WW - Workmen's Sleepers

130 WW in the Way and Works siding at Ballarat North.

WW workmen's sleepers were used to accommodate gangers where railway lines were being worked on. They would spend a period of time at a location and when a work project was finished they would be moved to the location of the gangs next work project. They were called Bug Huts by railway workers.

130 WW is a bogie van built from an old passenger carriage cut down and placed on a recycled underframe.  The double roofs were used to keep the interiors cool. There were many variations with these wagons, so its best to use a photographs for reference. Variations include the amount of bracing, roof ventilators, metal siding on the ends, and the length of the wheelbase between the bogies.

I started this project on a holiday to Bright in 2015, so its been a long term project. The sides are made from styrene sheet (0.040" and 0.010") with scribed sheet for the ends.  The double roof is made from cardboard with the outer layer covered in corrugated iron.  The white metal bogies and the buffers were both from the scrap box. The brass brake wheel is from Steam Era Models.

The bogie WW workmen's sleepers and their 4 wheeled cousins the W, were at the end of their lives in the early 1980's as the Victorian Railway's adopted portable ATCO hut buildings to accommodate it's mobile work gangs. 


Newsrail records the movement of bughuts on the western line in the period modelled.  T330 hauled a special of workmens sleepers from Bacchus Marsh on the 26th June 1982.  The special included 329W, 178W, 108W, 342W, 332W, 111W, 431W and HD208. As many of these wagons did not have brakes, other wagons were placed between groups of W's to ensure the train could be controlled. The same issue of Newsrail records a local contractor wrecking 97WW and 461W at Ararat.




On the layout bughuts are stored in the Way and Works siding at Ballarat North.  Occassionally they are marshalled into a bughut special and sent up country to accommodate workers in relaying rail lines. Other bughuts are stored at Ballarat North Workshops awaiting the scrappers torch.

130 WW stored with four wheeled W's in the Way and Works siding.