More Pre-Grouping Wagons in 4mm - the D299 appreciation thread.

[Compound2632]

18 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

• Drg. 866, dated 7 July 1891, "Circular Creosote Tank" and four detail drawings (including Drg. 855 "Number plate for Creosote & Gas Tar Tanks", along with Drg. 972, dated 5 May 1893, "Steam Cock for Creosote Tank". 

There is also Drg. 3061, dated 14 July 1908, "Outlet Cock for Creosote Tank"; quite possibly this is for a fixed tank in the wagon works or elsewhere.

 

Not so. Drg. 866A, which gives details of the tank for the Lot 282 etc. 2,000 gal creosote tank wagons, shows the method of emptying the tank, via an outlet pipe at its base. This has a plug attached to a vertical rod, leading to a screw thread terminating in a handle on the circular flange on the top of the tank. At the base of the outlet pipe, a valve has been sketched in in pencil, labelled "Proposed Turn Cock to prevent leakage" and with the note "Copy of this drawing, with Proposed Turn Cock shewn in Red, sent to Mr Derry on 15/4/08". So I think we can take it that Drg. 3061 is the detail drawing for this valve. Evidently after over a decade in service, the plug and its seat must have become worn, or there were problems with solid lumps getting stuck, leading to the plug not being sufficiently creosote-tight.

[Compound2632]

I'm still cogitating these Drg. 866 creosote tank wagons (rather than getting on with any actual modelling). There was an article on them: D.L.F. Gilbert, Midland Railway gas tar tanks - diagram 838, HMRS Journal Vol. 12 No. 2 (April/June 1985) p. 36. I've only seen the first page, illustrating the Midland Railway Study Centre catalogue entry. The article discusses an example photographed at Ashby-de-la-Zouch on 7 Oct 1951. This solves the mystery of the non-standard numberplate. The example photographed read:

 

M R No 20

W&W Dept

Gas Tar Tank

2000 gals

 

"W&W Dept" is a bit peculiar - there wasn't a Way & Works Department so-called but the Engineer's Department came under the purview of the Board's Way & Works Committee [A.E. Overton & R.F. Burrows, The Functions and Organisation of the Midland Railway Engineer's Department (Midland Railway Society, 2015)]. The wagon had a 1900 builder's plate, making it as Gilbert says, one of the six ordered to Lot 474. Gilbert has been confused by Essery over the diagrams, inferring a design change between ordering and building, but at least we can now see that the six numbers listed on the diagram, including 20, are presumably the numbers of the wagons built to this lot. The official photograph shows No. 41, without the steam heating pipes, so probably either from the first batch of six, Lot 282 or the penultimate batch of four, Lot 431. There is something I can't quite put my finger on that to me suggests the earlier date. (There is also disagreement between the drawing and the lot list as to whether the twelve built as Lot 332 had steam pipes or not.

 

I'm wondering if these Departmental tank wagons, which have two digit numbers, were actually numbered in a series of their own, hence the non-standard numberplates. (Though the two petroleum tank wagons of Lot 830 of 1913 have ordinary wagon numbers - 117656/7.) The twelve Lot 839 creosote tanks Nos. 48-59 had ordinary D-shaped numberplates but an additional cast plate that read:

 

Stores Dept, Derby

2120 Gallons

(Nett Capacity)

 

(The two petroleum tank wagons had similar plates.)

 

Incidentally, the diagram D830, Midland Wagons Fig. 118, for these 1913 wagons clearly shows the valve on the outlet pipe.

 

Of course I'm mulling over how one would build one of these Drg. 866 wagons. The underframe could be Slaters. The tank perhaps cries out for 3D printing but the support plates would be best in brass - the fancy curves suggest etching... 

Edited October 7, 2020 by Compound2632
Typos corrected

[Compound2632]

Never finish one thing before starting another, that's my motto!

 

 

Headstocks are deliberately cut over-width.

 

The scribed and skrawked pieces need a rub-down with fine sandpaper but there wasn't time to make such a mess and tidy up before dinner.

Edited September 11, 2022 by Compound2632
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[Mikkel]

Henry Ford would have approved.  Are those some of the Saltney GWR 1- and 2- plankers?

[Compound2632]

On 11/10/2020 at 13:42, Mikkel said:

Henry Ford would have approved. 

 

Any colour you like so long as it's black. Production line methods:

 

 

On 11/10/2020 at 13:42, Mikkel said:

Are those some of the Saltney GWR 1- and 2- plankers?

 

Yes, though one is a 4-plank Loco Dept. wagon (os Lot 66) for which I've found a promising excuse - it's travelling over the Midland en route between Markham Colliery and the Great Western gas works at Swindon:

 

 

Edited September 12, 2022 by Compound2632
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[Crimson Rambler]

l find this a fascinating photo - one of the Midland's Baldwin 2-6-0s heading north on the down goods line at Welsh Harp with a train of empty coal wagons. This view can be dated to within a narrow window extending from late 1899 until say mid 1902. The sensible wisdom is that part of the huge construction of D299 wagons was to replace bought up private owner wagons - something which makes a lot of sense - and by the time this photo was taken D299 production was too all intents complete -

 

 

yet four of the first five wagons appear to be ex-PO wagons purchased by the Midland, while the first six are dumb buffered. I expect the loco crew were pleased about that.

Another point of interest is that in 1884 the Midland introduced outside keyed track firstly with 85lbs rail followed by 100lbs in 1896 but here the down fast passenger line - the next but one to the engine - is laid with inside key chairs.

 

Crimson Rambler

 

 

 

 

[Compound2632]

@Crimson Rambler Thought-provoking indeed. Some number crunching needed. Between the mid-1880s and c. 1902:

 

Old PO wagons bought up: 66,000

 

New PO wagon registrations: 24,000+

New MR mineral wagons built: 62,000 D299 + 9,000 D351

 

Total new mineral wagons: 95,000

 

Implied growth in mineral traffic: 40%.

 

Is that realistic? As D299 was also the standard merchandise wagon, perhaps an over-estimate. What fraction of D299 were in mineral traffic? An indication might be given by the ratio of mineral traffic tonnage to goods traffic tonnage?

 

Questions, questions.

 

Evidently rail rolled in the early 1880s had a 20+ year lifetime in heavy main line use. I count ten chairs between fishplates which I think means 30 ft lengths.

 

Anyway, more Saltney wagonry. Basic assembly of the first 2-plank wagon:

 

 

Solebars are 0.156" x 0.040" Evergreen strip - 4.0 mm x 1.0 mm, scale 12" x 3". The prototype's solebars were probably 11" x 4½". The floor planks were probably 2½" thick, giving a total height from bottom of solebar to top of floor of 13½" - 4.5 mm at scale. A floor of 0.020" / 0.5 mm thick plasticard therefore gives the correct dimension, but is rather flimsy, so a sub-floor of 0.040" plasticard is fitted underneath. This is 25.5 mm wide and provides a positive location for the solebars, giving 27.5 mm over their outside faces - 6'10½" which is about the estimated prototype dimension. I've chosen to use thinner than prototypical solebars as on the Pelsall and Drake & Mount wagons, the MJT axleguards were a tight fit - being 24 mm between inside faces and etched from 0.015" brass, they're a scale 1" too wide over outside faces - 0.3 mm, enough to be an embarrassment. 

 

The ends were cut from 0.040" plasticard, so an extra strip of 0.020" x 4 mm plasicard was fixed to the rear of the headstock to give the prototype's 4½" thickness. This provides a support ledge for the 0.020" floor (the floor strengthener being cut 1 mm shorter than the floor). This strengthening strip is trimmed down at the ends to match the 3.7 mm-high headstock. Notches are cut in the ends of the side rail to fit round the headstock, then once the sides are fixed in place, the protruding ends of the headstocks are trimmed back.

Edited September 12, 2022 by Compound2632
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[Mikkel]

Looks good. I like the black and white, very stylish! 

 

 

[Compound2632]

4 minutes ago, Mikkel said:

Looks good. I like the black and white, very stylish! 

 

 

 

It can be taken to excess. I saw a headline - didn't read the report - of someone who expired of a surfeit of liquorice.

[Welchester]

16 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

It can be taken to excess. I saw a headline - didn't read the report - of someone who expired of a surfeit of liquorice.

It takes all sorts.

[Crimson Rambler]

Appearing below are two graphs drawing from the builders' dates for Midland 0-6-0s from 1852 to 1902. The info was taken from Stephen Summerson's books but my addition is not guaranteed! It is based on what I think are two not unreasonable assumptions - that the number of locomotives in service was (i) reflective of the traffic requirements even though SWJ often complained of too high a percentage were in steam/day and (ii) engines were ordered and delivered to match the anticipated traffic development - albeit deliveries were often late. Indeed the US engines were prompted by a strike.

 

 

During the 1870s there was a slump following the Franco-Prussian War - did this help provide the initial impetus for the Midland to try and rid itself of PO wagons only to find soon afterwards traffic so took off that it had to retain more of them for longer than planned?

In view of this observation I consulted Tavender:-

 

At this point I have probably said enough and leave it to others.

 

Just a slight point if I may - Midland 30ft rails - inside and outside key - normally had eleven sleepers per length. Sometimes an extra one would be added, my suspicion is that the rail with ten sleepers is a short one introduced to fit the point geometry. Certainly other rails had the standard eleven.

 

Crimson Rambler 

 

 

 

 

 

[Compound2632]

Some preliminary comments on @Crimson Rambler's post. A data point not mentioned by Tavender is provided by C&W Cttee minute 3037 of 14 Mar 1895, reporting goods stock at 31 Dec 1894 [Reproduced as Fig. 22 in Midland Wagons Vol. 1]. This shows a stock of 21,260 "coal wagons (as purchased)". The purchase programme was, I think, over by this date, implying the withdrawal of over 44,000 bought up wagons over the preceding 12 years. If they had continued to be withdrawn at the same rate of 3,500 - 4,000 per year, the would have been extinct by the end of 1899, whereas Tavender says 6,000 were still in stock. (In the photo, the first three wagons behind the Baldwin are 6-plank, so around 3'8" - 4'0" deep, so 10 ton capacity - clearly the most serviceable of the bought-up wagons.)

 

I'd done an analysis of that 1894 data against the Lot Book, similar to that presented by Tavender. Whilst it's a bit difficult to know exactly how many wagons had been built by a certain date, since we only have the dates on which lots were raised, not dates to traffic, counting the number of D299s ordered up to and including Lot 343 of 13 July 1894, up to 46,000 D299s had been built by the end of 1894, along with 2,000 of the D351 end-door version and 1,000 of the pre-D299 high sided wagons of Lot 29. There were therefore also at least 12,436 Midland-built high-sided wagons of pre-Lot Book vintage in traffic at that date. So that's a total of at least 34,700 pre-diagram high-sided/mineral wagons; from 1 Jan 1895 to the end of 1902 a further 16,000 D299s and 7,000 D351s were built - only 2/3 of the number needed to replace the pre-diagram and bought-up wagons. (But as Tavender says, there's the question of equivalent capacity.) There was then a pause of nearly 10 years before mineral wagon building resumed in earnest.

 

One still has to add into this the 32,000 new PO wagon registrations on the Midland from 1887 up to the end of 1900; 40,000 by the end of 1903 [TNA RAIL 491/920-924]. 

 

Tavender provides Midland numbers for wagons bought from the Birmingham Wagon Co. - presumably that part of their hire fleet that was on hire to collieries, factors, and merchants on the Midland system. These are in the blocks 40521-920, 41501-630/651-950, 43236-335/761-860/869-968. I've been collecting wagons numbers; I don't have many in those ranges but:

• 40697 - open goods wagon, one of 100 in a list of missing wagons circulate to the Great Western, 24 April 1917 (were these all D299s being called in for withdrawal and replacement?)
• 40755 - wagon label (MRSC Item 14058) 26 June 1897, Bristol Avon Wharf to Yeoford - unlikely to be a mineral load? A D299 in merchandise traffic?
• 40757 - recorded as a D299 in Midland Wagons, p. 97, source not yet traced.
• 41595 - recorded as a D663A in Midland Wagons, p. 97, source not yet traced. Built no earlier than 1921, so probably a replacement for a D299 that was itself a replacement for the BWCo. wagon.
• 41623-8 - D328 40 ton armour plate wagons of Lot 243, raised 28 Mar 1890.
• 43468 - D299, photographed 26 Sept 1922 (NRM DY 12738).
• 43839 - D360 covered goods wagon (steam fitted) Lot 462/543/563 (1899-1904).

I think this gives an idea of the date range over which these wagons were replaced, with at least one lasting to 1899. The vast majority will have been replaced (had their numbers taken by) new D299 wagons, simply because those represented the vast majority of new wagons being built. 

 

It's interesting that the buying-up of PO wagons was Allport's project and something that he'd tried before. It's also notable that the Midland's C&W Superintendent, T.G. Clayton, was chair of the RCH Wagon Committee that drew up the RCH 1887 specification. 

 

It's interesting that Tavender states that the LNWR was the biggest coal-carrier; that at first seems surprising (is it true?) but once one adds up all those Ramsbottom DXs, Webb coal engines, Cauliflowers, and 0-8-0s, one soon reaches a number on a par with the Midland's 0-6-0 fleet. 

 

There's the odd mistake in Tavender, such as listing D299 as a 10 ton, rather than 8 ton, wagon. But I'm coming to feel I really must seek out a copy. What is that reference "SRO 831/4/5/18 Record of Wagon Hirers"?

Edited October 13, 2020 by Compound2632

[Regularity]

11 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

It's interesting that Tavender states that the LNWR was the biggest coal-carrier; that at first seems surprising (is it true?) but once one adds up all those Ramsbottom DXs, Webb coal engines, Cauliflowers, and 0-8-0s, one soon reaches a number on a par with the Midland's 0-6-0 fleet. 

Well, the LNWR (and particularly the LNWR!) wouldn't have built the locos without the traffic, but they had access to most of the major English and some of the Welsh coal fields, either directly or via close working relationship, e.g. the Rhymney Railway as well as their own "heads of the valleys" line with connected with the RR. The GNR/LNWR joint line was also used to bring coal traffic down from the Nottinghamshire coalfields, using the line from Northampton to Market Harborough (although the LNWR's "Northampton District" has been described as tiny, it shifted a lot of freight, some of which - coal to Didcot power station - continued until 1981, even bringing Westerns to Northampton on rare occasions!) Traffic could also be sent from this line via Market Harborough and Rugby to the West Midlands. Then there are the Staffordshire coal fields, as well as Lancashire, Warwickshire, and presumably some Yorkshire traffic too, in competition with the LYR (as well as potentially forwarding coal from them). Possibly not quite as much coal concentrated on the flows to London as the Midland - at least, that's what we always think are told about the MR "goods lines" down to Londo - but possibly even greater diversity of flows?

[Compound2632]

7 minutes ago, Regularity said:

The GNR/LNWR joint line was also used to bring coal traffic down from the Nottinghamshire coalfields, 

 

And also from South Yorkshire? That would explain the presence of a Lofthouse Colliery wagon in the London-bound train seen at Bushey in 1897 if one of my favourite films: https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-railway-traffic-on-the-lnwr-1897-online

 

[billbedford]

1 hour ago, Compound2632 said:

 

And also from South Yorkshire? That would explain the presence of a Lofthouse Colliery wagon in the London-bound train seen at Bushey in 1897 if one of my favourite films: https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-railway-traffic-on-the-lnwr-1897-online

 

 

The LNWR had running rights over the GC between Ardwick and Sheffield for all except coal, and from Sheffield to Annersley for merchandise and coal. 

[Compound2632]

9 hours ago, billbedford said:

 

The LNWR had running rights over the GC between Ardwick and Sheffield for all except coal, and from Sheffield to Annersley for merchandise and coal. 

 

And even, striking deep into Midland territory, over the Midland Counties between Leicester and Rugby - compound 0-8-0s there several years before W.M. Smith and S.W. Johnson got their act together.

[Penlan]

And the LNWR of course from the Swansea area.
A publicity guide of circa 1910 gives a fact that over 6,000tons of Coal a week travels up the line.
I've tried to look for suitable mineral trains in the WTT's around that time,

but no way can I see that quantity travelled up each week, early Spin me thinks 
.
They are also promoting Golf Courses connected to LNWR Stations in mid-Wales too, Uhmnnn

[Compound2632]

7 minutes ago, Penlan said:

And the LNWR of course from the Swansea area.
A publicity guide of circa 1910 gives a fact that over 6,000tons of Coal a week travels up the line.
I've tried to look for suitable mineral trains in the WTT's around that time,

but no way can I see that quantity travelled up each week, early Spin me thinks 
.
They are also promoting Golf Courses connected to LNWR Stations in mid-Wales too, Uhmnnn

 

That's maybe three mineral trains per day?

[Penlan]

3 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

That's maybe three mineral trains per day?

I can't get to my copies of the Local regulations at the moment - we have builders in,
but I recall there are restrictions on the permitted loads, which made for a few more than 3 through trains a day.
I don't think there were even three in the WTT, but when I get access again I will have a look.

[Compound2632]

On 12/10/2020 at 17:17, Crimson Rambler said:

This view can be dated to within a narrow window extending from late 1899 until say mid 1902. 

 

I was wondering why mid 1902 but at a second look, realise that the trees are in leaf so it's spring / summer; the RCH headcodes were adopted in Feb 1903. With lamps at the base of the chimney and at the top of the smokebox door, that's the pre-1903 Midland code for a through goods or mineral train, so everything is in order.

 

There are plenty of good lineside photos at Welsh Harp around this period - the Princess of Wales singles feature heavily - I suppose they're all by the same photographer. Any ideas who he was?

Edited October 14, 2020 by Compound2632

[Crimson Rambler]

SRO - Staffordshire Record Office - Stafford.

 

 

Crimson Rambler

[Compound2632]

10 minutes ago, Crimson Rambler said:

SRO - Staffordshire Record Office - Stafford.

 

... because, despite its name, the Birmingham Railway Carriage & Wagon Co. was in Smethwick, anciently Staffordshire.

[Compound2632]

Despite @Crimson Rambler's best efforts to distract me back onto the Best Way, I've made a bit more progress with the Saltney wagons. They're still looking rather crude at this stage (photo not the best quality either):

 

 

I made a bit of a hash of the diagonals on the 4-planker - I trimmed them back 3 mm from the edge, then checked my drawing... The corner plates are only 2 mm wide. So some patching has been going on.

 

It doesn't show up well in this photo but the second two-plank wagon has had the doors cut out in order to distress the threshold - trying to give the impression of a wagon that's had thirty years of rough treatment. 

Edited September 12, 2022 by Compound2632
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[Crimson Rambler]

Moi - do a thing like that?

 

Never!!

 

 

Crimson Rambler

[Compound2632]

I've assembled one pair of MJT RCH/GWR axleguards (their part no. 2299) with the cranked keeper-plates - a fiddly bit of soldering, involving pushing the keeper-plate around on a film of molten solder until in just the right position, then removing the heat and hoping for the best, several times over - and MJT GWR grease axlebox/spring units (part no. 2245) in order to set the ride height for the Saltney wagons. I found I needed a shim of 0.020" plasticard under each axleguard unit. As I used black plasticard, the shim doesn't show up well in this photo:

 

 

I opened up holes in the shim to match the round holes in the axleguard unit, so that I could still line that up with my scribed reference lines in the sub-floor. I'll have to try to remember to make the latter out of 0.060" plasticard rather than 0.040" next time, to save having to faff around with shim - actually, I think I did use 0.060" for the Darke & Mount / Pelsall wagons, so I should have known better. Anyway, it starts to look a bit like a wagon, though there's a good deal more to do:

 

 

I haven't worked out how to do the brakes yet.

Edited October 5, 2022 by Compound2632
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