Talk:GWR 2303 Fruit Van

Both the GWR 813 Fund page and the Railway Heritage Register Wagon Survey refer to 2303 as a FRUIT A. Atkins et al confirms that within Diagram Y2, FRUIT referred to vacuum braked stock, while FRUIT A referred to dual braked (or Westinghouse piped) stock. That source also confirms that 47833 was part of Lot 260 which was the former type as built.

In passing, Atkins also confirms that during World War 2 FRUIT, FRUIT C and FRUIT D became PASFRUIT, PASFRUIT C and PASFRUIT D respectively, while confusingly FRUIT A lost the suffix to become merely FRUIT. On arrival, 2303 was initially referred to as a PASFRUIT in SVR News 30 which would be appropriate for a vacuum only FRUIT after that renaming.

The stock book lists it as a FRUIT and it is painted as a FRUIT rather than a FRUIT A. I therefore assume that the references to FRUIT A are incorrect, unless it received a brake conversion at some point? Any thoughts or additional information would be welcome. --Robin (talk) 16:28, 7 November 2017 (UTC)

I've submitted the query to the Facebook group, which has a few wagon experts passing through on occasion. --Danny252 (talk) 14:44, 8 November 2017 (UTC)
One response backed up your conclusion, and the rest have so far been a fairly impenetrable (at least for me!) wall of wagon-related discussion that didn't reach any clear conclusions. There was some discussion about the two ends of the van looking different (well, to the trained eye...), supposedly a regular feature of GWR vans that had been modified over the years. --Danny252 (talk) 10:29, 9 November 2017 (UTC)
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