February - Intercity Railway Society

Liveries over the years have varied, with BR Railfreight red used initially for the majority but either blue
or light green for those wagons diagrammed for Thames Board traffic. When sectorisation came in
they were all allocated to Transrail but retained their original liveries. Some have received EWS
maroon livery.
With the increased traffic brought about by the hurricane of 1987 more conversions were carried out
using redundant 45t VDA vans from the following batches.
Number Code Lot No Design Code Built Manufacturer
200550-200999 VDA 3855 VD001A 1976 Ashford Works
210100-210399 VDA 3908 1977-78 Shildon Works
As with the OBAs/OCAs it was a simple conversion involving removing the roof and sides. This left the
rounded end profile as seen below and a similar height to the extended OBAs/OCAs.
200975 & 112241 showing the different profiles of the VDA (left) and OCA (right)
conversions, Elgin Yard, 23 rd January 2012
examples of the two different VDA lots, 3855 (left) and 2908 (right)
As with the OBAs/OCAs both stanchion types were used within the same batch with no apparent
reason. I can only reason this was due to conversion at different works, does anyone know ?
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