NZR's Early Car-vans 2

NZR's EARLY CAR-VANS

Part 2 The 44ft and 46ft 7in

Class 'A' low Roofed Bogie Cars

Author John Agnew

The full article can be found in New Zealand Railfan, Issue 58, March 2009, pages 23 - 27

This article-summary aims to list the key facts, reference specific items of rolling stock mentioned, and describe the drawings and photographs that are presented in the full article.

The Developments

• mid 1878, Addington Workshops working on converting British 6-wheel cars to bogie cars to improve ride.
• Clemenson's patent Radiating Axles were fitted to some cars at Addington and Hillside
• 30 Clemenson's 6-wheeled carriages imported in 1879 - the last
• 13 Gilbert Bush & Co clerestory-roofed carriages and one Baggage C imported from USA in 1879 (3 cars and the van ordered for Rakaia and Ashburton Forks Railway, 10 cars allocated to Hurunui - Bluff Railway)
• From 1882, Addington Workshops started building 43ft and 44ft versions
• From 1882, C class cars were being converted to bogie cars using Blueprint_919.
• Two of the C class rebuilds were later converted to car-vans.
  • Car_A311 was allocated to Wellington and was converted to a car-van at Petone Workshops in 1895 to a variation of BP_919
  • Car_A241 was allocated to Dunedin and converted to a car-van in 1897