At least from 1886, bogie carriages on the VR were classed AA. Prior to this date, bogie carriages were classed as _A__. Early photos show the first car as "70 A".
The author presumes that the seating capacity difference between fixed wheel and bogie carriages created confusion. This led to segregation of the two carriages by coding small capacity stock, ie fixed wheel carraiges, as "A" and bogie stock, ie large capacity, as "AA". What is not known is whether an intermediate step of renumbering took place.
Sometime between 1879 and 1886, the carriages were reclassed and renumbered into the AA group. The date seems to be prior to 1883 when a fixed wheel carriage "70A" entered service.
The "Yankee" cars of the style introduced from American in 1879 were numbers 2 - 14 ( 1886 numbers ).
Car number "1" was renumbered from a bogie car taken over from the South Suburban system. This car later became 11 _BB_.
Cars 15 - 284 were built between 1887 and 1892. The cars of this style were dog box type of 45' long bodies. A further six cars were built in 1902.
Cars 181 to 184 never entered service. It seems likely that the cars were built but were modified and entered service as different vehicles and codes. For 1890/1891, there are four cars that suit this design that enter service: the ABDABD combine conversion to reduce operating costs during the depression and three cars for Joint Stock use were placed into service between Melbourne and Adelaide as ABAB cars.
Between 1892 and 1909 these cars were modified and recoded to:
The cars coded AC had been modified with side corridors in 1892/1893. They were relettered to a special group in about 1902.
The remaining cars were recoded and numbered to "A" class in the 1910 recoding between 1910 and 1912.
Between 1908 and 1914 the majority of this stock was lengthened from 45' bodies to 57'9" for the pending electric suburban train project. Some cars built 1902 were already 50'2" long and were lengthened to 57'9" too.
The information on "Victoria" car is most interesting. This car appears under the fixed wheel grouping class of "A". Most unusual for a car built in 1887 as a bogie vehicle. Data suggests the class relettered from "19 A" to "19 AA" before becoming officially known as "Victoria". This car was used by the railways as a special service car. It was scrapped in 1956 as works sleeper and the body can found at the old Carnegie scout hall in Mimosa Rd, a "stones throw" from the suburban rail lines. As at 2007, the carbody had been moved to one of the preservation group sites.