Castle Aching

[Compound2632]

2 minutes ago, Martin S-C said:

The sheeted pic of the MR open you showed, Compound, has more convincing brake blocks. Is that the Slater's model?

 

See the comment below the photo! Yes, it's the Slater's kit. Real grain sacks under the sheet...

[phil_sutters]

On 03/03/2019 at 13:02, Nearholmer said:

I doubt fruit would go in punnets to a jam factory.

 

when I was a boy, fruit picking was the summer job, and girls used to pick ‘just right’ soft fruit into punnets for premium sale, while boys got to pick fruit that was second quality (often because it had swelled too fast due to unexpected rain) into big tubs for the jam company. Worst fruit to pick was second-quality gooseberries, because the bushes are very low, the thorns rip your arms to shreds, and half the fruit turned to mush as soon as touched. Fastest and best pickers, btw, were gypsy women, who went at it like dervishes, but didn’t damage the crop.

As a youngster I used to pick blackberries, which were collected by greengrocer, Mervyn Knight, whose shop was by the S&DJR level crossing over the A39 in Highbridge. He, I understood, sold them on for dye making.

Later in life, for domestic and fund-raising jam-making, my family and I used to pick blackberries in Camberwell Old Cemetery. You could stand in one spot and almost fill a 1 litre ice-cream tub. We liked to describe our delicious bramble jam as full-bodied.

[Regularity]

2 hours ago, Hroth said:

If the grain was in a Belgian wagon, might they be Brussels Sprouts?

 

 

Corny.

[wagonman]

3 hours ago, Martin S-C said:

The sheeted pic of the MR open you showed, Compound, has more convincing brake blocks. Is that the Slater's model?

 

They could still do witha bit filing of the lower extremities...

[DonB]

13 hours ago, Martin S-C said:

The thought of what rain might do to sacks of flour or grain doesn't bear thinking about.

 

Ready made flour & water glue for primary school pupil's projects. ?

[corneliuslundie]

I am interested in the comment about fruit not being shipped in punnets. i am sure i remember reports, and possibly photos, of fruit in punnets being transferred from ships to GWR vans in Cornwall, having come from the Channel Islands. Have I misremembered?

And on arsenic, ideal for use in ladies' makeup of course.

Jonathan

[Edwardian]

7 minutes ago, corneliuslundie said:

I am interested in the comment about fruit not being shipped in punnets. i am sure i remember reports, and possibly photos, of fruit in punnets being transferred from ships to GWR vans in Cornwall, having come from the Channel Islands. Have I misremembered?

 

Jonathan

 

Does this help?  Strawberries on the South Western. 

 

[Nearholmer]

My point was that fruit for jam, or indeed juicing, is unlikely to go in punnets. First quality fruit, very definitely, because the small volume punnet is ideal to go direct to market, and protects the delicate fruit. We used to load punnets into big. trays, then they went to Covent Garden overnight and were at the shops c12 hours from the bush.

 

I’m not sure those things in that photo are punnets, they look like quarter(?) bushel baskets, but the same principle applies.

Edited March 5, 2019 by Nearholmer

[corneliuslundie]

Thanks. I suspect that I have misremembered and they were in baskets. Those in the photo look convincing, though I think those in the foreground must have been empty ones being returned. Did they travel by passenger or goods van? Or was it passenger when full and goods when empty and less urgent?

What I have remembered is that about ten thousand posts ago i mentioned a "foreign" van which regularly travelled empty to Norfolk to pick up fruit.

Jonathan

[Nearholmer]

From what I can understand, most pre-grouping railways with a significant fruit traffic used heavily ventilated milk vans, or special-purpose vans, for fruit, the key thing being that they had shelves, often flap-down shelves, to hold all the punnets/baskets/trays.

 

The LSWR ran short of fruit vans at one point, and resorted to using old 6W passenger coaches with the windows painted over and shelves fitted in the compartments.

 

Soft fruit went at passenger speeds, often attached to passenger trains, but sometimes by ‘special’ when there was a big harvest in the locality (that’s what that LSWR picture shows), much like milk, because of its perishability, but I think that hard fruits went in fitted goods trains ....... i’d need to check that last point by looking in my Wisbech & Upwell book, which shows pictures of fruit trains.

 

GWR had both brown and grey (but fitted) fruit vans, the LMS built both 6W passenger-rated and 4W fitted goods fruit vans, and the LNER built replacement passenger-rated brake vans for fruit trains as well as 4W fitted goods fit vans, which bears out that there was some distinction made between types of fruit, or perhaps how fruit was consigned on different routes.

 

And, here is a fitted goods van specially fitted for fruit carriage, showing the load https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/lms/mre1341.htm

 

I'm beginning to think that, where the volume was very large, and the traffic regular, fitted goods vans were used, and particular fast goods trains were timetabled to handle fruit.

 

Kent is an interesting question ........ knowing the SER/LCDR, fruit probably went in sheeted opens, the distances to market being short anyway. These railways certainly had a few isolated sidings, direct into orchards. The SR doesn't seem to have built fruit vans, although it inherited lots, and I suspect that the standard passenger-rated LWB vans might have been used for domestic fruit traffic.

 

This picture is utterly supreb, and CA-relevant, showing M&GN fruit train, which seems to consist of something I've never seen before: clerestory roof fruit vans! http://wisbech.ccan.co.uk/content/catalogue_item/loading-a-fruit-train-at-the-midland-great-northern-station-wisbech

Edited March 5, 2019 by Nearholmer

[Tom Burnham]

There's a photo in the Bexley Libraries collection of a "strawberry train" being loaded at Bexley station in 1905 (when it was still just about a Kent village) - the first 2 vehicles at any rate appear to be passenger-rated ventilated vans.  At a casual glance I can't see any reference to them in Gould's book on SE&C carriages.
https://www.boroughphotos.org/bexley/pcd_2211/

[Nearholmer]

That is a VERY interesting picture!

 

The fact that fruit trains attracted photographers attests to the fact that "getting the crop in" was a big thing for a town/village ........ soft fruit was a very good money earner, and picking it tended to involve mobilising half the population for a few weeks in June and July.

 

Another fascinating photo, which, if the caption is correct, shows LNWR fruit vans in deepest Hampshire. https://www.gettyimages.ca/detail/news-photo/piles-of-baskets-beside-a-goods-train-in-hampshire-which-news-photo/3287480 The roof ventilators look as if they belong on yachts.

 

and, from the same series, fruit being transferred from cart to train https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/loading-the-strawberry-harvest-onto-the-goods-train-in-news-photo/3287483

 

And, and, a rather cheesy Pathe News film https://www.britishpathe.com/video/fruit-special (notice that they're picking gooseberries with coat and gloves on .......... no way to go about It, because you get all tangled-up and slowed down).

Edited March 5, 2019 by Nearholmer

[Compound2632]

33 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Another fascinating photo, which, if the caption is correct, shows LNWR fruit vans in deepest Hampshire. https://www.gettyimages.ca/detail/news-photo/piles-of-baskets-beside-a-goods-train-in-hampshire-which-news-photo/3287480 The roof ventilators look as if they belong on yachts.

 

Looks as if the empty baskets have just been thrown out of the vans - a bit more tidying up has gone on in the photo James posted.

[Nearholmer]

But, the handles have been tied together with string, to make bundles that can easily be lifted, so maybe not so sloppy. also, I think they might have tags on them, showing which farm they belong to.

Edited March 5, 2019 by Nearholmer

[K14]

Also this one from the same photographer which shows the internals:

 

https://www.gettyimages.ca/detail/news-photo/strawberry-gathering-in-hampshire-at-the-turn-of-the-news-photo/3293045

 

https://www.gettyimages.ca/search/photographer?family=editorial&photographer=F.+J.+Mortimer

[Nearholmer]

Beautiful bit of loading!

 

Notice where that van is destined: Edinboro'. 

 

Here is the fruit train,

Crossing the border,

Carrying the strawberries in apple-pie order.....

 

They must have been blooming expensive delicacies by the time they got to Scotland.

 

This picture from the series is brilliant too. Notice the boys smoking, and the woman taking a chug from a bottle ...... it looks like beer, but is probably cold black tea, which was very 'trad' as a field drink in Hampshire and Sussex. My Grandmother, from that county, always classed herself a "tea boozer". https://www.gettyimages.ca/detail/news-photo/strawberry-pickers-in-hampshire-news-photo/2642467 We used to delight in sneaking people's bottles, which were meant to be in the shade, and laying them in the full sun, so that they became too hot to drink, and/or trickling the hot water/tea down the backs of people's trousers as they were bent over bushes ........ which wasn't well received!

Edited March 5, 2019 by Nearholmer

[Edwardian]

There has been some talk of Posca pens and, IIRC, Mikkel has used them on coaches.

 

Well I thought I'd give it a go.

 

Now if there is one thing the world is not short of it's crudely painted Ratio 4-wheelers.  One such had come in amongst a lot I bought some time ago. 

 

 

So no loss as the subject of an experiment. I broke it down, removed the glazing and covered sprayed with Halfords primer.  The lower body was brush-painted but the ivory upper panels and beading were coloured using Posca pens. 

 

 

I learnt a few lessons:

 

- I need practice.  It was vastly quicker than brush painting, but the result not yet to the standard I want.  Still, a similar result in a fraction of the time.

 

- The thinnest pen, 0.7mm, still cannot get everywhere it needs to, so a brush is required

 

- The ivory needed at least two coats, but, then, the hand-painted body I did some time ago needed at least three!

 

- The thick pen was great for filling in the panels, but I need a thinner one of the same colour to reach the nooks, crannies and corners. 

 

 

All in all I was pleased and will consider this method in future. 

 

Edited March 5, 2019 by Edwardian

[Compound2632]

I've been doing the same sort of experiment myself - 0.7 mm Posca pen in straw or yellow, followed by 0.4 mm Rotring pen with black ink. My current thinking is that a coat of varnish is needed between the water-based Posca paint and the ink, largely because the steel Rotring nib scrapes away at the paint. 

 

With a Ratio or Triang clerestory side, the moulded grab handles interrupt the flow - so may work better on e.g. a Slaters MR 6-wheeler side (my near-term goal) or etched kit side. 

 

I rule against a straight edge.

[Martin S-C]

11 hours ago, Edwardian said:

 

Strawberries on the South Western. 

 

Do my eyes play tricks or is that a cute little Beyer Peacock 2-4-0T?

[Steamport Southport]

Yes Beyer Peacock. But it's a 4-4-0T. The precursor to the 4-4-2T.

 

Commonly called the Plymouth or Metro Tanks, or Class 318 to use the LSWR system.

 

 

Jason

[Steamport Southport]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

Beautiful bit of loading!

 

Notice where that van is destined: Edinboro'. 

 

Here is the fruit train,

Crossing the border,

Carrying the strawberries in apple-pie order.....

 

They must have been blooming expensive delicacies by the time they got to Scotland.

 

They must be pretty expensive. Is that a soldier with a pith helmet and shouldered rifle in the centre?

 

 

Jason

[Mikkel]

Hi James, I haven't tried the Posca pen method (I use the "runny paint" method, whereby the paint runs along the sides and corners by itself), but it looks like an interesting way to go!  Is the paint in the Posca pens thin enough that it could run from the center to the sides by itself, if enough is applied?

[St Enodoc]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

Beautiful bit of loading!

 

Notice where that van is destined: Edinboro'. 

 

Here is the fruit train,

Crossing the border,

Carrying the strawberries in apple-pie order.....

 

They must have been blooming expensive delicacies by the time they got to Scotland.

 

This picture from the series is brilliant too. Notice the boys smoking, and the woman taking a chug from a bottle ...... it looks like beer, but is probably cold black tea, which was very 'trad' as a field drink in Hampshire and Sussex. My Grandmother, from that county, always classed herself a "tea boozer". https://www.gettyimages.ca/detail/news-photo/strawberry-pickers-in-hampshire-news-photo/2642467 We used to delight in sneaking people's bottles, which were meant to be in the shade, and laying them in the full sun, so that they became too hot to drink, and/or trickling the hot water/tea down the backs of people's trousers as they were bent over bushes ........ which wasn't well received!

Shirley "Embra" would have got its strawberries from the Carse of Gowrie, by means of the Caledonian Railway?

[relaxinghobby]

 

 

In Nearholmer's picture that he found at  https://www.gettyimages.ca/detail/news-photo/strawberry-pickers-in-hampshire-news-photo/2642467

which shows a strawberry picker work gang taking their lunch are the 3 boys near the front smoking ?

Was it compulsory for children to smoke back then?

 

 

Edited March 6, 2019 by relaxinghobby

[richard i]

Better for you than drinking? You can work after a smoke but not after too much booze.

Maybe?