NSE Rolling Stock In Manchester???

[Helvellyn]

I can remember in the late 1980s/early 1990s on a summer Saturday a set of NSE Mk1s and a 86 turning up at Lancaster on a Glasgow Central service.

I don't recall that, but I do recall a Saturday Paddington-Carlisle service using a mix of OM based Mark 1 SKs and Mark 2A BFKs/FKs in NSE livery. It would then be used to work the first Southbound service on a Sunday from Carlisle.

 

[sprinterguy]

This has me puzzled too.

The Class 87 were air brake only, and I'm pretty sure the DVT were also.

Almost all Mk 1 seating coaches were vacuum only to the end, and the car carriers likewise, which meant Motorail couldn't upgrade to Mk 2.

Class 81-86 (not 87) were dual braked and did have a brake translator which handled air on one side and vacuum on the other, but I can't see how the formation could be put together.

Most of the GUVs used on Motorail services were dual braked at the time that the DVTs were introduced (although the car flats that preceded them were vacuum only AFAIK), and a good proportion of the West Coast Motorail van fleet was air braked only by the early nineties.

However that doesn't detract from the fact that, as you rightly say, all NSE mark 1s remained vacuum braked while the DVTs were air brake only, and only two 85s (and no 81s) were ever fitted with TDM, and this only as a temporary measure solely for use during the early phases of TDM testing on the WCML. Like you I can't see such a formation being physically possible.