PGH

More photos at the river end of the castle: This shows how close the bridge tower is to the castle walls

Anthony, I was in the area today so had a wander round the station and castle, are these photos any help ? The old goods yard area has been considerably altered and repairs done to the town wall - the lighter patches of new stonework

Patience, there's more boring stuff to go through first !

Most of the brickwork is Slaters embossed plastikard, the one exception being the colliery loco shed. This was done with the courses represented by individual card strips glued to the wooden shell, with the vertical joints marked by a tool ground from an old hacksaw blade. Exactly why I did it that way is lost in the mist of time, but there isn't a great deal of brickwork with all the window and door openings and the fact that only the front and side visible are actually modelled. I must have had more patience back then and in future I'll stick to plastikard. There are many tedious and boring jobs when building a layout (perhaps its just the way I do it !) and one of the worst I think is painting individual bricks. Instead of finishing with 'that’s about right' this operation usually finishes with 'I've had enough that will have to do'.

TRACK: Colliery track is often less than perfect as here at Mardy Colliery in South Wales. This was on the lead to the loco shed, so it didn't take trains but it was regularly traversed by the 55 ton Peckett OQ Class 0-6-0ST, one of the heaviest industrial locos in the UK and now resident at the Elsecar Railway. This track at Bickershaw Colliery is perhaps more acceptable for modelling. Plain track on the layout is PECO, which was the only ready made track available when the layout was started, laid on 1/2" thick wood fibre insulation board. I don't think PECO points had been introduced at that time, although I wouldn't have used them anyway as I think its better to build the points to suit the layout rather than vice-versa and certainly using them I couldn't have squeezed as much in the space available. The points are constructed in situ with PECO chairs fixed to obechi sleepers by PECO track pins, the pin heads being turned down to a smaller diameter. This photo shows some of the pointwork before painting. Its not ideal, but it’s the only photo I have showing unfinished trackwork. The track after painting and ballasting Blades are hinged as I don't like long bendy point blades, and there is less strain on the tiebar fixings, etc. The hinge is a nickel silver strip pushed through a slot near the end of the blade, bent into a 'U' shape and soldered to the closure rail. There were no suitable point levers available, so I made patterns and had them cast in brass. The throw over type as here actually work exactly like the real levers but don't give enough throw for the model blades, so all points are worked remotely. When it came to painting the track I made up samples of various Humbrol colours and compared it to the real thing, for what its worth this was the result: Main well used lines - 82 Orange + 62 Leather + small amount of 33 Matt Black Sidings - 82 + 62 + 113 Rust + small amount of 33 Rarely used sidings - add more 113 (82 + 62 + 2x113) Point levers - 113 + small amount of 33 Sleepers - 64 Light Grey + 110 Natural Wood + 98 Chocolate Oil stains on slide chairs and point blades - 98 + 33 Oil to tops of slidechairs - 85 Coal Black + 53 Gunmetal + 98 Drybrush to sleepers and fishplates - 98 Drybrush to chairs and tops of checkrails - 98 + 53

I use an 0-4-0 or one of the smaller 0-6-0s to propel empties into the screens and position the wagons for loading. In full size practice of course this operation would be performed by gravity on track laid to a slight gradient with movement of the wagons being controlled by the wagon brakes but I don't think this is practical in model form. The other option would be a creeper under the screens to move the wagons along. However I think its quite satisfying to position the wagons for loading with a loco although it is unprototypical. Although it may not be apparent from the photos, the screen tracks are at a slightly lower level than the through lines and wagons would roll down to the screens after being propelled through the pointwork if allowed to. Locos can cross the weighbridge to collect the full wagons. I assume that in full size practice, unless the weighbridge was on a bypass track as here at Mountain Ash - the weighbridge could be locked in position when not actually weighing wagons. Note that in the Bersham thread Post #7 second photo, SPIDER has crossed the weighbridge to collect wagons from the screens. Also in this topic on Sutton Manor Colliery http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/56561-seen-at-sutton-manor-colliery/ there is a bypass loop line at the weighbridge but its obviously not been in use for some time so locos must be crossing the weighbridge which is on the main entry track to the colliery.

To all who have replied - Thanks for your encouraging comments I haven't seen it myself for years but apparently the drainage from the mines has been diverted to a treatment plant and the canal has lost its distinctive orange colour. As requested here is the track plan: Minimum radius curve is 3ft on the line past the loco shed

The line crosses the workbench and a window opening on two narrow removable sections, one of which incorporates a canal bridge. Note the orange tint to the 'water' reminiscent of the Bridgewater Canal in the Worsley area. The next part of the layout is less 'finished', most of it has only recently been ballasted and 'grassed', so its rather too neat and tidy and lacking buildings, etc The line then climbs at a gradient of approximately 1 in 30 past the switchback canal tip sidings. The tip itself will be at the end of the track on the right. (Note to health & safety - railings will be provided on top of the wall above the steps !) The gradient here against the loaded trains requires double-heading if smaller locos are used. Alongside the line on the left is the former trackbed with sleeper imprints of an abandoned colliery tramway which preceded the standard gauge railway at the top of the bank the line passes the (unfinished) wagon tippler building and sidings trail off to the coal washing plant, which will be situated where the wagons are standing in the distance. The 'corner' in the sky is unfortunate, but the alternatives were either to take out the chimney breast or lose valuable space, neither of which was viable. The line then crosses a road on a plate girder bridge and splits into two lines which disappear under an overbridge, to the rest of the system and the BR connection. In reality beyond the bridge are only a couple of mirrors. To the left will be a weighbridge cabin, then a single road loco shed (already with its pile of ash outside), and beyond a three storey low relief building to hide the end of the overbridge and point motors.

The layout occupies a slightly 'L' shaped room (originally two rooms joined into one) 16'-4" long x 9'-4" wide at one end and 12'-10" wide at the other, less a chimney breast. The baseboards are a hotch-potch of fixed sections, either free standing or resting on shelves and a cupboard, removable sections across window openings and a hinged flap across the entrance. The emphasis on building the layout was mainly on operation, so the scenery is rather minimal. A photo 'tour' of the system should give some idea of the track layout. The line begins with a headshunt in a tunnel capable of taking a small loco and three empty wagons. It's assumed that the empties weighbridge is somewhere down there as there ain't any room for it elsewhere. Pointwork leads off for the screen roads, this section is on a hinged flap. The empties side of the colliery screens, note the difference between the brickwork of the pitbank retaining wall and winding engine house, built when the colliery was first sunk, and the later pithead buildings and screens. Empty wagons go in here and…… ……come out full here then they pass over the fulls weighbridge the line then curves right past the colliery loco shed and disappears under a road overbridge to run on a shelf at the rear of the workbench

This topic was originally intended to describe only the wagon loading and unloading arrangements, but as industrial layouts seem rather thin on the ground in this forum perhaps a few more details of the layout itself would be of interest. The layout has been underway for some time, and its still far from being 'finished', although progress has not been helped by having two other layouts on the go at the same time. The layout represents a section of NCB line from a colliery, where the coal is loaded, to a coal preparation plant or washery, where the coal is unloaded for further treatment. En route the line will pass a canal tip (when it gets built) where coal will be also be discharged (into off scene canal barges). So within the layout there are three potential complete traffic movements - colliery to washery, colliery to canal tip and washery to canal tip. In practice many collieries were single units where all the required treatment of coal was carried out and the product despatched direct to the main line, internal traffic being confined perhaps to landsale traffic at the colliery or to a yard elsewhere. However there were examples of NCB railways connecting a single colliery or several collieries to a coal preparation plant on another site, such as the Haigh Colliery - Ladysmith Washery system at Whitehaven or the Waterside System at Dalmellington. My own interest is primarily the Lancashire Coalfield, which probably had more variety of locomotives than any other colliery area, including three unique and individual designs built by the colliery owners and also the only three industrial 0-8-0s in the UK. In the NCB period the longest systems were at Standish, to the north west of Wigan, where a coal washery adjacent to the West Coast main line served two deep pits and two drift mines; Haydock, where a coal preparation plant served four collieries; and probably the most well known and extensive system, Walkden Railways.

Strictly speaking the Mallet is a compound with low pressure cylinders on the front engine and high pressure on the rear, single expansion locos like the Big Boy are normally referred to as articulateds. In practice perhaps the Mallets could be described as high tractive effort but low speed machines whereas the articulateds were high horsepower and high speed. The UP had large Mallets, 2-8-8-0s nicknamed 'Bullmoose', but the massive low pressure cylinders and pivoting front engine restricted them to a low top speed of not much more than 20 mph (later they were rebuilt as simple expansion articulateds and permitted to run at higher speeds). To speed things up the 9000 series 4-12-2s were introduced, which could haul the same tonnage as the Mallets but at double the speed, although with a restricted route availability. The ultimate UP steam freight power were of course the articulated Big Boys and Challengers, and with smaller cylinders up front and different pivot and suspension arrangements they were capable of much higher speeds than the Mallets and somewhat higher than the 9000s. The Big Boys and later Challengers incorporated a tongue and slot arrangement (the tongue being on the front engine and the slot on the rear) in the pivot between the two engine units, which restricted the movement of the front engine to the horizontal, i.e. side to side. Vertical movement due to undulations in the track was taken up by the fairly complicated arrangement of springing which treated both units as a single locomotive and gave a good ride quality at high speed. According to William Kratville in his book on the Big Boys published in 1972, they were cleared for operation between Ogden and Los Angeles except for a few bridge speed restrictions in the Cajon Pass, although as far as is known they never operated over that route. He also describes in another publication how these locos and the Challengers were sometimes turned on turntables shorter than the loco. Special 'lifting frogs' were placed over the rails at the end of the table behind the tender and the loco then backed over them, lifting the rear tender wheels off the track sufficiently to allow the table to swing with the tender rear overhanging the end of it. This would no doubt have only been possible because of the rigid rear five axles of the 'centipede' tenders fitted to these locos.

Later diesel locos were not rebuilt WALLACE AKERS a Yorkshire Engine Co. 235hp 0-4-0DE, named after a former ICI director, was supplied new to Winnington Works in 1956 and transferred to Tunstead about January 1967. It is seen here at South Central Workshops in July 1967. It went to the Peak Railway Society in 1982 and was photographed at Buxton in October 1983. Ruston & Hornsby 395305 a 165DS 0-4-0DM was transferred from ICI's Weston Point Works in Runcorn to Smalldale circa 1966 and replaced the Motor Rail Simplex locos RS 12 and RS 9 View from Peak Forest station overbridge in October 1983 by which date all the ICI track had been lifted. The former line to Holderness Quarry had been cut back to Peakstone Ltd's hopper in left distance and just visible in front is their yellow ex BR 07001 0-6-0DE.

Unless there has been some further developments since 2011 that demolition was no accident, further details here: http://www.aditnow.co.uk/community/viewtopic.aspx?t=4028&pid=1&txtSearch=cowdale&lblnWhere=all&lblnMatch=any and photos of the buildings here: http://www.aditnow.co.uk/album/Ashwood-Dale-Limestone-Quarry-User-Album/ There are traces of the same building style in my photo of the ruins at Great Rocks Quarry (Post #2)

It seems curious that whilst they rebuilt the standard gauge locos with raised cabs and lowered engine casings to improve visibility they did exactly the reverse with some of the larger 2ft gauge Simplex locos by adding a steel box above the front casting. The box was used to contain batteries, and as they didn't carry lights I assume it would have been for electric engine starting, although clearly on RS 82 photographed at Hindlow it can't have been working as there is a starting handle in place. The larger Simplex locos also had air brakes, with the engine driven compressor alongside the radiator. On my first visit to Buxton Central Quarry the last two working 2ft gauge locos were locked in the shed. By the time of a later visit they had kindly removed the shed revealing RS 72 and RS 53 inside. The 2ft gauge 'V' skip wagons were either outside framed by Hudson or inside framed by Hudson or Bagnall. to be continued

ICI's Hindlow Quarry received a new Ruston & Hornsby 88DS 4wDM in 1957 to replace an Avonside 0-4-0ST and this was subsequently rebuilt with raised cab and lowered engine casing and numbered RS 2. I only saw this loco once while under repair in the loco shed at Hindlow, so I didn't photograph it. In April 1961 another 88DS arrived secondhand from ICI's recently closed Silvertown Works in Essex, named J.B.GANDY. The above photo (enlarged section of a poor negative) shows it outside South Central Works soon after arrival with the Avonside 0-6-0ST, still as built and in ICI blue livery. It received the number RS 89. J.B.GANDY was rebuilt similar to RS 2 and is shown above working at Hindlow in 1968. Briggs Sidings at Hindlow with J.B GANDY at the entrance to the ICI sidings and a BR loco waiting to back hoppers into the yard. They seem to be having trouble with the point in the foreground. Everything seems to have a generous coating of lime dust from the nearby kilns. A rather hazy view of Hindlow Limeworks, the two road loco shed is on the left. to be continued

Yes it is.

As previously mentioned in addition to the steam loco conversion RS 8, four diesel locomotives were transferred to Tunstead from ICI's Winnington Works circa 1960. They were CAVENDISH an English Electric 0-6-0DE and three Ruston & Hornsby 165DE 0-4-0DE locos, RAYLEIGH, TREVITHICK and RAMSEY. CAVENDISH and RAYLEIGH were soon returned back to Winnington. TREVITHICK was rebuilt in 1963 at South Central Workshops with a raised cab and lowered engine casing similar to RS 8, numbered RS 142 and is shown working near the kilns in 1967. TREVITHICK at South Central Workshops in 1969, with an ex MR bracket signal on the main line behind. In 1978 TREVITHICK was acquired by the Southport Locomotive & Transport Society and photographed at Southport in September 1980. It was scrapped there three years later. The fourth ex Winnington loco RAMSEY was transferred to ICI subsidiary Settle Limes Ltd., Horton-in-Ribblesdale, Yorkshire in 1961 and in return Tunstead received a Ruston & Hornsby 165DS 0-6-0DM. This was rebuilt in a similar way to TREVITHICK and received the number RS 143, although it doesn't seem to have been carried on the loco as seen here outside South Central Workshops in 1967. and here behind Great Rocks junction signal cabin in 1969. RS 143 went to the Midland Railway Centre in August 1976 and was scrapped there about December the following year. To be continued

Internal steam operation at Tunstead ceased about 1960 with the transfer of four diesel locomotives from ICI's Winnington Works in Cheshire and the conversion of one steam locomotive to diesel power. The final five steam locomotives comprised three Avonside 0-4-0STs, one Avonside 0-6-0ST and one Manning Wardle 0-4-0ST. In 1961 RS 4 Avonside Engine Co. No.1843, built in 1919 as it says on the tank, stands outside the loco shed situated just south of the crushing plant. The main part of the two brick road shed is behind the loco and probably held 4 locomotives. RS 4 is standing on a siding leading to an 'annexe' which held one locomotive and had a water tank on the roof. Steam locomotive livery was light grey and on RS 4 lined in black. By August 1963 three redundant steam locomotives - RS 1 Avonside 0-6-0ST, RS 5 Manning Wardle 0-4-0ST and RS 4 - were stored at the South Central Workshops. They were sold for scrap shortly after. The last (complete) steam loco to leave Tunstead was RS 16 Avonside Engine Co. No.1908 of 1925, seen here at the South Central Workshops sidings behind Great Rocks Junction signal cabin in 1965. It went to the Middleton Railway for preservation in 1966 and is now fully restored and carrying the post preservation name FRED at the Maldegem steam centre in Belgium. It still carries one of the Buxton Lime Firms RS 16 plates on the rear of the bunker. The fifth steam loco RS 8 0-4-0ST Avonside 1913 of 1923 was converted to diesel power with hydraulic drive in ICI's South Central Workshops in 1960 and is seen here in this rather poor view outside the loco shed with RAMSEY one of the ex Winnington Ruston 165DE locos. Before I could get a better view I think at this point I was collared by an official and ejected ! I never did get a reasonable photo of RS 8 at Tunstead, this being in shadow from a distance outside the South Central Workshops in 1967. In 1974 RS 8 went to the Bahamas Locomotive Society at Dinting and was photographed there in 1986. After the closure of Dinting it was transferred to the National Stone Centre at Wirksworth, where it remains in a vandalised condition. To be continued

View south from just north of Peak Forest Station October 1965. The large corrugated iron building on the left is ICI's Smalldale Lime Grinding Plant and beyond, in the centre of the photo, is the disused ICI Smalldale Quarry crushing plant. Between the two can be seen the elevated embankment which once carried the 2ft gauge line from the quarry. Peak Forest Station is just beyond the road overbridge. The ICI sidings are above the low wall on the left, while the other three tracks left of centre served S.Taylor Frith's Peak Forest and Holderness Quarries. The ICI sidings were shunted by a Motor Rail Simplex loco and the working loco RS 9 looks rather small compared to a BR hopper wagon. A similar loco RS 12 was spare. There is a useful modelling detail in the foreground - the oil drum propped on the wall with an oil stain below. Detail of a portable wheel chock to prevent runaways. When the wagon wheel contacts the hinged shoe it is standing on the flat portion thereby the weight of the wagon clamps the device to the rail. Great Rocks Quarry was situated on the east side of the main line just south of Peak Forest Station. The quarry closed circa 1922 although the kilns operated for a few years after that. By 1965 only a few ruined buildings remained and this timber chute for loading wagons. View north from Buxton Bridge (the overbridge next to Great Rocks Junction signal cabin) October 1965. In the sidings to the right of the main line are three lines of redundant ICI 5-plank P.O. wagons. The area to the right is the site of ICI's Long Sidings Quarry closed circa 1939 and in the foreground is the pit and water crane for servicing BR locos working the Tunstead trains, with the turntable just off the picture. In the distance crossing the main line at a high level is a pipeline carrying waste from Tunstead in the form of slurry to fill the old quarry workings. ICI 5-plank P.O. wagons at Long Sidings. Note the tarpaulin bar supports above the end of each wagon and the end of one of the timber bars (upside down) in the nearest wagon. Small lettering on the wagons read: "EMPTY TO TUNSTEAD KILNS PEAK FOREST L.M.R. FOR LIME TRAFFIC ONLY" or "EMPTY TO BRIGGS SIDINGS HINDLOW L.M.R. FOR LIME TRAFFIC ONLY" ICI internal user van No.4 To be continued

This topic was originally envisaged as only illustrating some of the early diesels at ICI's Tunstead and Hindlow Quarries which were rebuilt in their workshops into very unusual looking machines, including the steam loco conversion now at the National Stone Centre and recently illustrated in this forum. However in the course of scanning old negatives I thought some of the other photos taken at the time (1960s) might be of interest. The limestone trains in ICI's own fleet of hopper wagons and the locos that worked them on BR have been well covered in prototype and model form and photos have appeared on RMweb and elsewhere of industrial locomotives at Tunstead in recent years, but little (if anything) has been published on ICI's internal railways in earlier years. I first visited the area in 1961 when many quarries still operated internal railway systems both standard and narrow gauge and access either officially on weekdays or unofficially at weekends was usually no problem. However in the 1960s ICI were not particularly receptive to visits, official or otherwise, or photography on their premises (in my experience at least) and unofficial visits were sometimes terminated prematurely, so my collection of available photographs on the ICI sites is rather limited. By 1960 the only remaining ICI locations in the Buxton area with rail traffic and industrial locomotives were Tunstead, Hindlow, Smalldale and Buxton Central. Most of the locomotive details and dates are from information published by the Industrial Railway Society. In 1961 Tunstead Kilns were still both supplied and served by rail. In the sidings below the eight vertical kilns are a selection of wagons including 16-ton mineral wagons, covered hoppers, wooden 5 plank P.O. wagons and conflats with containers. At the top (quarry side) of the kilns coal was delivered in BR hopper and mineral wagons. Limestone was transported to the vertical kilns by a short 2ft gauge system from the loading point at the crushing mill, just off the photo to the right, to the wagon tippler at the kilns, just left of centre. Despite this short length the system had an unusually large amount of wagons and sidings. In the right foreground is a group of 8 parallel sidings containing mainly empty wagons while in the distance beyond is a series of 20 parallel sidings containing full wagons. In effect the system acted as a mobile stockpile so that limestone could be stored in the wagons while the crushing mill was operating and used to keep the kilns continuously supplied when stone was not being crushed at weekends. This enlargement of the above photo shows a Simplex loco on a train of empty wagons in front of the wagon tippler building and beyond a train of full wagons waiting to be unloaded. Sidings in the limestone cutting at the south end of the kilns. The cutting was excavated in 1929-1932 parallel to the ex MR Great Rocks Tunnel and formed the first stage in the development of Tunstead Quarry. By the 1960s limestone was only quarried at Tunstead and Hindlow with mechanical loading, and hand loading of stone into narrow gauge wagons had ceased in the mid 1950s with the closure of other quarries. Here at Hindlow a 150RB electric shovel loads an AEC articulated dumper. Note the armoured cable supplying power to the shovel disappearing off the bottom of the photo. Cowdale Quarry was situated in Ashwood Dale alongside the ex MR Buxton branch and closed in 1956, still operating up to closure with hand loading of limestone into 2ft gauge skip wagons. After closure the quarry was stripped of all locomotives, rolling stock and any easily removable buildings and machinery, apart from oddly enough one 2ft gauge Simplex loco chassis. The track however remained in place for about another 10 years, and the sketch plan above recorded in 1963 shows the complex track system required for hand loading. There are over 100 sidings for loading wagons at the quarry face and Motor Rail Simplex locomotives would have been continuously traversing the 'main line' circuit dropping off empty wagons and picking up full wagons for delivery to the crushing mill or kilns. Buxton Central Quarry was situated alongside the ex MR main line opposite the northern leg of the Buxton branch triangular junction. The quarry closed in 1951, but the kilns were operated until 1961 supplied with limestone by lorries from Tunstead which tipped the stone into 2ft gauge wagons used to feed the kilns. By 1963 when this photo was taken the Motor Rail Simplex loco which worked the standard gauge sidings below the kilns had been transferred away. The black line on the quarry floor to the right of the kilns is redundant 2ft gauge 'V' skip wagons. On the main line a passing northbound freight is headed by a 9F and banked by a 2-6-4T. On the old Cromford & High Peak line to the west of Buxton rail traffic had ceased at ICI's Harpurhill works and in 1963 the sidings were empty apart from this unusual very short internal user wagon. To be continued

Nice result Dave, but I'm not sure if the cropped chimney improves the appearance, although the original is rather on the tall side. Its reminiscent of the chimneys on the ten NCB Yorkshire Area 15" Hunslets fitted with Hunslet underfeed stokers and Kylpor exhausts, although they were perhaps slightly larger in diameter and had a fabricated base.

The suspension bridge between Telford's suspension bridge and the railway bridge actually carried a water main and there was no public access to it. I'm not sure when it was removed, possibly early 1970s although that is a guess.

It does look in a considerably worse state than when I last saw it 15 years ago. It was previously at Dinting, hence its connection to the Bahamas Society. By coincidence after posting the photo of the two MR locos at Smalldale - Post #8 in the Standard Gauge Tin Turtle topic - I have been wondering whether to post a new topic on ICI Buxton's 'first generation' diesels. In addition to RS8, the subject of the above photos, they also rebuilt several Ruston diesels to the similar strange appearance with raised cabs and lowered bonnets for use at Tunstead and Hindlow, most of which I photographed there or elsewhere.

This new topic in the Standard Gauge Industrial forum may be of interest on this subject: ttp://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/71150-bersham-colliery-sidings-an-ideal-subject-for-a-model/#entry1027244

A 'Kip' is a term used in the North East for a raised hump in the track used to assist the gravity working of wagons, usually associated with rope worked inclines.