John Lewis

This is part of a photo, courtesy of the GWR, showing AA9 No.60755 of lot 556. It is attached to a train of condemned coaches, possibly at Fosse Cross c.1923. John

Just to make another wild guess - the GWR scenery vans were coded "MONSTER" and came in several versions.

Or it could be the GWR "Python A" No 520, a CCT which was specially strengthened to carry elephants. The GWR was the only railway to have a snake that could swallow elephants.

This photo of V16 No.100211 was taken by Colin Strevens at Old Oak Common. It is in BR's light grey livery with black patches for lettering. Note that it has an iron roof - a number of V16s were built thus. This one was built in April 1922 and was condemned in January 1960. I would have thought it possible to produce a model with an iron roof by carefully filing off the rainstrip of a wooden roofed van and then sticking thin strips of plasticard across the roof to represent the capping strips. No, I don't know what was the purpose of the piece of wood on the end below the highest part of the roof!

No. 89662 of Lot 731 is another vacuum fitted V12, but it illustrates some things relevant to the V14s and V16s. It hds last been painted some time between the later 1920s and 1936, note that "Ventilated" no longer appears on the sides or ends, and its number is no longer painted on the ends. It carries the later, common, pattern of the Not Common User plate, these were removed during WW2. These wagons and most of the V14 and V16 covered goods were built with shutters closing off the end ventilators. They were behind the bonnets on the ends and could be operated by a long flat handle which can be seen coming out of the ventilators and behind the diagonals. During the 1920s the GWR found they were not being used and so they were gradually removed during the late 1920s - the early 1940s.

Diagram V12 covered both fitted and unfitted wagons. This shows No.16685, a fitted example, and is the best photo I have showing the off-centre V. It has laminated spring buffers and instanter couplings. It also shows the earliest livery with 25 inch "GW", "VENTILATED VAN" on the side and the earlier form of the "NOT COMMON USER" plate. It would have had "VentilatedVan" (in upper case letters) with its number below on the ends between the vertical stanchions. There was not really enough room for the lettering, and the letters were usually squashed together. It would probably be fairly easy for a modeller to change the buffers on a V14 or V16 to get a V12, but not something that could readily done on the prototype.

I would agree with the sceptics. When we were cataloguing the Haywood Collection at Kew (very much an ongoing project) we found quite a number of curious items, but I do not reca.ll any string/tape like this. We did find (e.g.) dipping pens (a big no-no at the National Archives) and even a sample of (hard) toilet paper (thankfully unused), but I don't remember if it was marked "G.W.R" or "Great Western" or "Great Western Railway"

2, 3 and 8. Not listed: One of the clerestory trailers. Why:2: The 70ft trailers were the most common type(s). 3. The Matchboarded trailers (ex-SRM) were distinctive and different. 8. The same goes for the Clifton Downs sets. An additional Intermediate trailer could be used as a hauled coach. Not listed. I find the clerestory trailers interesting and different.

No.1 in original state. Mising: Original 'Dreadnaught Dining car - a magnificent coach.

1-5, please.

1.

1-6, 8, 9, 11, 12. Someone has already suggested the Crocodile L, which would be tempting. so I will go for the 'Goliath' open scenery truck - see Russell GW Coaches 1 pg 214-5. Note the Serpent was goods stock, the Python, Scorpion and Hydra were carriage stock, (painted brown) even though the Hydra had goods stock numbers.

Some comments on the Rails of Sheffield/Dapol mdel. I have only seen the Rails' photos. The body looks the part and appears well detailed. The roof inevitably is of overscale thickness, the prototype's roof was of 1/8" iron plates! Adventurous modellers could perhaps thin the end edge from the inside? I have seen comments about the door frames. It seems that the side fr4aming was of 2½"x2½" oak, the bottom rail was of teak. The horse hook holes in the underfraame were 3½ inches in diameter. I the photographs, the buffer guides look a little heavy to me. When these vans were bult they had a single brake lever operating two brake shoes on one side only. The slightly unusual feature of this brake was that there was only one V hanger, which was rivetted to the solebar. As usual , the brake handle was on the outside, and the short lever operating the push rods was on the inside. Inside that was a vertical, slightly tapered, rod which had a bearing for the brake shaft on its bottom end and which was attached to an underframe bracket on its top end. The brake shaft did not go across the wagon. So if you viewed the wagon centrall y, the brake would appear to have a V with a vertical rod behind it. . In the 1920s the GWR started fitting a second brake handle to the other side of the wagon, so they simply fitted an independent brake, like the original, but in many cases only using one push rod and shoe. The brake raack was toothed, but as far as I am aware it did not have a connection to the nearest W iron. The "late condition" of the models with the 1921 -37 "GW" in 16" letters, seems to refer to it having the second set of brakes, it is in fact the earliest variant on offer. The end numbers were dropped in the 1920s, but it is good to see them here. I am not convinced that the 1937-41 livery is quite right, I think it should be in slightly heavier weight characters and spread out a little more. Some photographs are attached showing this. The tare was to be shown as 6_10 with out quarters, but Rails may have a photo of one in the format 6_7_5 In any event the signwriters seem to have had problems with not using italic characters for this! I am not sure where they got the number 88331 from - this is outside the range of their original numbers, but it could have been an ex-TVR example, possibly. It would be interesting to know of any one has photos of examples in BR livery. 47120 was built in July 1889 and lasted until July 1950, I don't know about 69552. I would suggest that teh BR examples should have a grey roof. The photos show 57917 in 1921-37 livery, The others are in the 1937-41 livery. 11036 show the brake rack and just the central support road behind the the push rod. 69065 has only one push rod and brake shoe on the side nearest the photographer, 69627 show the usual two shoe brake and appears to be freshly painted.

2,4 and 9. Not included: Diag C24 or C25 Crocodile L Diag J1 Gane. Diag N1 etc - 40T loco coal wagon Diag N3 etc 20T loco coal wagon with round corners (did we have this?) Diag T12 - Chaired sleper wagon - with load. Diag W7 sppecial cattle wagon n(did we have this?) |Diag CC3 or CC7 Tool Vaqn (iron body) Diag DD3 travelling oil tank Diag DD4 gas reservoir tank 9 reservoirs. (Could use 4 wheel coach u/frame? (did we have this?)