JV31 Midland Railway Company

Western Australian, Midland Railway Company, JV class, 1st class Sleeping Car No. 31

The Midland Railway was a privately owned railway company in WA operating between Midland and Walkaway (near Geraldton) commencing operations in 1894 until being absorbed by the WAGR in 1964.

 

The JV class sleeping cars were the last carriages built for the Midland Railway Co. being built in 1927 by the WAGR workshops at Midland. Only 3 JV carriages were built numbering 31 -33. The WAGR later went on to use the design for their own AZ class cars.

 

The picture here below from the State Library of WA shows JV 31 freshly painted in 1955.

 

 

In a 1927 report in the West Australian Newspaper, General Manager of the Midland Railway Mr J. J. Poynton proclaimed “They are the best sleeping cars on a narrow-gauge railway in Australia and as far as knowledge goes, not excelled anywhere in the world”.

 Each carriage provided sleeping accommodation for 60 persons in two berth compartments. The interior lining of the carriages was of beautifully finished Teak. Light but warm rugs made by the Albany Woolen Mills were provided for the sleeping berths finished with MR initials perforated in the centre. The corridors, considered “Remarkable”, were staggered, running half the length of the car on one side then crossing over to the other side via a vestibule with entry and exit doors, the advantages of the staggered corridors providing a better balance of weight distribution to the cars,  better access for passengers, and control of the wind draft “which is apt to whistle through a long corridor”.  

 

Other innovations included Enclosed Concertinas between cars and Water tanks under the floor with electric pumps to raise the water when required.  Automatic floodlights on the side of the cars came on when the train stopped, to light up stations at night, and then would turn off once a speed of 8 miles an hour was attained. Steps were provided at each end of the cars to allow for us at unattended sidings, a trap door in the floor of the corridor giving access to the steps when lifted and handrails swing into place “ready for use”. There could be no doubt that these cars costing approx. £7500 to build, fully equipped, would enhance the comfort of passengers and the prestige of the Midland Railway!

The Model

 

 

This model of JV 31 has been created from a WestOzModels urethane "AZ"  ½ door kit with some “creative” painting to achieve the MR livery .

 

 

The Decals have been painstakingly and beautifully reproduced by local member Rob Clarke of "Westland Models".

 

I would not normally model the MR, but I have built this carriage to assist local member Stuart Mackay who has been working on a MR layout of Watheroo for our annual exhibition for which rollingstock is a little hard to come by.

I personally prefer the WAGR greens and Creams and have got to say that after many attempts to photograph this model, Brown has to be the worst colour to photograph and get a good result. Thanks go to Bill Gray for his photo above - I believe he agrees with me.

Midland Railway rollingstock did venture onto parts of the WAGR, and so a bit of modelers license will allow my model of JV31 to fit into my future modeling intentions.

 

 

How to Make a Styrene Roof for Carriages

One of the best ways to put a roof on any model carriage is to make a styrene roof curved to shape, to suit the carriage being built. This ensures that there is very little or no stresses from the roof material to “spring” the Urethane cast sides.

This is easily done by taking a sheet of .20”/ .5mm styrene sheet and cut to length and width to suit the carriage being roofed. It is good practice to add/allow an extra 5mm of material all round to ensure coverage is achieved – the excess material can be trimmed off in the final fitting.

Find a suitable length of steel tubing – if possible to the correct diameter required to suit the carriage kit end walls. I use a piece of steel tube I saved from a piece of exercise equipment (foot section), which had been discarded by a neighbor during a local shire, kerbside rubbish collection, but any metal tube can be used including vacuum cleaner pipe, pedestal fan etc.

Take the cut section of styrene sheet and tape the ends to the steel pipe using electrical tape ensuring that the styrene is square along the pipe. Then simply wind the tape tightly along the length of the pipe ensuring the styrene sheet is pulled tight onto the pipe

Take the pipe section and stand it in the kitchen sink ( I usually have the plastic side down) and prepare 2 full kettles of boiling water - I keep an old kettle spare for this purpose so that you have the water ready to go. With the water at boiling, carefully pour the boiled water down the inside of the tube – slowly I find is best, allowing more time for good heat transfer to the steel pipe.

 

 

Allow the pipe to cool and then remove the electrical tape to reveal a nicely shaped section of curved roof material.

Take the roof section and test fit it to carriage – carefully trim the long edge to achieve a neat fit to the carriage body – this might mean making several small cuts/trims till correct size is achieved - allow excess overhang on the ends to enable addition of bargeboards and carriage end trimmings.

Glue roof into place by firstly gluing (squarely) on the end walls then using a scalpel blade laden with glue on its top surface, gently lift the sides with the pointy end and push a little glue onto roof underside and then allow the roof to return to its position – hold in place until set and then tack a few more places. Once the roof is tacked into place, run a bead of glue down the inside of the body to seal along the length. Fit end detail and trim to length.

AZ First Class Sleeping Car

In 1928, the WAGR built four new 1st class sleeping cars to a design which the Midland Workshops used to build 3 JV class cars for the Midland Railway Co. in 1927.

The 1928 WAGR cars were numbered AZ 434 – 437. In 1929 a further 6 cars were built numbered 438 –443.

These cars were used on the Perth to Kalgoorlie "Westland" overnight sleeper services until being displaced to other less important services by the more modern AH cars which were introduced in 1948. In the early 1960's some of the cars had their matchwood sides repanelled with plywood sheeting as part of the general refurbishment programme. With the demise of the "Albany Progress" in 1978 the AZ's became redundant.

The above picture shows a model of an AZ sleeping car - this is the prototype model for the kit which is now available from WestOz Models. The Kit is formed from patterns produced by Brian Norris. WestOz Models has produced this AZ "Body" kit in polyurethane with a aluminum roof. Some underfloor detail parts (Steps, water tanks and transformer box) are included in the kit. All other parts are available from Railwest Models