Sharp Stewert GCR Tank loco

[MarcD]

I will pop down to WHSmiths in the morning. We are now looking into motors as we found out last week the normal motors we use are not going to be avalable very shortly. we have the majority of the loco part of the 0-6-0 done. We now need to sort out the motor problem.

 

Marc  

[Edwardian]

I would love to model both the Furness and the Cambrian.  I very well may do so.  These kits could well provide the impetus.  

 

The Sharp Stewart 0-6-0s and 2-4-0s are wonderful prototypes, full of charm and very practical in that they are ideal for small stations in secondary and cross-country scenarios that are easier to contemplate for those with average space modelling in 4mm Scale.  A number of companies used them, as Furness Wagon's list shows, but I want to make the argument that their use is potentially even more extensive, and in fact, is limited only by the imagination.    

 

A subject of frequent musing is the possibility of freelance railways.  These scenarios have been very common in NG and reasonably common as standard gauge light railway scenarios, but relatively neglected as mainline subjects.  Rev. Beal conceived of one, I believe.  Nile of this parish provides a great example.  The reasons for the relative rarity of this genre are hardly mysterious; people tend to model real railways, even if the stations are fictional, because they are attracted by particular prototype locomotives, stock, stations and companies/regions/lines.

 

The challenges in creating a realistic finescale layout based on a freelance company are different, but (I am discovering!) very interesting and satisfying.  All layouts are exercises in the willing suspension of disbelief.  The more daring the premise (in my case you have to believe in the existence of a fictitious company at a fictitious location) the more realistic the approach, and this includes having suitable locomotives and rolling stock.

 

Whereas a large freelance pre-Group concern would design and build its own locomotives in whole or in part, my focus is on smaller concerns. There is plenty of middle ground between the likes of LNWR and the railways Colonel Stephens. Some of these could design and build or rebuild their own locomotives and some were the joint children of parents who could donate locomotives.  Others, however, were more or less dependent upon buying from private builders.

 

For what it's worth, when planning that 'might have been', I offer three themes to consider, which can combine and overlap:  

 

• A fictitious company that became part of a real pre-Grouping company.  Many amalgamations were made in the 1840s-1890s.  A fictitious constituent could well have purchased Sharp Stewart products of the 1860s.  The new owner, a bigger company, would have doubtless re-built them from time to time, changing boilers, adding cabs etc.  Why not kit-bash one of these kits to resemble how it might have looked if taken over by a company that never in reality owned them/kept them?  The variations contemplated by Furness Wagons provide examples of re-builds and would greatly facilitate such customisation.

 

• A real pre-Grouping railway, faced with the traffic requirements and route restrictions of your fictional essay, purchases these locomotives to run upon your line; the models have a treatment similar to above.

 

• Your small independent company survives, despite or because of the needs of its larger neighbours.  Here are freelance alternatives to Furness, Cambrian, Midland & South West Junction etc, etc.  This is the way I have gone for my own first layout. The standard products of private railway manufacturers, chiefly Sharp Stewart and Beyer Peacock, are ideal for such companies, of course, as they were supplied to their factual equivalents. 

 

Ultimately, the prototypes I would like to see running on my layout are these small Victorian types, built by the likes of SS, BP, Vulcan Foundry etc. The nice thing about a freelance company is that you can bring all the types you want together at a single location, provided that your premise supports it. 

 

I am hopeful that these will be well-conceived kits, designed with ease of assembly in mind, so that people like me, interested in unusual types and keen to develop their scant skills can have a reasonable chance of producing a decent model.  Both the 2-4-0 and 0-6-0 (with 4-wheel tenders) are perfect for my freelance company.  I had long anticipated the need for such types.  If you are to produce the kits, it is clearly sensible to wait for them in 4mmScale.

 

I wish you all the best with this project.

[Argos]

May I offer a fourth?

 

I have often pondered what the railways around the turn of the 20th century would have looked like without government intervention.

 

If you look at the LNWR it was prevented from numerous mergers and take-overs by Parliament on the grounds of reducing competition.

Off the top of my head it tried to merge with/take over:

• Midland Railway
• Caledonian Railway
• North Staffordshire Railway
• Great Central Railway
• Great Western Railway
• Lancashire &Yorkshire (which it finally managed in 1922)

And I seem to recall one the eastern lines, the Great Eastern?

There are probably numerous others if I trawled the book shelf.

 

Had these mergers succeeded the Railway map would have look very different.

I suspect the Settle and Carlisle, the London extension of the GCR and the Midland mainline into London would not have been built. 

However the Caledonian extension up Loch Ness to Inverness (especially as the Caley tried to take over the North British....) and the planned expansion to the North East coal fields from Leeds would almost certainly have been built.

 

Presumably the threat of this behemoth would have prompted consolidation of other railway companies.

 

But what would it be called?

London Western and Caledonian?

Great London and Caledonian?

 

or, god forbid, London Midland and Scottish or English Welsh and Scottish........

 

And what rolling stock would we have seen, the Caley was already doodling pacifics, the L&Y and to some extent the LNWR were committing to big engine policies and I am sure the might of Swindon and Crewe combined would have produce something awesome.

 

I just hope they wouldn't have painted it green..........

[webbcompound]

And then there are the minor pre-grouping railways who had great plans which never eached fruition. I'm building the WM&CQR at Connah's Quay, but assuming that the major dock expansion projected and authorised actually took place. Increased traffic, more connections to the LNWR, healthier relationship with the GCR.Cheshire Lines. All this means I will be running tank locos from the WM&CQR, the LNWR, the GCR, the Midland and the GNR. And incoming passenger services will include WM&CQR ex LNWR short four wheelers, as well as through rakes from GWR Barmouth made up of two 70ft Concertinas brake composites and a clerestory brake third, and LNWR  from London with tricompostes, plus four wheeler rakes from the Wirral Railways. All I've done is extrapolated the actual and potential, and moved the Birkenhead traffic to the (newly dredged) Dee. Simples.

[Caley Jim]

........ (especially as the Caley tried to take over the North British....) 

There was a proposal in 1889 for a merger between the NBR and the G&SWR, which was vigorously opposed by the Caledonian.   I seem to recall that there was an earlier proposal, agreed at Board level by all three companies, for a merger of the CR, NBR and G&SWR, but that was thrown out by the shareholders of, IIRC, the NB.  I can't find the reference to it at present.

 

 

I just hope they wouldn't have painted it green..........

Agreed!!!

 

Jim

[richard i]

Or the great central, great northern, great eastern proposed merger in the early years of the twentieth century.

[Poggy1165]

From what I can gather there was a certain amount of standardisation in GC/GN/GE goods stock after 1909. Can't recall the details, unfortunately. And of course in 1915 they became the first pooling group.

 

Parliament could never really make its mind up about railway competition and whether it was a good thing or not. The SECR was effectively given a monopoly of their territory as early as 1899. But other similar proposals got kicked into touch. I'm sure a detailed study of the politics would be quite interesting.

 

I believe the LNWR/Midland effectively stopped competing round about 1900. Again, I can't recall the source, but at Buxton, for example, they suddenly started co-operating instead of being awkward with one another. I think the penny had dropped with railway managements that a lot of the competition was 'wasteful'. 

[Nick Holliday]

Just a note that the second article on Sharp Stewart Locomotives on the Camrian Railways has appeared in the latest BackTrack magazine, the October 2016 edition.

[MarcD]

Off to WHSmiths!

[phil_sutters]

The WM&CQ had some amazing engines, some of which were rebuilt multiple times. I think this is the very first time anyone has proposed a kit for even one of them. That 0-8-0 tank is but one of several fascinating machines that the company owned.

A photo of said 0-8-0ST - which along with the rest of the GC element in an archive of LNER photos by W.H.Whitworth and the LPC, that my father acquired, now form a gallery at http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/gallery/album/4063-great-central-railway-c1920s/

 

[Poggy1165]

Now I'd love one of those! Is it me, or does it look like an overgrown pug?

[Caley Jim]

Now I'd love one of those! Is it me, or does it look like an overgrown pug?

Closely resembles a ' Jubilee Pug' (CR 232 class) but with an extra set of 'legs'. 

 

Dugald Drummond