Gloucestershire Transport History really started with my interest in the Gloucester Railway Carriage and Wagon Company Limited and although Bristol Road's output of private owner coal wagons and more advanced rolling stock stock for British Railways have been explored and celebrated on these pages relatively little attention has been given to products sold to the "Big Four" railways and their antecedents.

As such, I was very pleased when Richard Salmon emailed with news of a four wheeled 10 ton five-plank 9' wheelbase wagon ( pictured above ) built by the Gloucester Railway Carriage and Wagon Company for the Great Western Railway and now being restored at Horsted Keynes on the Bluebell Railway in East Sussex.

87782 was one of a thousand "OPEN A"  wagons (Nos. 87001–88000) in GWR Lot 697  ordered on 20 October 1911 and completed on 28 December 1912. 

The average cost to the Great Western per Gloucester RCW built wagon was £112 and 87782 was completed during week ending 23 November 1912.  In all 10,815 wagons identified by the telegraphic code "OPEN A".were built by or for the GWR to their diagram O11.

Rather than the continuous brakes of more modern wagons, 87782 was fitted only with a  Dean / Churchward ratchet type hand brake with handles on the right hand of either side. As the name suggests, this was designed by two succeeding GWR Chief Mechanical Engineers and widely used by the GWR but rarely by other railways. 87782 thus had a relatively low original tare (empty) weight of 5 tons 18 cwt 0 quaters, although it was marked 5 tons 17 cwt on arrival at the Bluebell Railway.  However, 87782 was originally fitted with a sheet support rail to prevent water accumulating in hollows in covering tarpaulins and leaking onto the goods below.

During the Great War (1914–1918) a number of locomotives and wagons were taken over by the military for use overseas. 87782 was so requisitioned on 21 February 1917 and was returned to the GWR on 11 April 1920, thus making this particular OPEN A a War veteran!

Notes on 87782 from the GWR Wagon Register further describe the iron framed wagon's wooden body as measuring 15' 6" long, 7' 7" wide and 3' 3" deep while suspension was provided by 3' 4 1/4" long leaf springs.

Length between centres of axle journals was 6' 6", size of journals 8" x 3 3/4", diameter through boss of wheels: 5 1/4" and diameter in middle: 4 3/4".  on the end of each axle were wheels with a diameter of 3' 1 1/2".  The buffers were self contained.

GWR maintenance records show 87772 being repaired and returned to traffic on 11 May 1932 and a Haywoods Slack Adjuster was fitted at Swindon on  7 January 1939

W87782 was condemned on the London Midland Region on 21 February 1959 and sold by British Railways to the Port of Bristol Authority on 26 December 1959. It was renumbered PBA 59627 and continued in service within the docks until the late 1970s, after which it was purchased for the Bluebell Railway by Neil Cameron, arriving with other vehicles from Bristol Docks in June 1981.

The Port of Bristol Authority wagons were regularly repaired and PBA 59627 was fitted with replacement headstocks and reinforced door pillars. The original GWR self-contained buffers were replaced with Dowty pneumatic buffers although the original solebars and underframe on this wagon are in particularly good condition for nearly a century of service.