Caves Express RBR Car

About the exhibit

Static exhibit

1st CLASS CORRIDOR BUFFET CAR RBR 1049

The restoration of this carriage involved many hours of research. Assisted by Jennifer Edmonds, project leader, Rod Hawkes, invested hundreds of hours of physical labour and offsite research to complete the project. Detailed plans of the original carriage were available from NSW State Rail archives.

At their 2015 Heritage Awards, the National Trust recognised the Museum for this restoration recognised the Museum for this restoration.

Custodian

Transport Heritage NSW trading as Valley Heights Locomotive Depot Heritage Museum

History

The R-Type corridor cars were constructed between 1931 and 1946, a total of 109 cars of BR, CR, FR, HR, RBR and RFR type were built, all as conversions from older Express Lavatory cars. They were built from existing cars with a basic Mansard style roof shape. The original underframe and roof were retained, with new sides, ends and interiors.

These coaches had a long and varied life - initially they were designed to service the medium distance country train workings, and provided Buffet facilities for all passengers via interconnecting gangways between cars. The brake seconds at the outer ends of the set had connecting gangways, so if any extra corridor cars were attached, they were able to access the buffet facilities.

These R-Type corridor cars were worked generally as sets. As the sets got older, carriages beyond repair were taken out of the sets without replacement, and the remainder of the cars lasted until the late 1970s and early 1980s.

SAB – 5c – Sets 105/106/107 – FR, BR, BR, RFR, FR
SEB – 6c – Sets 100/101/109 – HR, FR, RBR, BR, FR, HR
SIB – 4c – Sets 103/104/120/121 – FR, RFR, BR, FR
SOB – 7c – Set 102 – HR, FR, FR, RBR, BR, FR, HR
SUB – 5-7c – Set 108 – HR, BR, RBR, BR, FR, FR, HR

Prototype information for these models has been researched from the following sources:

  • Coaching Stock of the NSW Railways - Volumes 1 and 2, Cooke, Estell, Seckold and Beckhaus, Eveleigh Press, 1999 and 2003

  • Time of the Passenger Train - First (and Second, and Third) Division, Preston, Eveleigh Press, 2003 (and 2004, and 2006)

More information and photos

Valley Heights recognised in National Trust Heritage awards, Transport Heritage NSW 2015-05-19, [Link broken 2019-11-14]

Caves Express, Wikipedia, accessed 2020-11-29

Toot! Toot! All Aboard for Jenolan Caves!, Jenolan Caves website, accessed 2020-11-29