The LNER Encyclopedia

Hi People,

Please excuse my ignorance, just what are those boards for on the platforms at Kings Cross? They are stacked under the signal and on a trolley on the opposite platform.

http://i1083.photobucket.com/albums/j38 ... _thumb.jpg

Thanks

Steve

They are the boards for the ends of Pullman vestibules which folded on the centre line. The original LNER ones were wooden and oblong and the later BR ones were, if my memory is correct, some sort of hg plastic and radiused at the top.

In railway parlance they were called "Gangway Shields".

I believe there was an General Appendix instruction regarding their use but certainly later in BR days their
use seemed to decline.

One of the functions they performed was keeping the sliding vestibule door, at a coach end, clean. After a
few runs, with the "Suction" effect at the tail end of as moving train, a great deal of dirt would form on the
rear of a train and the gangway shield protected the (inner) sliding door from getting grimy. This avoided posssible claims
if a passenger got their clothing dirty brusing against a grimy door.

Also indispensible on troughs!

In the 1947 General Appendix they are referred to as Vestibule Shields (p38) of three types Pullman Shileds, British Standard Shields and Shields for fitting to LNER Mail Vans.

Instruction is that they must be fitted to each end of corridor trains, unless the loco has a corridor tender and if a train is composed partly of corridor stock Vestibule Shields must be fitted 'on the front and read of each vestibule portion whether compsed of one or more vestibule vehicles'

Demonstrated as fitted to The Elizabethan (view from 02:00):-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5kLJdCEgU4