Surplus rolling stock after Beeching

[ainsworth74]

This is something occurred to me recently and set me pondering.

During the 1950s (from a quick Wiki and back of napkin calculation) BR built well in excess of a 1,000 first generation DMU vehicles. I haven't been able to track down a figure but I'd guess at a not dissimilar number of Mark 1 hauled vehicles were built as well (possibly more even?). So BR must have built easily over 2,000 vehicles during the 1950s to operate the railway (as well as whatever was left over from the Big Four).

The Beeching Report comes out in 1963 (after a lot of this feverish building has been completed) and axes more than 2,000 stations and something like 5,000 route miles as well over the next decade(ish).

So, surely, that means that BR would now be awash with vehicles (and I suppose locomotives thinking about it) that no longer had a railway to run on!

Was this the case? If so what did BR do? Did they park up hundreds of vehicles in sidings (perhaps where the surplus vehicles for summer only specials came from?) or was there a miniature culling of this brand new rolling stock with some of it sent for scrap? Or did it simply make it easier to complete the replacement of Big Four era stock through cascades?

Any thoughts and information gratefully received!

 

[MarlowDonkey]

Or did it simply make it easier to complete the replacement of Big Four era stock through cascades?

Mk2 (to the extent there are any) and Mk3 coaches are now 40 years plus and counting. By 1968, almost all the Big Four loco hauled coaches had gone and that included those built in 1948 or later to designs that predate Mk1s. The Southern Region was probably a last outpost, with 1920s and 1930s Southern Railway EMUs lasting until the VEPs and others replaced them. Brighton Belle (1930s) lasted to 1972. Here and there wasn't there something really old lurking amongst the SUBs and EPBs as a rebuild?

It was wasteful really. There were auto-coaches to a Hawksworth design being built in the 1950s alongside DMUs, in some cases with a very similar internal layout. It's perhaps a little surprising that no attempt was made to regear a shunter as a push pull replacement for 14xx 0-4-2s for example, so as to get more use from the coaching stock.

 

[yorksrob]

Mk2 (to the extent there are any) and Mk3 coaches are now 40 years plus and counting. By 1968, almost all the Big Four loco hauled coaches had gone and that included those built in 1948 or later to designs that predate Mk1s. The Southern Region was probably a last outpost, with 1920s and 1930s Southern Railway EMUs lasting until the VEPs and others replaced them. Brighton Belle (1930s) lasted to 1972. Here and there wasn't there something really old lurking amongst the SUBs and EPBs as a rebuild? .

There were indeed some 2EPB's and 2 HAP's built on previous generation underframes. There were also some Bullied era trailer carriages, built to strengthen wooden bodied 3SUB units which found themselves reformed into 4EPB's.

One example relevant to the original post is of the Hastings Guage DEMU's which were over supplied to serve the Bexhill West branch (closed in 64). Some of these vehicles were formed with spare EPB driving trailers to produce the famous Tadpole units, used on the North Downs route.

 

[Cowley]

This is something occurred to me recently and set me pondering.

During the 1950s (from a quick Wiki and back of napkin calculation) BR built well in excess of a 1,000 first generation DMU vehicles. I haven't been able to track down a figure but I'd guess at a not dissimilar number of Mark 1 hauled vehicles were built as well (possibly more even?). So BR must have built easily over 2,000 vehicles during the 1950s to operate the railway (as well as whatever was left over from the Big Four).

The Beeching Report comes out in 1963 (after a lot of this feverish building has been completed) and axes more than 2,000 stations and something like 5,000 route miles as well over the next decade(ish).

So, surely, that means that BR would now be awash with vehicles (and I suppose locomotives thinking about it) that no longer had a railway to run on!

Was this the case? If so what did BR do? Did they park up hundreds of vehicles in sidings (perhaps where the surplus vehicles for summer only specials came from?) or was there a miniature culling of this brand new rolling stock with some of it sent for scrap? Or did it simply make it easier to complete the replacement of Big Four era stock through cascades?

Any thoughts and information gratefully received!

I'm interested in this. I was reading the other day about the withdrawal of Bulleid coaches after the electrification of the Poole route in 1967. Although a few were repainted maroon and sent off for further service, it seems like the vast majority were just laid up and I assume scrapped en mass?
This must have been going on in other regions too and I was wondering if any of the older members on here remember where they were scrapped?
There must have been some long lines of withdrawn coaches around the network around then and some very busy gas torches...

As far as DMUs go, when I first started taking any proper notice of things in the 1980s there still seemed to be many different classes around which were being whittled down at an ever increasing rate by then and Vic Berry's was doing a roaring trade in dismantling them (asbestos ridden and all).
Most of the first generation DMU classes seemed to have survived into the 1970s with a few exceptions, and they'd obviously replaced a lot of hauled stock in the 1960s which must have been scrapped, but perhaps not in such large numbers as would have been the case when the teak coaches had all been replaced on the former LNER routes for instance?

 

[Bevan Price]

Almost all non-corridor loco-hauled stock was withdrawn by 1968, and that included some BR Mark1 suburban coaches. The main survivors were those used on Kings Cross / Moorgate line peak hour services, mostly hauled by Class 31 - these survived until electrification of the KX suburban lines (circa 1976).

The other hauled non-corridor stock had been replaced by emus, or had been used on lines closed by Marples-Beeching.

As MarlowDonkey suggests, pre-BR hauled corridor stock was the main casualty of the line closures and use of dmus on longer distance services. Much of this stock went for scrap, but a few coaches became departmental stock. Much of the MarkI stock used on hauled summer saturday trains saw midweek use on "SX" peak hour services (e.g. Paddington - Oxford/Newbury lines, Euston - Northampton, etc., ) although some was stored - but appeared on Footexes, Adexes, etc., which were still common until at least the early 1980s.

From memory - apart from accident victims, I think that serious withdrawals of Mark 1 corridor stock only commenced as they started to build Air-Con coaches (Mark2 then Mark3), and HSTs.

I should add that some dmus were also early casualties of the closures. Many of the early "yellow diamond" dmus had gone by the early 1970s, as had all of the 4 wheel railbuses.

 

[yorksrob]

I'm interested in this. I was reading the other day about the withdrawal of Bullied coaches after the electrification of the Poole route in 1967. Although a few were repainted maroon and sent off for further service, it seems like the vast majority were just laid up and I assume scrapped en mass?

In terms of the Bullied loco hauled stock, I think I read somewhere that they were wooden framed, which may have counted against them.

 

[Cowley]

Bevan and Yorksrob - Just taking the example of the Bulleid coaches then, there must have been a lot of them withdrawn in one fell swoop at that time. Would they have just been lined up and scrapped at Eastleigh or would private dismantling companies have been involved?

 

[Bald Rick]

Many of the line closures in the Beeching era were rather short on train services anyway - hourly at best, often much less frequent, and also often consisting of very short trains. So although lots of lines closed, not as many trains fell out as a result.

On top of this, some major line upgrades sucked in stock at around the same time - for example the WCML electrification increased frequencies substantially, which needed much more rolling stock.

 

[yorksrob]

Bevan and Yorksrob - Just taking the example of the Bulleid coaches then, there must have been a lot of them withdrawn in one fell swoop at that time. Would they have just been lined up and scrapped at Eastleigh or would private dismantling companies have been involved?

I don't know that much detail I'm afraid.

The Swanage railway have an interesting page on them though:

http://www.swanagerailway.co.uk/new...ince-1966-ndash-thanks-to-22000-hours-of-work

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

ISTR that the last few Bulleid coaches in service were in Scotland (in maroon) in 1968. The 1967 Summer Saturday additional Waterloo-Exeter trains still had a few Bulleid vehicles in them I recall, even after Bournemouth went live. The Hawksworth sleepers (in Blue and Grey) survived on Paddington - Milford to the early 70s as did the LMS sleepers Euston - Manchester and on the internal Scottish services. Some of the LMS 'Port Hole' stock also made it into B & G. Most famously, of course, were the Gresley Buffets with the 'North Country Continental' example surviving to 1976.

 

[30907]

There were indeed some 2EPB's and 2 HAP's built on previous generation underframes. There were also some Bullied era trailer carriages, built to strengthen wooden bodied 3SUB units which found themselves reformed into 4EPB's.

One example relevant to the original post is of the Hastings Guage DEMU's which were over supplied to serve the Bexhill West branch (closed in 64). Some of these vehicles were formed with spare EPB driving trailers to produce the famous Tadpole units, used on the North Downs route.

To be pedantic as usual: the Bexhill West branch was worked by a couple of the 2-H units (four were left as 2-car till the 70s IIRC). The Tadpoles were converted from 6-S units.

 

[theblackwatch]

Some DMUs were withdrawn in the late 60s, notably the non-standard 79xxx sets. these included:
* 8 Early Derby Lightweight 2-car sets based at Hammerton Street, which worked Leeds-Bradford services from 1954 (these actually went in 1964).
* Some 80 or so 2-car and five 4-car Derby Lightweights which had been new to various depots such as Lincoln, Norwich, Carlisle Upperby and Monument Lane.
* 36 Metro-Cammell 2-car sets based at Norwich/Lincoln/Bury.

The 50 Class 112/113 Cravens sets, new in 1959 and based in the North West, only survived until 1969 as well. They were non-standard and apparently were prone to catching fire (presumably this applied to the car which was withdrawn in 1962).

 

[yorksrob]

To be pedantic as usual: the Bexhill West branch was worked by a couple of the 2-H units (four were left as 2-car till the 70s IIRC). The Tadpoles were converted from 6-S units.

I don't know whether they were actually used as such, but I read thy were built for it

 

[chorleyjeff]

This is something occurred to me recently and set me pondering.

During the 1950s (from a quick Wiki and back of napkin calculation) BR built well in excess of a 1,000 first generation DMU vehicles. I haven't been able to track down a figure but I'd guess at a not dissimilar number of Mark 1 hauled vehicles were built as well (possibly more even?). So BR must have built easily over 2,000 vehicles during the 1950s to operate the railway (as well as whatever was left over from the Big Four).

The Beeching Report comes out in 1963 (after a lot of this feverish building has been completed) and axes more than 2,000 stations and something like 5,000 route miles as well over the next decade(ish).

So, surely, that means that BR would now be awash with vehicles (and I suppose locomotives thinking about it) that no longer had a railway to run on!

Was this the case? If so what did BR do? Did they park up hundreds of vehicles in sidings (perhaps where the surplus vehicles for summer only specials came from?) or was there a miniature culling of this brand new rolling stock with some of it sent for scrap? Or did it simply make it easier to complete the replacement of Big Four era stock through cascades?

Any thoughts and information gratefully received!

But the routes closed had little traffic and possibly needed relatively few coaches. Did the closures actually release many coaches ?

 

[PeterC]

I didn't keep up with all the details of rolling stock at the time but in the late 60s and early 70s I certainly remember full DMU cover being available for evening services out of LST when engineering meant that there was no power to the OHLE.

 

[edwin_m]

Most of the longest-lived trains are EMUs. EPBs and Mersey units etc all lasted longer than any pre-nationalisation hauled stock - and that's without considering the Underground. While I guess an EMU has an easier life than a DMU it probably gets more wear and tear than loco-hauled stock, due to greater weight and more intensive use.

This suggests that hauled stock could have been kept in service for longer if necessary, but there wasn't any need for it as the lines it worked were closed, electrified or turned over to MUs. Few electrified lines were closed, as these tended to be the routes with more passengers. Hauled stock was also increasingly concentrated on prime expresses, where regular replacement was necessary to be competitive.

 

[randyrippley]

........ If so what did BR do? Did they park up hundreds of vehicles in sidings (perhaps where the surplus vehicles for summer only specials came from?) or was there a miniature culling of this brand new rolling stock with some of it sent for scrap? Or did it simply make it easier to complete the replacement of Big Four era stock through cascades?

What did they do?
They stopped building/buying new stock for around ten years except for express coaches. Excess diesel locomotives were scrapped under the guise of "standardisation". Older coaches were scrapped, leaving just BR built Mk1 stock as the oldest. By the 1970s, anything containing asbestos was targeted - some had the insulation removed, most were scrapped. That removed a lot of the excess DMU stock.
There was a hiatus in building DMU stock from around 1964 until the first Pacers and Sprinters arrived. There was a hiatus in building passenger locos from around 1967 till the arrival of the HST sets.
That ten year production gap allowed the excess stock to be used up and thrown away without incurring capital costs for replacements. It also rang the death knell for most of the UK rolling stock builders

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Vast numbers of older stock - retained for summer only / odd football specials etc were specifically targeted by the Beeching reccomendations and cut up.

One of the first actions was to ban pre nationalisation stock on inter regional services - so the older vehicles were kept locally. Then they banned wooden only coaches.

This resulted in a very good friend of mine as a young rolling stock controller making up an entire pre 1948 set at Ferme Park which had one return trip Hitchin to King Cross - Monday to Friday only. This glorious caravan of LMS / GW/ LNE stock lasted for about 3 months in 1966 until someone "who mattered" spotted it one evening , casuing instant condemnation of the whole set. He managed to keep some LNER sleepers in service for a couple of years , one regular passenger insisted on them , so they looked after his needs - until other passengers complained about musty , old carriages on long distance trains. Pre computer age , you could get away with some things.

 

[ainsworth74]

Thanks all for the interesting replies!

 

[yorksrob]

, so they looked after his needs - until other passengers complained about musty , old carriages on long distance trains. Pre computer age , you could get away with some things.

If only that had worked for us.

Would anyone have noticed a solitary phase 1 CIG on an obscure south coast service in 2017 ?

I doubt they would have complained.

I suppose we had the Lyminhton CIG's and the Pretendolino, both of which I used

 

[coppercapped]

Interesting thread but I have to say that your DMU figure is too low. The Modernisation Plan foresaw the construction of some 4,600 DMU vehicles - at the end of the 15 year Modernisation Plan period in 1970 there were 3621 vehicles running. My source is Johnson and Long British Railways Engineering 1948-80, MEP, 1981.

I am sure that more than the 3,600 were built, but some of the earlier ones, and those that weren't so reliable, had already been withdrawn by this date including the ex-GWR railcars.

Regarding the loco hauled stock, the Beeching Report gives the total number of gangwayed coaches allocated to fast and semi-fast services as 18,500 in 1959. Of these only 5,500 were in year-round service. Observations showed that these were mainly BR built Mark 1s with some of the last built Grouping coaches. The other 13,000 coaches were of Grouping and indeed some pre-Grouping survivors. By 1963 the total number of coaches had been reduced to something under 13,000. The coaches were scrapped at BR workshops and by a number of private contractors.

 

[ainsworth74]

Well I did say the numbers were real back of a napkin jobs!

 

[coppercapped]

Well I did say the numbers were real back of a napkin jobs!

I do such calculations on beer mats...!

 

[ainsworth74]

I'll clearly have to update my equipment!!

 

[RichmondCommu]

It was wasteful really. There were auto-coaches to a Hawksworth design being built in the 1950s alongside DMUs, in some cases with a very similar internal layout. It's perhaps a little surprising that no attempt was made to regear a shunter as a push pull replacement for 14xx 0-4-2s for example, so as to get more use from the coaching stock.

Given that branch lines were already closing and the Swindon had built rail cars in the 1940s I think it was a real act of folly to have been building auto-coaches in the 1950s. Surely the Western Region at Swindon must have realised that DMUs were the way forward.

 

[coppercapped]

Given that branch lines were already closing and the Swindon had built rail cars in the 1930s I think it was a real act of folly to have been building auto-coaches in the 1950s. Surely the Western Region at Swindon must have realised that DMUs were the way forward.

The Western Region, as successor to the GWR, was fully aware of the advantages of diesel power. However the Railway Executive, in the form of Robin Riddles, was convinced of the benefits of electrification - at least of the main lines - and saw diesel traction as a diversion. Until lines were electrified steam traction was seen to be the way to go.

This resulted in a diesel development hiatus from 1948 which for locomotives lasted until the first ones were ordered under the 1955 Modernisation Plan but only until 1952 in terms of DMUs for secondary services. An internal working party reported in March 1952 which recommended that services in the Bradford - Leeds - Harrogate - Halifax area should be turned over to one-man operated (in the sense of 'no fireman') lightweight rolling stock. As a result the 'Derby Lightweights' were designed and the first ones were ready for trials in April 1954. Even so, 7 years were lost, in this time more GWR designed railcars could have been built...

It is shocking, but not surprising, that autocoaches were still being built in the early 1950s.

 

[Cowley]

Given that branch lines were already closing and the Swindon had built rail cars in the 1940s I think it was a real act of folly to have been building auto-coaches in the 1950s. Surely the Western Region at Swindon must have realised that DMUs were the way forward.

Oi RC. Don't question The Western.

 

[theageofthetra]

Vast numbers of older stock - retained for summer only / odd football specials etc were specifically targeted by the Beeching reccomendations and cut up.

One of the first actions was to ban pre nationalisation stock on inter regional services - so the older vehicles were kept locally. Then they banned wooden only coaches.

This resulted in a very good friend of mine as a young rolling stock controller making up an entire pre 1948 set at Ferme Park which had one return trip Hitchin to King Cross - Monday to Friday only. This glorious caravan of LMS / GW/ LNE stock lasted for about 3 months in 1966 until someone "who mattered" spotted it one evening , casuing instant condemnation of the whole set. He managed to keep some LNER sleepers in service for a couple of years , one regular passenger insisted on them , so they looked after his needs - until other passengers complained about musty , old carriages on long distance trains. Pre computer age , you could get away with some things.

Lovely story. Wonder if a photo of the 'caravan' exists?

 

[Bevan Price]

The GWR railcars were obsolete designs from the 1930s; the last one was built in 1942. It is doubtful that 1950s engines could have been used without a major redesign.

But yes, it was probably foolish to build GWR autocoaches as late as 1954.

At the time, one advantage of steam was that, for busy services, it was easy to add another coach without needing an extra "motive power unit". Some of the GWR railcars were geared to haul trailing coaches - but a consequence was that they were limited to 40 mph - not helpful if part of their journey used sections of the "main line".

.

 

[Taunton]

But yes, it was probably foolish to build GWR autocoaches as late as 1954.

Ah, that was Swindon They were also building pannier tanks until then as well (last of the 16xx), some time after volume production of Class 08 diesel shunters started. They later convinced themselves to build the D95xx centre cab diesels, which started to be disposed even before the last ones were built, although they seemed to find a ready market with industrial users.

Some of the GWR railcars were geared to haul trailing coaches - but a consequence was that they were limited to 40 mph - not helpful if part of their journey used sections of the "main line"

Never heard of that speed restriction. There was actually a 3-car set, built as a twin unit which then had a Hawksworth coach inserted. That ran at normal speeds; it used to turn up at Bristol TM mid-afternoon, coming from Weymouth.

More generally, a vast amount of rolling stock was disposed in the late 1960s. The last steam locos were only a start. A lot of dmus were got rid of after only about 10 years service. Some were unreliable (eg all the later Cravens/Rolls-Royce units), but the "yellow diamond" units were quite straightforward, and in truth were little different to the subsequent units and could have been standardised with them quite readily.

The earlier Mk 1 stock was a poor design, especially for corrosion of the bodywork, being the first real attempt to build all-steel main line stock. EMUs were fine, with electric heating, but the extent to which leaking steam from the heaters rusted the lower body from the inside was substantial. Looking at later GW/LMS/LNER/SR stock, it looks to be steel panels, but take those off and they had an ash/teak wooden body framing supporting this (the 1950s bus industry was the same). Bulleid on the Southern didn't even use steel roofs, they were (including some of the earlier 4-SUB electric units) just of canvas stretched over timber framing, into the BR build period.