Description
550 F6 10 ton fish vans were built by the North Eastern Railway from 1906 to 1908, with a further batch of 400 between 1921 and early 1923. Built to replace the open fish truck to Diagram C1, these vans formed part of the East Coast fish traffic until the introduction of the standard LNER van in quantity in the mid 1930s. After this time general withdrawal began. Even so some 485 were extant in 1938. However, numbers started to fall rapidly in the 1940s with 436 in 1942, 374 in 1944, 239 in 1946 and 122 in 1948. By this time it is probable that the vans were only used for local traffic. The introduction of the BR blue spot fish vans would have seen their final demise in the early 1950s.
Most of the early batch was fitted with through steam pipes from January 1909 onwards; the entire later batch had them from new. All had Westinghouse and vacuum brake when new, but during the 1930s the LNER removed the Westinghouse brake gear.