Deliberately Old-Fashioned 0 Scale - Chapter 1

[GRASinBothell]

Austerity tanks and hockey sticks made me think of the Great St Trinians Train Robbery.

But I don't recall any cranes in that, although it's been half a century...

Gordom

[Nearholmer]

I'm 99% certain its Longmoor, a crane, Austerity Tanks and, yes, The Great St Trinian's Train Robbery, which was filmed at Longmoor.

 

Is it possible that Chris and Gordon (were you named in honour of an LMR loco?), on separate continents, could share a 1s 9d postal order?

 

 

Edited January 12, 2021 by Nearholmer

[GRASinBothell]

Named in honour of an uncle (born 1912). The name "Gordon" was popularized after the death of General Charles Gordon (who I presume the LMR loco honoured), so not too far from the truth!

Thr great trick, of course, would be to find a 1/9 Postal Order. Or, I suspect, a Postal Order of any kind. Do they still do them?

Gordon

[Nearholmer]

Well, much to my amazement, it seems that postal orders can still be obtained - you can probably still buy a dog license if you ask nicely*.

 

We're only allowed out with a "reasonable excuse" currently, and I'm not sure that "Going to buy a 1/9 postal order." will cut much ice the day after The Home Secretary told the police to get hard on enforcement, especially as police-persons are awfully young these days, and possibly won't have heard of a postal order or 1/9, so you may have to wait a few months until we're let out again.

 

*You can! Because "In Northern Ireland, dog licences are required under the Dogs (Northern Ireland) Order 1983. As of October 2011 dog licences cost £12.50 a year, with reductions for pensioners and owners of neutered dogs." (It doesn't seem to make clear what the fee is for a license to keep a pensioner or a neutered dog.)

Edited January 12, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Ben B]

11 hours ago, GRASinBothell said:

Austerity tanks and hockey sticks made me think of the Great St Trinians Train Robbery.

But I don't recall any cranes in that, although it's been half a century...

Gordom

 

In the excellent history books (3 doorstep volumes!) on Longmoor that came out a few years ago, it does mention a re-railing excercise... when they were rehearsing one of the lunatic chase scenes, the modified Austerity the crooks are using ended up in the ballast when someone mis-judged a point throw. Can't remember if they used the crane or re-railing jacks.

 

They certainly used the crane in a crash scene for an earlier film made at Longmoor though, both to arrange a derailed train, and as set-dressing in the scenes set during the aftermath. Also counts as 1:1 scale model making as the derailed loco was a studio-built mockup

[Nearholmer]

Another piece of Meccano Limited crane trivia: when the big HD crane was introduced (October1959), there was a lot of moaning from the more serious enthusiasts about the size of the winding-handles and the jacks,  and they claimed that it looked like a toy, because it was painted red. Meccano had to mount a rearguard action by pointing out that the colour was what BR was just about to start using on its cranes, which had been black until then, and that the model was in advance of reality.

 

The photo in the advert that I posted was very obviously heavily re-touched (I guess Meccano received it as a B&W print), and the crane in it was probably army green in reality!

[Ben B]

20 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Another piece of Meccano Limited crane trivia: when the big HD crane was introduced (October1959), there was a lot of moaning from the more serious enthusiasts about the size of the winding-handles and the jacks,  and they claimed that it looked like a toy, because it was painted red. Meccano had to mount a rearguard action by pointing out that the colour was what BR was just about to start using on its cranes, which had been black until then, and that the model was in advance of reality.

 

The photo in the advert that I posted was very obviously heavily re-touched (I guess Meccano received it as a B&W print), and the crane in it was probably army green in reality!

 

Similar to Hornby in the 80's getting models of things like Class 58's into the shops before the real things entered service, with consequent livery errors

[Nearholmer]

In the 1959 case, Meccano were right, of course, and the red livery persisted until at least the 1980s - the big 75 ton diesel one that we had in our department for lifting transformers was, predictably, called The Red Baron. One of the guys who supervised lifts, and drove it on really tricky jobs where absolute precision was needed, was a closet Dublo enthusiast, with a decent layout, so I guess he could practice at home in his shed/loft!

[Keith Addenbrooke]

1 minute ago, Nearholmer said:

In the 1959 case, Meccano were right, of course, and the red livery persisted until at least the 1980s - the big 75 ton diesel one that we had in our department for lifting transformers was, predictably, called The Red Baron. One of the guys who supervised lifts, and drove it on really tricky jobs where absolute precision was needed, was a closet Dublo enthusiast, with a decent layout, so I guess he could practice at home in his shed/loft!

Wow, the handles on the real one must have been massive when scaled up!

[Simond]

there are two issues with the photo of the big red crane in Kevin' advert; 

 

the chimney is down, despite the crane being in steam (were these steam or already diesel - I should know, I had one, albeit second hand and without the famous outrigger jacks)

 

and

 

it appears to be rewheeling the derailed tender of a Dean Goods.  This is obviously fictional as such things didn't happen on a proper railway

[Compound2632]

13 hours ago, Metropolitan H said:

The picture of the Dean Goods is of one in "Army" service, on a training exercise - notice that all the blokes milling around under the load are wearing khaki fatigues and berets! I think the picture was taken at Longmoor - but not absolutely sure.

 

Photo? I'd taken it for a painted illustration - though it might be an overpainted photo or based on a photo. There are several features of the Dean Goods that look wrong - the profile of the firebox and the position of the smokebox door, 

[Northroader]

It was very rare that anyone ever bothered to put the chimney extension up, usually it was left down, and you’d get a good enough draught without it, (they were steam powered back then, diesel conversion happened much later)

just lifting the back end of the tender at that radius is quite a light lift. If it started to get hairier you’d have a guy laid flat on his tum behind the crane watching for the back wheels to start to lift.

[St Enodoc]

6 hours ago, Northroader said:

It was very rare that anyone ever bothered to put the chimney extension up, usually it was left down, and you’d get a good enough draught without it, (they were steam powered back then, diesel conversion happened much later)

just lifting the back end of the tender at that radius is quite a light lift. If it started to get hairier you’d have a guy laid flat on his tum behind the crane watching for the back wheels to start to lift.

Another interesting thing about that picture (I agree, I don't think it can be a photo) is that the tender is dead level even though the chains are only at one end. Hmm.

 

Regarding the lift, it's certainly a light lift as the Stokes' bogies are still attached. Nevertheless, I'd probably have used the rail clips.

[Northroader]

Well, you only took the Stokes bogies off when they were in the way and you wanted to get closer. We never used the railclips, the theory is you put them on the rail, leave them slack, but watch to see if they go tight. With a tricky lift, there was a guy watching for the back wheels to rise, which we preferred.

The classic I remember with railclips was one Sunday tea time on the South Wales main line. The engineers had an occupation all day, mainly concerned with jobs to do with MAS installation, but it was a bit of a three ring circus, and they handed over occupation whilst this diddy little CCE crane was still trying to lift a bracket semaphore signal out at Llanharan, The first train after came from Swansea to Paddington with a D1000, and tried to swing the crane back parallel (train was on one track, crane on t’other, square across.) The engineers had the railclips on, I suspect they were hoping this would stop the crane from tipping when lifting,  but anyway, when I got there, the express was stopped with the crane halfway along the train, and the crane was still on the rails, but tilted over at around 45 degrees, it would have gone over on to its side, but for the railclip, which had lifted up the track panel around two feet in the air on that side. What larks, Pip.

[Compound2632]

9 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

There are several features of the Dean Goods that look wrong - the profile of the firebox and the position of the smokebox door, 

 

I take that back. I just now chanced on a photo of a late condition Dean Goods from about that angle and it did look like that.

[Simond]

And I discovered, though Northroader has beaten me to it, that the chimneys were not often raised.  
 

I understand that typically they were only raised for steam raising, which was not done very often as they kept them hot.

 

every day’s a school day

 

cheers

Simon

 

(and I didn’t mean “photo”, very sloppy use of language, sorry!)

Edited January 13, 2021 by Simond

[Nearholmer]

1 hour ago, St Enodoc said:

Another interesting thing about that picture (I agree, I don't think it can be a photo) is that the tender is dead level even though the chains are only at one end. Hmm.

 

I reckon it is a b&w photo coloured-over, and that they have been practicing a really simple re-rail of maybe only one wheel-set, and that the tender is now back on the road.

 

They may even be lifting it off, so that the troops can put it back on using jacking, packing and, frogs, which would be a far more important practical lesson than how to interact with a whopping great crane that you almost certainly wouldn't have access to in the field.

 

Makes me wonder if the prime use of such a crane on a military railway would be to gently create derailments, rather than to re-rail things.

[Nearholmer]

41 minutes ago, Northroader said:

What larks, Pip.

 

Not always larks, tragically. Find and read the inquiry report into an accident at Hilsea, where the taking of the block went completely awry, and a train hit a crane.

[ianathompson]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

Not always larks, tragically. Find and read the inquiry report into an accident at Hilsea, where the taking of the block went completely awry, and a train hit a crane.

  Sounds abouut right for the engineers in my experience as a signalman.

 

Ian T

[St Enodoc]

4 hours ago, Northroader said:

We never used the railclips, the theory is you put them on the rail, leave them slack, but watch to see if they go tight. With a tricky lift, there was a guy watching for the back wheels to rise, which we preferred.

With a tricky lift I would probably do both.

 

4 hours ago, Northroader said:

Well, you only took the Stokes bogies off when they were in the way and you wanted to get closer.

Fair comment. I'd wind the weight back on to the crane though.

[Nearholmer]

7 hours ago, ianathompson said:

Sounds abouut right for the engineers in my experience as a signalman.

Have you read what it has to say about the signalman?

[Northroader]

At Longmoor, if you were training the engineers, you’d be expecting them to be following behind an army, replacing damaged track, renewing bridges, and dealing with derailments, and use of a crane would be very necessary experience. I fancy that following the D day landings, rail cranes would have have been landed along with other things, although I haven’t sen mention of this. Certainly they were items of particular interest, along with Locomotives, that should be nobbled in wartime, and at our depot we used to get visits from the gentlemen based at  RAF Credenhill, who had this as part of their training.

Larks? well, we were lucky that there was always the potential for loss of life, but it was extremely rare it happened, pretty well every time you went out, it was an entertaining challenge with minor irritations, and a welcome break from the everyday job.

[St Enodoc]

11 minutes ago, Northroader said:

there was always the potential for loss of life

The most dangerous time was (is) after the job was finished, everybody was knackered, the adrenalin had stopped flowing and the blokes all set off from the depot to drive home - often in the middle of the morning rush hour.

[ianathompson]

3 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Have you read what it has to say about the signalman?

 

No I have not but I can well imagine.

I worked with some well known idiots in the boxes who could quite easily involve an innocent signalman in their cock ups.

You knew who was next door and when to be careful.

 

Having said that in my personal experience I had to deal with some proper cowboys on the engineering side.

Admittedly these were generally at PICOP level but I heard enough stories about their management to make me wary.

 

I could write a book about the engineers on the Cambridge-Norwich resignalling from the stories that I heard.

Whether it was a horror story or comedy of errors depends upon your point of view I suppose.

 

Ian T

[Nearholmer]

Find and read the report. Not one single person came out of it well (one guy came out of it dead, and several were injured), from the managers who planned and authorised an unworkable possession, through the PICOP who wasn't competent, to the signalman who, among other failings, granted the block while two entry points to it weren't 'sealed', and then signaled a passenger train across a firmly blocked road. An horrendous mess from start to finish, which betrayed serious malaise across all departments.

 

I joined the engineering department concerned a few months after it happened, and a copy of the inquiry report was "stapled to my forehead" the day I started there - it led to a huge shake-up of practices.