GWR Railcar no.20 at KESR

Hi Everyone.

The Kent and East Sussex Railway have announced that they have received a grant of £20,000 to assist with the completion of the restoration of GWR Railcar no.20. As a result of this, they have announced a new appeal to raise another £20,000 to finally finish this project, that has now been going for about 30 years!

The information is available at https://kesr.org.uk/donate/gwr-railcar/

I know times are tough, but please help if you can. It would be fantastic to finally get no.20 over the finishing line.

 

It will be really good to see this railcar restored. I've enjoyed my trips on W22 when it's been in service at Didcot.

 

I went to the website to try to make a donation - however CAF [who handle the donations] requested my date of birth. I don't know why they need it. It's not required for a gift aid claim. I may be paranoid - but providing this piece of information will enable identity theft. So I am afraid that I will have to make my donation by cheque - remember those! I just wonder how many people will be put off by this from making a donation at all. It's also not very clear who to draw the cheque in favour of.

 

By using CAF don't you lose the chance of claiming Gift Aid?

 

Be nice to see it back in action. Did manage a ride in it when it was being used as hauled stock back in the 70s.

 

I think they claim it for you but they take a percentage of the donation as a handling fee

 

There is a very detailed article in Trackside this month about this railcar. Shame more of them didn't survive.

 

..... along with a Sentinel or two, in my books.

 

You could start a project to rebuild a Sentinel. I think the Middleton Railway has an original part. You just need to ask @Steve politely.

Sent from my SM-A105FN using Tapatalk

 

Being an outright weirdo, the LNER railcars were far too run of the mill for me (even though there were some great names there). I've got a soft spot for the peculiar Jules Vernesque contraption built during Maunsell's reign for the Southern's Devil's Dyke Branch. So far as the UK market goes, it was the last new design produced.

 

I have to question why the railcar has been under restoration for 30 years, I knew Andrew, and I at times wondered if he actually wanted to see it finished, the number of times I saw work being redone, because he wanted perfection, when modern substitutes, fitted out of site would have been easier, frustrated me,
I often thought that progress would only come, once it became a C&W project, and seemed to have been proven right. Had Andrew still been in charge, it would still be stuck under a tarpaulin whist bit's already done, were taken apart, and re done, but hopefully now it can be progressed, Will the already overhauled engines need to be redone, because of the time they have sat unused?

 

Railcar OOS for 30 years doesn't necessarily equate to under restoration ... certainly not active restoration. Ask anyone on the Isle of Man!

I seem to recall originally getting No.20 delivered to the K&ESR was something of an exercise in itself. Not sure the modern big railway could be so accommodating, even if they felt so inclined.

 

I visited Tenterden about 15 years ago and saw No 20 'under resoration' on my visit - it looked well along then - there was a donation page and I made a couple of donations. However, the website went very quiet about it a few years back and the donation page disappeared. What concerned me was that it was taking up space in the building it was it. I am glad to see that something is happening at last. I contacted KESR with my queries about donations and received a very quick response - so my cheque is now 'in the post'.

 

The article in trackside is very detailed well worth a read. It says when they started on the engines they were in reasonable condition and not seized and praises the fitters in the 1970s for that and they found they could run them on test.

They were then both sent for professional overhaul and ran on test again.

Unfortunately a volunteer then pressure washed inside the exhaust of one of them mid 2010s and it then was left with presumably water inside the cylinders for some years before the damage was discovered.

It has then since had to be rebuilt again with new liners, pistons and bearing shells.

It then says "however. Both engines are now happily reunited with the vehicle and have been tested.

From the article sounds like it has suffered by there previously being nowhere undercover to store or work on it.

 

Often it was because progress was so slow, and the road it was taking, was needed that it spent time out in the open, under a tarp, Often a small team, worked on it, but at the same time, others were not allowed to help out, even if they had the skills, We at the time, could not afford for it to be sat there, with nothing happening, or very little happening, whilst other coaches and wagons often awaiting repair, or inspection had to wait their turn, the only other road, was the inspection pit road and that was always in use 7 days a week, If a coach wasn't over it, there would be one of the deisels, or the DMU, .

 

I don’t think their ability to self combust helped with their survival rate.

 

In the early 1990s, the Severn Valley Railway approached Andy to purchase the railcar. The request was not received well and was rebutted, possibly too hastily. In retrospect, had the offer been accepted, W20 would have been returned to service years ago but there is a crux. W20 would not have fitted to the SVR's operational requirements of long trains and high passenger capacity, rendering it an anomaly. Their request was understandable given that W20 was shedded at Worcester Shrub Hill and frequently operated on Bewdley service. However, in the long term, W20 is more suited to the KESR and may even prove to be a roving ambassador for the railway at galas.

 

Seeing a model of this railcar next to a GWR autocoach made me ponder.
Were the two ever run coupled together and were the drive systems compatible so one could control the other?

 

Yes and no.

Railcar 18 (and all constructed after it) was built to be capable of hauling a tail load for working the Lambourn branch. That tail load was, on occasion, an autocoach.

The 'drive system' for GWR autocoach working was a mechanical linkage (other systems were used on other railways - the LSWR one was certainly different) which allowed the driver to operate the steam engine's regulator from the cab of the autocoach. It was not compatible with working a diesel-electric driven vehicle.