The last example of an airbraked coal hopper wagon, number 361000, which was built in 1977 at Shildon Wagon Works, has been designated for preservation by the Railway Heritage Committee.
The wagon is now on display at Locomotion, the National Railway Museum in Shildon.
The coal hopper will be a lasting example of the later years of production at Shildon Wagon Works and illustrates how the “modern railway” attempted to run faster coal freight trains in the domestic market. This is the only example that will remain in preservation.
The HBA / HEA wagons were built following a decision in 1976 by British Railways to introduce an airbraked coal hopper for domestic and industrial coal. Initially, these were coded HBA and some were introduced with Bruninghaus suspension. Bruninghaus suspension meant that the wagons could run at 60mph.
Until 1984 coal was moved by rail in bulk on relatively slow coal trains. This was becoming increasingly uneconomic. In 1983 and 1984 all the HBA wagons were fitted with Bruninghaus suspension and were recoded as HEA. 1500 became integrated into the Speedlink wagon load service network. Coal could now move faster and with other types of goods.
In the 1980s the coal industry had started to contract and by 1990 there were no Coal Network services south of London and the use of the HEA hoppers ceased by 1993.
The privatisation of Railfreight saw new liveries appearing on the HEA fleet, including Transrail grey, Mainline blue, and EWS maroon.
The number of HEAs declined steadily throughout the 1990s, by 2007 only 122 HEA remained in stock and have since been phased out completely.
Wagon number 361000 was transferred to the National Railway Museum’s collection by train operation DB Schenker (Rail UK) and wears their predecessor English, Welsh and Scottish Railway’s red and gold livery.
Shildon & District's local community newspaper.
