Bachmann Bogie Well Wagons
The GWR used the code name 'Crocodile' for its trolley wagons. These are long bogie
wagons with a depressed area between the bogies in order to get the centre of gravity as
low as possible and give maximum height clearance for large loads. The GWR had a range of
different designs, each identified by a letter suffix and some dating back to the start of
the last century. The 'Crocodile H' dates from the 1920s and seems to have been small in
number. This might explain the repeated use by Bachmann of the running numbers of two of a
small batch of only three that were built in 1926 and fitted with commonwealth bogies. 
The wagon type became a 'Weltrol WH' in BR days and the floor was strengthened to increase its capacity from 45T to 65T. No new ones were built by British Railways; instead, they built 'Trestrols' in the late '50s for carrying steel plates.
The Bachmann model was inherited from the Mainline range and there have been 16 versions of it. A new shorter coupling was introduced to the model in 2004. Illustrated here are GWR 'Crocodile H' No.41974 in dark grey (33-900E) and LNER 'Protrole' No.736919 in a lighter grey and carrying a boiler load (33-879).