Garden Railway Forum

I am currently working on designing and producing a set of coaches for a 45mm 16mm scale garden railway.

For a rake of British narrow gauge coaches, what is a standard formation of coaches. I gather the compartments you can do are First, Second, Third, Luggage, Guard. Which of these are essential for a plausible rake of coaches? Do you need a guard compartment at both ends? Are duckets a necessity? I've also seen the label for a 'Brake' compartment. Is this the same as a guard compartment?

My plan is for a first class coach (possibly with a luggage compartment), a second class coach, and a third class coach with a guard compartment at the end. Is this a prototypical formation?

Sorry for the amount of questions.
Harry

Not sure that there really is any such thing as a standard or typical formation. Then again "narrow gauge" is a very wide field. The Lynton & Barnstaple was much more of a 'mainline' operation than, say, the Festiniog & Blaenau. The F & B ran a Brake/3rd, 1st/2nd Composite, 2x All Third - all 4-wheelers, standard formation, mainly because that is all they had! The L & B in contrast had bogie stock, of which there were 16 or 17 of 6 different types.

So in answer to your question, you can run whatever you fancy! Generally speaking, on narrow gauge lines 1st class would have been very limited ( on the F & B it was a single 1st class compartment sandwiched by a 2nd class at both ends) and the majority would have been 3rd class. A full brake ( guards) was rare and most would have been an enlarged compartment at one end of a passengar coach ( Brake Composite).

Thanks for the information. In that case I may do a brake/3rd, first and second composite, and maybe an all third.

As Philip says, it was dependent on each railway's resources.

For example, the Southwold Railway had six (six wheeled) coaches - three were first/third composites and three were all thirds. The only difference between the seats in first and third was cushions on the wooden bench seats.

The Welshpool & Llanfair had the three bogie coaches - two were 3rd/brake/1st composites and one was all 3rd.

The Leek and Manifold had four bogie coaches - two were brake/third/ first and two were third only

The Rye & Camber had two bogie carriages - one was 1st/2nd composite and one was all 3rd

The Schull & Skibbereen had eight coaches (five four wheelers and three bogies) - one of the four wheelers was All 1st and the other four were all 3rds. One bogie coach was a 1st/3rd composite and the other two were all 3rds

As Philip says some railways (eg IoM) had dozens of coaches

Hope that helps

Rik

Thanks for the further info. It seems second class compartments are less common than I had thought. I may go for a Brake/third/first and an all third like the Welshpool ones (which I've also just looked at and realised they don't have duckets on their guard compartment).