South Wales Valleys in the 50s

[KingEdwardII]

1 hour ago, Budgie said:

Western Welsh did run a route into Aberdare.

Indeed they did. Although the majority of longer distance buses were "Red and White", for example the service from Aberdare to Cardiff which I used to use. Some details on their fleet are on this site:

 

http://richardstransportpages.co.uk/redwhitefleets.htm

 

The local buses in Aberdare however belonged to Aberdare UDC in those days. This Flickr group seems to have a set of photos covering a range of vehicles and liveries over the years:

 

https://www.flickr.com/groups/aberdare_udc_and_cynon_valley_borough_council_/

 

Buses seem just as complex a topic for modelling as railways...

 

Yours, Mike.

[The Johnster]

Probably more so in terms of the sheer number of companies and liveries, though unlike the bigger railways the bus companies did not make their own vehicles.  

[MrWolf]

At the risk of revealing that I don't really object to buses (unless placed centrally on a bridge ) there were companies who made their own buses and very good ones too.

 

"Midland Red - Wikipedia" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midland_Red

[The Johnster]

I have started work on 'West Street', building up the basic formation with layers of cardboard for the roadway with a pavement superimposed on top of it, the final details to consist of individually laid paving slabs, kerbstones, and gutters made of plasticard.  The first building is built, Tegfan Morris' General Store Post Office, a Scale Model Scenery laser cut kit.

 

 

Not ideal for the 50s; the Post Office oval sign is too modern and the mention of scratch cards in the window is not appropriate to the period either.  Still need to glaze upstairs windows, provide a downpipe, ridge tiles, and flashing for the chimney stack, but it's complete enough to give the general idea.  There will be a pub to the right and an Italian cafe (as much a Valleys essential as 56xx) to the left, and eventually more cottages beyond the cafe.

 

Painting is to represent render, common for Valleys buildings from the late 19th or early 20th centuries, the time when the area was being developed intensively for coal mining,  The photo cruelly reveals my failure to get the shop front square; it was ok but must have moved while the glue was going off.  I blame mining subsidence and think it gives the place character...

 

I'll have a shot at some interior detail for it eventually!

Edited May 20, 2021 by The Johnster

[The Johnster]

Meanwhile, down at the Tondu end, the scenic break has moved about a foot towards Tondu, allowing drivers better sighting of the home signal, and the 'stub' siding to be extended; it can now hold 6 wagons instead of 2.  Some basic scenic work has been undertaken, including a stone retaining wall behind the NCB platform, and a grass embankment leading up to the overbridge.  The running line needs to be ballasted between the old and new scenic break positions, and I am thinking about putting a small factory on the viewers' side of the extended stub road, with the interior of the side wall modelled and openings cut in it to allow loading or unloading of sliding door vans. 

 

The stone retaining wall behind the NCB stores is from a stone paper sheet included with the shop kit, and as there was a brick paper sheet as well, not to mention roofing slate paper, I have faced the NCB platform in brick paper.  Exciting times on the Cwmdimbath branch!

Edited May 20, 2021 by The Johnster

[ianathompson]

23 hours ago, The Johnster said:

The photo cruelly reveals my failure to get the shop front square; it was ok but must have moved while the glue was going off.  I blame mining subsidence and think it gives the place character...

 

It adds that all essential character that gives a "sense of place".

Grew up in the West Riding mining areas and moved to the Fens in later life.

Would not know/undertsand a four square building if I saw one!

 

Ian T

[CEINEWYDD]

Trying (mostly succeeding) to not listen to Eurovision....... Read the stuff about Western Welsh etc.  I lived in Talbot Green from 1951 to about 1970.  I well remember Rhondda buses, as we had a bus depot for them in T.G.  under the control of Mr Richard Thomas a.k.a. Dicky Ticket. We travelled on them daily to Cowbridge (from 1962 in my case). Two double deckers for us  at the grammar school, and two for the Ladies at Cowbridge High school and any 'civilian' travellers.  Probably wise as I remember fondly the older boys (i.e. one year older and great friends and role models)  being so bored at waiting for a driver to finish his tea and fag that they started chanting 'We want Ivor - Ivor the driver'. This was accompanied by rocking the bus from side to side - quite easy as we were upstairs.  It is really surprising how far a double decker will sway.  I am not sure what caught the conductor's attention -  the swaying bus, or our screams of terror and laughter.  Whatever, he shot out of the office and by the time he got upstairs he was bright red, visibly frothing at the mouth, and screaming "I'll give you Ivor the bloody driver, get off my bloody bus".  We did, still laughing hysterically.  Calm was eventually restored by Dicky Ticket, and we all trooped back on the bus so that we could get to school, including Dicky's son who was one of the prime culprits.  Aaaah happy days.   

 

 

The double deckers also were used on the Pontypridd run via Llantrisant up the zig zag in the middle of Llantrisant. Turning up into the middle of Llantrisant at Southgate the bus used both sides of both roads - very scary if on the top deck which was the preferred position.   I do not remember any W.W. buses in TG and I am sure that the route from Cardiff to the Rhondda valleys  (Bach & Fawr) via TG only ran Rhondda buses.  I thought I read somewhere that WW and Rhondda were both owned by the same holding company.  Anybody know??

 

 

[ianathompson]

31 minutes ago, CEINEWYDD said:

The double deckers also were used on the Pontypridd run via Llantrisant up the zig zag in the middle of Llantrisant. Turning up into the middle of Llantrisant at Southgate the bus used both sides of both roads - very scary if on the top deck which was the preferred position. 

 

The ones in Batley used to get in the middle of the road to "shoot" railway bridges.

There were unfortunate consequences if the driver got this wrong.

I well remember returning to Primary School, after dinner, and observing that what had been a Heavy Woollen double decker was now a "single decker".

 

Ian T

[chrisf]

7 hours ago, CEINEWYDD said:

I thought I read somewhere that WW and Rhondda were both owned by the same holding company.  Anybody know??

Rhondda came under WWOC's control on 1st January 1971.  Before that the two companies were closely associated but the position appears complex.  When I get a minute or several I will see what further light is shed by Colin Scott's book.

 

In 1961 the two companies had operated jointly Route 240 between Pontypridd and Porthcawl via Talbot Green.  WWOC had sole responsibility for the Wednesdays only service between Bridgend, Talbot Green and Hensol Castle.

 

Chris

[The Johnster]

Matters are progressing at the Tondu end of the layout, where the extra coach length of space created by the southward movement of the scenic break has enabled the overbridge to be moved further out.  The extended stub siding is not yet purposed, but might be a good place for the cold store and food distribution business, and I ran a trial train yesterday, the stock of which is now in the siding.  8497 is getting under way with the afternoon pickup, and Forest No.1 is shunting loaded coal wagons, using the exchange road as a headshunt, to make up the next clearance.

 

 

Bit grainy. but this is the view from above the station  throat, with the repositioned and re-angled bridge in the background.  The pipe bridge has moved towards the station a bit, and the NCB's water header tank sits alongside it, with the low relief stores behind.  The new brick paper facing on the NCB platform is evident.

 

 

This is the new version of the standard photographers' viewpoint at Cwmdimbath, the colliery access road bridge.  Plenty work still to do, scenic treatment and blending the bottom of the colliery stores platform retaining wall, suprisingly effective in this light as it is a paper sheet with no actual relief.  Some track, formerly on the fy side of the break, needs painting and weathering, and the boundary fence between BR and the NCB needs extending.  The bracket home signal is a bit wonky, not apparent from the normal side viewing angle and easily attended to.  It's 16.05 and the photos are taken in natural light at about the right real time...

 

8497 should not stricly be employed on the pickup, or on mineral work, though I often do allocate her to these duties.  Tondu for some reason regarded it's 94xx allocation as passenger locos, maybe because of the cramped cab's unsuitability for pilot or mineral work compared to a 57xx or 8750.  I should keep her for passenger work, but Rule 1 and all that!

[The Johnster]

More work has been done at the 'town' end; a pub, actually a corner shop from inthegreenwood laser on the Bay of e, but finished as a pub by giving it a name and frosted windows, delieates the end of the main street and the start of the square, and has joined Tegfan Morris's post office and general store. 

 

 

I'd intended the pub to be the 'Forge Hammer' but in the even settled for 'The Forge' using Ocean Mails and Royal Mail lettering from a HMRS GW coaches and loco insignia sheet.  It still commemorates the forge whose ruins are marked just on the other bank of Nant Lechyd at this spot, a nod to the valley's real, and imagined pre-railway, history.

 

 

This is take a little to the east of the previous shot, with the wooden boundary goods yard fence in the foreground.  As can be seen, the street rises, not steeply by valley standards, but noticeably.  Time I think to give the street a name, and Ffasg Road, from the tributary stream that comes down the western mountainside just behind the buildings and joins the Lechyd the other side of the square, seems reasonably appropriate.

 

 

Now we are looking down the hill from the top of Ffasg Road, cruelly exposing the shortcomings in my road surface (work in progress) and establishing the relationship between Ffasg Road, the square, the goods yard and station entrance, and Lechyd Terrace.  The pub kit had a chimney with is supposed to have gone on the other end of the roof from the nearer of the two shown here, in a situation that would require a chimney flue from a fireplace that would have clashed with the side window facing the square, so I cut the attaching lug off and put it centrally along the roof.  I didn't like the embossed slate roof that came with the kit at all, so I used some of the slate paper that came with the general stores/post office from Scale Model Scenery.

 

 

Now we see it from a birds eye view above the station, directly above the goods siding turnout, so that the goods road and depot, with the loco release headshunt, is centre foreground, Lechyd Terrace is to the right, the Square behind, and Ffasg Road leading off top right. 

 

This has given at least the start of an impression of the village and reason for there to be a passenger station here.  There is to be an Italian cafe to the left of Morris', and possibly a street of terrace houses leading further up the valley around a bit of a corner,  I bought some Kytes Lights street lamps to avoid this being a black hole in the evenings,  The mountainside behind the Square has taken a bit of a battering and needs a bit of tlc. There needs to be a pillar box in the nook between Morris' and the pub, and some lighting in the bar as well.  And a few more sheeps, of course, one outside the pub wating to be let in!

[The Johnster]

 

Couple of panniers at Cwmdimbath; 9649 is in the 1946 livery she was delivered to Tondu new in, but it must be 1954 at the earliest because that is the year that 8497 arrived at the shed.  9649 is on temporary pilot duty, I'll explain more later, and 8497 is running around it's train, and captured in the process of setting back on to it in the platform road.  We had a minor panic with this loco today, as the gears came out of mesh; took the top off and found that, although the general layout of the loco is standard for Bachmann 6-coupled tanks, there is a cover over the top of the gearbox held by 4 very small screws.  Removing this showed that there was play in the motor mounting that allowed unmeshing, so I pressed it back down and tightened the screws hard (they'd come loose, which accounted for the demesh).  Full performance was immediately restored and the photo actually shows the loco being test run with the body on, before I'd replaced the couplings...

 

Now then, what has happened over the last week is the result of me playing with cardboard shapes to see what might be provided on the newly lengthened stub road to see what the sight lines were and such.  The cardboard shapes sort of took on a life of their own, and one has morphed somehow into a small factory, with brick ends and timber clad side, openings being provided railside to allow a wagon drop door or a sliding door van to deliver or collect materials.  I haven't decided what sort of factory it is yet, but one idea is an electroplating and/or galvanising works.  It can't be much bigger than the low relief I've modelled, as the mountain rears up quite close here.  Zinc can be delivered in plates in crates or perhaps granules in sacks, and all sorts of other things can arrive to be galvanised or plated and then sent out again.

 

There is a loading platform inside the doors and the viewing point is from inside the building looking outward, but I have used matchsticks to simulate a vertical planked outside wall covering on battens; below platform level it is brick.  Sliding doors on the inside of the wall are modelled, and there will in time be all sorts of details on the platform and the inside of the walls, which I've done as a plaster rendered whitewashed finish.

 

 

This is the view from the bridge, with 9649 backing a couple of sliding door vans, one LMS and one LNER, into position.  The lintels above the openings are coffee stirrers, painted grey to represent concrete slabs, and a downpipe is broken, algae staining resulting from the water running down the outside of the wood and some foliage growing at the bottom.  The roof is slate paper, not brilliantly applied as is clear from the cruelty of photography, but I am considering overlaying this with Wills' corrugated sheets, iron or asbestos.

 

 

This is the view from the other end, showing the platform inside the building and the openings a little better.  The thing is literally stuck on to the edge of the baseboard.  Photos from the interior later when I've detailed it up a bit!  This is about as crude and basic as modelling gets, and I am not unhappy with the overall appearance, not far off the rather ramshackle and uncared for look I was going for!

 

I'm still not 100% happy with the colliery inlet connection, in terms of alignment and level, and as my 42xx objects to it, I've ripped it out again and am relaying it.  Thus, the colliery traffic has to enter the site off stage at the 'bottom shunt' which means more movements to get the empties in and the loadeds out.  In order to minimise impact on the timetable, a pilot has been allocated until the new 'top shunt' is commissioned, the loco coming up with the first train of the day and going back with the last.  Job is on hold until Wednesday (pension day) as my minidrill (bought back in the 80,s so it doesn't owe me anything), has died, and I need a new one so as to be able to cut the track accurately to splice in the new section, which is being made up as a single piece including the turnout for the NCB loco shed.  Hopefully this will be the end of the matter.  Some would say it is the result of poor tracklaying and bodged preparation, but I am claiming mining subsidence...

[The Johnster]

More photos.

 

 

Bridge parapet shot of 5756 engaged in shunting the morning pickup, while Forest No.1 has coupled up to the 5 planker of pitprops that 5756 has left for it.  The NCB surface shift inspector needs to examine the cargo before it is propelled down to the prop storage area, and as he is being called from another part of the site, the Peckett's crew are taking the opportunity to indulge in a quick brew-up.  5756 is performing it's last move to complete the return trip back to Tondu Goods, and the LNER sliding door van has been picked up from the new factory siding.  I'm leaning towards an electroplating and galvanising business for this.

 

 

Slightly different viewpoint, up a ladder attending to the gutters on the new factory.  The NCB workshop and store building is well shown, and the arrangement of props in the wagon is taken from a railtour photo of Avon Colliery at Abergwynfi.  The props themselves are reed diffuser sticks suitably roughened and weathered.  The LNER vanfit has just entered the turnout and is beginning it's swing to the left.

 

 

This is the view from the pipe bridge, a cobble up of bits of Airfix/Dapol/Kitmaster signal gantry and Knightwing pipes.

 

 

A view through one of the loading bay doors of the new factory, siding in the foreground, main running line next, and then the colliery exchange siding as the Peckett sets off for the prop store and the rest of it's mornings' shunting at the washery.  I'm pleased with the rather rough and ready slap it on whitewashing, which has left patches and what looks like various sorts of staining and plasterings in a building that suffers from rising damp and is not brilliantly well looked after...

[The Johnster]

 

5633 hasn't appeared for a while, but she's fine and thriving in her June 1948-August 1949 livery and red backed number plates.  Here she is, taken this evening, squealing to a halt and demonstrating the famous 56xx accoustic brakes, bringing up a brake van for the morning's first colliery clearance, Monday only as the diagram brings a train of empties up the rest of the week.  She will stand over here on the loop while an auto arrives from Bridgend, takes water, and returns whence it came, and will, when the Peckett has brought the loaded up, shunt across to the colliery exchange siding, and, with the Peckett standing clear on it's shed road, attach the brake van and draw the train out on to the platform road, run around it, and perform the necessary (guard gives load slip to driver), lamps put on the correct brackets, and she's ready to run down the bank to Ogmore Jc Yard.  Before this can happen, though. the morning pickup must come up the valley, it's driver handing the electric token to the signalman who will do the necessary with the instruments before issueing it to 5633's driver; it is his authority to occupy the section to Blackmill, formerly the junction for Hendreforgan off the Ogmore Vale branch and, in my version of reality, still the junction for Cwmdimbath. 

 

She is demonstrating the reason for the set forward middle lamp bracket on 56xx locos, preventing the lamp handle from catching on the step at the bottom of the smokebox door when the loco is lamped as light engine or engine and brake van.

 

I cannot praise these Bachmann 56xx highly enough; superb little runners, highly detailed, and even now a lot of loco for the money, my only moan being the rather crude floating rear axle, which is not that prominent a feature in use.  No South Wales layout should be without at least a couple, and you could run an entire timetable with a few of these and some 57xx or 8750 panniers, and Bachmann do these rather well as well...

[The Johnster]

 

A bit of a one-off auto working; 5524 runs in with the 14.30 arrival from Bridgend, but the sharp-eyed amongst you will notice that the first trailer, 178, is in GW 1945-7 livery (and very smart she looks, too), unlikely as auto working did not begin at Tondu until the introduction of the 1953 Summer timetable and the A30s were not allocated to the area until at least a year after that, by which time it would have lost the livery even had it been painted very late in 1947. 187 is an eBay purchase. original Airfix, and has been acquired as a buffer, bell, and passenger door handrails donor for other trailers.  The buffers are to go on to the Rule 1 W 207 W, a diagram A31 and a type that was never used at Tondu, but it is a stand-in for the two panelled diagram N trailers that were, nos 37 and 38.  It has a running mate, W 211, both 'worked up' secondhand K's whitemetal kit trailers which weigh almost as much as the prototypes.  Both trailers were allox Newport Division, but worked the Usk-Monmouth and Wye Valley branches   The bell and handrails are for plain crimson liveried W 194 W.

 

The different shades of cream on the two trailers is very apparent, and my feeling is that the other one, Hornby W 189 W,  is not the right shade, but I am assuming that GW cream and BR blood and custard cream were the same colour, something I do not know to be fact, and I could be wrong.  Comparing W 189 W's cream to other vehicles in that livery from Mainline and Bachmann, though, I am reassured that I am right; W 189 W is therefore pencilled in for a repaint when I finally acquire my long awaited Round Tuit...

 

It rather surprises me that there was no auto working in the Tondu valleys until the Summer of 1953.  The area is ideally suited to such working, and prior to 1930 when the Bridgend-Gilfach Goch service was still running, it reversed at Hendrforgan, and auto working would have saved a run around move here in each direction.  There was plenty of auto work elsewhere in South Wales, but the Summer 1953 timetable extended it considerably.  This timetable introduced regular interval services in the Cardiff Valleys and to Penarth and Barry, the basis of the timetable that is still operating at present in the area.  At Tondu, auto working was introduced on the Abergwynfi, Ogmore Vale, and Porthcawl (resulting in the withdrawal of the 44xx  that had worked Porthcawl trains) branches (as well as Cwmdimbath of course), but the Blaengarw branch closed to passenger trains in 1953 and I am not aware of auto trains ever running there in the few months that they would have been able to; probably did, though!

 

There were never enough auto fitted locos or enough trailers at Tondu to run the timetable completely with them and loco hauled working continued, and indeed photographs show auto-fitted 4575s hauling 'ordinary' stock and non auto-fitted 57xx, 8750, and 45xx hauling auto trailers that they had to run around and haul as normal stock in the 'downhill' direction.  When the Ogmore Vale branch closed to passenger traffic in 1960 and track rationalisation between Cwmmer Afan and Blaengwynfi allowed the Abergwynfi trains to terminate there instead of at Abergwynfi, the 4575s were xfer to Plymouth and 64xx were considered capable of the work, which featured 3 trailer sandwich formations to cope with extra traffic on Saturdays.  The Swansea/Neath-Treherbert service closed in 1962 and a new Bridgend-Treherbert service was introduced featuring Single Unit Bubble Cars, W55019 and W55025 introduced.  This lasted until a roof collapse closed the Blaenrhondda Tunnel in 1967, but 'ran' until 1970, terminating at Cwmmer Afan and connecting with a bus to maintain the link to Treherbert. stopping at Blaengwnfi.

 

A local group is campaigning to re-open the tunnel as a cycle and pedestrian route.

 

It also engendered the conversions of Collett flat ended non-gangwayed compartment stock to auto trailers, the A43 and A44 types, and the fitting of auto gear to a number of 4575 small prairies, some of which were xfer to the Pymouth Area in later years. 

[The Johnster]

Goodies in the post this morning, an unmade Ratio Toad kit, which looks like older stock but seems all ok,` and a Five79 (Chivers) 6 wheel LMS fish van.  The fish van should present no difficulties but I will need to buy wheels (only 4, this kit has fixed dummy centre wheels) and bearings for it, so a delay will ensue before I put it together.  If it's anything like the LNER 'pigeon' BY from the same company it will be a shake the box job!  I'll probably finish it in late LMS livery but must find out a bit more about how they were numbered, as there is a small anomaly in the Five79 instructions, which claim 140 were built to Diagram 2115 between 1946 and 49, which makes them quite modern for Cwmdimbath, but that the number sequence was from 40300 to 40339, which makes for 40 vehicles. not 140...

 

The Toad is another matter, not in terms of it's difficulty but in it's intended purpose.  I am experimenting with ways of having trains correctly lamped with lit lamp for night running.  Now, the sensible way to do this is with DCC, but I cannot afford DCC and am therefore investigating the possibilities of doing it with DC.  I am aware of DCC concepts excellent working steam age head, tail, and brake van side lamps, but these are unsuitable for my purposes for reasons that will become apparent shortly.

 

As Cwmdimbath is a terminus, it necessary for lamps to be changed before trains that have arrived can depart for the return journey.  I have very nearly achieved this with an auto loco and set of trailers, which only require on head and one tail lamp.  On the loco, a Bachmann 4575, I have installed a battery holder for 2x LR44 button batteries in the cab, which feeds a single led cut from a coach lighting strip, to which is UHU glued a length of clear perspex bar which extends into the smokebox.  This in turn supplies light to a length of 0.75mm optical fibre that sits into a hole drilled at an angle of roughly 30 degrees into the top of the perspex bar, and runs out of the top of the smokebox to a hole drilled in the rear of the lamp, which is a Modelu GW/BR(W) head or tail lamp depending on the direction of the train.  At the other end of the train, the lamp is fed by optical fibre through a hole drilled in the cab front behind the lamp bracket, and the fibre is attached to one of the coach lighting leds at the moment but I may replace this with a dedicated led powered and mounted similarly to that on the loco.

 

It is, of course, necessary for the lamps to be continually powered which means a track supply is of no use, and on board batteries must be used.  Switching the lamps on and off is achieved by magnetic switches or simply by removing the battery from the holders. 

 

A night time coal working is proposed, the body of an old Mainline 56xx being modified to do the honours, and for this a head lamp must be positioned on the front lh bracket (Class K, mineral train stopping in section) and, for the return journey, on the rh (in direction of travel) bunker bracket, (Class J through mineral train).  Of course, this means that no light must be visible through the fibre feeding the lamp not in use, just an empty bracket, and the proposal is for a similar set up to the 4575 but with the fibres removable from the clear acrylic 'light box' to effect changing the lamps to the other end of the loco.  I feel some compromise is permissible in appearance, as the train will be running in the dark, so a length of fibre protruding from the front of the lh tank or coming up through the running plate to feed the rear of the lamp bracket is acceptable, but it does mean the loco will not run in 'daylight'.

 

This is where the Toad comes in.  The idea here is, again, a battery powered led feeding an acrylic 'lightbox' in the cabin, but the van must carry 3 lights, a tail and two sides; moreover, the side lamps must show red to the rear and white to the front, and of course be changed for the return journey.  The idea is to have the fibres in this case permanently glued to the rear of the lamps, with chamfered ends in the side lamps.  These will be fixed by pushing the fibres through drilled holes suitably placed in the van's sides and ends, and (becuase they are a little flexible) inserted into predrilled holes in the lightbox in the same way as jack plugs in a traditional telephone exchange.  The advantage of the Ratio Toad for this job is that (in addition to it's detail shortcomings being less obvious in the dark) the roof can easily be removed to get at the lightbox.

 

I must at this point acknowledge the very considerable assistance I have recieved in respect of this project from Tomparryharry of this parish, whose sensible and practical advice and opinions have been invaluable, and as they were imparted in licenced premises over beer, not unpleasant, either.  The auto should be fully working by the end of the week, the main delay at the moment being that it's too hot to do modelling, definitely too hot to be playing with the soldering iron!  Photos in due course, therefore; the cheapo Chinese coach lighting has already been in use for over a year and has proven trouble free and effective.  When the mineral train is finished, I am planning to put a lightbox into my old Airfix Large Prairie and light some loco hauled coaches and maybe one or two items of NPCCS.  I already have building, platform, yard and lit signal lights.

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

Goodies in the post this morning, an unmade Ratio Toad kit, which looks like older stock but seems all ok,` and a Five79 (Chivers) 6 wheel LMS fish van.  The fish van should present no difficulties but I will need to buy wheels (only 4, this kit has fixed dummy centre wheels) and bearings for it, so a delay will ensue before I put it together.  If it's anything like the LNER 'pigeon' BY from the same company it will be a shake the box job!  I'll probably finish it in late LMS livery but must find out a bit more about how they were numbered, as there is a small anomaly in the Five79 instructions, which claim 140 were built to Diagram 2115 between 1946 and 49, which makes them quite modern for Cwmdimbath, but that the number sequence was from 40300 to 40339, which makes for 40 vehicles. not 140...

 

Essery & Jenkinson, The LMS Coach, gives 140 to three lots:

Lot 1428 qty 50 built 1946/7, Nos. 40200-49

Lot 1445 qty 50 built 1949, Nos. 40250-99

Lot 1509 qty 40 built 1949, Nos. 40300-39

They have a rather small photo of M40250, first of the post-nationalisation builds. It is in LMS fish van livery but without the lettering LMS, of course - plain red sides and ends, X-FISH in LMS-style elongate serif letters near the top of each sliding door, number at the LH end about 1/3 of the way up the body. There's a mysterious ring-shaped mark at the bottom right, and a script text along the bottom at the LH end, presumably giving the loading. 

Edited July 21, 2021 by Compound2632

[The Johnster]

Thanks for this, Stephen; the mist clears a little!  I like the transition liveries of the late 40s, one of the reasons for specifying 1948-58 for Cwmdimbath.  Clearly, lot 1428 must have been in late LMS livery, and one would reasonably assume that lot 1509 would have been put into service in a BR livery, but the middle lot, 1445, are a bit less easy to pin down.  M40250 in LMS livery and lettering but no LMS branding is stated to have been built in 1949, but the livery conforms to the instruction from Marylebone Kremlin covering the period 1/1/48 to 31/5/48, after which the new BR liveries had been decided on and should have been used, but 'on the ground' things were not so easily defined.  A wooden bodied van may well have been painted even as late as 1949 in LMS livery while stocks were used up. 

 

I will, in the light of this information, probably finish the van as part of lot 1428, in LMS fish van livery; my next task is to find out what that was!  Task for later this evening as I am about to do a shopping run...

 

If I don't buy food, I won't eat, and if I don't eat, I'll die!

Edited July 22, 2021 by The Johnster

[The Johnster]

The diagram 2115 fish van is built, and after some thought has been painted in BR Crimson livery, and will be numbered to represent one of the final 1949 lot, lot 1509.  The reasoning behind this is that, for a layout period of 1944-58, it is this batch that are least likely to appear in 1956 maroon, and we may be certain that all of them were in this livery.  The LMS built vans are only certain up to 1954/5, and may have been repainted after that.  Lot 1509 is therefore in the most predictable livery for the longest part of the layout period. 
 

Numbering and lettering is still to do, and will be followed by weathering and varnishing.  Primer was in short supply in 1949 and wooden bodied stock of that vintage deteriorated quite quickly in appearance, so weathering should be fun…

[Darwinian]

I've been pondering the van/loco directional lamp illumination problem and have been wondering if a bi-colour red/yellow LED for each end would be a solution. It should be possible to arrange a changeover switch but would need two fibre opitc feeds into the van side lamps which might not be possible. 

 

[The Johnster]

13 hours ago, Darwinian said:

I've been pondering the van/loco directional lamp illumination problem and have been wondering if a bi-colour red/yellow LED for each end would be a solution. It should be possible to arrange a changeover switch but would need two fibre opitc feeds into the van side lamps which might not be possible. 

 

The van side lamps are probably the most accommodating in terms of fibre optic feeds, at least in my case where they are GW toads, which means the optic feeds can be routed directly into the side of the lamp body through the cabin wall.  But even here I think one is pushing the amount of room inside the lamp body; after all the end of the fibre has to be large enough in diameter to represent the 3" dia lamp lens.  I haven't got as far as this yet, but the plan is to have side and tail lamps for the brake van that are in the form of lamps with individual optic fibre for each lamp.  There are 3 lamps, one red tail and two sides that show white (yellow) forward and red to the rear (not all the time; the rear facing lens has a red shade which can be removed to show a white to the rear as well, used to indicate to overtaking trains that the van is on a train on a slow, goods, relief or loop, safely out of the way).  Each lamp will be attached to a length of fibre which will plug in to a predrilled hole in the perspex light box like cables in an old-fashioned telephone exchange; this way the lamps can be physically moved and changed around to account for the change in direction, and an alternative side lamp showing white in both directions can be substituted when appropriate.  The van roof is removable to facilitate this, 

 

I will open a topic specifically for this subject when I have done enough to write about; not sure where it should go yet!  Polite answers only on a postcard, please...

[Nick C]

10 hours ago, The Johnster said:

I will open a topic specifically for this subject when I have done enough to write about; not sure where it should go yet!  Polite answers only on a postcard, please...

Modifying and detailing RTR Stock maybe?

 

Another suggestion for a slightly cheating option - have two vans, one with lamps set for an inbound train, one set for outbound - then just make sure the shunt goes beyond the scenic break at some point and swap them over...

[The Johnster]

 

Here is the completed, painted, and weathered LMS Dia.2115 Express Fish Van.  It is a BR 1949 built example, with different numbers on each side so that 'different' vans can appear on the layout, M 40324 M on this side and M 40305 on the other, made up from numbers on a Cambridge Custom Transfers sheet.  Two slightly different periods are thus represented, as the suffixes to coaching stock numbers were not applied until the first mk1 stock appeared in 1951, to avoid number duplications.

 

It was a satisfying kit to build, and runs very well on 14mm Bachmann coach wheels in top hat bearings, and I am pleased with how unobtrusive the dummy centre set is on Peco medium radius turnouts.

[Sandhole]

19 minutes ago, The Johnster said:

 

Here is the completed, painted, and weathered LMS Dia.2115 Express Fish Van.  It is a BR 1949 built example, with different numbers on each side so that 'different' vans can appear on the layout, M 40324 M on this side and M 40305 on the other, made up from numbers on a Cambridge Custom Transfers sheet.  Two slightly different periods are thus represented, as the suffixes to coaching stock numbers were not applied until the first mk1 stock appeared in 1951, to avoid number duplications.

 

It was a satisfying kit to build, and runs very well on 14mm Bachmann coach wheels in top hat bearings, and I am pleased with how unobtrusive the dummy centre set is on Peco medium radius turnouts.

NICE work.

[The Johnster]

 

Lunctime at Cwmdimbath, and the midday workman's from the ROF at Tremains has arrived, and it's loco. 4144, is running around, while 4218 stands over on the colliery exchange road with a train of loaded coal wagons which it will draw out into the platform road when there is a path.  The stock from the ROF has been backed out of the platform following arrival and shunted into the loop, in order to clear the platform for an auto working.

 

 

And here's the said auto, 5524 and a pair of A30s, passing 4218.  The colliery water tower seems to have fallen victim to subsidence...