR stock - current contender will the old bakerloo line units on the IOW, as they were heavily rebuilt and refurbished before re-entry in to traffic at ZG1. On the mainland i would suggest Aylesbury sandites as currently still running around....

 

[Strathclyder]

The original Glasgow Subway rolling stock lasted 80 years, from December 1896 to May 1977.

 

[scarby]

Looking through "Departmental Coaching Stock" from 1990, there was then still a vast amount of very old stock in use - some dating back as far as 1907 (some of which has been preserved) with a lot of stock from the 1930s.

This one for example from 1907 was in use in 1987 and I think has been preserved:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/timhorn/6106129566/

I guess the book was published around the time that the destruction of this stock began in earnest.

I don't know if any of this pre-WW2 stock still survives outside preservation as stores/internal users, etc?

 

[Genocide]

LNER buffet cars in service till the early 1970.s and large numbers of parcel vans till later - especially ex SR ones.

Southern designed (not necessarily Southern built) wooden bodied CCT's were kicking about in regular service until at least the late '80's. I saw GWR design syphon G's in the late 70's.

Edit - Having read the post more thoroughly - at least two Thompson RB's got blue and grey and were used on the Harwich-Manchester which was a contained diagram until at least the late 70's. Don't forget, though, that this is design, not build. A lot of the better designed big 4 stock was still built until at least the mid 50's - LMS BG's were still being built at Horwich while Mk1 BG's were being built elsewhere.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

I'm pretty sure the GWR Syphon G vans were still in regular use on newspaper trains in the first half of the 1980s; I have a photo somewhere of one at Newbury in about 1982 / 1983 / 1984 thereabouts.

 

[scarby]

Here's an LNER flat wagon from 1945 that's at Neville Hill, Leeds:

http://www.ws.vintagecarriagestrust.org/ws/WagonInfo.asp?Ref=13864

Not exactly the most riveting piece of stock, but hey-ho.

 

[nw1]

The Wirral electrics built in 1956, 9 years after nationalisation, were numbered in the pre-nationalisation series, complete with company suffix.

I'm pretty sure that the 1956 stock did not have the M suffix.

What is it with these suffixes btw?
I remember seeing EPBs in the 80s with coach numbers like S12345S. At the time I assumed the first "S" meant Southern Region (as every unit type had coaches numbered SXXXXX) and the second "S" meant "suburban". But then you see "MXXXXM" or "EXXXXE"- seems duplication of information,

 

[eastwestdivide]

The suffix means effectively "built to a pre-BR design and numbered in the series of one of the Big Four". It wasn't 100% consistently used, e.g. parcels stock in those number series had lost the suffix by the 1980s.
There were instances of prefix and suffix being different, where transfers to another BR region had taken place, changing the prefix.

 

[Taunton]

The 1956 Wirral electrics did have the M suffix, they were built to the same designs, by the same manufacturers, as the previous batch the LMS ordered in 1938. All the 1950s EPB units built to SR principles (although the SR never actually built EPB units) got the S suffix, but in the late 1950s the design was changed to use the BR Mk 1 bodyshell, and these cars did not therefore get the S suffix.

 

[theageofthetra]

The Southern Queen Mary brake vans must be the winner here as their origins are actually pre grouping. The frames are from the LBSCR overhead electric power cars! Good old Southern /SR getting value from its assets.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Vale of Rheidol coaching stock of course - 1930's GWR build...