Withdrawn British Rail Stock
Encyclopedia
Withdrawn British Rail Stock is British
railway Coaches, Waggons
and locomotives that have been removed from service.
which continued to work the Vale of Rheidol line
for British Rail until it was sold in 1989. They remain in operation on the privately owned heritage railway.
(though more progress had been made in other countries, whose experience could arguably have been used to a greater degree in informing developments in the UK). Only two main-line diesel (LMS prototype) locomotives was inherited in 1948 (though more were on order) and a handful of diesel shunters of various types.
Initially, BR persisted with the small scale experimentation with diesel traction while continuing to build hundreds of steam locomotives to old and new designs. Even some steam shunters were being built through to the mid-1950s, when standard diesel shunters were already in large-scale production. It was not until the 1955 Modernisation Plan that more substantial developments in main-line diesel locomotive technology were planned.
The Plan envisaged small numbers of prototype locomotives of varying power types being ordered from a variety of manufacturers. These could be tested and compared against each other before large-scale orders were placed. Unfortunately, even before many of the prototypes had been delivered, a combination of the political need to maintain employment in the British locomotive-building industry and over-optimistic assessments of the possibilities offered by new diesel locomotives meant that large-scale orders were placed for a wide variety of untested and incompatible designs, many of which proved to be very poor.
By the end of 1968 all steam locomotives had been withdrawn - but during 1967-71 so were a large number of virtually new diesel locomotives and shunters (some only three years old) as many designs had proved unsuccessful, non-standard, and unnecessary with changed requirements on the railways, e.g. widespread line closures and the decline of wagonload freight traffic. However, some of the diesel shunters withdrawn during this period found further use on industrial railway systems.
After the production of some 5000 diesel locomotives in the 1956-1968, the British locomotive-building industry virtually collapsed. BR needed very few new diesel locomotives from then on; only 285 heavy-duty freight locomotives and 199 High Speed Train
power cars were purchased from then until privatisation began in 1994. No diesel locomotives have been built in Britain for the mainline system since 1991; the most recent new types have been imported from Canada
and Spain
.
In the early years of BR, a number of locomotives were built to operate on the newly-refurbished and electrified Woodhead Route using the 1500 V dc overhead system. However, by the time that the next major electrification project, the West Coast Main Line (WCML), was underway, the decision had been taken to adopt 25 kV ac overhead as the standard supply system.
BR decided to test a variety of new 25 kV ac types for the WCML electrification; 100 locomotives of five classes were built by different manufacturers. Having learned the lessons from these types, a further 100 examples, of standard class 86, were ordered. This class was introduced in 1966, and some are still in service today. The earlier prototypes, mostly pretty successful, succumbed in the 1980s and early 1990s as non-standard following the arrival of new electric locomotives.
Although the purchase of new electric types was carried out in a more successful way than the comparable process for diesel locomotives, the 200-odd electric locomotive fleet used to operate the WCML from the mid-1960s was still far smaller than that originally envisaged; more than 500 were thought necessary when the initial plans were developed. It was fortunate that changes in the railway's operation had already occurred before mass orders were placed for electric traction.
However, BR had intended to move away from loco-hauled electric trains on the main line as early as the 1970s. The Advanced Passenger Train
(APT) was a multiple unit
design intended to reduce journey times on the WCML by running at speeds of up to 150 mph. The APT used a sophisticated tilting mechanism to allow the coaches to lean into curves, and featured a hydrokinetic braking system to allow the train to stop within the existing fixed block signalling system. The project was plagued with technical problems and a lack of political will to overcome them resulted in the project being cancelled in the mid 1980s. In the end, the APT enjoyed something of an "afterlife" in the 2000s when its tilting technology re-appeared on the Italian designed Class 390
"Pendolino" trains introduced for the WCML modernisation, finally replacing most of the electric loco fleet.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
railway Coaches, Waggons
Railroad car
A railroad car or railway vehicle , also known as a bogie in Indian English, is a vehicle on a rail transport system that is used for the carrying of cargo or passengers. Cars can be coupled together into a train and hauled by one or more locomotives...
and locomotives that have been removed from service.
Steam locomotives
BR inherited more than 20,000 locomotives from the constituent Big Four companies, the vast majority of which were steam locomotives. BR built 2537 steam locomotives in the period 1948-1960: 1538 were to pre-nationalisation designs, and 999 to its own standard designs. These locomotives were destined to lead short lives, some as little as five years against a design life of over 30 years, because of the end of steam traction on 11 August 1968. The exceptions were locomotives No. 98007-98009British Rail Class 98
TOPS Class 98 has been used to cover all steam locomotives used on the mainline in Britain, but also has a particular usage for the three Vale of Rheidol Railway-design 2-6-2T locomotives that remained in the ownership of British Rail after the end of mainline steam traction in August 1968...
which continued to work the Vale of Rheidol line
Vale of Rheidol Railway locomotives
thumb|No 7 Owain Glyndŵr taking water and oil at Aberystwyth depot.thumb|No 8 Llewellyn at Devil's Bridge - at this time all three steam locomotives were allocated a TOPS code, and painted in [[rail blue]] livery....
for British Rail until it was sold in 1989. They remain in operation on the privately owned heritage railway.
Diesel locomotives
When BR was created, diesel traction was in its infancy in the United KingdomUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
(though more progress had been made in other countries, whose experience could arguably have been used to a greater degree in informing developments in the UK). Only two main-line diesel (LMS prototype) locomotives was inherited in 1948 (though more were on order) and a handful of diesel shunters of various types.
Initially, BR persisted with the small scale experimentation with diesel traction while continuing to build hundreds of steam locomotives to old and new designs. Even some steam shunters were being built through to the mid-1950s, when standard diesel shunters were already in large-scale production. It was not until the 1955 Modernisation Plan that more substantial developments in main-line diesel locomotive technology were planned.
The Plan envisaged small numbers of prototype locomotives of varying power types being ordered from a variety of manufacturers. These could be tested and compared against each other before large-scale orders were placed. Unfortunately, even before many of the prototypes had been delivered, a combination of the political need to maintain employment in the British locomotive-building industry and over-optimistic assessments of the possibilities offered by new diesel locomotives meant that large-scale orders were placed for a wide variety of untested and incompatible designs, many of which proved to be very poor.
By the end of 1968 all steam locomotives had been withdrawn - but during 1967-71 so were a large number of virtually new diesel locomotives and shunters (some only three years old) as many designs had proved unsuccessful, non-standard, and unnecessary with changed requirements on the railways, e.g. widespread line closures and the decline of wagonload freight traffic. However, some of the diesel shunters withdrawn during this period found further use on industrial railway systems.
After the production of some 5000 diesel locomotives in the 1956-1968, the British locomotive-building industry virtually collapsed. BR needed very few new diesel locomotives from then on; only 285 heavy-duty freight locomotives and 199 High Speed Train
High Speed Train
There are three types of trains in Britain that have been traditionally viewed as high speed trains:* Advanced Passenger Train - Tilting trains which never entered into regular revenue-earning service....
power cars were purchased from then until privatisation began in 1994. No diesel locomotives have been built in Britain for the mainline system since 1991; the most recent new types have been imported from Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
and Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
.
Electric locomotives
Electric traction was more advanced than diesel traction at nationalisation, with a number of isolated electrified networks across the country using a variety of power supplies, though 1500 V dc overhead supply had been accepted as the national standard in the 1930s. Most of these networks used electric multiple units to provide the passenger service, with steam locomotives operating freight trains. Thus, BR inherited only 13 ex-North Eastern and three ex-Southern Railway electric locomotives, plus two departmental electric shunters, also ex-Southern Railway.In the early years of BR, a number of locomotives were built to operate on the newly-refurbished and electrified Woodhead Route using the 1500 V dc overhead system. However, by the time that the next major electrification project, the West Coast Main Line (WCML), was underway, the decision had been taken to adopt 25 kV ac overhead as the standard supply system.
BR decided to test a variety of new 25 kV ac types for the WCML electrification; 100 locomotives of five classes were built by different manufacturers. Having learned the lessons from these types, a further 100 examples, of standard class 86, were ordered. This class was introduced in 1966, and some are still in service today. The earlier prototypes, mostly pretty successful, succumbed in the 1980s and early 1990s as non-standard following the arrival of new electric locomotives.
Although the purchase of new electric types was carried out in a more successful way than the comparable process for diesel locomotives, the 200-odd electric locomotive fleet used to operate the WCML from the mid-1960s was still far smaller than that originally envisaged; more than 500 were thought necessary when the initial plans were developed. It was fortunate that changes in the railway's operation had already occurred before mass orders were placed for electric traction.
However, BR had intended to move away from loco-hauled electric trains on the main line as early as the 1970s. The Advanced Passenger Train
Advanced Passenger Train
The Advanced Passenger Train was an experimental tilting High Speed Train developed by British Rail during the 1970s and early 1980s....
(APT) was a multiple unit
Electric multiple unit
An electric multiple unit or EMU is a multiple unit train consisting of self-propelled carriages, using electricity as the motive power. An EMU requires no separate locomotive, as electric traction motors are incorporated within one or a number of the carriages...
design intended to reduce journey times on the WCML by running at speeds of up to 150 mph. The APT used a sophisticated tilting mechanism to allow the coaches to lean into curves, and featured a hydrokinetic braking system to allow the train to stop within the existing fixed block signalling system. The project was plagued with technical problems and a lack of political will to overcome them resulted in the project being cancelled in the mid 1980s. In the end, the APT enjoyed something of an "afterlife" in the 2000s when its tilting technology re-appeared on the Italian designed Class 390
British Rail Class 390
The Class 390 Pendolino is a type of train used in Great Britain. They are electric multiple units using Fiat's tilting train pendolino technology and built by Alstom. Fifty-three 9-car units were originally built for Virgin Trains from 2001 to 2004 for operation on the West Coast Main Line , with...
"Pendolino" trains introduced for the WCML modernisation, finally replacing most of the electric loco fleet.
Coaches
BR inherited the rolling stock of the Big Four railway companies and also continued to build coaches to their designs. In 1951 BR began its own programme of coach construction using standard designs, and included significant improvements in comfort and safety over previous designs. The first BR design was the Mark 1, with the final design being the Mark 4.- British Carriage and Wagon Numbering and ClassificationBritish carriage and wagon numbering and classificationA number of different numbering and classification schemes have been used for carriages and wagons on Britain's railways, and this page explains the principal systems...
- Coaches of the London, Midland and Scottish RailwayCoaches of the London, Midland and Scottish RailwayThe London, Midland and Scottish Railway inherited several styles of coaching stock from its constituents. Stock built by the LMS itself can be categorised into three separate periods, numbered I to III.-Coaches inherited from pre-grouping companies:...
- Coaches of the Great Western RailwayCoaches of the Great Western RailwayThe passenger coaches of the Great Western Railway were many and varied, ranging from four and six-wheeled vehicles for the original broad gauge line of 1838, through to bogie coaches up to long which were in service through to 1947...
- Coaches of the Southern Railway
- Coaches of the London and North Eastern RailwayCoaches of the London and North Eastern RailwayThe London and North Eastern Railway inherited several styles of coaching stock from its constituents. Sir Nigel Gresley continued the styles that he had established pre-grouping at the Great Northern Railway and for the East Coast Joint Stock....
- British Railways Mark 1British Railways Mark 1British Railways Mark 1 was the family designation for the first standardised designs of railway carriages built by British Railways. Following nationalisation in 1948, BR had continued to build carriages to the designs of the "Big Four" companies , and the Mark 1 was intended to be the...
- British Rail Mark 2British Rail Mark 2The Mark 2 family of railway carriages were British Rail's second design of carriages. They were built by British Rail workshops between 1964 and 1975...
- British Rail Mark 3British Rail Mark 3British Rail's third design of standard carriage was designated 'Mark 3' , and was developed primarily for the InterCity 125 High Speed Train...
- British Rail Mark 4British Rail Mark 4British Rail's fourth design of passenger carriages was designated Mark 4, designed for use in InterCity 225 sets on the newly-electrified East Coast Main Line between London, Leeds, and Edinburgh.-History and construction:...
Freight wagons
- Coal trucks.
- Parcels vans and mail wagons.
- Industrial and oil tankers.
- Flat-cars and car-transporters.
- Gravel hoppers.