LMS railcars
The London Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) introduced a number of railcars to service between 1933 and 1939. They were mainly single units but one was a three-car articulated set.
Single units
The LMS purchased three four-wheel diesel railcars from Leyland in 1933. They were numbered 29950-29952 (in the multiple unit section of their carriage number series). Each had a 95hp diesel engine fitted. After trials between Preston and Carlisle, they operated from Blackburn to Springvale and Clitheroe and subsequently at Hamilton in Scotland. They were inherited by British Rail at Nationalisation, but were withdrawn in the early 1950s, so never received TOPS classification.
In passing, mention should be made of an Armstrong Whitworth diesel-electric railcar which operated a luxury twelve-seat express service on the LMS for two weeks in 1933 between London and Castle Bromwich near Birmingham in connection with a British Industries Fair. This car, with body work by Cravens which incorporated a kitchen, was powered by a standard Armstrong-Saurer 250bhp engine.
Articulated unit
In 1937 the LMS decided to produce a more modern diesel train for itself. This was a three-car articulated railcar which was outshopped from Derby Carriage and Wagon Works in 1939. The cars were numbered 80000, 80001 and 80002.
The streamlined three-car train was a single articulated unit; the two outer coaches were each 64ft long and rested on a centre coach that was 52ft long. The articulation was an idea that had been already taken up by Sir William Stanier for some locomotive hauled stock.
Mechanically the train was a development of the railcars that had entered service from 1933 on the LMS Northern Counties Committee's (NCC) lines in Northern Ireland, using an identical arrangement of in-line powertrain as NCC railcars Nos.2-4. Under each coach were two vertically mounted Leyland 125bhp diesel engines driving the inner axle of each bogie through a Lysholm-Smith torque converter. There were six engines for the three-car set which gave a total power of 750bhp. As the whole unit weighed 73 tons, this yielded a power/weight ratio of slightly more than 10bhp/ton which provided a main line standard of performance with a maximum speed of 75 mph.
It was first used on the Oxford-Cambridge line and then on St Pancras-Nottingham services. A second unit was planned but never built and No.80000/80001/80002 was withdrawn in 1939 on the outbreak of World War II; it never re-entered passenger service.
In 1949 the train was converted to a two-car set for overhead line maintenance. The centre car was removed and the number of engines in the set reduced to two. The driving cabs were given flat ends, all the passenger seats were removed and the roof was flattened to allow engineers to work on the overhead cables. It worked on the Manchester-Altrincham route. The set was moved to a depot at Longsight in 1959 and taken out of service shortly afterwards although it was still in existence in a derelict state as late as 1967.
The design may be seen as a step in the development of post-war British Railways diesel multiple units (DMU) such as the Derby Lightweight units, at least as far the powertrain is concerned.
See also
References
- The Development of the Railcar by R W Kidner, published by the Oakwood Press in 1958
- Diesel Rail Cars (An Introduction) by R H Mann, published by the Draughtsmen's and Allied Technicians' Association in 1963
- Diesel Dawn by Colm Flanagan published by Colourpoint Books, Newtownards in 2003, ISBN 1 904242 08 1
External links