Steam Railcars/Railmotors of the UK

Sitting in a display case in our lounge is a model made by my late father-in-law in O-Gauge of a Midland railway Railmotor from the early 20th century. David painted the model in LMS livery. Its presence in our lounge has been an encouragement to find out more about steam powered railcars.

The linked article is the first of at least 6 articles about steam railcars.

http://rogerfarnworth.com/2024/06/11/steam-railcars-part-1-an-early-example/

 

This second article about Steam Railcars focusses on two early proponents of the units ...Dugald Drummond and Harry Wainwright. .....

http://rogerfarnworth.com/2024/06/1...gald-drummond-lswr-and-harry-wainwright-secr/

 

A third article about UK Steam Railcars/Railmotors. This article focusses on the Great Western Railway. ....

http://rogerfarnworth.com/2024/06/17/steam-railcars-part-3-the-great-western-railway-gwr/

 

This fourth article covers other railway companies which had steam railmotors in the early 20th century. ...

http://rogerfarnworth.com/2024/06/1...-railmotors-owned-by-other-railway-companies/

 

This fifth article about Steam Railcars/Railmotors focusses on articulated steam railmotors in the first two decades of the 20th century. ...

http://rogerfarnworth.com/2024/06/20/steam-railmotors-part-5-articulated-steam-railmotors/

We will look at steam railmotors which served during the era of the big four companies after grouping in the next article.

 

The new companies which came into existence with the grouping in 1923 addressed once again the best way to serve lightly populated rural communities. The options available to them centred on various forms of light railcars. Two forms of propulsion were available, the internal combustion engine and the steam engine. Electricity, in many cases required too large an investment for the likely traffic on the intermediate routes in rural areas.

Steam railcars/railmotors surprisingly given early experiences, had a second opportunity to serve in the era of the big four!

http://rogerfarnworth.com/2024/06/26/steam-railmotors-part-6-after-the-grouping/

 

This is an Addendum to this series of articles resulting from being able to purchase Kidner's monograph about railcars, tramcars and auto-coaches/trains published in 1947. ...

http://rogerfarnworth.com/2024/06/30/steam-railmotors-part-7-an-addendum/

 

Some really interesting material, thank you for sharing.

on the same subject, I wonder if there are any plans for the Didcot Railmotor- all seems to have gone rather quiet.

Chris

 

I was interested to see the LNWR Railmotor on the Oxford - Cambridge line in the fourth article: I do wonder that if that was adequate enough to cope with passenger traffic on that line in that period, why on Earth are they reviving that line now?

 

Cab view of an LNER 6-cylinder engined Sentinel railcar. Note the 3-mm hot water injector at bottom left.