South Wales Valleys in the 50s

[chesterfield]

13 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Now, that, Nevermakeit, is a very good question, because I have never really considered it from someone else's point of view.  All my layouts, even the very many I have planned and never built, have had at least the basis of this sort of backstory, ever since my teenage effort 'Blackwater', inspired by Barnstaple with the addition of boat trains connecting to a steamer service to Rosslare. 

 

The thought process behind Cwmdimbath was informed by what I thought I would want from

a layout of this size and shape, and alternatives were the throat of a yard of coal storage sidings in northern Cardiff, based loosely on Crwys Sidings, a small wharf terminus somewhere on the Glamorgan coast, geographically inspired by Ogmore-by-Sea, and Cwmdimbath.  I visited this rather remote and forgotten valley as a teenager as part of a picnic day out with a chum and his parents in the mid 70s, and have sort of had it lurking away somewhere in the back of my mind ever since; unspoilt valleys not destroyed by the quest for more and more coal are rarer than rocking horse doodoo, and here was a blank slate!  The real valley is farmed but is wild forestry in it's upper reaches.  There's coal under it right enough, but it was literally undermined by pits in the neighbouring valleys, from Gilfach Goch, Clydach Vale (Tonypandy) and Ogmore Vale.  It sort of dovetailed into an idea for a single track roundyround with a branch junction, based on Hendreforgan, the real junction for Gilfach Goch, that I never built. 

 

Some features were givens, absolutely essential for my needs, notably a South Walian location, tank engines, and coal trains.  Amatuer 6th form geology shapes the landscape, and the layout has to fit in to the real industrial history of the area.  Tondu valleys are particularly amenable to this scenario, as few 'foreign' locos penetrated the hinterland beyond Tondu, so we have a defined and distinctive allocation of locos.  There is wobble room for 2 or 3 rule 1 locos that never appeared at Tondu, or did not do so within my timeframe. 

 

I chose 1948 to 1958 as the period because of the variety and interest of this transitional livery period.  I've identified a dozen different loco livery variations that might have appeared during the period, and have photographic evidence of them in some cases, and have painted some locos in liveries which may be incorrect, in which case I am prepared to repaint them if better knowledges becomes available.  Along with the changeover liveries for passenger and freight stock and the WR's pre-1950 habit of painting auto trailers in carmine and cream, there is plenty of variety!

 

Once I had decided on the location and period, the layout built itself.  The track was laid to requirements rather than a specific plan; I have never been able to lay track accurately to a plan.  The main thing is that there had to be a run around loop, and the headshunt for it had to be able to accommodate the largest loco on the layout (42xx/5101) with room to spare so that the thing did not look cramped.  In the event the panniers can clear 3 10' wheelbase wagons here if needed.  Having used that to determine where the engine release turnout was to go in relation to the actual buffer stop end of the branch, I simply laid what and where I wanted; a spur off the loop to service a goods platform, another at the other end to service a private factory siding, and one off the platform road back through the scenic break as the exchange road for the colliery.  The colliery loco shed is a spur off this at the station end

 

Scenery in reality in this spot is a very steep and narrow valley, all but a gorge. with heavily wooded mountainsides each side of the Nant Lechyd stream that runs through it, and of course on my layout the trees have all been cut down for pitprops ages ago, so the backscene is a mountainside rising precipitously behind the track, to the east of the stream.  The corresponding steep slope on the western, viewing, side, is imagined.  That, basically, is Cwmimbath. 

 

As for the trains, the locos are correct Tondu for the period but for one rule 1 example, not completely implausible, and the colliery W4. and we are making progress with coaches.  I am satisfied with the layout, which does everything I want it to and will provide modelling projects for probably the rest of my miserable existence.

 

I suppose I was influenced by the likes of Peter Denny's GCR opua, Frank Dyer's Borchester, Iain Rice's wonderful little oddities, and Ian Petherton or Pemberton (I can never get it right) with South Shields, all layouts that influenced me greatly and all layouts with well thought out and entirely plausible backstories; South Shields is of course a real place with a real well thought out and plausible backstory  I was involved with layouts depicting real places during my club days, but space considerations made it impossible for this layout (though I looked very closely at Abergwynfi).

 

So, how would someone else apply this sort of philosophy and backstory to a layout.  I think the givens are essential; area, type of operation (branch, roundyround, main line; this will be goverened by the space and resources you have available) and period need to be established and observed.  Also, consider what you want the layout to do for you; are you interested in operation, or other aspects of railway modelling.  If you are interested in operation, like me, there is little point in a roundyround where trains just pass through and don't do anything, and OTOH there is little point in a complex terminus like Borchester Town which requires several trained operators to get the best from it if you are a lone wolf operating at home.  The BLT is the obvious answer, but is often not very exciting.  For example, Wallingford; lovely looking bucolic backwater with lots of character, but once you've shuttled the 14xx and auto trailer back and forth a few times and run a pickup goods, you've done it all, and then you need to build another one to maintain your interest.  South Wales mining branches were a good compromise; restricted track layouts despite very busy working timetables and maximum utilisation of capacity, and Tondu was the hub of a network of single line branches.

 

I'm not young and this is my last layout, and it must provide me with entertainment for the rest of whatever time I have before I am withdrawn from service.  A younger modeller may be in a better position to consider being a serial layout builder, but not me; I'm done with all that.  I needed a layout I could get to a 'finished' (no such thing of course) and operational in a fairly short time with consideration to it being simple enough to not need much wiring; all turnouts are hand operated, though a later addition has been Dapol working signals.  Another alternative might have been industrial layout; lots of action and character in a small space, but I wanted a bit of ex GW action!

 

I think I can only describe the thought processes behind Cwmdimbath, Nevermakeit, and suggest generalised ideas for you rather than try to talk you through the process, because my needs and wants are going to be different to yours.  Establish the givens, study the area in terms of geology, landscape, vernacular architecture, even farming practices in order to evoke the general appearance and 'feel' of the thing.  Learn about the area to be modelled in the period to be modelled so that you can assess what the traffic would have probably been; the more thought you put in and the more you know about your area and your railways' operating practices in your period, the better your layout will be because you will automatically lay it out to cater to your railway's methods and automatically devise means of providing a plausible appearance. 

 

For steam era track plans, look at real examples on National Library of Scotland's OS datebase, free, and adapt the real plans to your purposes.  If your thing is post steam, then you are a bit more limited in your track plans, many of the smaller locations you may need to model will have been rationalised to the bone and operating interest will be limited.  How about a suburban/parcels section of a larger station, like KX suburban which is outsided of the overall roof, running local passenger trains during the day and berthing parcels traffic at night, can be done in minimal space and you can use big main line locos.  This could also be done as a steam era layout of course, if you like big tender locos and a restricted for space...

 

Sorry, that turned into one of my screeds a bit; hope some of my thoughts are of use to you!

and when do we get the next one? From following this particular topic, I started to appreciate what the valleys must've been like. Have managed to pick up – finally – how small the area is and that the traffic was intense but comparatively short runs – I am use to goods traffic operating over 100 to 200 miles as a minimum. Rickard's Record has been my starting point, so keep up the good work.

[Nevermakeit]

14 minutes ago, chesterfield said:

and when do we get the next one? From following this particular topic, I started to appreciate what the valleys must've been like. Have managed to pick up – finally – how small the area is and that the traffic was intense but comparatively short runs – I am use to goods traffic operating over 100 to 200 miles as a minimum. Rickard's Record has been my starting point, so keep up the good work.

What is Rickard's Record, please? A quick Google search didn't show anything. 

[Gopher]

15 minutes ago, Nevermakeit said:

What is Rickard's Record, please? A quick Google search didn't show anything. 

Sid Rickard was a South Wales based photographer who took some wonderful photos of the railways in and around  Cardiff and the South Wales valleys in the 1950s and 60s.   Rickards Record are books (three volumes I think) of his photos.  I think they were published by the Welsh Railways Research Circle.  Not sure if they are currently available but can be found on some second had book sellers web sites.    Sid moved from Cardiff to Glasgow but used to sell copies of his  photographs if you contacted him.  He sadly passed away a few years ago, and I think Brian Miller (also sadly deceased) bought his photo collection.   Well worth a look if you have any interest in the railways in South Wales in the 1950s and 60s  

 

  

 

 

 

Edited August 23, 2021 by Gopher

[The Johnster]

The Tondu valleys were penetrated by single track branch lines, though there was double track between Bridgend and Tondu and between Tondu and Brynmenyn, a short distance to the northeast and the junction of the Garw branch from the Nantymoel.  The Llynfi valley is relatively broad and of open aspect, but the Garw, Ogmore, and Ogmore Fach (Gilfach Goch) are steep sided and have little level land at the bottoms, as does the Dimbath.  At some places platforms were staggered because of the lack of space, and everywhere there was a sense of cramped conditions, the collieries crowding close to the railway and the towns built in terraces up the mountainsides.  In all cases, the passenger termini were very simple affairs, a platform, a small booking office hut, and a shelter, with a simple run around loop, minimalism to the extreme, but lost in a sea of colliery sidings.  One would usually have several collieries in very close proximity, each of different depths and working different seams.  Over time many connected underground, and centralised washeries serving several pits were established at Nantyfyllon in the Llynfi and Wyndham in the Garw. 

 

Abergwynfi, the inspiration for Cwmdimbath, conformed to the pattern, but only had one colliery to deal with at the terminus.  As at Blaengarw and Glifach Goch, the collieries at the top ends of the valleys were usually at a higher level than the terminus and some very steep inclines were needed to access them.  The product was high quality steam coal or household coal, depending on the seam being worked. 

 

As it was essential to keep the collieries clear of loaded wagons and maintain a constant supply of empties to keep the men underground working, the system was worked very close to capacity; this is a feature I find attractive from the operating point of view.  Short section lengths mean that trains can appear within reasonable real time after the last one has departed the layout, and there is always colliery shunting, or getting on with modelling, to fill any down time.  The steep banks and incline working mean that relatively short trains are plausible with what look to the incognesciti like wastefully powerful locomotives.

 

South Wales valleys are in general parallel to each other, but the steep mountainsides make communication between them difficult by public transport, or even by foot in winter or inclement weather; any roads over the mountains are steep, and subject to closure in winter; some of them can be a bit hairy even in summer when the weather closes in and the mist is down!  Most of them were built in the 1930s as unemployment relief work.  So, when you look at a map and see that Nantymoel and Blaengarw are less than a mile each other as the crow flies, but the crow must fly about 1,700 feet straight up to cross the mountain; actually travelling between the two places would mean going down one valley to Brynmenyn and back up the other one, ten times the distance and about an hour travelling time.  Getting around anywhere takes much more time than the map suggests to anyone who is not familiar with the area. 

 

It is an area that has much to commend it from a modellers' point of view; intensely operpated, short haul, very distinctive in character.  They were a part of my childhood, as we had rellys in Tonypandy and Wattstown.  There was constant activity on the railways and in the collieries, always to the musical accompaniment of the squealing overhead buckets feeding the spoil tips.  This was so pervasive that you tuned it out, and became aware of it when it stopped and a relative silence descended.

 

I operate to 'Cwmdimbath Time', which is real time that can be modifed by stopping it, in which case no movement is allowed on the scenic section, or condensing it, which can only take place when there is no movement on the scenic section.  Operating in sessions of one or two hours most evenings, it takes me about 5 or 6 days to complete a 'Cwmdimbath Day'. 

[Northroader]

The thing I liked about South Wales, up the valleys you’d expect deep steep sided valleys with rocky scarps, and the floor crowded in with long strings of terraced houses, and the hilltops on the barren side, scrub and heather, but it was still Wales, and you’d suddenly find quite beautiful settings. There’s where the Taff goes down a geological step between Abercynon and Quakers Yard, and you have a tree lined ravine with rocky pools, or if you follow the small valley the Port Talbot Railway went up on the Maesteg line. Once clear of Port Talbot, it’s just like the Fathew valley on the Tal y Llyn Railway, small sheep meadows and foxgloves.

[sidmouth]

12 hours ago, Gopher said:

Sid Rickard was a South Wales based photographer who took some wonderful photos of the railways in and around  Cardiff and the South Wales valleys in the 1950s and 60s.   Rickards Record are books (three volumes I think) of his photos.  I think they were published by the Welsh Railways Research Circle.  Not sure if they are currently available but can be found on some second had book sellers web sites.    Sid moved from Cardiff to Glasgow but used to sell copies of his  photographs if you contacted him.  He sadly passed away a few years ago, and I think Brian Miller (also sadly deceased) bought his photo collection.   Well worth a look if you have any interest in the railways in South Wales in the 1950s and 60s  

 

  

 

 

 

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/184497830496?

 

It is a book that you don't often see that cheap . There were I think three volumes , volume 3 being mixed traffic 

 

There was a Bradford Barton as well featuring a lot of his work 

 

Off topic slightly but the Steam in South Wales series by Michael Hale are very good 

[KingEdwardII]

14 hours ago, chesterfield said:

I started to appreciate what the valleys must've been like. Have managed to pick up – finally – how small the area is and that the traffic was intense

Perhaps in contrast to the Tondu valleys, many of the more "famous" valleys (Rhondda, Cynon, Taff and eastwards) were somewhat more spacious and typically had 2 or more separate lines running through them, all usually double track. "Intense" is certainly the right word for the traffic - the Taff Vale line up from Radyr to Pontypridd was quadruple track, such was the intensity of the traffic there. A glance at the railway map of South Wales for the 1920s/1930s is simply astounding for the sheer density of the rail network.

 

There were lines that crossed between the valleys. Perhaps the most significant was the GWR line from Neath to Pontypool, which my father used to get from home in Aberdare across to his job in Bargoed for part of his career. There was also the LNWR "Heads of the Valleys" line running from Merthyr to Abergavenny, with its somewhat insane gradients (steepest was 1 in 34, which makes some of our model gradients sound like a picnic!). The tunnels and viaducts involved with these lines were spectacular, since the lines cut across the grain of the valleys.

 

Many of the workings were relatively short distance - colliery to docks, perhaps little more than 20 - 25 miles and when loaded, usually downhill all the way! This led to the dominance of smallish tank engines (the characteristic 0-6-2Ts). However, there were some much longer and onerous journeys to inland destinations and these required significantly beefier motive power like the 2-8-0s, 2-8-2Ts and so on. The Aberdare shed allocations from the 1920s to the 1960s give an idea of the wide range of locos that were used. I have a fine picture of a 2-8-2T hauling the typical train of loaded coal wagons at a spot a mile or so south of where I lived in Aberaman in the early 1960s.

 

Yours, Mike.

[The Johnster]

As a general but not absolute rule, lines that were owned by the GWR prior to the grouping used small prairies for passenger work and 42xx or 5202 2-8-0s for the heavy stuff, backed up in those days by various Buffalos, 1854s, 2721s and so forth.  The independent lines almost all used 0-6-2 tanks, as they were simple and powerful and had sufficient room in the bunker for a full day's work's worth of coal.  They were in general of 3 types differentiated by driving wheel size, a 5'3" or thereabouts for passenger work, a 'goods' with 4'6" or so, and a mineral with 4'1", and no vacuum or air brakes.  The GW lent several 45xx small prairies to the Rhondda and Swansea Bay, which painted them in their very attactive red livery, and some large prairies to the Barry for it's Cardiff Branch to Cogan.

 

Faced with the task of modernising and standardising these locos post-grouping, a policy of scrap (the old and weak), rebuild with GW components, and replace.  The replacement was the 56xx 0-6-2, most of which were allox South Wales, and were effectively a Rhymney Railway R class goods loco built of Swindon components.  The smaller museum pieces were replaced with 57xx or 8750, as were the Buffalos and so on on the GW lines, but one was less likely to see an 0-6-2 on a line that had been GW pre-grouping, and less likely to see a 2-8-0 on one of the former independent lines' routes.  The final part of the scrap/rebuild/replace policy was the 94xx, which was intended to replace the rebuilt independent locos.  3MT BR standard prairies appeared at Barry, Cathays, Merthyr, and Rhymney when they were first built.

 

The variety was considerable, though intensity was all pervasive and you were very rarely out of earshot of a locmotive being thrashed, either on your own line, or the one across the valley, or in a colliery.  There were gangwayed coaches used on the Swansea and Neath to Treherbert trains, on the Pontypool Road-Neath route, and on Neath & Brecon and Brecon & Merthyr services, because of the time taken on what were relatively short overall distances.  Pontypool Road-Neath was in many ways a secondary main line, and featured 2-8-0 tender locos.  The Newport-Brecon service took more time to manage the 35 miles to Brecon that it took to get from Newport to Paddington, and might be hauled by 57xx, 8750, 2251, Dean Goods, or Ivatt/Riddles 2MT moguls.  Miner's workman's services featured redacted stock, upholstery removed so they could be hosed clean, and at Glyncorrwg's featured firstly the last GW 4 wheel coaches in service until 1954, then the last GW clerestories until 1958, and finally the last of Metropolitan and City stock until 1960, the trains being propelled up the last few miles above Glyncorrwg village, with the leading coach having a window in the end for the guard to keep a lookout; he also had an auto trailer type warning bell and could stop the train with the brake setter in his compartment.  I am unaware of this sort of working anywhere else.

 

As you say, most of the larger valleys had more than one railway competing for their traffic, but consider Cwmmer Afan, steep, remote, and hemmed in by big mountains on all sides.  There were 3 stations and 3 routes through here, Cwmmer Corrwg on the South Wales Mineral Railway from Briton Ferry, Cwmmer Afan on the Rhondda & Swansea Bay, and another Cwmmer Afan on the GW Bridgend-Abergwynfi line.  The R&SB and GW stations were combined to become Cwmmer General eventually, and there was an independent licensed refreshement room that is still in business today!  The closure of the South Wales Mineral south of Cwmmer Corrwg meant that all traffic from the Corrwg branch passed over Cwmmer Viaduct to be dealt with on the GW's Llynfi Valley route, through the Caerau Tunnel.  North of Cwmmer General, the GW Abergwynfi Branch and the R&SB ran close to each other as far as Blaengwynfi, each dissappearing behind cuttings and into tunnels or over bridges rather like a 70s 009 'Rabbit Warren' layout...

 

Or the 'Tongwynlais Gap', where the River Taff breaches the line of mountains to the northwest of Cardiff between Taff's Well and Tongwynlais.  The valley is the main route to Cardiff and the sea from the Rhondda, Cynon, and Taff Valleys, and much traffic was routed that way from the Rhymney, but is not much more  than a hundred yards wide.  From west to east was the Barry Railway's Energlyn Branch, which ran over the Walnut Tree Viaduct (this route featured excursion to Barry Island from Tredegar in the 50s, LMS compartment stock hauled by LNWR G2a 0-8-0s, tender first on the outward journey), then the road from Morganstown to Gwaelod-y-Garth, then an industrial railway, the Melingriffith Ironworks Railway, then the river, then the 4-track TVR main line, then the Glamorgan Canal, then the A470 trunk road, then the Cardiff Railway, which was cut into the cliff on the eastern side of the gap because there was no other room for it.  Viewed from Castell Coch Woods at the top of the cliff, the activity was constant and greatly entertaining, though by my time the canal and the Melingriffith were out of action, and the Cardiff was derelict.

 

And the entire network of valleys lines within the Newport Division were red route availability, so some of the east-west routes could be used for diversionary traffic.  Add excursions to away Rugby internationals and outings to Bristol Zoo, and it was not impossible to see big named tender locos in most of the valleys at times.  The coal traffic was by and large short haul, pit to port, steelworks, coking ovens, or marshalling yard for onward transmission.  There were big marshalling yards at Radyr, Rogerstone, Llantrisant, Briton Ferry, and Jersey Marine, where the local locos came off and were replaced, sometimes after the traffic had been shunted out, by main line tender locos for either transfer working, working to inland steelworks like Corby or Scunthorpe, or to destinations such as Exeter, Salisbury, Acton, Banbury, Wolverhampton, or Shrewsbury, where they would usually be taken forward by another company's locomotives and brake vans.

 

Tondu was in many ways a typical South Walian GW shed, with an allocation of around 45 or 50 locos, but there were exotics here as well.  44xx small prairies were used up to 1953 on  the Porthcawl branch because of the severe curvature, and the locos were turned at lunchtime each day to even out flange wear!  Porthcawl generated the daily Cardiff commuter 'residential' service, hauled pre-war by a Stella 2-4-0 followed by a series of Bulldogs, not typical valleys fare, and post war by 3100, first of the five-strong Collett 1938 large prairies rebuilt from Churchward 3150s, no,4 boiler and 5'3" drivers, a real thug.  When auto services were introduced in 1953, the shed got some auto-fitted 4575s, and the initial allocation of trailers were all gas-lit, in view of the low speeds on the Porthcawl Branch and distinct lack of high speeds elsewhere in the Tondu Valleys.  They included W 3338 W, the last surviving Clifton Downs compartment trailer which had been withdrawn in 1948 and then re-instated in 195, at which time it was painted in a non-standard lined carmine livery, and each of the 3 very elegant TVR gangwayed twin sets of trailers in turn, ostensibly for Porthcawl again but they were used on all of the Tondu branches.

 

In South Wales you learned to expect the unlikely.  The area featured Waterloo, a tiny ground level halt on the Brecon & Merthyr's Caerphilly branch from Machen, consisting of a broken gate, a few sleepers to determine the edge of the platform, and a gas lamp that didn't work, the whole kit'n'caboodle about 20 feet long, contrasting with Caerphilly, where 6 companies had access in pre-grouping days, or Pontypridd TVR, the longest island platform in the UK and with 10 faces including the bays.

 

If you had even merely a passing interest in the railway scene, a journey on any of the valleys lines may have been short in terms of distance, but was packed with interest and constant action!  There was something to look at everywhere, and it was usually moving or making some sort of noise and mess, and the steep gradients guaranteed fireworks from the locos on the way up the hill and the brake blocks on the way back down.  Never a dull moment...  Pre 1923, the major players were the GW and the LNW, then the independents; the Midland managed to show a presence at Swansea!  The Taff Vale was for a time the most profitable limited liability company in the world, and was alleged to have hidden a solid gold rail chair somewhere on it's network, but nobody ever found it...

[1466]

5 hours ago, The Johnster said:

As a general but not absolute rule, lines that were owned by the GWR prior to the grouping used small prairies for passenger work and 42xx or 5202 2-8-0s for the heavy stuff, backed up in those days by various Buffalos, 1854s, 2721s and so forth.  The independent lines almost all used 0-6-2 tanks, as they were simple and powerful and had sufficient room in the bunker for a full day's work's worth of coal.  They were in general of 3 types differentiated by driving wheel size, a 5'3" or thereabouts for passenger work, a 'goods' with 4'6" or so, and a mineral with 4'1", and no vacuum or air brakes.  The GW lent several 45xx small prairies to the Rhondda and Swansea Bay, which painted them in their very attactive red livery, and some large prairies to the Barry for it's Cardiff Branch to Cogan.

 

Faced with the task of modernising and standardising these locos post-grouping, a policy of scrap (the old and weak), rebuild with GW components, and replace.  The replacement was the 56xx 0-6-2, most of which were allox South Wales, and were effectively a Rhymney Railway R class goods loco built of Swindon components.  The smaller museum pieces were replaced with 57xx or 8750, as were the Buffalos and so on on the GW lines, but one was less likely to see an 0-6-2 on a line that had been GW pre-grouping, and less likely to see a 2-8-0 on one of the former independent lines' routes.  The final part of the scrap/rebuild/replace policy was the 94xx, which was intended to replace the rebuilt independent locos.  3MT BR standard prairies appeared at Barry, Cathays, Merthyr, and Rhymney when they were first built.

 

The variety was considerable, though intensity was all pervasive and you were very rarely out of earshot of a locmotive being thrashed, either on your own line, or the one across the valley, or in a colliery.  There were gangwayed coaches used on the Swansea and Neath to Treherbert trains, on the Pontypool Road-Neath route, and on Neath & Brecon and Brecon & Merthyr services, because of the time taken on what were relatively short overall distances.  Pontypool Road-Neath was in many ways a secondary main line, and featured 2-8-0 tender locos.  The Newport-Brecon service took more time to manage the 35 miles to Brecon that it took to get from Newport to Paddington, and might be hauled by 57xx, 8750, 2251, Dean Goods, or Ivatt/Riddles 2MT moguls.  Miner's workman's services featured redacted stock, upholstery removed so they could be hosed clean, and at Glyncorrwg's featured firstly the last GW 4 wheel coaches in service until 1954, then the last GW clerestories until 1958, and finally the last of Metropolitan and City stock until 1960, the trains being propelled up the last few miles above Glyncorrwg village, with the leading coach having a window in the end for the guard to keep a lookout; he also had an auto trailer type warning bell and could stop the train with the brake setter in his compartment.  I am unaware of this sort of working anywhere else.

 

As you say, most of the larger valleys had more than one railway competing for their traffic, but consider Cwmmer Afan, steep, remote, and hemmed in by big mountains on all sides.  There were 3 stations and 3 routes through here, Cwmmer Corrwg on the South Wales Mineral Railway from Briton Ferry, Cwmmer Afan on the Rhondda & Swansea Bay, and another Cwmmer Afan on the GW Bridgend-Abergwynfi line.  The R&SB and GW stations were combined to become Cwmmer General eventually, and there was an independent licensed refreshement room that is still in business today!  The closure of the South Wales Mineral south of Cwmmer Corrwg meant that all traffic from the Corrwg branch passed over Cwmmer Viaduct to be dealt with on the GW's Llynfi Valley route, through the Caerau Tunnel.  North of Cwmmer General, the GW Abergwynfi Branch and the R&SB ran close to each other as far as Blaengwynfi, each dissappearing behind cuttings and into tunnels or over bridges rather like a 70s 009 'Rabbit Warren' layout...

 

Or the 'Tongwynlais Gap', where the River Taff breaches the line of mountains to the northwest of Cardiff between Taff's Well and Tongwynlais.  The valley is the main route to Cardiff and the sea from the Rhondda, Cynon, and Taff Valleys, and much traffic was routed that way from the Rhymney, but is not much more  than a hundred yards wide.  From west to east was the Barry Railway's Energlyn Branch, which ran over the Walnut Tree Viaduct (this route featured excursion to Barry Island from Tredegar in the 50s, LMS compartment stock hauled by LNWR G2a 0-8-0s, tender first on the outward journey), then the road from Morganstown to Gwaelod-y-Garth, then an industrial railway, the Melingriffith Ironworks Railway, then the river, then the 4-track TVR main line, then the Glamorgan Canal, then the A470 trunk road, then the Cardiff Railway, which was cut into the cliff on the eastern side of the gap because there was no other room for it.  Viewed from Castell Coch Woods at the top of the cliff, the activity was constant and greatly entertaining, though by my time the canal and the Melingriffith were out of action, and the Cardiff was derelict.

 

And the entire network of valleys lines within the Newport Division were red route availability, so some of the east-west routes could be used for diversionary traffic.  Add excursions to away Rugby internationals and outings to Bristol Zoo, and it was not impossible to see big named tender locos in most of the valleys at times.  The coal traffic was by and large short haul, pit to port, steelworks, coking ovens, or marshalling yard for onward transmission.  There were big marshalling yards at Radyr, Rogerstone, Llantrisant, Briton Ferry, and Jersey Marine, where the local locos came off and were replaced, sometimes after the traffic had been shunted out, by main line tender locos for either transfer working, working to inland steelworks like Corby or Scunthorpe, or to destinations such as Exeter, Salisbury, Acton, Banbury, Wolverhampton, or Shrewsbury, where they would usually be taken forward by another company's locomotives and brake vans.

 

Tondu was in many ways a typical South Walian GW shed, with an allocation of around 45 or 50 locos, but there were exotics here as well.  44xx small prairies were used up to 1953 on  the Porthcawl branch because of the severe curvature, and the locos were turned at lunchtime each day to even out flange wear!  Porthcawl generated the daily Cardiff commuter 'residential' service, hauled pre-war by a Stella 2-4-0 followed by a series of Bulldogs, not typical valleys fare, and post war by 3100, first of the five-strong Collett 1938 large prairies rebuilt from Churchward 3150s, no,4 boiler and 5'3" drivers, a real thug.  When auto services were introduced in 1953, the shed got some auto-fitted 4575s, and the initial allocation of trailers were all gas-lit, in view of the low speeds on the Porthcawl Branch and distinct lack of high speeds elsewhere in the Tondu Valleys.  They included W 3338 W, the last surviving Clifton Downs compartment trailer which had been withdrawn in 1948 and then re-instated in 195, at which time it was painted in a non-standard lined carmine livery, and each of the 3 very elegant TVR gangwayed twin sets of trailers in turn, ostensibly for Porthcawl again but they were used on all of the Tondu branches.

 

In South Wales you learned to expect the unlikely.  The area featured Waterloo, a tiny ground level halt on the Brecon & Merthyr's Caerphilly branch from Machen, consisting of a broken gate, a few sleepers to determine the edge of the platform, and a gas lamp that didn't work, the whole kit'n'caboodle about 20 feet long, contrasting with Caerphilly, where 6 companies had access in pre-grouping days, or Pontypridd TVR, the longest island platform in the UK and with 10 faces including the bays.

 

If you had even merely a passing interest in the railway scene, a journey on any of the valleys lines may have been short in terms of distance, but was packed with interest and constant action!  There was something to look at everywhere, and it was usually moving or making some sort of noise and mess, and the steep gradients guaranteed fireworks from the locos on the way up the hill and the brake blocks on the way back down.  Never a dull moment...  Pre 1923, the major players were the GW and the LNW, then the independents; the Midland managed to show a presence at Swansea!  The Taff Vale was for a time the most profitable limited liability company in the world, and was alleged to have hidden a solid gold rail chair somewhere on it's network, but nobody ever found it...

The Taff Vale Railway Act 1900-1901, enabled companies to sue trades unions for lost profits due to strikes … surely not linked to being a profitable enterprise? Happily that iniquitous position was reversed in 1906 . 
Ken (with my retired HR hat on ).

[chrisf]

This has to be one of the most evocative posts ever seen on RMweb!  Regarding the Super D 0-8-0s at Tredegar, I think you will find that they were turned at Barry using a loop through the docks that would not permit larger tender locos.  Towards the end, the Tredegar - Barry Island excursions comprised a pair of LMS corridor coaches and four suburbans of GW origin.  This lucky boy had grandparents at Barry with a wonderful view from the front bedroom!

 

Chris

[KingEdwardII]

6 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Or the 'Tongwynlais Gap'

Ah, mention of that brought back memories, since in my teens, we lived in Coryton, the suburb of Cardiff nearest to Tongwnylais. We used to wander up to Tongwynlais from home regularly - as you say, a lot packed into a small space. One major mistake is that none of the magnificent viaducts were preserved, like Walnut Tree at Tongwynlais - these were significant engineering achievements that were destroyed almost without a second thought.

 

Taffs Well, a short distance north of Tongwynlais, was a significant junction with the route from Caerphilly joining the main Taff Vale line, plus another double line running to Nantgarw colliery and coke works. At least Taffs Well is to retain its railway associations with the establishment there of the major maintenance depot for the South Wales Metro. I will have to pinch myself when EMUs powered from overhead wires ply the valley lines.

 

By my teenage years, the marshalling yard at Radyr, just a short distance south, was the lair of class 37 Growlers which had taken over all the remaining freight duties. We used to do a bit of trainspotting from the garden of a friend who lived over there.

 

Yours,  Mike.

[Northmoor]

Johnster, as others have said, you really need to collate your RMWeb writings into a book.  You may think they are just a brain dump (notable how more "loquacious" you are in the small hours; are the old cells better lubricated then?) but they are always extremely informative ones.

[ianathompson]

11 hours ago, KingEdwardII said:

somewhat insane gradients (steepest was 1 in 34, which makes some of our model gradients sound like a picnic!).

Might be the case on many 'flat earth' model railways but for some of us this is our ruling grade.

 

Ian T

Edited August 24, 2021 by ianathompson
typo

[The Johnster]

12 hours ago, KingEdwardII said:

somewhat insane gradients (steepest was 1 in 34,

The last pitch approaching Nantymoel terminus was 1 in 26.  The NCB at Talywaun featured a stretch at 1 in 14!  Then there was Pwllrehebog, but that was a cable incline and doesn’t count; locomotives were taken up and down it, though. 
 

If you took god’s big iron and got rid of the area’s lumps and folds, it would be much bigger and easier to get around, and the trains could be longer and heavier, but it would be much less fun!  
 

The other coalfields in which export traffic came downhill from the pits to the ports and for onward transmission were the Durham and Northumberland fields, and here railways also evolved from tramroads, but the character and operating methods were different, perhaps because there were fewer independent lines once the amalgamations that formed the NER had taken place, so there was not the competitive and sometimes speculative duplication of lines. While some lines up there penetrate into the eastern flank of the Pennines, there is nothing like the Central Glamorgan plateau, with it’s steep, narrow, valleys with precipitous sides.  

[KingEdwardII]

1 hour ago, ianathompson said:

but for some of us this is our ruling grade.

Perhaps you're the man to model Clydach Gorge 

 

Steep gradients, bridges, viaducts, waterfalls, abandoned works - who needs Switzerland??

 

Yours, Mike.

[The Johnster]

2 hours ago, Northmoor said:

Johnster, as others have said, you really need to collate your RMWeb writings into a book.  You may think they are just a brain dump (notable how more "loquacious" you are in the small hours; are the old cells better lubricated then?) but they are always extremely informative ones.

It would just be my inane and repetitive ramblings punctuating what others have already written, and I don’t think I could actually bring anything new that was useful to the table, but thank you for your kind words, Northmoor; they are appreciated. 
 

I prefer the forum, itself a magnificent source of both direct information and referrals, with the advantage if the support of an online community.  I can brain dump in bite sized lumps here.  As for being more loquacious in the grim watches of the night, I suppose I am but I can be pretty longwinded when the sun is up as well.  I like this sort of writing; I was the sort of wierdo that enjoyed essays at school!

[ianathompson]

24 minutes ago, KingEdwardII said:

Steep gradients, bridges, viaducts, waterfalls, abandoned works - who needs Switzerland??

 

You will find most of these in Altonia.

It is not,however, to everyone's taste by a long chalk, as I am well aware.

 

At the risk of thread hi-jack, It can be accessed from here, if you are so inclined.

At least the realiisitic operation of trains is a priority in my parallel universe, as it is in the Johnster's.

 

Ian T

[The Johnster]

Not heard of Altonia before, but instantly liked and approved of it; this sort of backstory and imaginary life when all we are doing in reality is moving little plastic boxes on wheels around with self propelled electric mice that gives what I think of as perhaps the most important part of my railway, which in my mind is a railway, not a layout, only small and 70-odd years ago.  My goods siding handles all classes of general merchandise freight, mostly inward, and the private siding serves a food processing plant and a zinc and electroplating factory, which generates fruit and insulated vans for the food plant, plus the odd open with tinplate for canning, and the zinc works takes in chemicals in carboys from sheeted opens, and various items in vans.  Finished products are sent out in vans mostly.  Then there is the colliery, with mt minerals in and ld out of course, but it also takes in materials for the pithead baths and canteen that the NCB promised in 1947 and which are being built, and pit props in opens. 

 

Other establishments further down the branch and not actually modelled include a sawmill which sends out cut planks in opens, an indeterminate factory which requires an occasional delivery of fuel oil; these wagons will appear on the pickup, only to be taken back down to Tondu when it is made up for the return journey.  Then there is the distribution warehouse for 'Military and Empire Stores', a mail order company attracted to Glynogwr by a post-war Government grant, which generates a somewhat Rule 1 return daily trip of NPCCS, which has to come up to the terminus to run around to be propelled into the warehouse on the stub of the Hendreforgan/Gllfach Goch branch, closed in 1930.  Passenger services run from Gilfach to the Tremains ROF factory during WW2, but could not have come this way because the track had been lifted, and must have involved a reversal at Llantrisant.

 

On a real railway, someone familiar with the operation will be able to tell fairly accurately what time of day it is simply by observing what vehicles are stabled in which sidings, and there is an element of routine.  But it can and is frequently disrupted by the sort of issues that occured on real branch termini of this sort; a customer failing to call for his items or to unload a mileage vehicle will tie that vehicle up until he collects them, which can be an issue for a location with limited goods siding space.  An occasional 'cripple' wagon emerges from the colliery, and is removed by the pickup to the wagon repairers, or sometimes C & W have to come up from TDU to sort things out on site.  One passenger train in the morning and one if the afternoon is booked time to shunt tail traffic, and it has, as it happens, just run in to the platform with a vanfit as the tail vehicle, an urgent delivery ordered by control to the goods road.  It will depart for Bridgend with an empty Fruit D from the private siding, which is required elsewhere.  Control, at Tondu, organise this sort of thing, but, as at Altonia, this sort of thing can easily overrun and cause delays, the last thing anyone wants on a network of single line branches where, because of the intesity of traffic as you get closer to TDU, it is important to keep to your booked path or the whole network is affected.  Running a system like this, five busy interconnecting routes with running around at Bridgend fouling the up SWML, to the timetable, is on one hand, just the normal day, and on the other, a precarious and heroic balancing act between problems or breakdowns, staffing issues, poor steaming/bad coal, communication problems (storm brought the phone lines down, so partial block failure), per.way speed restrictions, and sometimes just plain bad luck, all against the clock!  The working timetables have built in recovery times to help cope with this, but this is not always sufficient.

 

Altonia clearly does this very well indeed.  Taken to extreme, you would not need a model railway at all, it could all take place in your head, but of course the model is not only a brilliant visual reference check, it has it's own challenges and attractions which will give immense satisfaction.  But, I would contend, that if you do not incorporate this imaginary 'traffic management' element to your operating, you are missing out, a lot!

[KingEdwardII]

6 hours ago, ianathompson said:

You will find most of these in Altonia.

I'm sorry, I now see that my "who needs Switzerland" quip could be taken the wrong way - and I most certainly never meant to imply that a layout set in that country, or one like it on the continent, would be in any way inferior.  I was only intending to get across the idea that there are parts of the UK, like Clydach Gorge, which have plenty of drama to offer the modeller.

 

I have many fond memories of travelling in Switzerland by train, including the entertainment of an overnight fall in early August of 6 inches of snow in Goschenen where we stopped overnight in the local youth hostel on a trip south into Italy - Goschenen is at the northen end of the Gotthard tunnel. The locals were nonplussed and rather put out at this unusual experience in mid summer - we took the hint and made rapid steps for the first southbound train that morning. An hour later, the sun was blazing down and the temperature near 80F as we descended into Italy.

 

Yours, Mike.

[tomparryharry]

15 hours ago, KingEdwardII said:

Perhaps you're the man to model Clydach Gorge 

Yours, Mike.

One trainee driver, looking down the hill from Furnace Sidings, visibly gulped and said:- " I don't mind the go-ing, it's the whoa-ing  that worries me". When City of Truro visited the Pontypool & Blaenavon, it needed banking out with a little RSH 0-4-0.

[The Johnster]

Most drivers will assert that any idiot can make a loco go (though I proved this wrong at Talywaun being 'given a go' with Hunslet 'Llewellyn' light engine up Gelynos; I stalled after about 20 yards despite being given a bit of a run at it), but that the skill is in making it stop.  Indeed, one of the few comments from Prof. Tuplin that I set any store by is that the job of the driver is to stop the train at the places and times indicated in the working timetable, and that the primary concern of the fireman is to ensure an adequate level of water in the boiler at all times.

 

Did a bit of unofficial driving in my BR career, on one occasion unsupervised with double headed 37s on the empty Albion-Waterston tanks on a very dark and wet night from Hereford to Cardiff, and did ok, but failed to make the schedule, not having the nerve to run up to train speed at the bottoms of the banks.  Nerves of steel, will of iron, heart of stone, knob of butter.  For the sandwiches...

[KingEdwardII]

6 hours ago, The Johnster said:

but that the skill is in making it stop.

On my first run driving King Edward II at Didcot - on the flat-as-a-pancake main line - I managed to stop the train 10 yards short of the platform due to over-enthusiastic braking (otherwise known as nerves). I did a lot better afterwards and stopped with carriages in the middle of the platform. When you have that much metal pounding down the track, you are very conscious of the effort required to make it stop. 

 

Yours, Mike.

[The Johnster]

 

10 hours ago, KingEdwardII said:

I did a lot better afterwards and stopped with carriages in the middle of the platform

I think, at least I hope, you meant 'alongside the middle of the platform'; what you suggest is a lot worse than stopping short...

 

Tongue in cheek facetious childish comments aside, the momentum of a train, even at a low speed on level track, is awesome.  The reason railways are built is to exploit the low resistance of a small contact area between the wheels of locos and vehicles and the railhead, and the free running of axles in greased or roller bearing axleboxes.  This means that a locomotive of only a couple of thousand horsepower or so can pull a 300 ton train along at about 90mph on level track, or a 1,000+ ton one at 60..  At a rough ball park estimate 1,000 tons would need about 20 big articulated lorries with a combined horsepower of about 7,000hp to manage this. 

 

There is a downside, an elementary rule of physics being that there is no such thing as a free lunch.  The train inititall has more deadweight, and the low contact area means that accelleration must be gentle and controlled in order to avoid wheelslip, and that braking is much more of an issue once you've got the load moving, as the deadweight is now momentum, weight x velocity, and it is harder to stop than it was to start.  The braking surfaces are limited and overenthusiastic application will simply lock the wheels which then slide along the track.  The distance needed to stop a sliding train, even on a dry track, is considerably greater than that achieveable under controlled braking with the wheels still turning but not freely.  Also delivering inferior braking performance to controlled retardation of forward revolving wheels is the practice of reversing the locomotive's motion and driving wheels beloved of flim producers and sometimes used in real life, because all this does is achieve the same sort of inferior braking performance as sliding. 

 

You need to hold the wheels back as much as you can while retaining their grip to the railheads, and the huge momentum and low co-efficient of friction that makes trains practical and efficient means' of transport in the first place now becomes your enemy, sometimes a deadly one...  You can prevent yourself from getting into problematic situations in the first place by allowing generous braking distances and enforcing them with signalling block sections to keep the trains safe distances apart from each other, you can keep gradients as gentle as possible and specify what loads can be taken down them, and you can do your best with the brake technology, but bringing a train, even a light engine, to a stand at a precise location, essential for the unloading of parcels and mails and highly desirable to deposit your passengers under the canopy close to the exit, is a highly skilled enterprise.  The brakes will perform differently each time, and the speed at which they release is also unpredictable as both vacuum and air brake automatic systems are prone to leakage; performance is a function of the size and capacity of your locomotives vacuum/air pumps or exhausters/compressors.  Royal train red carpet stops are ths stuff of comedy potential, and usually feature very cautious final approaches by highly skilled senior drivers with many years' experience.

 

You can't just apply the brakes and expect the thing to stop like a car or lorry, and while load, velocity, gradient, and weather conditions affect the braking of road vehicles, by and large you can simply put the brakes on and the vehicle will come to a stand in a few seconds.  On a train, it may take over a minute and need a couple of miles in bad conditions, and the brake has to be constantly manually adjusted in real time to get the best performance.  Getting it wrong is going to cause a problem ranging in severity from embarrassing minor inconvenience through disciplinary action after SPADs to full on headline news disaster.

 

If you stop short, this is not a big deal so long as passengers do not attempt to leave the train thinking they are at a platform, not unknown at night in the days of slam door stock, more slam dunk...  It may result in delay to other traffic especially if you are foul of a junction and the signalmen will not by pleased, but hey, nobody died.  It is usually the result of cautious approach to a station followed by the brakes not releasing as you expected for the final controlled run in,   If you overshoot, then this is a bigger deal, as arrangements must be made for you to set back into the platform.  This may be a simple move, or complicated by passengers opening doors at the rear of the train which has come to a stand at the platform, trailing turnouts having to be clipped and spiked in order for passenger carrying vehicles to be reversed over them, and of course the overshoot may have resulted in a SPAD at the starter. 

 

Now consider the issue of controlling a 'loose coupled' freight train over an undulating road.  The job here is to keep the couplings taut between the vehicles to the greatest extent possible, and to not exceed the train's permitted top speed, and requires intimate road knowledge from driver and guard, who assists by using the handbrake in his van at the rear of the train.  You still have to run to time if you can, so can't hang about, but fulfilling all the conditions above on an undulating road on a dark or foggy night requires constant attention to the brakes from both ends of the train, and is a skill of a very high order indeed; most would argue a much higher order than that required to control a high speed express, which has full automatic brakes an all it's vehicles.  Hence my failure to maintain speed and time with the fully fitted Albion tanks because I was unwilling to clot my botty book with excessive speed on this 60mph train in the dips, where you need to keep some power on to keep the couplings taut when you release the brakes.  I could not manage more than 50mph in these places, which resulted in speed being too low at the summits.  The skill is in braking, not in how you handle the controller, where the worst that can happen is wheelslip.  Freight is heavier and faster these days, 2ktons+ at 75mph being the norm, and even more skill is required of modern drivers.

 

In the event, our Llanelli relief was delayed on their way up to Canton, and all was well. 

 

Wheelslip can result in burn to the rails and is highly undesireable, and sliding from overbraking will develop flats in the vehicle wheels, a very common and irritating feature of HST mk3s, because of applied handbrakes not being released and the train moved about in the depot with the wheels skidding.  This was the cause of the high-frequncy banging woodpecker impression that plagued these trains for years, annoying passengers and not doing the railheads much good either.  Drivers were usually unaware of it so it was not reported, and comments on passenger guard's journals were seldom passed to maintenance staff as they should have been until other people had processed them and the train was back out in service.

Edited August 26, 2021 by The Johnster

[KingEdwardII]

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

you meant 'alongside the middle of the platform';

I did indeed mean just that 

 

Happy passengers - although these were all K.E. II fanatics like myself and would not have blinked an eyelid if I'd driven them to Banbury!

 

Yours, Mike.

[The Johnster]

5633 has set back on to the colliery exchange road to couple on to an outgoing loaded coal train which has been brought up by ‘Forest no.1’, now standing clear on it’s loco shed road and brimming the saddle tank, just out of shot upper left.  The 56xx will draw it’s train out on to the platform road, run around it, and back it on to the brake van currently standing on the goods road. 

Edited August 31, 2021 by The Johnster