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

[Compound2632]

5 minutes ago, richbrummitt said:

Moving things around does not usually solve any space problem here and will lead to the regular moving around of those items moved around to make 'space' that is highly volatile. 

 

There's a line from The Cat in the Hat Comes Back that has become a catchphrase in the Lea household: "It comes off the old bed! It goes on the T.V."

[Northroader]

Just having a pleasant dally on the “Nuneaton and North Warwickshire” site, “On LNWR lines”, or “On Midland Lines”, and lifted this wagon out:

Edited May 14, 2021 by Northroader

[Compound2632]

This photo is also on the Warwickshire Railways website, with a caption by Keith Turton. I was going to write "an informative caption" but realised that would be redundant, given the author. When I first came upon this, I was disappointed to learn that the green and yellow livery didn't come in until after my period:

 

 

So upgrading of this very nicely-printed Hornby wagon is a job at the back of the queue, alas. POWSides do do the red livery.

 

 

 

Edited May 14, 2021 by Compound2632

[mike morley]

Internal strapping runs in the opposite direction to usual.  Or is it even more unusual criss-cross strapping?

Edited May 14, 2021 by mike morley

[Ian Smith]

Looks to me like a cross strapping - on the inside can be seen a “normal” strap running wagon end bottom to door top, but also evident is the curved top end of a strap at wagon end, on the near solebar the bottom end of such a strap can be seen bolted to solebar below door.

Ian

[Compound2632]

Altogether looks a bit ramshackle. I wonder if it is one of the conversions from broad gauge, still in traffic fifty years later? That is a Gloucester axlebox, I think.

[mike morley]

Hmm . . .

Gloucester axleboxes are straight-sided, like the ones on your green wagon with Thomas. 

The one in Northroader's picture looks more horseshoe-shaped.

[Compound2632]

5 minutes ago, mike morley said:

Hmm . . .

Gloucester axleboxes are straight-sided, like the ones on your green wagon with Thomas. 

The one in Northroader's picture looks more horseshoe-shaped.

 

Yes, looking again, I think you're right there.

 

There are a couple of plates on the solebar, one rectangular, which might be the builder's plate, the other diamond-shaped which I think is the "reconstructed" or "converted" plate applied to previously dumb-buffered wagons fitted with sprung buffers.

[mike morley]

Three-quarters hidden by shadow to the immediate right of the door-banger is what might be a third, oval-shaped plate.

[Compound2632]

8 minutes ago, mike morley said:

Three-quarters hidden by shadow to the immediate right of the door-banger is what might be a third, oval-shaped plate.

 

Oval plates can be owner's plates, if the wagon is owned outright rather than leased or hired, as on this Gloucester-built Stockingford Colliery wagon. However, other Ayres wagons were hired: No. 530, illustrated in Montague's Gloucester book, has the full set of Gloucester builder's, owner's and "for repairs advise" plates, while No. 400 as modelled by Hornby has a Birmingham owner's plate:

 

[Compound2632]

Random D299 alert: https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrc10.htm.

 

In the interest of company balance, also at Claverdon but around 20 years earlier, in addition to several interesting Great Western and private owner wagons, a LNWR D1 with sheet: https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrc872.htm. I think the red cross can just be made out; it's certainly a right cross rather than a saltaire. There's some mystery about the saltaire, which several reputable makers of wagon sheets have produced, including Bassett-Lowke:

I suspect that there must have been a change from right cross to saltaire in late LNWR days, but when? I'm afraid this is re-opening a whole can of worms that @Penlan has already gone through.

[Northroader]

The second picture is quite interesting, apropos Mikkel’s current blog, with a wagon load of manure being loaded/ ?unloaded. One of the wagons is a private owner “executors of ??”, makes you wonder how long it took to get the will sorted with wagons in traffic painted up like that.

Edited May 16, 2021 by Northroader

[Compound2632]

9 minutes ago, Northroader said:

The second picture is quite interesting, apropos Mikkel’s current blog, with a wagon load of manure being loaded/ ?unloaded. 

 

Yes, that's what got me looking at Claverdon again on Warwickshire Railways. As I note on Mikkel's blog, the manure wagon, with axleguards outside the solebars ans self-contained buffers looks likely to be a conversion from broad gauge. My notes from Atkins give 201 such 4-plank wagons, numbered in the 11xxx block, along with 400 3-plank wagons: old series Lots 345, 369, 385, 408, and 525, so mostly around 1886-8 I think. But were the original broad gauge wagons 3 and 4-plank, or were the rebuilds just being made to conform to the current standard?

 

15 minutes ago, Northroader said:

One of the wagons is a private owner “executors of ??”, makes you wonder how long it took to get the will sorted with wagons in traffic painted up like that.

 

Don't, that's a bit close to the bone at the moment, what with a 6-month delay in getting Dad's house on the market, thanks to the last two lockdowns.

[Northroader]

It just so happens that the current BGS “Broadsheet” no 85, spring 2021, has a nice photo of Teignmouth c 1881, with two wagons parked on the centre road. The far end one has an indistinct number, possibly 10415, which would place it as South Devon Rly origins, but if you convert it from broad gauge, and load it up with manure, it would come out close to the one in the picture? The fragment of the other wagon on view is very rum, low slung and short bodied.

 

 

watch this space, edit coming on.(sorry, can’t find it, as you were.)

Edited May 16, 2021 by Northroader

[Compound2632]

While @Northroader sorts himself out there, some Midland progress at last:

 

Primer exposes the extent of my crude bodgery on the hopper bottom wagon:

 

 

I'll have to have a go at improving the joints in the corner plates, at least.

 

The 4-plank wagon has come together rather better, I think:

 

 

On this 1870s wagon, the bolt heads are proud of the ironwork rather than being countersunk into it as on the D299 and similar wagons of the 1880s/90s, so I've gone round with the Archer resin transfers. It's a bit representational, given the too-high floor and the circular mould marks in the sides. Also I've fudged the corner ironwork - only two verticals rather than four, matching the columns of bolts on the cornerplates.

 

Next time I buy some Archer rivet transfers, I'll get the next size up.

[Compound2632]

25 minutes ago, Northroader said:

The fragment of the other wagon on view is very rum, low slung and short bodied.

 

I've seen something like that very recently:

 

41 minutes ago, Northroader said:

It just so happens that the current BGS “Broadsheet” no 85, spring 2021, has a nice photo of Teignmouth c 1881, with two wagons parked on the centre road. The far end one has an indistinct number, possibly 10415, which would place it as South Devon Rly origins, but if you convert it from broad gauge, and load it up with manure, it would come out close to the one in the picture? 

 

The presumed ex-broad gauge wagon at Claverdon is, I think, more similar to this 2-plank wagon, apart from being higher-sided, of course, although this one has a flitch plate so that the axleguard is sandwiched between that and the wooden solebar, I think:

 

 

 

[Crop from a photo in the Huntley & Palmers Collection.]

 

This wagon, No. 25637, has been positively identified by @Chrisbr by reference to the GW Wagon Register as an 1874 conversion of a broad gauge wagon No. 1461:

There are some similar conversions in photos in Tony Wood's Saltney book.

 

[Western Star]

5 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

In the interest of company balance, also at Claverdon but around 20 years earlier, in addition to several interesting Great Western and private owner wagons, a LNWR D1 with sheet: https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrc872.htm.

Stephen @Compound2632,

 

Never mind the D1 and the D299...  just what colour has been useed for the sheeted GWR open?  To me the wagon looks like a new coat of paint, the darkness / intenseness of the paint suggests that this wagon is fresh out of shops in red.

 

regards, Graham

[Compound2632]

8 minutes ago, Western Star said:

To me the wagon looks like a new coat of paint, the darkness / intenseness of the paint suggests that this wagon is fresh out of shops in red.

 

Well, yes, as one would expect for the second half of the 1880s.

[MR Chuffer]

6 hours ago, Northroader said:

One of the wagons is a private owner “executors of ??”

PoWsides has an example "The Executors of John Hargreaves Ltd - Burnley Collieries", a 7 plank open with coke raves so not unique, why did they do this?

[Northroader]

Well, the Court of Chancery was abolished in 1875, so we can’t blame that.

[Compound2632]

18 minutes ago, MR Chuffer said:

PoWsides has an example "The Executors of John Hargreaves Ltd - Burnley Collieries", a 7 plank open with coke raves so not unique, why did they do this?

 

The business had to be kept going while the executors worked out how to distribute the deceased's assets in accordance with the will. There might have been complications introducing considerable delay - perhaps one of the beneficiaries had disappeared into the Australian bush.

[Mikkel]

Lovely Midland wagons, Stephen (your builds). Primer is so unforgiving! 

 

I hadn't seen the first of the Claverdon photos before - the one with the train arriving. It's a nice scene. I note the wagon with the "skirts" of the sheeting pulled up, I have tried to model that on one occasion but have not seen it so untidy loose before. 

 

The lady waiting for the train reminds me of one of @ChrisN's figures.

 

Edited May 16, 2021 by Mikkel

[MR Chuffer]

9 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

The business had to be kept going

Not wishing to labour this, another observation is that Burnley Collieries was a substantial operation with coking, gas, household and manufacturing outputs from c1859-1947 with 8 mines and 2,600 employees in 1923. And my wagon is numbered 576 - no guide to the actual number of wagons they owned, I know - but if they had more than the handful, that's some repainting job as a placemarker to cover for tardy will processing. 

 

From what I'm reading in Graces Guide, Durham Mining Museum and Lancashire archives, this nomenclature probably lasted a long time e.g. Graces Guide and DMM.

[Poggy1165]

Another similar example was 'Bridgewater Trustees.' I forget the full SP, but I believe the Trustees were in charge for a good hundred years. Later they became Bridgewater Collieries and later still part of the merged Manchester Colleries. I have seen photos of wagons lettered 'BT' but have to admit I have forgotten whether the full name was also used.

Edited May 17, 2021 by Poggy1165

[figworthy]

12 minutes ago, Poggy1165 said:

Another similar example was 'Bridgewater Trustees.' I forget the full SP, but I believe the Trustees were in charge for a good hundred years. Later they became Bridgewater Collieries and later still part of the merged Manchester Colleries. I have seen photos of wagons lettered 'BT' but have to admit I have forgotten whether the full name was also used.

 

The Duke's will (all 66 pages of it) stated that the "trust was to run for as long as the lives of all the peers of the House of Lords and of their sons who were living at the time of the Duke's death and for a further 21 year as allowed by law".  Why ?, it appears that he wanted to ensure that the working of his mines and canal continued unaltered.

 

Adrian