The END of the Four Wheel Railfreight Wagon?

Wagons featured in this video include the PCA presflo, PGA hopper, PAA covhop, CDA covhop, PNA, VGA van, IZA twin two-axle van and the SSA scrap wagon.

The short wheelbase four wheel, two axle freight wagon has been a fixture of the UK rail freight scene from the earliest days of the railways.

In recent years they have become increasing rare, either because the commodities they carried have been lost to the railways or they have been replaced by bigger, high capacity bogie type wagons.

In this video I will look at some of the four wheel wagons that can still be found on freight flows plus those that have been recently withdrawn from service.

We begin with the PCA presflo cement wagon. Dating back to the 1970s these wagons can still be seen working on a number of flows.

66419+66595 6L87 Earles - West Thurrock Souldrop 17/4/2012

66952 6M91 Theale - Earles Harrowden Junction 19/11/2013

70015 6M91 Theale - Earles Bromham 12/11/2013

70004 6L87 Earles - West Thurrock East Hyde 15/4/2014

66623 6M91 Theale - Earles East Hyde 27/10/2014

66009 6F93 St Pancras - Ketton Irchester 26/1/2015

66727 6F93 St Pancras - Ketton Wellingborough 7/5/2021

70014 6G65 Earles - Walsall North Stafford Junction 19/5/2022

The PGA hopper wagon has been in use since the early 1970s. In 1988 Redland (later trading as Lafarge) created a innovative self discharge train. The PGA wagons unloaded onto a conveyor which was linked between the wagons and then to a discharging wagon at the end of the rake. Most of the PGAs have now been withdrawn or scrapped.

66606 6D45 Luton - Mountsorrel Irchester 14/4/2015

66121 6Z79 Marks Tey - Brentford Tey Green 20/8/2013

66122 6L43 Mountsorrel - Kennet Beggars Bridge 2/9/2014

66055 6L39 Mountsorrel - Norwich Trowse Ely 27/4/2015

66105 6L43 Mountsorrel - Kennet Soham 27/4/2015

66016 6L41 Mountsorrel - Barham Ely North Junction 19/4/2016

The PAA covered hopper wagons which look similar to the PGAs date back to the 1980s were used for industrial sand traffic from Middleton Towers. They have now been replaced by high capacity bogie wagons.

66249 6E88 Middleton Towers - Goole Pymoor/Welney 13/6/2011

66704 6E84 Middleton Towers - Monk Bretton Marholm 30/12/2014

66723 6E84 Middleton Towers - Monk Bretton Helpston 10/3/2015

In 1987 BR introduced a fleet of 125 CDA covered hopper wagons to carry china clay within the West Country.

They were all withdrawn in 2023, a number have been preserved including at the Bodmin and Wenford Railway and the Plym Valley Railway.

66152 6G07 Fowey - Goonbarrow Middleway, St Blazey 23/9/2014

66152 6G08 Goonbarrow - Fowey Golant 23/9/2014

In the late 1980s some OBA wagons were converted to PNAs to carry Plasmor concrete building blocks from Heck to depots in Biggleswade and Bow. They are still in use on this circuit to this day.

66091 6H75 Peterborough - Biggleswade Sandy 16/7/2013

66002 4E25 Bow - Heck Bragbury Junction 22/3/2022

For a period of time in the late 00s DCR acquired a number of PNA spoil wagons. They were often used alongside it’s fleet of JRA bogie boxes.

56312 6Z34 Hitchin Yard - Chaddesden Langford 14/1/2015

56303+56312 6Z31 Clacton - Eastleigh Ruscombe 23/3/2014

56303 6M06 Barrington - Willesden Meldreth 20/4/2018

56303 6M06 Barrington - Willesden Shepreth 19/4/2018

The MOD still retain a number of VGA 29 ton payload vans that were constructed in the early 1980s.

66075 6A48 Bicester - Didcot Yard Hinksey/Oxford 2/11/2012

66144 6L89 Didcot Yard - Shoeburyness MOD Leigh-on-Sea 22/5/2012

The IZA twin two-axle van was introduced between 1986 and 1987. Although each wagon has four wheels they are permanently coupled together in pairs, effectively forming an eight wheeled articulated wagon.
From the outset, they were designed to work traffic between the UK and the continent via the Dover train ferry and later, the Channel Tunnel. The Dollands Moor to Daventry water train is formed of these IZA 'twin' wagon to this day.

66174 6O67 Daventry - Dollands Moor Wilson’s Crossing/Northampton 17/8/2019

TTA fuel tanks were once a common sight but most have now been withdrawn.

66541 6E53 Ipswich Yard - Lindsey Ely 2/2/2016

There are still some SSA scrap wagons working on the mainline, here a lengthy rake heads south on the East Coast Mainline near Sandy in 2020.

66012 6O57 Doncaster Belmont - Angerstein Wharf Sandy 14/9/2020