Jump to content
 

Why were TOADs not double-ended?


spikey
 Share

Recommended Posts

BR Headquarters evidently sympathised and placed severe restrictions (if not an outright ban) upon their use on inter-regional trains originating on the WR.

 

Some did migrate to other areas in departmental use, but there's a world of difference between working such a van in traffic and using the enclosed portion as a riding van or for messing/dormitory purposes.

There was a ban introduced in 1957 on brake vans without duckets being used on long distance trains, when the newest GW design brake vans were only 7 years old (AA23 / BR 1/502 type)

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

There was a ban introduced in 1957 on brake vans without duckets being used on long distance trains, when the newest GW design brake vans were only 7 years old (AA23 / BR 1/502 type)

Thanks, so it was the lack of duckets rather than the single-ended design that was at the root of the policy.

 

John

Link to post
Share on other sites

My Guard seems to quite like his Lima O Scale Toad, which has had a bit of TLC applied...

 

post-704-0-12130000-1542063113_thumb.jpg

 

Re American Cabooses (or 'Cabeese'?!) here's one on display at the Railroad Museum in Plant City, FL. I think the "Wide Vision" copula would easily break the UK loading gauge, & the whole thing would make any UK brake van look very small, but of course they were partly built for much longer distance travel.

 

post-704-0-70890800-1542063326_thumb.jpg

 

Here's the interior view through one of the end doors. Includes a kitchen sink!! ;) and a big stove (not sure if this one would be oil or propane gas-fired). Ladders to the seats in the copula are next, then more benches and seats to look out of the end windows beyond. Quite a contrast to a UK Van!

 

post-704-0-39761500-1542063434_thumb.jpg

 

 

 

 

 

  • Like 10
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

My Guard seems to quite like his Lima O Scale Toad, which has had a bit of TLC applied...

 

attachicon.gif20180609_154752.jpg

 

Re American Cabooses (or 'Cabeese'?!) here's one on display at the Railroad Museum in Plant City, FL. I think the "Wide Vision" copula would easily break the UK loading gauge, & the whole thing would make any UK brake van look very small, but of course they were partly built for much longer distance travel.

 

attachicon.gif20170619_121047.jpg

 

Here's the interior view through one of the end doors. Includes a kitchen sink!! ;) and a big stove (not sure if this one would be oil or propane gas-fired). Ladders to the seats in the copula are next, then more benches and seats to look out of the end windows beyond. Quite a contrast to a UK Van!

 

attachicon.gif20170619_121101.jpg

There is one preserved in the UK at Mangapps, IIRC the stove is coal fired. They usually accomodated three men, a senior conductor and two conductors. These could spend more than a week out on the road. Coming fully equiped with the various facilities grounded examples were very popular as holiday homes.

Link to post
Share on other sites

In fairness to British railways, some of them built similarly advanced stock for their own use. For example the LSWR had vacuum braked bogie ballast wagons well before WW1, and the LMS bogie coal wagons that fed their own power stations were many generations ahead of the 4 wheel wagons that they built to transport coal for third parties.

 

Some of the blame for the conservatism has pointed at British industry as a whole - how many collieries were there that couldn't take anything bigger than a 16t mineral wagon?

There WERE attempts by the Railway Companies to provide more 'modern' wagonry : the 20T 'Felix Pole coal wagon on the GWR ( almost back on topic ) and any number of large capacity VACUUM BRAKED (!!!!) wagons on the Lanky for instance.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

In fairness to the Midland, their late 19th century passenger stock was highly innovative; they were the first in the UK with bogie stock, the first with corridor connections, the first with restaurant cars, and I believe the first with toilets, when the GW was still faffing around with the broad gauge and stopping for tea at Swindon.  

  • Like 2
Link to post
Share on other sites

My Guard seems to quite like his Lima O Scale Toad, which has had a bit of TLC applied...

 

attachicon.gif20180609_154752.jpg

 

Re American Cabooses (or 'Cabeese'?!) here's one on display at the Railroad Museum in Plant City, FL. I think the "Wide Vision" copula would easily break the UK loading gauge, & the whole thing would make any UK brake van look very small, but of course they were partly built for much longer distance travel.

 

attachicon.gif20170619_121047.jpg

 

Here's the interior view through one of the end doors. Includes a kitchen sink!! ;) and a big stove (not sure if this one would be oil or propane gas-fired). Ladders to the seats in the copula are next, then more benches and seats to look out of the end windows beyond. Quite a contrast to a UK Van!

 

attachicon.gif20170619_121101.jpg

Surprising lack of handrails inside.  

Though I suppose this does date from postwar where they had such luxuries as limited slop drawgear and controlled airbrakes.  American cabooses earlier werent a far cry from the humble brake van.  You best hold on when the train gets going.

  • Like 2
Link to post
Share on other sites

In fairness to the Midland, their late 19th century passenger stock was highly innovative; they were the first in the UK with bogie stock, the first with corridor connections, the first with restaurant cars, and I believe the first with toilets, when the GW was still faffing around with the broad gauge and stopping for tea at Swindon.  

..... not to mention the first to get rid of Second Class and give the Third Class cushions to sit on !

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

There is one preserved in the UK at Mangapps, IIRC the stove is coal fired. They usually accomodated three men, a senior conductor and two conductors. These could spend more than a week out on the road. Coming fully equiped with the various facilities grounded examples were very popular as holiday homes.

Seen a whole village of cabooses somewhere on the west coast, it might have been near Seattle.

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

It is a bit ironic that a Midland enthusiast is ridiculing the GWR for a lack of innovation....

 

 

Not ridiculing, just remarking.

 

In fairness to the Midland, their late 19th century passenger stock was highly innovative; they were the first in the UK with bogie stock, the first with corridor connections, the first with restaurant cars, and I believe the first with toilets, when the GW was still faffing around with the broad gauge and stopping for tea at Swindon.  

 

I think the first restaurant carriage in Britain was a Pullman used on a Great Northern Leeds service. Also I'm not sure about corridor connections - certainly for general service passenger stock, the Midland did lag behind the LNWR by around a decade, likewise the Midland was a year or two behind the LNWR in restaurant car provision. The LNWR introduced a day corridor train with full dining facilities in 1892 (the 2pm Scottish Express, the "Corridor", of course); it wasn't until 1899 that the Midland had a comparable Scotch corridor express, though it could be argued that the standard of the carriages built for those trains was higher than the equivalent LNWR/WCJS of the same date. On the other hand, on the locomotive side, I'd point to the early adoption of piston valves, the invention of steam sanding, and, going back to Matthew Kirtley's day, the firebox brick arch that enabled locomotives to burn coal rather than coke. 

 

That's a fair comment, Johnster.

 

:)

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

In fairness to the Midland, their late 19th century passenger stock was highly innovative; they were the first in the UK with bogie stock, the first with corridor connections, the first with restaurant cars, and I believe the first with toilets, when the GW was still faffing around with the broad gauge and stopping for tea at Swindon.  

Also I believe the first with "control" and freight management based on American ideas - and of course they tried to eliminate PO mineral wagons by buying up a very large fleet.

 

Paul

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

Also I believe the first with "control" and freight management based on American ideas - and of course they tried to eliminate PO mineral wagons by buying up a very large fleet.

 

Paul

The North Eastern likewise with their own fleet of coal wagons.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

Also I believe the first with "control" and freight management based on American ideas - and of course they tried to eliminate PO mineral wagons by buying up a very large fleet.

 

Paul

 

The North Eastern was definitely early in the field with various control office style arrangements and took onboard a lot of practice and ideas garnered from the USA.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • 11 months later...

The earlier comment about the alleged unpopularity of GW brake vans off their home system prompts the question as to what extent did goods brake vans venture off their "home" system in the days before nationalisation/common user arrangement. 

 

I would think that on short journeys such as cross-London transfer freights, they would work through.  Would this also be the case on long-distance freights or would they have been changed, perhaps at the same time as loco changes?  Were visiting brake vans ever "borrowed" in the same way as ordinary goods wagons?

 

Just looking for an excuse for SR and LMS brake vans on an ECML based layout!

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

21 minutes ago, 2750Papyrus said:

The earlier comment about the alleged unpopularity of GW brake vans off their home system prompts the question as to what extent did goods brake vans venture off their "home" system in the days before nationalisation/common user arrangement. 

 

I would think that on short journeys such as cross-London transfer freights, they would work through.  Would this also be the case on long-distance freights or would they have been changed, perhaps at the same time as loco changes?  Were visiting brake vans ever "borrowed" in the same way as ordinary goods wagons?

 

Just looking for an excuse for SR and LMS brake vans on an ECML based layout!

 

Brake Vans would not normally borrowed as they were required for traffic purposes as they were not common user. The borrowed for freight stock did not come into it but used for return loads to the originating company/system.

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

Pre-nationalisation, goods brake vans were not common user and would have strayed off their own railways only as far as the point at which the train was handed over to the next company. This would be the same point as where the locomotive would be changed, which would be the first major yard beyond the company boundary. 

 

Jim

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
On 13/11/2018 at 18:26, Siberian Snooper said:

Seen a whole village of cabooses somewhere on the west coast, it might have been near Seattle.

At the Strasbourg Railroad in PA, theres a Caboose Hotel about a mile up the line from the first station.

 

Very much recommended this line, especially as it still runs steam hauled commercial freight.

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

A number of years back, watching an old black and white film, I saw a scene where a freight arrives at a country halt, with a pannier or 14xx, and whilst the actors were doing the scene, just behind them a porter and a guard were unloading milk churns and pidgeon baskets from a Toad van, so I always assumed the verandah was for local low volume packages to be off loaded from country stations.

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
30 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

At the Strasbourg Railroad in PA, theres a Caboose Hotel about a mile up the line from the first station.

 

Very much recommended this line, especially as it still runs steam hauled commercial freight.

 

A lovely line right through Amish Country. Have ridden it 4 or 5 times.

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
7 hours ago, adb968008 said:

A number of years back, watching an old black and white film, I saw a scene where a freight arrives at a country halt, with a pannier or 14xx, and whilst the actors were doing the scene, just behind them a porter and a guard were unloading milk churns and pidgeon baskets from a Toad van, so I always assumed the verandah was for local low volume packages to be off loaded from country stations.

 

Just an addendum to that,watching the Titfield Thunderbolt tonight, the Brake is used twice for freight, once at the start where a box marked fragile is thrown from the brake by the guard, and later is shown stacked with tomatoes before departure.

 

So maybe the big veranda was for carrying local extras, unlike double endeds, maximising potential.

Edited by adb968008
  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

On 09/11/2018 at 22:16, kevinlms said:

But NEVER in a photo of a model layout!

When you have a GWR/WR terminus the brake van has to run veranda first wither when coming into the terminus or when going back out. So exactly 50% of the freight workings on my layout had the brake van veranda first. Rather oddly I did get a few comments that the brake van was the wrong way round at exhibitions. I was always careful to be polite when I explained.

 

In this photo the pannier is about to run round the assembled freight train ready to go back down the branch.

ngs08.jpg

Edited by Chris M
  • Like 4
  • Agree 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, Mark Saunders said:

 

Brake Vans would not normally borrowed as they were required for traffic purposes as they were not common user. The borrowed for freight stock did not come into it but used for return loads to the originating company/system.

I've seen at least one picture of a former Southern Railway Pillbox brakevan on the Shipley to Laisterdyke line in Bradford before. This was in BR days however. 

 

Edit: found it!

FB_IMG_1572767256195.jpg

Edited by Aire Head
Found image
  • Like 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...