Forklifts loading BR standard vans and palvans

[Stoker]

I'm looking for information and any photographs regarding the use of forklifts for loading BR vans in the 1960s/70s. Specifically I want to know whether forklifts were commonly used, and if so were they driven into the wagon to place the load as with the more modern bogie vans, when the transition happened between using sack carts to manually load jute sacks into vans and using forklifts to load pallets, and really anything else about this subject as it seems there isn't much information out there. If pallet jacks were common back then, I'm assuming folding dock ramps were used as well to bridge the gap between the loading edge and the wagon floor...

Any help would be much appreciated.

[Gordon A]

I would think in most places the fork lifts would stay on the ground, except where the wagons are being loaded from a platform.

Even when loading from a platform they may not actually enter a wagon.

A fork lift trolley (forgotten the proper name) would then be used to pack the pallets in the wagon.

 

Gordon A

[25901]

1 minute ago, Gordon A said:

I would think in most places the fork lifts would stay on the ground, except where the wagons are being loaded from a platform.

Even when loading from a platform they may not actually enter a wagon.

A fork lift trolley (forgotten the proper name) would then be used to pack the pallets in the wagon.

 

Gordon A

Pallet truck

[Fat Controller]

The ground pressure exerted by the average forklift would probably cause it to go through the floor.....Even a pallet truck is very good at detecting dodgy floors.

In my younger days, I did quite a lot of unloading and unloading of both rail wagons and road trailers. In almost all cases, the lift truck would stay on the ground; any manouevring of pallets would either be done from ground level , using a lift-truck (most of which had extended forks, so they could comfortably reach beyond the mid point), or by a pallet truck on the wagon.

[Stoker]

5 hours ago, Fat Controller said:

The ground pressure exerted by the average forklift would probably cause it to go through the floor.....Even a pallet truck is very good at detecting dodgy floors.

In my younger days, I did quite a lot of unloading and unloading of both rail wagons and road trailers. In almost all cases, the lift truck would stay on the ground; any manouevring of pallets would either be done from ground level , using a lift-truck (most of which had extended forks, so they could comfortably reach beyond the mid point), or by a pallet truck on the wagon.

That's what I figured, forklift on the dock (or ground), pallet truck in the wagon. I'd imagine you could only fit a maximum of 6 pallets on a BR standard van anyway, so your two at either end could be positioned with a pallet truck, and the furthest middle pallet either positioned with a reach fork or just pushed into place using the second middle pallet as a bumper. Frowned upon now but I know it was common practice back in the day. Then some inflatable or timber dunnage between the pallets.

I know that Palvans had doors on each end on opposing sides, so as to make loading easier. I have seen a photo of a palvan being loaded with a forklift around 1961, but not sure how common that was at the time. My main problem is that I'm not old enough to have been around to see any of this stuff!



This 1958 photo showing the interior of the bagging plant at Goonvean & Rostowrack's eponymous Goonvean siding shows large sacks which were loaded from here into vans. These were 2 hundredweight bags, so the 9 bags in the foreground would've been almost 1 ton. As far as I know the men just used a sack cart to get the bag as far as the van, and from there would handball it into position. Heavy work once you got past the first layer of bags! Goonvean were about 20 years behind ECC in terms of technology.

My period is late 60s early 70s, capturing the end of the class 22. By this time I'd be surprised if forklifts weren't in use, but believe it or not I actually don't have really any photos or information regarding the use of pallets or forklifts in this time period.

 

Edited December 11, 2019 by Stoker

[phil-b259]

14 minutes ago, Stoker said:

I know that Palvans had doors on each end on opposing sides, so as to make loading easier. I have seen a photo of a palvan being loaded with a forklift around 1961, but not sure how common that was at the time. My main problem is that I'm not old enough to have been around to see any of this stuff!
 

 

 

However this arrangement was asking for uneven weight distribution (if loading could only take place form one side then it would all end up at one end of the van).

 

This uneven weight distribution led to a number of derailments - just as badly loaded shipping containers  have been cited by the RAIB as a factor in a number of derailments / blow offs on the current network.

 

As a consequence BRs 'Palvan' had a short lifespan and BR went back to central doors or full accessibility along both sides for later designs.

[Stoker]

Just now, phil-b259 said:

 

However this arrangement was asking for uneven weight distribution (if loading could only take place form one side then it would all end up at one end of the van).

 

This uneven weight distribution led to a number of derailments - just as badly loaded shipping containers  have been cited by the RAIB as a factor in a number of derailments / blow offs on the current network.

 

As a consequence BRs 'Palvan' had a short lifespan and BR went back to central doors or full accessibility along both sides for later designs.

According to Paul Bartlett they rode poorly due to their suspension, which was the cause of derailments, not uneven weight distribution. The load would've been distributed evenly inside as a matter of economic viability, the end doors simply meant that it could be loaded right to the ends without the need for a pallet truck inside. The downside being that the forklift would've needed to drive around to the other side of the wagon to load the opposite end. Some were fitted with better suspension and later refitted with air brakes, lasting well into the 80s.

[Firecracker]

For what it’s worth, there’s a BTF film on YouTube (think it’s ‘They take the high road’) showing a gang of wagon drivers shifting bagged cement to a hydro dam under construction in Scotland from the local goods yard.  They’re hand balling the bags out of 12t vans onto pallets on the wagons,  with a forklift unloading the wagon at the dam site.  The film claims this has been going on a while, so suspect this was standard practice, rather than BR not being prepared to send a forklift.

 

Owain

[phil-b259]

9 minutes ago, Stoker said:

According to Paul Bartlett they rode poorly due to their suspension, which was the cause of derailments, not uneven weight distribution. The load would've been distributed evenly inside as a matter of economic viability, the end doors simply meant that it could be loaded right to the ends without the need for a pallet truck inside. The downside being that the forklift would've needed to drive around to the other side of the wagon to load the opposite end. Some were fitted with better suspension and later refitted with air brakes, lasting well into the 80s.

 

Loading one van from alternate sides does rather presupposes that such a thing is possible - at many goods yards the presence of sidings or buildings means its not as simple as you imply and so it is quite likely that an awful lot of these vans were running round with all the weight concentrated at one end

 

An unbalanced load is an unbalanced load regardless of how good or bad the suspension is. The laws of physics / gravity dictate that any vehicle with poor weight distribution is inherently less stable than one where the weight  is uniformly distributed - and hence the RAIBs comments on badly loaded ISO containers being a big factor in a number of derailments despite the actual freightliner flats having sophisticated suspension etc.

[doilum]

40 minutes ago, Stoker said:

That's what I figured, forklift on the dock (or ground), pallet truck in the wagon. I'd imagine you could only fit a maximum of 6 pallets on a BR standard van anyway, so your two at either end could be positioned with a pallet truck, and the furthest middle pallet either positioned with a reach fork or just pushed into place using the second middle pallet as a bumper. Frowned upon now but I know it was common practice back in the day. Then some inflatable or timber dunnage between the pallets.

I know that Palvans had doors on each end on opposing sides, so as to make loading easier. I have seen a photo of a palvan being loaded with a forklift around 1961, but not sure how common that was at the time. My main problem is that I'm not old enough to have been around to see any of this stuff!



This 1958 photo showing the interior of the bagging plant at Goonvean & Rostowrack's eponymous Goonvean siding shows large sacks which were loaded from here into vans. These were 2 hundredweight bags, so the 9 bags in the foreground would've been almost 1 ton. As far as I know the men just used a sack cart to get the bag as far as the van, and from there would handball it into position. Heavy work once you got past the first layer of bags! Goonvean were about 20 years behind ECC in terms of technology.

My period is late 60s early 70s, capturing the end of the class 22. By this time I'd be surprised if forklifts weren't in use, but believe it or not I actually don't have really any photos or information regarding the use of pallets or forklifts in this time period.

 

Brings back memories of student jobs in the mid 1970s. We had to manage the 2cwt sacks of barley on an oversize sack trollies. These were forced over ancient wooden floors and then loaded on to an internal use only lorry, driven 70 metres to another bay and then off loaded again with a block and tackle.

The highlight of that job in 1975 was sitting in the disused rail loading bay having a morning break and watching the special train transferring display stock for the Shildon 150. This spectacle was repeated over several consecutive days.

[Stoker]

Just now, phil-b259 said:

 

Loading one van from alternate sides does rather presupposes that such a thing is possible - at many goods yards the presence of sidings or buildings means its not as simple as you imply and so it is quite likely that an awful lot of these vans were running round with all the weight concentrated at one end

 

An unbalanced load is an unbalanced load regardless of how good or bad the suspension is. The laws of physics / gravity dictate that any vehicle with poor weight distribution is inherently less stable than one where the weight  is uniformly distributed - and hence the RAIBs comments on badly loaded ISO containers being a big factor in a number of derailments despite the actual freightliner flats having sophisticated suspension etc.

With all due respect that all sounds extremely unlikely, and I'd like to try to keep the pie in the sky speculation to a minimum in this thread as I'm trying to gather historically accurate information for a model project.

[Fat Controller]

11 hours ago, Stoker said:

That's what I figured, forklift on the dock (or ground), pallet truck in the wagon. I'd imagine you could only fit a maximum of 6 pallets on a BR standard van anyway, so your two at either end could be positioned with a pallet truck, and the furthest middle pallet either positioned with a reach fork or just pushed into place using the second middle pallet as a bumper. Frowned upon now but I know it was common practice back in the day. Then some inflatable or timber dunnage between the pallets.

I know that Palvans had doors on each end on opposing sides, so as to make loading easier. I have seen a photo of a palvan being loaded with a forklift around 1961, but not sure how common that was at the time. My main problem is that I'm not old enough to have been around to see any of this stuff!



This 1958 photo showing the interior of the bagging plant at Goonvean & Rostowrack's eponymous Goonvean siding shows large sacks which were loaded from here into vans. These were 2 hundredweight bags, so the 9 bags in the foreground would've been almost 1 ton. As far as I know the men just used a sack cart to get the bag as far as the van, and from there would handball it into position. Heavy work once you got past the first layer of bags! Goonvean were about 20 years behind ECC in terms of technology.

My period is late 60s early 70s, capturing the end of the class 22. By this time I'd be surprised if forklifts weren't in use, but believe it or not I actually don't have really any photos or information regarding the use of pallets or forklifts in this time period.

 

It makes my eyes water to see those sacks; the ones full of gypsum I unloaded at Longport were 'only' sixty kg. They came in on pallets via the train ferry; the only problem was that they were only loose-stacked, so there were pallets and sacks everywhere when you opened the wagon.

[nightstar.train]

One of the British Transport Films called Freight and a City is about the development of Tinsley and the new Sheffield Freight terminal. Can’t find it on YouTube I’m afraid, but it’s on Volume 4 Reshaping Britain’s Railways of the DVDs. I remember it showed a lot about the loading of wagons. 

[Fat Controller]

At the same time I was 'hand-balling' bagged gypsum , another part of the yard was dealing in Guinness traffic. This came from Park Royal in 12t Vanfits, well-nigh impossible to load directly with pallets. Instead,the forklift driver would bring the empty or loaded  pallet to the van door, and the small team inside the van would handball the kegs in or out.

[Fat Controller]

One thing to bear in mind is that the majority of fork-lifts in the period you are modelling would be very much for indoor use. Most were ex-military, and came in a selection of inspiring camouflage colours. My father's company did a lot of work on 'repurposing' old tin-works in the Swansea area around the time you're looking at modelling; concrete floors had to be laid to fine tolerances, else the 'trucks' would have trouble moving. 

12 hours ago, Stoker said:

With all due respect that all sounds extremely unlikely, and I'd like to try to keep the pie in the sky speculation to a minimum in this thread as I'm trying to gather historically accurate information for a model project.

 

[keefer]

Were the Palvans not a rather 'specialist' vehicle for dedicated traffic, in which case provision would be made for either-side loading at either destination? As Phil pointed out earlier, there doesn't seem to be much point if loading can only be done from one side?

[w124bob]

20 hours ago, Firecracker said:

For what it’s worth, there’s a BTF film on YouTube (think it’s ‘They take the high road’) showing a gang of wagon drivers shifting bagged cement to a hydro dam under construction in Scotland from the local goods yard.  They’re hand balling the bags out of 12t vans onto pallets on the wagons,  with a forklift unloading the wagon at the dam site.  The film claims this has been going on a while, so suspect this was standard practice, rather than BR not being prepared to send a forklift.

 

Owain

Pretty sure thats the Killin branch, if it's BRS drivers featured. I seem to recall they used a camping coach and some big fry ups.

[jim.snowdon]

I had long presumed that the object of the wide doors on the Palvans, and the later Vanwides was to allow fork lift trucks both access to the interior of the van and sufficient space to allow them to turn so as to get the pallets loaded in the blind ends of the body.

 

Jim

[Bernard Lamb]

On 11/12/2019 at 07:17, Stoker said:

I'm looking for information and any photographs regarding the use of forklifts for loading BR vans in the 1960s/70s. Specifically I want to know whether forklifts were commonly used, and if so were they driven into the wagon to place the load as with the more modern bogie vans, when the transition happened between using sack carts to manually load jute sacks into vans and using forklifts to load pallets, and really anything else about this subject as it seems there isn't much information out there. If pallet jacks were common back then, I'm assuming folding dock ramps were used as well to bridge the gap between the loading edge and the wagon floor...

Any help would be much appreciated.

No doubt you will get all sorts of replies some very accurate and some rather based on anecdotes. 

My credentials. I worked for Dexion the leading storage and materials handling specialists from 1970 to 2003.

There are two main types of pallets. Chep from the second world war and Euro Pal from around 1961. You can Google these to find some details of the history.

These began to be more widely used with the introduction of adjustable pallet racking circa 1964.

As others have said FLTs did not usually drive into vans. They dropped the pallet in the doorway and it was moved into position using a pallet truck.

Many smaller freight depots used hand stacking right up until the time that they closed. Many closed during the 1960s.

FLTs changed rapidly during the period that you are interested in. They got bigger and the range of power options increased. It is rather important to get the right type for the area and date that you wish to model. Petrol machines changed to LPG for example and battery power improved greatly.

From those days from what I can remember is that sacks when handled in bulk would be put into tote containers rather than being stacked on pallets.

I would say that this change came bout in general between 1964 and 1967 but there would be earlier and later examples depending on all sorts of factors.

Bernard

 

 

[The Stationmaster]

16 hours ago, jim.snowdon said:

I had long presumed that the object of the wide doors on the Palvans, and the later Vanwides was to allow fork lift trucks both access to the interior of the van and sufficient space to allow them to turn so as to get the pallets loaded in the blind ends of the body.

 

Jim

The clue is in the name of the vehicles - Palvan = Pallet Van.   At goods depots (which happened to have one) a pallet truck would be used and could go into the vehicle if working at platform level.  Working from ground level in a yard was different as a fork lift (if the depot had one) had to be used - hence another reason for the wide doors on Palvans.  So first fork out pallets by the doors then use a pallet truck (if you had one and could get it into the van) to get any remaining pallets to where the fork lift could get at them or simplt y hand unload the pallets.

 

As anyone who has worked with a pallet truck will know they are pretty easy to get into all sorts of spaces but they have very small wheels so won't work across gaps between platforms and vans unless you use a metal bridging  plate.  Fork lifts are also easy to work but generally were far too heavy to go into railway wagons nor could they turn once in.  One method I saw used with tinplate was to fork it in then try to push it around inside the wagon with the forks.

[Fat Controller]

1 minute ago, The Stationmaster said:

The clue is in the name of the vehicles - Palvan = Pallet Van.   At goods depots (which happened to have one) a pallet truck would be used and could go into the vehicle if working at platform level.  Working from ground level in a yard was different as a fork lift (if the depot had one) had to be used - hence another reason for the wide doors on Palvans.  So first fork out pallets by the doors then use a pallet truck (if you had one and could get it into the van) to get any remaining pallets to where the fork lift could get at them or simplt y hand unload the pallets.

 

As anyone who has worked with a pallet truck will know they are pretty easy to get into all sorts of spaces but they have very small wheels so won't work across gaps between platforms and vans unless you use a metal bridging  plate.  Fork lifts are also easy to work but generally were far too heavy to go into railway wagons nor could they turn once in.  One method I saw used with tinplate was to fork it in then try to push it around inside the wagon with the forks.

Mike,

You'll remember the ex-Midland Morriston branch from your time in Copperopolis. At the Morriston end of the branch was a former tinplate mill called Duffryn Works. Sometime in the mid/late 1960s, dad's firm landed a contract to convert the soundest buildings into a 'buffer' store for export tinplate. Trostre, Felindre and Ebbw Vale would make a given quantity every week, and these 'buffers' would absorb anything of this which wasn't pre-ordered.

It was decided that rail traffic would be unloaded at a semi-covered loading bay, and an exact specification was drawn up for platform levels, to minimise slopes. Unfortunately, the spec was based on a supposed, probably imagined, fleet of sliding-door vans. What turned  up for trials were a mixture of cupboard-doored stock. The problem was that, if the vans went out loaded, the bottom edge of the door was sitting tight on the platform. If the vans came in loaded, then the bottom part of the door was blocked by the platform edge. In either case, door opening and closing could only be done away from the platform. 

After a few weeks, a tamper was borrowed to lift the siding by three or so inches.

[Stoker]

8 hours ago, Bernard Lamb said:

No doubt you will get all sorts of replies some very accurate and some rather based on anecdotes. 

My credentials. I worked for Dexion the leading storage and materials handling specialists from 1970 to 2003.

There are two main types of pallets. Chep from the second world war and Euro Pal from around 1961. You can Google these to find some details of the history.

These began to be more widely used with the introduction of adjustable pallet racking circa 1964.

As others have said FLTs did not usually drive into vans. They dropped the pallet in the doorway and it was moved into position using a pallet truck.

Many smaller freight depots used hand stacking right up until the time that they closed. Many closed during the 1960s.

FLTs changed rapidly during the period that you are interested in. They got bigger and the range of power options increased. It is rather important to get the right type for the area and date that you wish to model. Petrol machines changed to LPG for example and battery power improved greatly.

From those days from what I can remember is that sacks when handled in bulk would be put into tote containers rather than being stacked on pallets.

I would say that this change came bout in general between 1964 and 1967 but there would be earlier and later examples depending on all sorts of factors.

Bernard

 

 

I know of both CHEP and Euro Pal. I've operated a forklift in previous work so those were included in the training. In reference to what Mike was saying, "nudging" pallets was fairly common practice - also using the forks of the machine to open sliding doors! One trick I saw frequently was using a pallet on the forks as a bumper to push another pallet further back in lieu of using a reach truck - probably done fairly frequently on the palvans I'd think.

I asked on a china clay history specific group on facebook whether any of the chaps there remembered what was being used. I didn't get very many replies, but one fellow who worked in home market sales for ECC recalled that back in the 60s and 70s they had some issues with customers getting confused between "palletised" and "pelletised". He felt fairly confident that forklift handling was something the company was doing at the time. I agree with him, back in the 60s Alfred and Judy were often pictured double headed handling fairly long rakes of palvans.

[Fat Controller]

I heard somewhere that there were approaching 200 Palvan allocated to Cornish clay traffic . They didn't last long, being replaced by Vanfits and Vanwides; the roller-bearings were put on to 13t open wagons for the Clayliner trains, and most Palvans ended up as Internal Users and static stores.

One thing that comes to mind about loading pallets was that earlier ones were 2-way. More recently , four-way ones have come into general use. 

[Bernard Lamb]

There have been various comments about pushing pallets into position with another pallet.

This practise ceased when reach trucks came into common use as they could extend both forwards and to the left and right.

Using pallet trucks as oversize scooters was a regular game and you could get up quite a turn of speed, although cornering was a problem.

Bernard

 

[Stoker]

1 hour ago, Bernard Lamb said:

There have been various comments about pushing pallets into position with another pallet.

This practise ceased when reach trucks came into common use as they could extend both forwards and to the left and right.

Using pallet trucks as oversize scooters was a regular game and you could get up quite a turn of speed, although cornering was a problem.

Bernard

 

You've gotta do that tokyo drift thing around the corners... when the supervisor isn't looking that is!