Well I never knew they tried this (Bus body ala Pacer, Mk1 Underframe)....

This is rather interesting... http://www.cs.rhrp.org.uk/se/Carria...wq2WAX2CWLylq4_7Z4r2WsZ6seyHbGceyTwmPDgFSSKnE

 

You didn’t know? Keep up! Seriously it featured in an article in Traction Mag some time ago, I’m sure it’s been mentioned on the Pacers thread on here too.

 

I seem to remember it in the mags from the time, a cheap way of replacing life expired Mk1 bodies where the underframes were still good. Even in 82 the oldest ones were already between 20 and 30 yr old.
I wondered what happened to it but you have to be grateful some things are an evolutionary dead end, think what heritage lines might be like if it had been successful.

 

Possibly our correspondent from Hayling Island might have had something to REALLY moan about

 

Leaving aside various 'railbuses' from the 1920s onwards, the CIÉ beat BR to it by a couple of decades, with this 1953 budget response to the carriage crisis on their C&L section* ... two sawn-off bus bodies mounted in opposition on the frame of carriage No.7

This 'ere image is credited to our very own @Roger Farnworth:



* some bright spark in GSR days decided the C&L carriages didn't need a shed, which went about as well as it did for stock left in the open on the FR during the years of closure.

 

Worth making the point about this and Pacers that BR was desparatley short of money and while this idea wasnt further developed, the Pacers did save many secondary services

 

A claim that is now considered debatable when assessed against the costs of those units and the poor reputation they gave the railway for the 30-odd years they served.


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From experience the main issue was where they were used. In the NW they were generally used for fairly short commuter type turns which were similar to what you would actually use a bus for in terms of duration. What was odd and really got peoples backs up (and probably injured same backs) was using them on routs such as Leeds - Morecambe which was nearly 3 hrs on the bloody thing much more suited to something in the 150 family, then using 150's on Lancaster Morecambe which again would be more of a pacer turn???

 

I remember on a journey to Birmingham one morning, deliberately leaving the train at Coventry so that I could then catch the following Manchester service and have a ride in it. Not very impressed, it just reminded me of my local bus service Leyland Nationals, which, of course, it basically was.

 

The idea was considered for the Hastings line as an alternative to electrification - Pacer bodies on Hastings DEMU chassis, hauled by class 33s.

 

I dont know when that idea was considered but by then I imagine the 33's were getting a bit long in the tooth and I cant imagine HMRI being happy about the crashworthiness

 

Methinks the "30-odd years" goes to the heart of the criticism, in that the original intent was a stopgap, which they were ..... it's just that gap they 'stopped' was somewhat longer than any could reasonably have anticipated.

Historically, the first gen steam 'railmotors', which served much the same purpose as the Pacers in the pre-grouping era, were subject to precisely the same criticisms, with the last (ex-L&Y) units just about limping into the nationalisation era.

 

They did come about during Mrs Thatchers time and let’s not forget she wasn’t exactly a big railway fan was she?

 

I believe I read over on WNXX that yes they were cheap at the time but over their entire lifespan they worked out about as dear if not more than an equivalent 15x which have served the railways as long with much less noise made about them.

 

Agreed, though I’m not quite sure why her government were responsible for the Pacers when they also authorised the (significantly better) Sprinters. And let’s also recall that this anti rail government was the one that authorised the ECML electrification.


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Quite the contrary, she was a fan of it. Its one of the few public utilities she actually tried to keep close to the chest despite a change in EU rules in 1991. Major pulled the trigger on privatisation which was doomed to be little more than an upwards funnelling of money and a wholesale acceptance of short-termism. We might have seen the Pacers binned 15-20 years ago if every franchise wasn't focused no further than the end of their lease.

 

I understood that the proposal was discussed at Regional level and quickly dismissed. At that time the Regions had considerable influence over how the BRB set policies. Also a number of senior regional managers lived between Tunbridge Wells and Battle.

With a large First Class season ticket holding customer base along the Hastings Line, the cheap and tacky Leyland National bus body idea would have caused a very bad press. Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells ( and other locations) would have had plenty of material.

The line was due for resignalling and that provided the easy way of controlling the single line sections through the narrow tunnels. A reduction in the number of signalling posts would be offset against the resignalling costs. The negative side was the perceived need to remove Grove Jn south of Tunbridge Wells Central which hastened the closure of the Tunbridge Wells to Eridge line. (Grove Jn could have been retained but the hourly Eridge service would have reduced operational flexibility and increased resignalling capital costs.)
At the time it was considered to be a "bad thing" by many enthusiasts and a few normal passengers, but now we have a vibrant heritage railway instead. ( A few days of doing passenger counts proved that apart from school traffic, the Eridge - Tonbridge service was almost empty between Tunbridge Wells West and Eridge.)
Refurbished CEP units would give a better standard of service and be standard rolling stock for the region, thus reducing rolling stock costs. A quick cascade of inner and outer suburban units as 455 units were delivered provided the required number of CEP units.

Cheers, Neil

 

Interesting that, 15 years or so later when Mk1s had to be got rid of, an updated variant of this was tested with an Electrostar style body on a VEP underframe. I remember seeing the prototype exhibited at Victoria and thinking that it combined the worst of both worlds, giving the ride of a VEP with the discomfort of the latest generation of stock.

 

The positives of the idea got rid of the timber and steel composite mark 1 bodies, providing power operated doors, offering better crash resistance plus saving body overhaul costs. The preservation industry has learnt the hard way how much work mark 1 stock needs.
The down side was there were still the track wearing high maintenance underframes with heavy axle hung motors which the track engineers and mechanical engineers wanted to replace.
It could be viewed as the last throw of the dice of Southern Railway/Region recycling and rebodying rolling stock.

Cheers, Neil

 

Indeed - but it was a Frankenstein monster of an idea, which I'm glad never progressed.