| British Rail Sleeper Either Class | |
|---|---|
 GWR Night Riviera at Penzance | |
| In service | 1982– |
| Manufacturer | British Rail Engineering Limited |
| Built at | Derby Litchurch Lane Works |
| Family name | British Rail Mark 3 |
| Constructed | 1981–1984 |
| Number built | 208 (120 SLEP, 88 SLE) |
| Fleet numbers | SLEP: 10500–10619, SLE: 10646–10733 |
| Capacity | SLEP: 12–24 beds (12 compartments), SLE: 13–26 beds (13 compartments) |
| Operators | Great Western Railway |
| Specifications | |
| Car length | 75 ft 0 in (22.86 m) |
| Maximum speed | 125 mph (200 km/h) |
| Weight | 43 t (42 long tons; 47 short tons) |
| HVAC | Electric heating (ETH index SLEP: 7, SLE: 6), air conditioned, electric cooking |
| Bogies | BT10 |
| Braking system(s) | Air |
| Track gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) |
A Sleeper Either class (SLE) and Sleeper Either class with Pantry (SLEP) are a type of railway sleeping car used in Great Britain. Some units were later modified for better wheelchair access as Sleeper Either class Disabled (SLED). A smaller number reused in Denmark were classified as WLABr.[1]
A total of 208 vehicles were built at Derby Litchurch Lane Works by British Rail Engineering Limited between 1982–1984 to the British Rail Mark 3A profile for British Rail. They were introduced to replace an ageing fleet of Mark 1 sleeper cars built to various designs and which dated from the late 1950s to early 1960s. The order consisted of 88 SLE variants, numbered 10646–10733, were constructed with thirteen bedrooms each, and 120 SLEP variants, numbered 10500–10619 constructed with twelve bedrooms with the last compartment used for an attendant. The Mark 3 air-conditioned sleeping cars were introduced including many additional safety features that had been lacking in the Mark 1 carriages that had caught fire at Taunton.[2] The Night Riviera stock was the first on the route fitted with controlled emission toilets.[3]
As of October 2019[update], the only mainline operator of this type of carriages are Great Western Railway on the Night Riviera, whose fleet was refurbished in 2017.[4]
With the decline of overnight sleeper services in the United Kingdom shortly after their introduction at the end of the 1980s,[5] many of the carriages later were moved to heritage railways to provide sleeping accommodation for heritage staff and volunteers.
- ^ "DSB litra WLABr. Oversigt over samtlige vogne". www.jernbanen.dk. Retrieved 1 August 2017.
- ^ "Night Riviera cuts sleeper travel costs". Modern Railways. No. 420. Ian Allan Publishing. 1983. p. 454. ISSN 0026-8356.
- ^ Abbott, James (1983). "Controlled emission toilets". Modern Railways. No. 421. Ian Allan Publishing. p. 554. ISSN 0026-8356.
- ^ "Our new Night Rivera sleeper". Gwr.com. Retrieved 23 October 2021.
- ^ "Decline of the sleeper". The Independent. 5 April 2013. Retrieved 23 October 2021.