GWR B Set

The WSR were looking at the P & B restaurant car for their project.

 

That vehicle is probably the biggest tragedy considering it's current condition & the fact it used to be part of the national collection.

 

I just thought I would pick up this thread as there are several of us at the GWSR who would now like to do something to rescue these carriages. As has been noted, they are in a dreadful state and only just saveable. As has also been said, they are not pure B set coaches but are non corridor stock, as was used in 8 - 12 car sets in South Wales. One is bow ended and the other is straight so they are not a pair.

the situation is that the GWSR wants a clear out of all the collapsing stock at Winchcombe & Toddington because there is a lot of so-called preserved stuff just lying around falling apart and not under cover because we dont have sheds to keep them dry. All the railway's available volunteer time in the C&W DEpt is devoted to keeping 3 sets of Mark 1s on the rails and looking nice. Boring but essential work so we need to generate new volunteers who are keen to work on heritage projects.

The 'B set' is available free to an owner (and there is also a nice Hawksworth Brake 3rd and full brake + some nice LMS carriages that include the oldest Stanier carriage in the country, 2 inspection saloons and some 6 wheelers). Any external bidder has to remove them but we would like to get a project together to get them under permanent cover at Winchcombe so we can stop the rot and begin work on restoration when we have the money. The aim would be to have a Cotswolds branch train with a tank engine like 5542 - arriving within a fortnight for the season - on the front, which we can provide. It strikes me that an HLF bid might be in with a chance here, due to the uniqueness of the 2 carriages.

I would really welcome some thoughts about this and I need some contacts for people who could come and provide an expert assessment of the pair and the likely costs of restoration. We will also need some good wood workers with lots of patience!

We may well be setting up a GWSR Heritage Trust whcih would take it all a lot wider so we would then be hoping to gain support more widely.

 

It would be great to see them done but having played a major part in rebuilding a GWR toplight 7545 (we are still not finished), I can honestly say that the two B set coaches are too far gone. If they were ever going to be rebuilt, you would have to effectively build a new body incorporating a little bit of the original, none of this would be impossible, but there would be simply too much of it for volunteers to do. You would never get it completed. The whole bodies/roofs are distorted etc.

Perhaps if there were huge monies available, enough to pay full time staff then it could be done, but without this then in my opinion really their only use is as a chassis for a different body in better condition.

With any of these coaches we have found that as volunteers the limitation is not the money for materials but finding the skilled people with available spare time to do the work.

 

I wouldn't say they are impossible by any means, just fairly expensive to do. Thompson 1623 at the NYMR has had most of its frame replaced, section by section, for example, although this was done professionally, and the work was 50% paid for by a PRISM grant. It is the sole survivor of its type, however, and therefore worth doing, as are these two coaches, but whoever allowed 5539 in particluar to get to that state should hang their head in shame. It would only have taken a couple of hundred punds worth of roof sheet to prevent that.

Like the West Somerset before it, the GWSR will always be a relatively sterile line if all it operates is Mk 1 stock, so I for one hope that they do form a historic coach group and get stuck in. They've proved they can do it with the GW horsebox.

 

These? Scroll to bottom.
http://www.gwsr.com/media/207263/rolling stock for disposal jan 2012.pdf

 

It would be a shame to loose these items, there are several coaches that have been rebuilt from the frames up, althogh they may have had more of the frames to re-use. Is there more of the framing inside the vehicles? Would removing these items have allowed to roof to collapse and make it look worse? If so it may not be as bad as it first seems, but still a major undertaking.

 

Are the chassis on these carriages the same as on a 'true' B Set?

If so, considering that these, pedantically, are not a 'true' B Set, does their horrific condition give the opportunity for their frames and bogies to be used on a 'newbuild' 'true' B Set?

 

I may may be wrong, but I think some of the coaches planned to be part of the Swanage'ss vintage train are equally bad, and they haven't given up on them.

It's easy to say they are beyond redemption but once they're gone they're gone and suburban stock for any of the big four is relatively rare. I hope enough people at the GWSR care enough to do something about them.

 

Neither of them are B Set Coaches. The were both built for suburban use though. No 5500 was built in 1934 to Lot Number 1493 and Diagram D117 with a flat end. No 5539 was built in 1928 to Lot Number 1392 and Diagram D101, this vehicle is a Bow ender. I will be able to scan and attach pictures tomorrow