Collet coaches...

[portland-docks]

Well today i managed to pick up 5 maroon collet coaches, newest batch, and they do look stunning...

Now i got back and thought, what the hell do i run them with?

I dont even know which region they ran on!

My layout is preserved railway so technically i could run them with anything but what is the main loco that would be seen pulling maroon collets?

[EtchedPixels]

End of steam Western region.

[portland-docks]

So any gwr loco in br livery then? Such as foxcote manor?

[EtchedPixels]

So any gwr loco in br livery then? Such as foxcote manor?

Yep. Dunno about diesels - their period does overlap a little but I've never looked for diesels on collett photos and I'd guess by then they were the odd coach in a train not in entire rakes ?

[daveg]

A Hall might look good but there again, I run my railway using Rule 1 
http://www.ehattons.com/58866/Dapol_2S_010_001_Class_49xx_Hall_steam_locomotive_4951_Pendeford_Hall_in_BR_lined_green_with_late/StockDetail.aspx

Dave G

[gc4946]

They were built between 1938-1941 and were withdrawn from regular service by 1965/66.
Several lasted longer running in the Swindon Works test train until 1968.

http://www.didcotrailwaycentre.org.uk/coaches/7371/7371.html
http://www.gw-svr-a.org.uk/1086.html

Due to their modified profiles (slightly narrower than many GWR designs) they could be seen on services well away from GWR/Western Region lines.

In theory any suitable Western Region-allocated loco could pull these as well as appropriate locos when used on inter-regional services.

[Newportnobby]

Thanks for that. Nice to know my Hymek pulling a rake on cross country services is justifiable

[Jerry Howlett]

If you have them in chocolate & cream you can add class 37's 47's and even a 76 !

Lovely coaches I have 2 rakes one blood and custard and the other maroon.

[E Pinniger]

I also have a question re. these coaches: Were pre-nationalisation types like the GWR Colletts ever run in mixed rakes with BR Mk1 coaches?

[gc4946]

I dug out as many books as possible in my collection that contained BR Western Region formations.

It appeared rare for local services to have a mix of Collett and Mk1 corridor types.
This is because GWR and LMS carriage designs were fitted with British Standard gangways that needed adaptors which could be time-consuming to couple with carriages built with Pullman type gangways on Mk1s, Gresley and SR Maunsell/Bulleid types.

Churchward, Collett and Hawksworth corridor types could all be marshalled together in a formation, subject to constraints of width and/or length depending on the train's route and destination as they all had compatible gangways.

However, Hawksworth corridor types in general, and Collett dining cars in particular, were regularly inserted into express passenger formations that consisted of Mk1s, eg Cornish Riviera.

On the other hand non-corridor Collett and Hawksworth types were freely mixed with BR Mk1 suburbans because they didn't have the problem of having to couple up gangway connections.

[E Pinniger]

Thanks for the information, very useful to know. I've seen numerous photos of passenger trains on the WR where there are obviously a mix of 2-3 different coach types, but due to the angle of the photo I can't identify what types they are (someone more knowledgeable would no doubt be able to ID them just from the roofs); presumably they're an assortment of ex-GWR designs.
From reading your post, am I correct that LNER Gresley (and Thompson?) and SR Maunsell and Bulleid coaches were mixed with Mk1s? I have some old Farish SR coaches which I'm intending to eventually convert to Maunsells (the bodies are correct for this type but the roofs + underframes/bogies need reworking)

Currently (despite my layout's WR/SR setting) I only have one Dapol Collett coach; acquiring more is definitely a priority!

[gc4946]

I only gave details in my last post of what happened with ex-GWR stock.

Southern Region arranged many of its carriages in fixed, numbered sets in a variety of formations from 2 to 10 carriages.
Many of them were composed of one particular design of carriage (all Maunsell, all Bulleid, all Mk1) the most common being:
BTK/BCK
Maunsell (1959-1960 version) push-pull BCK/TO
BTK/CK/BTK
BTK/TK/CK/BTK
BTK/CK/CK/BTK (Maunsell)
BTK/TK/TK/FK/TK/TK/TK/TK/BTK
with loose vans, or "loose" carriages such as TK or TO added at the end of a set or if a through portion was required, often a BCK.
eg TO or TK/BTK/CK/BTK
Also, catering carriages were inserted either within a set or between two shorter sets.
It was common for "loose" carriages to be a different design or style from the main set(s).

From photos it seems that corridor Mk1s, Gresleys and Thompsons were intermingled in train formations as they all had identical Pullman gangways, but unlike the Southern they weren't so regimented with fixed formations.

Looking at photos, LMS Stanier carriages were often added either to the front, or the rear of a rake of Mk1s, or conversely, Mk1s added to a Stanier formation at either end, presumably to simplify gangway coupling between two different types.

[EtchedPixels]

The Southern and LNER (and some of their constituents eg the GNR) had adopted pullman gangways, buckeye couplers and other modern contrivances on highly standardised coaching stock. The LMS had highly standardised coaching stock but using the smaller BS gangways. The GWR coaching stock is a whole story of it's own for much of the GWR history but used BS gangways except in the early days.

Unfortunately it's not quite as simple as that. LNER pullman gangways are at a different height to the British Rail ones but could be attached. The BS gangway was always the same arrangement however as it was a real standard (hence BS).

British Rail also used the old style BS gangways on some of the DMU stock when they fitted corridor connectors later. These vehicles were not designed for buckeye couplers and also it meant they could recycle gangways removed from GWR and LMS parcels stock.

To complicate things further some LNER 60' coaches were fitted with BS gangways for certain through workings. It was also possible to join the two types with a gangway adapter, but this was fiddly and it seems generally avoided when possible. They were used however and there are pictures of for example Mark 1 coach sets running with a 12 wheel LMS restaurant first in the late 1950s.

Early GWR corridor stock was even odder - with a gangway set to one side of the coach not central so that no vestibule was needed. It meant keeping the coaches the right way around but it was already done on those services so that the compartment windows faced the sea.

Not all SR stock had pullman gangways - including confusingly the 6PUL and 5BEL units !

Some LMS units (eg the 503s) were buckeye and bufferless.

There were also some Mark 1 vehicles specially adapted to couple to the Wagon-Lits stock for the Night Ferry.

Its also worth noting that it's very hard to retrofit the buckeye and pullman gangways to coaches not designed for it. When using buckeye couplers the buffing load is taken on the coupler on the centre line of the underframe and all the forces act in different places so the underframe has to be designed for it.

Alan

[dodger]

Southern Region trains frequently  mixed Maunsell, Bullied and Mk1 coaches, sometimes just coupling complete sets of different designs and at other times loose vehicles of a different design were added to  strengthen a set.

If boat trains are included the you could include Pullmans as well. A number of fixed sets, escpecially those of more than 5 coaches were formed of different design coaches.

dodger

[daveg]

Hi Guys

Thanks for a load of really interesting and useful info. 

Dave G