Motor Luggage Van (Class 419)
| On first overhauls in 1964, units gained small yellow
warning panels on the cab fronts, a few also had their vehicle numbers added in
the usual 'unit number' position, though some never carried these
whilst still in green. In March 1967 68004 was painted all-blue with full
yellow ends, whilst all others went direct from green to blue/grey with full
yellow ends, the last being done about July 1970, with blue 68004 following in
August. In early 1986 vehicles began being repainted into the LSE sector
'Jaffa Cake' two tone brown livery, 68001/3/5/6/7/8/9/10 being done.
Early in 1987 the vehicles were allocated unit numbers for the first time given
a class number of 419, becoming 419001 - 419010. The new numbers were applied
on cab ends each side just above the windows rather than high up in the centre
as previously, and only the last four digits were shown. This renumbering order
caused some confusion as 9001/2/3/6/8 had their body side numbers altered in
error though these were quickly changed back to 68xxx. The increasing use of
these vans on mail and postal trains led to the repainting of 9001/9 in Post
Office red livery in late 1988/early 1989. However unit 9004 was held-up and
robbed on the Quarry Line near Merstham on 8 March 1989 whilst working a
Brighton to London Bridge mail service and both were quickly repainted again,
into the new NSE livery. All ten MLVs had their brake rigging rearranged during late 1985/early 1986 to completely separate the braking systems on the two bogies. Previously, like other similar '1957' type EMU's, there was only a single brake cylinder on each vehicle and the rigging applied the brakes on both bogies. However, following a number of instances of signals being overrun and culminating in a buffer stop collision at London Bridge 18th April 1985, when a brake cylinder defect had affected the braking performance, all were modified to split the brake system into two (with another brake cylinder fitted) so that in event of a failure the braking capability was only reduced by 50%. Obviously this was not such a problem on other types of unit which always had another vehicle attached to assist with stopping the train when a fault arose. For this reason, the units were 'blacked' by drivers for a while, and then ran temporarily attached to 2Hap 'runners' until the modifications were completed, units 6011/6087/6103 being retained past their planned withdrawal dates for this reason. From May 1990, carriage of mails by internal SR services
ceased, and by this time most boat train duties had also finished and most of
the MLVs became surplus with units 9003/7/8/9/10 going into store at Ramsgate.
From May 1991 9001/3/5/7-9 were officially withdrawn followed by the remaining
four from 30 September. All were then allocated numbers in the departmental
series as 931091-99 and 931090, though many were not physically renumbered as
they were out of use. A few were used at Ramsgate & Slade Green as depot
'shunting horses' for a while and 9006 was damaged in a shunting mishap
at Ramsgate 6 December 1991 and later scrapped at Gwent Demolition,
Margam. |
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The LSE sector was re-launched as Network SouthEast when Chris
Green became its Director, and 9004 is seen here in the NSE colour scheme at
Redhill during April 1990. The traction battery hatch covers can clearly be
seen on the left.
photograph by David Smith |
| The second member of the class is seen here during its latter
days in Network SouthEast Livery.
photograph by David Smith |
 |
All photographs are copyright
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This page was last updated 3 March 2004
