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jointline

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Everything posted by jointline

  1. A bit off topic but a similar freight, fresh cut flowers, were sent by rail from the nurseries around Cowley Middlesex to the London markets via the Metropolitan at Uxbridge, mostly in the evenings for the next morning markets. This was pre-1939. Can't find the source for this at the moment of course, but will keep looking....
  2. This rather bad picture I took in 1962 shows the vegetation already established, and would probably almost foul the passenger stock. But I think (although don't know for sure) that the railcar never went (was allowed?) further along, it just reversed. Somebody will know better than me!
  3. Many thanks for this link! Wish I could have afforded colour film in those days, could barely afford black and white! Completely off-topic, but the clerestory and four wheelers shown at Hayes (I have identical pictures in B & W) were there for the re-signalling scheme in the early sixties. I always show them to modellers who want four wheelers in BR livery!
  4. Chris, here's another one with STAINES rather than STAINES WEST on the destination blind, taken July 1961.
  5. Others will know more than me, but I believe the GWR suburban services through to Liverpool Street ceased on the outbreak of war in 1939, and were never resumed. Engine change (to Met electric locos) was at Bishops Road, Paddington.
  6. I agree, but it just seems inconsistent (Greenford, Henley and Marlow all showed through trains to Paddington by the note T) so why not Uxbridge and Staines. After all, presumably timetables are meant to inform and encourage the travelling public. Not putting Paddington (or Reading) in the station bank meant that the punter had to then look at another page to see when their connection would be. Or possibly they were working on the assumption (as I was informed by a senior manager) that nobody would travel from either Uxbridge or Staines to London by WR as there were better alternative services.
  7. Interesting! But Table 51 (Staines Branch) in the WR Public Timetables doesn't show this as a through train, although Table 50 (Reading to Paddington) has a note "8.5 am from Staines" against the 8.28 from West Drayton. Neither does it show this as 1st and 2nd Class from Staines, so wonder if a ticket would/could gave been issued for 1st class travel?!! (Given this branch was advertised as 2nd Class only). Typical of the time in that there was very little promotion of these branches, even when they could offer a potentially attractive service.
  8. Spot on! In the absence of working timetables often the best indication of train formation around this area is the presence or absence of 1sf or 2nd class accommodation. Eg the train leaving West Drayton at 0405 in the morning in 1960 was advertised as 2nd class only, so was likely to be an auto-train/single car. 1st class on the Uxbridge branch meant either a five car suburban set, or 117 unit. These were busy hours only. Curiously there was a break in trains between West Drayton and Uxbridge between 1000 and 1600 on weekdays. I remember the driver of Staines railcar being annoyed as I once got off at Yeoveney on the down trip (to take photographs) and then stopping him on the return trip to get back on! The only time I remember the train to Staines being busy was a Saturday morning, and that was in GWR railcar days.
  9. Oh absolutely, I was thinking more of Staines/Uxbridge.
  10. Just as a general comment, the formation mentioned (3car +1+1) was exceedingly uncommon, if not unique, and I can't ever recall seeing it (although I would have been on the way to school at the time of this particular one!) 3 car 117s were common on the Uxbridge branch. The driving trailers were also phased out quite quickly in my recollection (although perhaps somebody has better memory than me). Traffic on the Staines line rarely needed anything other than a single car.
  11. The 1951 public timetable, the only one I have to hand, doesn't give any through trains, but they were notoriously short on detail. Often, as Chris says, the auto-trains from both Uxbridge and Staines went to the West Drayton Bay and then went on to Southall or Paddington; I can remember travelling in one back to Hayes on a Sunday lunchtime. With regard to a book, Chris Turner (who is author of many books published by Wild Swan) contacted me about forty years ago saying he was putting a book together, and I sent him a dozen or so pictures of the buildings on the line. Perhaps it was well known that he was putting a book together, so nobody else bothered? As has been mentioned above, Chris Leigh is the real authority. He has a blog page, and there are pictures of his N gauge Staines West. (https://www.model-rail.co.uk/online-features/chris-leigh-blog/'n'-gauge-progress/ and here: https://www.model-rail.co.uk/online-features/chris-leigh-blog/countrystyle/) There are some useful pictures of West Drayton in "Railways to Uxbridge" by C T Goode. If you need pictures of any of the buildings, particularly at Staines West, I may be able to help. Here's one of the daily goods running round its train at Colnbrook: because the points extended across road the gates had to be closed for such shunting movements.
  12. And be sure to post some pictures when it's finished! Sounds fascinating!
  13. Talking off the top of my head.......but Certainly have read this elsewhere about the 94xx class, in terms of being ergonomically imperfect! Also have read that Hawksworth was keen to involve drivers in designing locomotives, so something obviously went amiss here. The 94s were basically 22xxs with side tanks, so did the cab layout change I wonder, or did they use a tender engine cab layout for a tank engine without realising the implications.
  14. Re: storage uncovered. Those who go to the coasts in Spain and Portugal will be familiar with the "Salt mountains" as the salt obtained from sea water evaporation is stored outdoors. It seems to form a crust left this way, so although there may be some loss, it is not great. During preparation for the table the salt crystals are washed, which sounds strange at first, but does not last sufficiently long to dissolve much salt. (the residue is re-evaporated).
  15. This thread was a long time ago now, but just re-reading Peacock's book on GWR Suburban services, and he mentions that there was a workman's train, not advertised for public use, from Clapham Platform 12, at 0703 , returning at 5.56, to Greenford via Ealing. Stopping at all stations except Acton. (Saturdays returning at 12.32 and only going as far as Kensington). The carriages were put away on the old down goods loop between Lillie Bridge and Kensington, working empty from Clapham for this purpose. This was in the STT from 4th July 1938, and presumably stopped thereafter. Another little big of the jig-saw relating to this line!
  16. The WR often had parcel trains of one or two vans, depending on the load. This very poor shot is of the Uxbridge to Paddington return trip sometime in the early '60s passing Hayes. Was unusual to use a 43xx, usually a 61xx or pannier. Two vans, (GUV + Mk 1) but I've a few pictures of a one van working with a Hawkesworth full brake.. Just depended on the load they had to take.
  17. I think I was reading somewhere recently that the original act of P contained a requirement (or allowed) a spur between the S & D and the GWR at Wincanton/Bruton, but it was of course never built. More's the pity, it might actually have enabled some more cross country traffic to have been built up (and would make a great model.......)
  18. Have a look at Bledlow on the Risborough to Oxford (single) line. Main building on the down side, only trailing sidings, and level crossing!
  19. Yes, I have long thought that the Beyer Garratt was way ahead of other locomotive designs in terms of maximising the loading gauge for fireboxes etc, and ease of bi-directional running.
  20. Can't disagree. The book I was reading was by someone who was in India over the independence period, and was involved in the cement and chemical industries. It was certainly his view that the old boy's network of Brits in the Indian firms ordered from the UK by default. When the main players in these firms were replaced by Indians there was a sea change in procurement. Could be of course, that in a newly independent country there was a feeling that there shouldn't be an automatic continuation of ordering from the UK, and perhaps the sales reps of other countries quite rightly saw opportunities in a market where they had traditionally experienced difficulties in getting a foothold. However I think overall there was a preponderance of UK built stuff in our colonies. Remember visiting North Borneo, for example, and being impressed by the completely UK built steam loco fleet, and Ransomes and Rapier equipment.
  21. Not much to disagree with here, but top link machines would have benefited, and small coal could have been easily supplied to the few sheds those engines were stabled at. Think availability of cheap labour was more of a deciding factor against mechanical stoking than technical constraints (which can normally be solved given the necessity!) As you say, they didn't warrant the cost, even if they may have been desirable from a lot of other perspectives.
  22. Part of the NMH/NIH syndrome (Not Made Here/Invented Here) which pervades most cultures and countries, the USA in particular! Presumably the US railroads would have had to pay a licence fee for using the design as well. Was reading a book about India the other day, and it is clear that the supply of machinery, including railway equipment, was largely determined by the (British) owners and managing engineers of companies using firms of engineers in UK that they were familiar with, rather than sourcing best value or best technology from the rest of the world. This changed dramatically at independence. This largely explains the "success" of British engineering around the former Empire, and in the Commonwealth. (And the UK products were good of course, but there was a lot of other stuff out there in Europe and the States which never even got a look in). But all changed when dieselisation happened, as we were way behind the US development curve, and coinciding with the end of British administration and retirement of British engineers, it started the decline in British manufacturing. (of which there were, of course, many contributory factors....)
  23. I guess I was trying to stimulate debate! Yes, hindsight is a valuable commodity, and as usual there were a few very far sighted folk at the time who saw the way forward. Nothing to disagree with here, and even if they were wasteful, coal was a lot cheaper in the USA. However the point I'm pushing is that, as you say, these were the conditions at the time, but if diesels/electrification had not come along, do we think that the development of the steam locomotive would have stood still and men or women would still be shovelling coal on a footplate? No serious attempts seem to have been made to develop a mechanical stoker that would be effective on smaller grates. Obviously no need while there were people willing to do it, and necessity drives invention a lot of the time. Even Bulleid, a noted innovator, on the Leader class, which had a top notch boiler in thermal efficiency terms, didn't seem to think anything about the crew, who only had access to the firebox from one side of the loco, and whose working conditions were so bad that it dictated that only non-union labour would work them. The issue with having an outside builder design an engine is of course unanswerable with only one of a type. Although the LMS could have, horror of horror, contracted maintenance out to Beyer Peacock and rotated the engines through a service schedule. Or do what the GWR and others did, which was to deal with boilers as a separate item, and have spare chassis and boilers for rolling maintenance. So many what ifs, and, as you say, I wonder what they'll think of us in 100 years (if there's anybody left....)
  24. Have to agree with Lantavian. Beyer-Garratt's worked on some of the most difficult lines in the world, and were incredibly successful as locomotives, and builders. I think there are a few factors at play, and I'm certainly not pretending to speak with any expertise, so I'll be slightly provocative! 1. Interference from the purchasing company, whether LNER or LMS certainly was not helpful in the design phase. BG had been designing effective engines for years, and should have been given an output spec and left to design it. Automatic stokers were an obvious thing to have put in. 2. Despite what has been said above, loco men seemed very conservative about engines from other lines, or maybe just anything that was different. Occasionally it went the other way: I recall a LMS driver saying what a revelation it was driving a GW pannier and not having to use a Jinty. The pannier in his view was far superior. But this seems to have been an exception. The will to succeed is probably outweighed by the desire to prove things don't work (there was some evidence of this with the SR Leader class according to Kevin Robertson). Therefore no incentive to make things work: if a crew had been offered £500 to make a success of the engine for a year you might have seen some improvement in performance! 3. Autocratic designers seemed to take little thought for the men driving the machines: the whole history of the locomotive cab shows this. 4. Resistance to any new developments that would make life easy: power stoking, standard on US railways for large engines, was never highly regarded; use of generators for light etc; roller bearings on locos. Also the dreadful working conditions in most steam sheds were a disgrace in terms of health and safety, although the newer sheds were getting better, and the very slow introduction of colour signalling and ATC. Many of these developments were discussed in detail and dismissed on what seems very light pretexts, although cash was probably at the bottom of a lot of them. Steam stokers in particular were something which should have been developed. I know there was a "macho" aspect to shovelling 6 tons of coal in eight hours or whatever, but it was interesting how quickly engine men decided that riding a cab on a diesel was infinitely preferable, to the extent that it was often difficult to find a steam crew when the changeover to diesel was in progress! So probably there are a range of factors: it was not a very successful machine mechanically because of input rather than output specification; there was little thought given to the men who would be operating it eg in terms of extra pay or better breathing equipment; and there was resistance to anything new or from "over there", and there was no lateral thinking about how buffering up etc could be better done using electric communication (a shock absorbing intermediate vehicle wouldn't have been too difficult to design I wouldn't have thought.......)
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