pull-push trains

[snowy1051]

Hello,  I know that pull-push trains/auto trains/motor trains are normally worked with the locos bunker next to the drive trailer. Has anyone seen or heard of the train locomotive being coupled with its chimney next to the drive trailer? I've looked at lots of bunker first workings, for example, there are 3 together in Colin Giffords Decline of Steam (photos 34,35 & 36.) One is obviously not a p-p train, the other two do not appear to be as I'm sure the coaches are not auto. I run 3 p-p/auto trains on my layout and a little variety now and then would not go amiss. Thank you for any info.

[Kubes]

As far as I am aware there is no reason not to - the locos would have the necessary pipework on both bufferbeams.

[Pannier Tank]

Has anyone seen or heard of the train locomotive being coupled with its chimney next to the drive trailer? 

 

 

GWR / BR(W) operated with Auto Trailers at the front and rear of a Locomotive. The maximum number of Trailers (due to the mechanical linkage) I believe was two Trailers in Front and two Trailers in the Rear of the locomotive. 

[The Johnster]

No reason not to run up to two trailers attached at the smokebox or bunker end with the GW system, but limited to two vehicles from the loco due to the play in the linkage as stated above.  This means that you can have the loco smokebox away from the train, smokebox towards the train, or in the middle of a 2, 3, or 4 trailer train, depending on the traffic requirements of the service. Auto trains on the GW (and hence steam era WR) were rooted in the company's early 20th century flirtation with steam rallmotors, and some of the older trailers were in fact converted from such vehicles.  The system gives the driver a regulator handle in the trailer cab, ATC, sanders and a vacuum brake setter; a bell operated by a foot pedal was the means of warning of approach and these had a suitably funereal tone for those who ignored them.  And not much else!  The rest was down to the fireman on the loco, who had to look after the reverser and cut-off as well as his own duties, senior, and preferably 'passed' men were preferred for such duties.  There was a battery operated bell system between the trailer cab and the loco.

 

Auto trains are usually connected in the minds of modellers with sleepy branches, and are often seen on show layouts shuttling in and out of bays at the junctions, but the original purpose of the steam railmotors was largely to compete for suburban traffic with the then new and expanding electric tramway systems in large towns and cities, 'haltes' as they were orignally known springing up all over the place to be served by them at the same time.  The GW was by no means the only railway that developed such traffic, and inherited auto trailers from the South Wales railways at the grouping as well, which it converted to it's own system.  I do not recall ever seeing one of these absorbed vehicles in a photo directly connected to a GW trailer, and there may have been an additional issue which made this impractical, but they worked fine with the locos (or they may have just been kept in their sets for convenience; IIRC the TVR ones were corridor connected)!

 

This means that, while the 48xx ambling along the branch with a single trailer was certainly a reality, much auto work took place on main lines or busy suburban networks with more powerful engines and up to 4 coaches.  There may have been a reason for the more common appearance of the trailer being at the bunker end, and I suspect it had something to do with the play in the linkage, the connection being closer to the cab and hence easier to work, but I do not know this to be a fact and am not claiming it to be one, just a suggestion.  Trailers originally had end windows identical to the driving cab ones at the brake van ends as well, and the reason these were plated over is said to have been because they frequently got broken while the loco was coaling.

 

Plymouth area suburban auto trains were formed of twin trailer sets both sides of the loco which were corridor connected 70 footers, the 'inner' trailers having driving cabs alongside the corridor connection much like a modern dmu; they were rarely used as the trains ran in fixed sets.  The loco cab would have been nigh on 170 feet away from the driving cab of the trailers at the smokebox end!  Cardiff suburban trains seem to have been commonly 3 trailer affairs, with 2 behind and one in front of a loco working smokebox first up the valley.  

 

The auto linkage only works 'one way around', so any trailer with the cab next to the loco, or facing towards th loco, means that the train cannot be worked as an auto and the loco must run around and haul it 'normally', in non-auto mode, in each direction, which happens in service occasionally if a trailer turns up the wrong way around and there is no immediate method of turning it, another option you can use on the layout occasionally.  And of course you can vary the locos; as well as 14/48xx and 54/64xx, some 4575 were auto fitted, and prior to the introduction of the 48xx, the first loco specifically designed for auto work, '2021' class panniers, some with outside frames, some in saddle tank configuration in early days, '517' class 0-4-2s and 'Metro' 2-4-0s were used, up until the time of their withdrawal.

 

If you wanted to vary things from the rtr trailer offerings from Hornby and Bachmann, there are plenty of designs preceding them, in 59 and 70 foot lengths, matchboarded and panelled, with and without toplights plated over in their later lives, and with a variety of bogies, along with the 'Clifton Downs' compartment panelled trailers and some clerestory vehicles, nearly all of which lasted into the nationalised era.  On top of those, some Collett compartment brakes were converted, originally for use on the Lydney-Sharpness Severn Bridge services, but a larger later batch of brake 3rds and all 3rds were converted in the mid 50s for use in South Wales which made their way around the WR in their last years.  These were flat ended and had a single central window in the driving cab.

 

The Lambourne branch used auto trailers as loco hauled stock because tender locos were preferred for range on this line which had ground level halts which had to be served by stock with retracting steps; perhaps you could invoke something like this on your layout using the Authority of Rule 1.

 

I am not knowledgeable enough to offer any comment about other railways' methods of push-pull operation.

 

Enough variety for you, snowy?  If you can get your local library to find you a copy of 'Great Western Auto Coaches' by John Lewis (Wild Swan IBSN 0 906867 99 1) it will provide with much more information and some inspirational photos!

Edited August 15, 2017 by The Johnster

[ROSSPOP]

Don`t just think GWR !!!!

 

 

 

And here is a push -pull attached chimney end...................

 

Edited August 15, 2017 by ROSSPOP

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

...Auto trains are usually connected in the minds of modellers with sleepy branches, and are often seen on show layouts shuttling in and out of bays at the junctions, but the original purpose of the steam railmotors was largely to compete for suburban traffic with the then new and expanding electric tramway systems in large towns and cities, 'haltes' as they were originally known springing up all over the place to be served by them at the same time...

So where did the 'turnover' point occur, above which the investment In the additional equipment for p/p operation was not justifiable, the job just as well done by running the loco round the train at journey ends? (Obviously enough if the regular loading was too great for the number of vehicles that the mechanical linkage would reach over, then p/p was a non-starter.)

 

Was p/p mostly short distance, so that a run round each end took up too much time from a briskly operated shuttle schedule? Or was p/p a method for simplification of signals and track, no need for run round loops and the signalling installations?

[Joseph_Pestell]

So where did the 'turnover' point occur, above which the investment In the additional equipment for p/p operation was not justifiable, the job just as well done by running the loco round the train at journey ends? (Obviously enough if the regular loading was too great for the number of vehicles that the mechanical linkage would reach over, then p/p was a non-starter.)

 

Was p/p mostly short distance, so that a run round each end took up too much time from a briskly operated shuttle schedule? Or was p/p a method for simplification of signals and track, no need for run round loops and the signalling installations?

I don't think that there is any fixed policy involved but services such as the Plymouth suburbans and Gloucester - Chalford would have been much easier push-pull.

 

But what to make of the Bridport Branch where a very restricted layout at Maiden Newton would have favoured autotrains but instead a complex flyshunt move was used to get the loco to the other end of the train?

[Poor Old Bruce]

The LMS instructions for 'Motor Trains' allowed up to 4 specially fitted coaches to be attached at the leading end of the engine (presumably that means with the train in the propelling mode rather than the chimney end of the engine). The standard LMS motor train operation was by vacuum control of course.

 

It was common practice for the engine of the Buxton to Millers Dale motor train to be chimney end to the coaches.

[Joseph_Pestell]

The LMS instructions for 'Motor Trains' allowed up to 4 specially fitted coaches to be attached at the leading end of the engine (presumably that means with the train in the propelling mode rather than the chimney end of the engine). The standard LMS motor train operation was by vacuum control of course.

 

It was common practice for the engine of the Buxton to Millers Dale motor train to be chimney end to the coaches.

I think that the longest that I have seen on LMS lines is the 3-coach set which ran on the Worth Valley.

 

In Europe, plenty of cases of much longer P-P trains, often with smokebox at the train end.

[chrisf]

Pannier Tank is absolutely right.  On the [G]WR the limit was two trailers at either end.

 

There are other factors.  Whether the trailer is at the chimney end or the bunker end of the loco may depend on which way round the trailer is.  The Brixham branch, for example, was normally worked with the trailer at the Churston end and the loco at the Brixham end.  If the regular trailer was not available and the only substitute was the other way round the established order was reversed.  Sometimes no auto-fitted loco was available so a non-fitted one had to be used, necessitating running round at each end.  There is at least one photo of Johnster's beloved Abergwynfi showing a 57xx arriving with three trailers in tow, suggesting that if a fitted loco had been available it would have been a sandwich working.

 

As for the formation of one trailer at each end of the loco so beloved of preserved railways, this was not as common as one might think.  It was used in the London division before the Central Line changed everything, possibly because some of the sets went round three sides of a triangle in the course of the day's work.  Elsewhere I understand that the preference was for there to be two trailers at one end of the loco before a third or fourth was added.  This was certainly the case in Cardiff post 1953 and, as already mentioned, in Plymouth.  For some lines instructions were in force ordaining at which end extra trailers were to be added, Dibber's alma mater Staines West being a case in point.

 

It is, as always, an education to look at photographs.

 

Chris 

[Jub45565]

I think that the longest that I have seen on LMS lines is the 3-coach set which ran on the Worth Valley.

 

In Europe, plenty of cases of much longer P-P trains, often with smokebox at the train end.

 

There are gala day photos of 4 coach units on the worth valley, push pull worked.  I'm sure I've seen more than 1 photo, but the one which springs to mind is from 1957 where the 3 coach gangwayed set was supplimented by a none gangwayed composite.  I'll try to remember and edit in my source later...

[Oldddudders]

Am I being churlish to note that the OP referred to 'pull-push' - a Southern Railway term - rather than 'push-pull' as widely used elsewhere?

[snowy1051]

Don`t just think GWR !!!!

 

3.JPG

 

 

Absolutely, my push-pull (or pull-push) locos are 2x Jintys, a L & Y (BR) 2-4-2T and an Ivatt 2MTT. 

[snowy1051]

Am I being churlish to note that the OP referred to 'pull-push' - a Southern Railway term - rather than 'push-pull' as widely used elsewhere?

No Not at all, I'm sure I've seen the term used in LMS literature. I am quite happy to be corrected. (only 'cos I'm the other side of The Atlantic!)  

[chrisf]

Am I being churlish to note that the OP referred to 'pull-push' - a Southern Railway term - rather than 'push-pull' as widely used elsewhere?

 

Certainly not!

 

Chris

[Nearholmer]

Both terms, and numerous others, are correct, and even the Almighty GWR used different terms for the same thing within the same official document! Useage varied by place and time.

 

While we are on the subject: can anyone confirm which railway in GB was the first to operate whatever they're called? I thought it was the Midland, but the NER and LB&SCR were early users too.

 

Kevin

[Steamport Southport]

LMS Pull Push trains were certainly labelled as such, even on the coaches themselves.

 

 

 

The LMS actually had 'Pull & Push' ( or just P&P) marked on the cab of their driving trailers (just below the left hand window in lettering about four inches high) and this marking was retained into the 1960s on ex LMS stock.  Such carriages would have been all over maroon with maroon ends and a single driving trailer in unlined maroon would have been coupled up to an Ivatt 2MT 2-6-2 engine on the Holywell Town branch in the 1960s or an ex LNWR Webb "Coal Tank" before that..

 

 

Photos here with some useful information.

 

http://glostransporthistory.visit-gloucestershire.co.uk/Push%20Pull%20YTT.html

 

 

 

 

Jason

[The Johnster]

My 1960 working timetable in which my beloved Abergwynfi services are shown uses the term 'rail motor train' but for clarity we all know what we mean by 'auto train', in GW terms at least!  I am aware of the photo of a 57xx with 3 auto trailers here, in colour no less, and while I see that it may have resulted from no auto-fitted loco being available would note that all the trailers are the same way round and could not have been worked in that formation by an auto fitted loco evem had one been available...  

 

In fact several photos of Abergwynfi seem to show auto trailers with non auto fitted locos and one wonders how common this arrangement was on this particular service.  I have already noted that the usual arrangement in the Cardiff area was to have 2 trailers behind the bunker and a third in front of the smokebox with the loco running smokebox leading up the valley; this seems to have been the norm on Coryton trains.

 

Instructions specifying that 2 trailers were coupled to a loco at one end before a third was added make sense in the light of the need to have the driver on the footplate of the loco for at least some of the time; once the loco was 'sandwiched' the fireman was left on his own aboard the loco for considerable periods of the duty, and this is at variance with the idea that the driver is in charge of the loco.  As I have said, experienced and preferably 'passed driver' firemen were preferred for auto work, and I imagine this was more so in the case of 'sandwiched' locos where the driver would be absent from the loco for most of the duty.  There must have been situations where it was unavoidable that a single trailer at each end of a sandwiched loco could not be avoided, but they would hardly have been encouraged!

 

I am aware that other railways indulged in this sort of working, but know little of it, so do not feel justified or qualified in commenting.  Some systems used steam or compressed air to effect the control, unlike the GW's mechanical linkages, and may well have been better in performance.

 

But the OP's original question was about loco orientation and the possibility of varying the trailer coupled to bunker end arrangement. and he is justified in running more or less any arrangement he likes so long as a) no more than 2 trailers are coupled at each end of the loco, and b) the trailers are the correct way around, at least as far as the GW system is concerned.

Edited August 15, 2017 by The Johnster

[snowy1051]

So where did the 'turnover' point occur, above which the investment In the additional equipment for p/p operation was not justifiable, the job just as well done by running the loco round the train at journey ends? (Obviously enough if the regular loading was too great for the number of vehicles that the mechanical linkage would reach over, then p/p was a non-starter.)

 

Was p/p mostly short distance, so that a run round each end took up too much time from a briskly operated shuttle schedule? Or was p/p a method for simplification of signals and track, no need for run round loops and the signalling installations?

The Midland branch from Swansea St. Thomas to Brynamman was 19 miles long and push-pull operated by Jintys from the mid 30's (I believe) until closure in 1950. The layout at Brynamman ruled out any run round. There again look at the Stourbridge Junction to Stourbridge Town branch, just ¾ of a mile long. Horses for courses perhaps? 

[snowy1051]

LMS Pull Push trains were certainly labelled as such, even on the coaches themselves.

 

 

 

 

Photos here with some useful information.

 

http://glostransporthistory.visit-gloucestershire.co.uk/Push%20Pull%20YTT.html

 

 

 

 

Jason

 

Spot on, there's a very interesting picture of a 4 coach BR pull-push service taken at Streetly, near Sutton Coldfield on the occasion of the 1957 Boy Scout Jamboree at Sutton Park. 41220 is propelling a 4 coach set and one can clearly see Pull & Push underneath the right hand front window. 

Page 86 in Bradford Bartons' London Midland Steam In The Midlands. 

[Il Grifone]

Rumour has it that sometimes the autocoach mechanisms weren't connected and the fireman was left to do all the driving. (Of course it's only a rumour....)

 

As previously mentioned Plymouth area autotrains were two in front and two behind a 64xx. (I can remember seeing them and the coaches in the sidings at Laira.) Conersely the Princetown branch was operated by gravity shunting the coaches. Presumably as it wasn't considered worthwhile autofitting the 44xx used on the line. Some 45xx were fitted for South Wales in BR days.

 

As regarding nomenclature, there was a children's TV series called 'The old Pull and Push'* in the days of yore (which obviously I watched avidly - for the trains!). IIRC the locos were SECR H class. Being of a GWR persuasion, I couldn't figure out why the title was back to front!

 

* or similar

[ThePipersSon]

I had a quick browse through the 2 GWR Auto-trailer books by Wild Swan.  There are several examples of the engine attached to trailers at the chimney end, although I cannot be sure that these trains are operating in 'push-pull' mode.  However, one of the photographs was of the a train on the Brixham branch, with just an auto-trailer and loco, so I assume that would be operating in 'push-pull' mode.

[chrisf]

My 1960 working timetable in which my beloved Abergwynfi services are shown uses the term 'rail motor train' but for clarity we all know what we mean by 'auto train', in GW terms at least!  

 

Before 1954 or thereabouts the [G]WR used the expression "auto" in the WTTs.  When the format was changed, and passenger services put into separate books from freight, the expression "rail motor" was revived, despite the last rail motor having run in 1935.  No, I don't know why!

 

Chris

[ejstubbs]

The 1959 Railway Roundabout DVD appears to feature a pannier tank hauling a two-coach push-pull train bunker first (ie smokebox towards the first coach).  You can view it on YouTube here.

Edited August 16, 2017 by ejstubbs

[phil_sutters]

The S&D used push-pull on the Wells branch and there are some nice photos in the Middleton 'Burnham to Evercreech Junction' book. These include a push-pull mixed train, albeit with only the goods brake on the one shown - push-pull coach - 0-4-4T then the goods brake. So there's another combination for you!