Another consist question (pullmans)

[Intercity]

Ok guys I'm in need of help again.

After purchasing Dapol Pullman liveried class 73s I decided a rake of pullmans would be needed (to run as an excursion or charter), however I'm not sure which coaches would make up a believable 12 coach rake, so my question is which coaches do I need to get, who makes them (if it's farish are they newer blue ribbon, or old tooling) and what order in the rake do they go.

As I say it would be a modern day excursion set up so rule 1 applies if needed

[Karhedron]

A bit of rule 1 really. Modern excursion sets tend to be formed of whatever preserved vehicles are available and appropriate. Some are made up of genuine pullman coaches while others are made up of assorted slam-door stock that has been repainted (there is a rake of Mk2 aircons painted in faux-pullman livery rolling about at the moment).

If you are looking for real pullman vehicles, Farish make the Mk1 pullman coaches to modern standards (their Blue Ribband label) which are nice but don't seem to have run with the class 73 very often (if at all). The most common vehicles seem to have been the 1951-vintage steel-sided pullman coaches which are not available RTR unfortunately. Farish used to make the older match-board sided 1920s pullman coaches. These are not to modern standards but can be improved with a bit of work and some vinyl overlays if you feel so inclined.

What I would say is that the catering is a big part of modern charter sets so plenty of kitchen cars would be appropriate. Here are some shots to give you a bit of inspiration.

[Carmont]

This maybe doesnt answer the question fully, but to give an idea of consist, the Bournemouth Belle on it's final run was made up as follows:

MK1 Full Brake
Parlour
Kitchen
Parlour
First Parlour
First Kitchen
First Parlour
First Kitchen
Parlour
Parlour
Mk1 Full Brake

Most of these were 1928 stock, but the formation could be considered typical, to an extent, and despite rule 1, it's a plausible consist.