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DMU identification please

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inzera

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Can anyone help ID a DMU for me please. I used to go from London's Marylebone Station on a DMU in the middle 1960's. I am trying to find out what class DMU I would have travelled on. My searches uncovered photos of classes 107/108/115, all of which look pretty similar. Attached is a photo of a DMU from around 1962-65 so can anyone say exactly what class it might be? Thanks
 

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MichaelAMW

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That's a class 115 at Marylebone.

Both may be seen in a classic ritish film of the following decade:


looks like a class 108 to me, but happy to be corrected.

Edit: I agree its a 115.

Yes, a 108 doesn't have doors to every seating bay.
 

hexagon789

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Can anyone help ID a DMU for me please. I used to go from London's Marylebone Station on a DMU in the middle 1960's. I am trying to find out what class DMU I would have travelled on. My searches uncovered photos of classes 107/108/115, all of which look pretty similar. Attached is a photo of a DMU from around 1962-65 so can anyone say exactly what class it might be? Thanks
Class 115, I think this photo from the excellent railcar site will provide the comparison:

 

Taunton

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Although the cab front looked the same (and was also supplied under subcontract to Pressed Steel and to Birmingham RCW for use on the later Western Region dmus), the 107 and 108 could be distingushed in such a photo as they had "low density" bodywork, with only two doors per side. The 115 had doors to each seating bay, as can be seen here.

There were a few low density 108 cars allocated to Marylebone at the end of the classic dmu era, they were used to form 2-car sets, which allowed onetime 8-car formations to be reduced to 6-car ones.
 

inzera

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So, now im confused. That film was from 1973. My journeys were made between 1962 to 1965. Also the cars were all green with yellow flash on the front. So, would that not make it more likely to be the earlier Class 108? The photo from the film showed a blue livery 115.
 

Journeyman

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So, now im confused. That film was from 1973. My journeys were made between 1962 to 1965. Also the cars were all green with yellow flash on the front. So, would that not make it more likely to be the earlier Class 108? The photo from the film showed a blue livery 115.
108s didn't operate out of Marylebone in the 60s.
 

Gloster

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So, now im confused. That film was from 1973. My journeys were made between 1962 to 1965. Also the cars were all green with yellow flash on the front. So, would that not make it more likely to be the earlier Class 108? The photo from the film showed a blue livery 115.
The 115 went to Marylebone in 1960 and took over the local and suburban services. The 108 had been delivered a few years earlier and were spread around the country, but didn’t appear at Marylebone until the 1970s or 1980s.
 

inzera

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OK. thank you everyone for your valuable help. I'm taking it that the train I travelled in was a Class 115.
Now I can sleep easy at nights !!

Thanks again
 

yorksrob

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Both may be seen in a classic ritish film of the following decade:




Yes, a 108 doesn't have doors to every seating bay.

There's also a corpse fall out of one of them at Marylebone in an episode of Dempsey & Makepiece.
 

inzera

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Out of interest the photo I put in my first posting was taken off-screen from an early 1960's film shown on TV the other night in the "Tales of Edgar Wallace" series. The interior shots brought back memories of Marylebone Station which I used most days and then the definitive shots of the Class 115 train pulling out took me back a fair bit !
 

Taunton

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The Marylebone 115 cars appear in many films and TV programmes as this was long the "quiet" London station, especially off-peak, that suited this. You would never know this nowadays. The BR headquarters building next door, where the PR department was, gave an added bonus.

Marylebone and its suburban lines were actually notably isolated from the rest of the BR network, and the Class 115 units, once steam ended there in 1966, ran on for the best part of a quarter century very much in isolation, and really the only type of rolling stock normally in use there at all.

Just in passing, regarding the 108s, Derby works ran two dmu production lines in parallel right through the classic dmu construction era, the "lightweight" cars (108s etc), short frame cars with alloy bodies and low density seating/doors, and the "heavyweight" cars (115s etc), long frame cars with steel bodies, many (but not all) with high density body designs. The front ends were standardised, and when they changed over from the plain roof dome with high destination to the 4-character display with destination in the middle window, this was done for both lines at the same time.
 

Gloster

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BR had a designated manager for liaison with film and TV companies who was, I believe, based at Marylebone. There were obvious advantages if the Home Counties based film and TV industry wanted a quick shot or short scene or two of a generic ‘train in busy station’ type in regularly doing the work at the same place.
 
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Revaulx

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A handful of additional 115s were built for the express services on the CLC main line: Liverpool Central (later Lime Street) to Manchester Central (later Oxford Road & Piccadilly).

Their high-density suburban layout didn’t feel at all right on a supposedly “inter-city” service, though they were more reliable and less rattly than the other DMUs we had to endure around South Manchester.
 

Grumpy Git

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..................... less rattly than the other DMUs we had to endure around South Manchester.
Maybe my mind is playing tricks on me, but the 156 Crewe-Newark Castle service I used at the weekend didn't feel any better or faster/quieter than the 104's I used to endure in the 1970's on the Buxton-Piccadilly service?
 
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Journeyman

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A handful of additional 115s were built for the express services on the CLC main line: Liverpool Central (later Lime Street) to Manchester Central (later Oxford Road & Piccadilly).

Their high-density suburban layout didn’t feel at all right on a supposedly “inter-city” service, though they were more reliable and less rattly than the other DMUs we had to endure around South Manchester.
It was a tad nicer inside than the 116/7/8s, though - higher backed seating and better quality finishes. The first class was 2+1 and actually quite luxurious.
 

Revaulx

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Maybe my mind is playing tricks on me, but the 156 Crewe-Newark Castle service I used at the weekend didn't feel any better or faster/quieter than the 104's I used to endure in the 1970's on the Buxton-Piccadilly service?
The Buxton 104s were ok. Longsight seemed to take better care of them than Newton Heath!

It was a tad nicer inside than the 116/7/8s, though - higher backed seating and better quality finishes. The first class was 2+1 and actually quite luxurious.
Not just the seats and finishes; they seemed very well engineered and robust. It was just that they seemed rather incongruous on an express service; even if a fairly short one. The throaty roar of the exhausts on leaving a cavernous and moribund Manchester Central was impressive though.

I’d completely forgotten how nice the first class was https://www.railcar.co.uk/images/15354
 
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Journeyman

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Not just the seats and finishes; they seemed very well engineered and robust. It was just that they seemed rather incongruous on an express service; even if a fairly short one. The throaty roar of the exhausts on leaving a cavernous and moribund Manchester Central was impressive though.
They had the more powerful Albion 230hp engines, which probably helped there! I think that was to ensure adequate performance on the bits of route shared with LT.
I’d completely forgotten how nice the first class was https://www.railcar.co.uk/images/15354
Sadly I never got to sample it in service. :(
 

70014IronDuke

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The Marylebone 115 cars appear in many films and TV programmes as this was long the "quiet" London station, especially off-peak, that suited this. You would never know this nowadays. The BR headquarters building next door, where the PR department was, gave an added bonus.
Some might say the most famous film produced (and showing 115s, IIRC) at Marylebone and on the line out north was "A Hard Day's Night". It has a scene where 'fans' chase the FAb Four near Marylebone station.

An absolutely awful film, IMHO, with a worse story line - if it can be called that - than "Help", though some of the music was fine by me.

It was also where an awfully young George Harrison met Patie Boyd, which was kind of influential on both their lives.
 

Gloster

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IMDb lists 43 locations for Marylebone, while reelstreets gives double that for Marylebone, although this probably includes normal streets in the area. The one I remember is The Ipcress File.
 

Sprinter107

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There was a sit com in the 1980s with Penelope Keith, she played a business woman, cant remember the name of the programme, but that had several interior and exterior shots of the 115s.
 

MichaelAMW

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Although the cab front looked the same (and was also supplied under subcontract to Pressed Steel and to Birmingham RCW for use on the later Western Region dmus), the 107 and 108 could be distingushed in such a photo as they had "low density" bodywork, with only two doors per side. The 115 had doors to each seating bay, as can be seen here.

There were a few low density 108 cars allocated to Marylebone at the end of the classic dmu era, they were used to form 2-car sets, which allowed onetime 8-car formations to be reduced to 6-car ones.
Those two-car sets were a 108 driving trailer paired with a 115 from Allerton, which unlike the Marylebone ones had a gangway connection. The Marylebone 115s they replaced were sent to the West Midlands to be mixed in with their 116s to form four-car sets for the Cross-City line.
 
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