Coal yards

[Nearholmer]

I read that siding between the backs of the pens as being a dumping ground for empties.

 

The coal sidings are ten or more yards in front of the pens.

[Mikkel]

Yes, that's also how I interpret it. The pens were filled up and emptied from the front. Here's a photo I took at Haworth a couple of years ago. 

 

Edited December 11, 2019 by Mikkel
Corrected bins to pens :-)

[Nick Holliday]

5 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

Interesting. Maybe its a regional thing and / or the various railway companies had different attitudes to permitting them?

 

As I suggested, the practice of having pens adjacent to the tracks was more prevalent in the south east, particularly the GER, SECR and LBSCR as well as the eastern end of the LSWR. From what I have been able to find, although the GWR did have some examples, such as Acton, but seldom in the West Country. There was also a time factor, with more appearing post-nationalisation, I suspect because of the reduction of other users in the yard, and the introduction of the 16 ton steel wagons, which probably were really too big for the smaller merchants to handle in the way that their smaller wagons allowed them to. 

5 hours ago, Brassey said:

Coal was left stored in the wagon(s) until needed.  10 tons of coal would have lasted a small village quite some time.

 

I read somewhere that the LNWR coal depots in South London serving populations of around 100,000 had about 3 coal trains a week.  You easily see that amount shunted in and out on BLTs at exhibitions in less than a day.

 

There were a number of reasons why coal was not stored in wagons. The main problem is that if the unloading took longer than a specified period, two or three days, the merchant would have to pay additional siding charges, and if the wagon was not his own, then demurrage charges would also kick in, giving a great incentive to clear the wagon in a couple of days. This seems feasible, as a ten ton wagon load could be unloaded and bagged and placed on the delivery trolley, which would possibly handle two or three tons, so the wagon would be cleared after delivery in each morning and afternoon. It would be in the merchants' interest to get the coal to their customers as quickly as possible, as coal tends to lose its calorific value if stored for too long, especially if wet.

35 minutes ago, russ p said:

 

Oh wow , would those wagons be discharged over the sleeper wall into the pens?

In previous discussions on this topic, those who know have suggested that quite a large proportion of a coal load would normally be shovelled over the top plank, rather than through the side door, so it would be reasonable that the pens might be filled in this manner. By the look of them the rear walls of the pens were much higher than the floor of the wagons anyway, which makes sense as that would increase the capacity of the pen.

Edited December 11, 2019 by Nick Holliday
Others' comments noted

[Rivercider]

I suspect a lot of layouts have coal pens, (or bins), modelled in the goods yard because they appear in a lot of track plans, particularly by CJ Freezer. He was familiar with them as they were quite common on the LSWR network in the West Country.   

A quick look in Main Line to the West, Part 4 by Nicholas and Reeve has track plans of a number of yards, with pens shown.

 

Exmouth has 13 conjoined pens shown, all unnamed.

Budleigh Salterton has about 10 named pens of varying sizes ; Budleigh U D Council, Keslake, A McDown, A McDown, Keslake & Sons, A McDown.

Sidmouth has no pens on the map, but photographic evidence elsewhere shows there were extensive coal pens in the yard.

Ottery St Mary apears to show about 10 or so pens, large in the middle, smaller at the ends.

Colyton Town shows 3 large pens named for Bradford & Sons coal stack (x2), Strowbridge Bros coal stack.

Chard Town has pens for Bradford & Sons, and Somerset Trading Co.

 

The Salisbury to Exeter by Phillips and Pryer has coal pens marked on maps for Pinhoe, Honiton, Crewkerne, Sherborne, Gillingham, Semley, and Tisbury, (the name Bradford & Sons gets another 2 mentions along the way).

 

cheers

  

[russ p]

30 minutes ago, Nick Holliday said:

 

As I suggested, the practice of having pens adjacent to the tracks was more prevalent in the south east, particularly the GER, SECR and LBSCR as well as the eastern end of the LSWR. From what I have been able to find, although the GWR did have some examples, such as Acton, but seldom in the West Country. There was also a time factor, with more appearing post-nationalisation, I suspect because of the reduction of other users in the yard, and the introduction of the 16 ton steel wagons, which probably were really too big for the smaller merchants to handle in the way that their smaller wagons allowed them to. 

 

 

As my layout is supposed to be ex GER would the pens be adjacent to the track and discharged into the back of the pen from the wagon?

[Nick Holliday]

1 minute ago, russ p said:

 

As my layout is supposed to be ex GER would the pens be adjacent to the track and discharged into the back of the pen from the wagon?

Not necessarily. Although the adjacent position was more accepted on the GER, it was by no means compulsory. You need to consider all the factors that would influence this within the context of your layout, including how far you are from Liverpool Street, the date of your setting,  the room available and how the bins would impact on other traders. I'd also consider whether having what is a bit of a cliche is worth it; a different position could add a touch of subtlety to your layout.

If you have an imaginary location for your layout, it might be worth researching GE stations in the same area, to see how they deal with the subject.

[Ian Smeeton]

Why don't you have a look at the Britain from above website for yards around your area of interest.

 

https://www.britainfromabove.org.uk/en

 

Sign up, it costs nothing, and more to the point, they don't bombard you with e-mails.

 

The great thing is, that by registering, it allows you to zoom in, sometimes close enough to read loco numbers!

 

I cannot guarantee that oyu will manage to escape without losing many, many hours.

 

Regards

 

Ian

[TheSignalEngineer]

I used to work for a coal merchant occasionally in the early 1960s. My great aunt was manageress at a merchant's branch office on the local sidings. They had several pens along the yard fence next to the office. They were built from old sleepers and even a couple of wooden headstocks and underframe timbers. I still have a repair plate rescued from one of them. The pens were used for the different types of fuel such as anthracite, smokeless fuel, coke and various grades of house coal.

There was a clear space over  two lorries wide between the wagons and pens. I think there were three different merchants with offices there.

Orders would be phoned through to the main office for so many wagons of the grades needed for the expected deliveries. From memory, because of the lumpy nature of house coal a 13T ex-PO or 16 ton mineral would only hold about 8 tons max. The method of unloading varied with the season. When a lot of coal was being sold if a wagon of the right grade had arrived and was waiting to be unloaded the lorry was tared on the weighbridge with the number of bags needed for the next run. The lorry was parked and the wagon door dropped onto the flatbed. Bags were loaded and weighed straight from the wagon then the lorry was weighed again on the way out of the yard. One of my jobs when the men were out in the road was to tally the weighslips against the wagon numbers and check the total amount unloaded from each wagon against what was on the wagon label then pass the information to the main office so they could deal with paying the NCB. If we had too much of a particular grade the lorry was tared and up to about 3 tons shovelled onto it, weighed again then shovelled into the appropriate pen.

As this was after nationalisation BR charged demurrage, a form of rent, for wagons not unloaded within a certain number of days. Originally it was a week but was later reduced to three working days IIRC. This made for a nice little earner on a Saturday morning clearing spare coal out of wagons needing to be released back to traffic and dropping it into the pens.

[russ p]

Just looked at Norwich city,  I know is MandGN but the coal yard is really hotch potch which I think I will go for that way I can incorporate the ratio coal merchants 

I should have asked my coal man as his business was originally there 

[bécasse]

Outside suburban areas most coal merchants were one-man concerns and even then were often a part-time occupation. They didn't have the capital to be able to stock coal and it was generally ordered by the wagon load to match demand - it would have been needed year-round but obviously much, much more was burnt in winter.

This pattern of operation was changed by the Second World War when it became paramount in the national interest to keep the mining and flow of coal steady as steady as possible all year round, which in turn meant that storage was required at coal yards, and so the pens were built - often very ramshackle because of the general shortage of building materials. (Sometimes air-raid shelters were incorporated into such pens - it having quickly become apparent that stacks of coal were remarkably effective as absorbing bomb blasts. Lines of loaded coal wagons were sometimes used as a shield to allow trains to pass known UXBs in relative safety.)

There were pens in places before WWII including some for domestic coal but these were mainly in suburban areas where the bigger players (notably the Co-op of course) had the capital to be able to buy coal more cheaply in the summer months and to store it for subsequent sale. However, a lot of the earlier pens held coal for industrial rather than domestic users. Many industrial users, including some surprisingly large ones, relied on coal being trekked by road from the nearest railway yard (rather than having their own private sidings) and found it convenient, and cheaper, to store the bulk of their coal on railway premises rather than their own.

One further point to note is that "upper class" (the squire and his like) often ordered their own coal direct from a colliery; colliery shares weren't an unusual dowry, and naturally if one owned shares one tended to buy from that colliery, often at an "owners" discount. This brought the odd wagon from that colliery into yards where normally only wagons of a merchant or factor were seen.

[Compound2632]

I go back to the case of Stroud, as between Ian Pope's book mentioned above and this local history website it is particularly well-documented. At least three or four of the coal merchants active in the late 19th/early 20th century were substantial citizens of the town. 

[Aire Head]

57 minutes ago, Ian Smeeton said:

Why don't you have a look at the Britain from above website for yards around your area of interest.

 

https://www.britainfromabove.org.uk/en

 

Sign up, it costs nothing, and more to the point, they don't bombard you with e-mails.

 

The great thing is, that by registering, it allows you to zoom in, sometimes close enough to read loco numbers!

 

I cannot guarantee that oyu will manage to escape without losing many, many hours.

 

Regards

 

Ian

 

Well that's another site I'm losing hours to!

 

I'm now obsessed with looking at what is clearly a GW van at Ilkley station in 1928, why would you do this to me!

[Compound2632]

4 minutes ago, Aire Head said:

I'm now obsessed with looking at what is clearly a GW van at Ilkley station in 1928, why would you do this to me!

 

With pooling, that shouldn't be a surprise. 

[russ p]

I hadn't been on Britain from above for ages but haven't been able to put it down since Ian mentioned it!

[Aire Head]

54 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

With pooling, that shouldn't be a surprise. 

 

I realised that as I posted it.

 

More surprised to see a Southern Cattle Van at Guiseley as I though they weren't common user.

[TheSignalEngineer]

1 hour ago, Aire Head said:

More surprised to see a Southern Cattle Van at Guiseley as I though they weren't common user.

Fitted and unfitted Cattle wagons except GWR were common user from 1925. Fitted wagons were withdrawn from the arrangement in 1933. 

[grandadbob]

Here's a link to a post earlier this year on the same topic which may be of interest:

 

 

Edited December 12, 2019 by grandadbob

[Fat Controller]

10 hours ago, Aire Head said:

 

I realised that as I posted it.

 

More surprised to see a Southern Cattle Van at Guiseley as I though they weren't common user.

Non-Common-User stock could still work 'off-system'; however, they had to be returned to their home company once unloaded.

[Aire Head]

Must have been a long trip for the cattle!

 

Back OT though here is an image of Grassington Goods Yard showing coal cells next to the sidings.

 

 

[TheQ]

20 hours ago, DavidCBroad said:

 

To pick up on Nearholmer's point,( he posted after I started writing!,)  a coal yard would often serve more than one village, For instance Foss Cross,(MSWJR)  serving a hamlet of about 12 houses, also provided coal facilities for Chedworth 300 dwellings and the Coln Valley to Bibury, about another 500 dwellings. Probably 1000 dwellings in total plus a Lime Kiln.It may even have served Northleach 4 miles north with no railway, but Andoversford and Bourton were equally convenient.    Chedworth the next station North did not have goods facilities and Cirenceser Watermoor the next station south had limited coal traffic as Cirencester Town GWR had extensive yards and got in 30 years before the MSWJR!  Prior to the railways coal was a prohibitively expensive luxury for many ordinary country folk..  They went "Wooding" and burned anything that would burn basically.    

Whereas Down at Ludgershall also on the MSWJR, none of the three coal merchants had facilities on railway property. Two of the merchants unloaded at the coal siding and then moved their coal to their yards which were a couple of hundred yards away.

But my Families business (HG Rawlings & Sons)  unloaded their coal in the Military yard (1/2 mile by road) and then conveyed it to their yard which backed onto the railway Station!!

[C126]

Sorry for reactivating this thread, perhaps under false pretences.  I hope this is thought legitimate.

 

Marking out my coal yard last night (declining 1970’s B.R. (S.R.) for a medium-size market town), I have been looking at a few sources for size and number of pens.  How many have people used on their layouts?  I found a photograph of dear old Eastbourne’s, and had to reach for the lavender water:

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/mcxv/4565850995/in/photolist-vtx3Vd-7XtbqT-pSfXpc-q7ouxL-gj47z3-gj3N4r-gjhr9b-gj4o3Z-gj3PwW-gj3TQX-gji6wH-gj4N3F-gjiJgV-gjiQtV-gj4sDT-gj3UfJ-gjhF1u-gj4Hnw-gjiM3j-gjiuX2-gj4j61-gj4rB1-gjiy5n-gjhXib-prEu5d-oeMLhc-g7a1KZ-od5m7W

 

I assume I need six pens at least.  How many different types of coal would have been stocked in a yard?  To-day, the 'Coal Shop' web-site offers Scottish and Colombian "doubles" and "trebles" (lump size), plus five different smokeless nuggets.  Were there different types of Anthracite?

 

Finally, has anyone put her/his mental health on the line and attempted to sculpt a pile of Phurnacite smokeless nuggets (ovoids approx. 0.5mm. long I calculate), whether for a wagon-load or stock pile...

 

All thoughts gratefully received.  Thanks.

[Johann Marsbar]

Ipswich Co-Op had some rather substantial, presumably concrete, coal pens at their yard next to Derby Road station.  They even had a roof over them!

 

 

I've just completed a scratchbuilt set-up like that in low-relief for the coal yard on my layout.

 

Edited December 2, 2020 by Johann Marsbar

[Fat Controller]

The anthracite would be in various sizes, to suit different appliances; anthracite boilers are easily blocked by the 'wrong sort of coal. At the minimum, there were 'grains', 'peas' and 'beans'. Don't forget that each merchant would have their own cells. For 'ovoids, have you looked at different seeds, such as sesame, nigella and black onion? If you go for these, get them from the nearest Indian grocer, as they do proper-sized bags.

[C126]

1 hour ago, Johann Marsbar said:

Ipswich Co-Op had some rather substantial, presumably concrete, coal pens at their yard next to Derby Road station.  They even had a roof over them!

 

 

I've just completed a scratchbuilt set-up like that in low-relief for the coal yard on my layout.

 

 

Thanks for the photograph.  I am still bracing myself to try and build a coal-elevator.  Did you include the pens in your model, and if so, how many, please?

[russ p]

5 minutes ago, C126 said:

 

Thanks for the photograph.  I am still bracing myself to try and build a coal-elevator.  Did you include the pens in your model, and if so, how many, please?

 

Can't remember what make they are but I bought a kit of a pair of them