12w Pullmans

Reading a book about the grand old 12 wheeled pullman cars, it occured to me that none of the surivors are running. Is this just due to the massive amount of money which would have to be spent on one coach alone (what do you think, 1.5 million?) or is it due to the fact they totaly made out of wood including the bogies means Health and Safety would have a fit? Or their high weight to passenger ratio?

I would love to see one of these in use again, because they are masterpieces of engineering. Wheres that Lotto ticket?

Thinking about aren't the 'Mets' at the Bluebell wooden framed?

 

I don't think the bogie frames were made out of wood! The bodies were of all-wood monocoque construction though. The 2 twelve wheelers in the north east, Rosalind and Padua, were offered for sale a while ago, and I made some inquiries with the VSOE maintenance engineer, who could see no reason why they shouldn't be ok for preserved line running, but the interest petered out and, as far as I know, they still haven't ben sold. The opinion was that of these two, plus an 8-wheeler, it would be possible to make two good ones out of the three.

 

Do you know what the asking prices we're?

 

Yes they are teak wooden framed, I have worked on them.

Regards
Chris

 

The asking price was £50,000 for the three, I think. But as we all (should) know by now, buying them is the cheap part of the process! I think you'd probably have to budget around £150,000 per coach to get them runnable in a reasonable timescale.

 

How many 12 wheel Pullmans survive?

 

I think there were Rosalind and Padua, plus three at Marazion - but I don't know if any of the Marazion ones survived. There's another in use as the Ian Allan boardroom and I'm not sure if the one in the NRM is a 12 wheeler.

 

The one in the NRM is not a 12wheeler I afraid.
There was Cambria but that was destoyed by Arson in 2001, while Calas at Marazion was scraped casue she was a rotton shell by 2003, so that only leaves 3, all orignally First class cars built in the 1920/1 for the SE&CR.
Malaga (Kitchen) was the board room for Ian Allan Ltd. but I though it was sold recently.
Padua (Parlour) and Rosalind (Kitchen) are (or were) at Saltburn.

The other cars at Marazion were 8 wheeled cars, some suriving at Petworth Station as hotel accoidation.

 

The Pullmans are at Seaburn (in Sunderland) not Saltburn.

 

whoops!!!!

 

mmmm..... without looking at them! ....I have a feeling your price for restoration *might* be a bit high (or then again far too low!)

 

I've a fair bit of experience of carriage restoration as other on here will probably attest to. To do something like a Gresley with a mixture of volunteer and contract labour leaves very little change out of £100,000, but to be fair that does usually include total reconstruction of the interior which would not be the case wihn these. I think that doing these Pullmans would probably more of a contract job, because of the need for specialist work such as having the marquetry restored, and lots of french polishing. The ones from America that have been done at Carnforth are reputed to have cost around £250,000 each.

 

Just to add to a very old topic
http://www.sunderlandecho.com/news/business/sunderland-s-seafront-train-carriages-reopen-as-tea-rooms-1-671287

At least they are being cared for. And there is always hope. Especially being 12 wheelers.

 

Three.

A summary list of 'Pullman Cars' in preservation can be found at

http://www.rcts.org.uk/features/pre...hing Stock of British Railways - Part Two.pdf