“BEYOND DOVER”

[jonhall]

On 28/04/2020 at 21:36, Northroader said:

I’ve finished off the paint and weathering for the Belgian beer van, one side is Flemish, and the other Walloon, so honours are even. Maybe it did happen, or maybe it’s a figment of the breweries imagination, but the Chimay brewers aren’t saying. Incidentally, Chimay had its own private railway, the local nobs having dreams of a fast link to Paris over the Ardennes. Politics got in the way, and it ended up being worked by the Nord-Belge, which was the French NORD railway in Belgium, but it wasn’t finally absorbed in the SNCB until 1948.

 

I think alternate language sign-writing is quite credible, I don't have time to look it up, but I'm pretty sure there were 'Dubonnet' tanks, that were lettered 'Cinzano' on the other side, I feel I've got that information from this thread on the LR Presse forum https://forum.e-train.fr/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=5424

 

Jon

Edited July 3, 2020 by jonhall

[Northroader]

Thanks for the link, Jon, that’s one I’m looking at for bi-foudres. I doubt if you’d get a beer van done either side for two non-allied suppliers, I just did it to get some variety out of the same van.

[Northroader]

FRENCH GOODS WAGONS, GENERAL COMMENTS, PLUS EST DRAWINGS.

 

Some general comments on old French goods wagons. Generally they were iron framed, and early ones could have very noticeable axleguards with the diagonal braces splayed very widely. Spring suspension was noteworthy in having the leaf springs ending in short swing links, rather than ending in plain shoes under the solebar like British wagons. Some extra clearance was allowed for between the axleguards and axleboxes, and this gave an easier ride. You could see a similar arrangement on GWR brake vans, for the same reason.

Plank widths could vary quite widely, some wagons having quite narrow planking. One distinctive feature on NORD wagons was having diagonal planking, and this was done to a lesser extent on OUEST wagons. You can see it on the ETAT wagon drawing for just the side doors. Side doors on open wagons were normally cupboard type, rather than drop, as on English wagons. Vans were constructed with apertures in the upper part of the sides, which could be closed by shutters, either hinged or sliding, on the inside or outside of the body. I would think this was to give dual purpose usage, either for general merchandise or cattle transport.

The majority of wagons had no brakes of any kind. There is a video showing loose shunting in sidings where slippers were placed on the rail, and these were squeezed along the rail by the wagon wheel, retarding it. Fourgons had brakes applied by a screw, but these were marshalled at the head of the train, like a passenger train, rather than at the rear as in Britain. The rearmost vehicle was a goods wagon fitted with screw applied brakes, with a small box for the brakeman to shelter, and he would keep the train stretched to avoid snatching, and look after breakaways. similar vehicles were scattered along the length of the train, and presumably manned depending on the speed and terrain. I’ve tried to estimate the proportion of braked to unbraked wagons, looking at photos of sidings, and it seems around one in four, to one in five. I’m fond of their appearance, and running short trains, I end up with nearer one in two. It would appear that brakes applied by a side lever appeared in the twentieth century, but were not universal. Air braking also started to be applied from roughly 1890, and new wagons with airbrakes also had longer bodies, higher capacity, but also longer wheelbase, to improve track running for higher speeds. Freight train operation could then be classed as “RA” (regime accelere) for fast services, and “RO” (regime ordinaire) for slow unbraked trains, with older designs of wagons.

I cobbled up some drawings for EST wagons, using the Denis Allenden ETAT drawing as a basis, and working off various photos, so you’ll appreciate they’re not exact by any means, but gave me a basis to work off, so here’s some opens (tombereau), vans (couvert), and brakevans (fourgon)

 

Edited October 2, 2022 by Northroader

[Compound2632]

In British practice, as I'm sure I don't need to point out, swing links were characteristic of coaching stock (including NPCS) until J-hangers began to prevail from the 1880s onwards.

[Northroader]

But not wagons, which stayed the same until the 1950s. With dieselisation, there was a spate of “plain line” derailments, and the virtues of what we then called “Continental” suspension started to be appreciated.

[Mikkel]

Lovely drawings, you should frame them. Despite the differences, the wagons seem more akin to the British style than German ones. Perhaps  it's the short wheelbase.

 

8 hours ago, Northroader said:

There is a video showing loose shunting in sidings where slippers were placed on the rail

 

- Charlotte, 'ave you seen my slippers? 

- Mais oui, Hugo, you left them under the beer wagon.

 

[Northroader]

FRENCH WAGON SHUNTING WITH “SABOTS” AND “CABESTANS”

 

BADEN STATE RAILWAY (GrBadStE) LINK (FOR WAGONS)

 

Yes,here we are, found it, an old elf n safety film, with a little snip in it about “sabots” - Sorry, not slippers! It looks like a very French way of going on, but they’d laugh themselves silly at the way shunter ran besides loose wagons straining on the brakestick in Britain.

 

Regarding wagon appearance, I think there was quite a sea change at the end of the nineteenth century, air braking started to be introduced, ability to run at faster speeds and wagon capacity increased, all leading to bigger wagons than what was running in Britain, which was left behind in the twentieth century.

 

As you say, Mikkel, the old French and British wagons did have resemblances due to size, but the same could be said for old Germany. Here’s a link to a well organised source of information about Baden State Railway, looking through the goods wagons pages they weren’t that different either.

http://diehugs.de/Wagen/Guterwagen/guterwagen.html

Edited October 2, 2022 by Northroader

[Mikkel]

I enjoyed watching that, including the capstan shunting. Searching for sabots led me to the page below.

 

The chap in the last photo makes it look like an olympic sport, but I found the text about the development of wagon sorting/shunting interesting (if dense, I used Google translate). I was a bit surprised that gravity shunting was employed already in 1846.

 

http://www.dieupentale.com/index.php?/pages/39-exploitation-du-triage-par-gravite-sncf

 

[Compound2632]

4 hours ago, Mikkel said:

http://www.dieupentale.com/index.php?/pages/39-exploitation-du-triage-par-gravite-sncf

 

 

The discussion about the development of out-of-town marshalling yards as a response to the difficulty of working city-centre goods stations is fascinating; it closely parallels development in Britain. The description of those goods stations, with either platform bays at right angles to the entrance lines, served via wagon turntables, or with platforms parallel to the entrance lines, and the different problems they presented, could almost be describing Somers Town and St Pancras goods stations, along with the marshalling yard successively known as Childs Hill, Cricklewood, and Brent.

[Northroader]

CLIVE LAMMING. VERY USEFUL ESSAYS ON FRENCH 1900s SCENE. EXCELLENT FOR OLD MECHANICAL SIGNALLING.

 

It’s just crossed my mind whilst looking at something else that really I ought to put a link to Clive Lamming on here. He’s a talented historian and author, and has a website with well illustrated essays, featuring old time French Railways. It would be nice to be indexed, you just rummage through and take pot luck. There’s a good maps section, and it’s the best place I’ve seen for explaining the ins and outs of French mechanical signalling.

https://trainconsultant.com/

Edited May 27, 2022 by Northroader

[Northroader]

FRENCH GOODS WAGON COLOURS.

 

Picking up on old wagons, the vexed question is what colour do you paint them?  I have to confess I’m on shaky ground here, I’ve been fumbling my way on this and still uncertain on some, as it’s all black and white photos. One way was looking at what other modellers have done, and also seeing what’s on offer from dealers doing paint for modellers,  AMF87 and Decapod. It’s worth reiterating that the period 1890 - 1900 is the bit that I really like, the start of La Belle Époque, as the trains were nice and compact. It’s worth defining this, as the paint shops aren’t clear what era they apply to, and around then I sense that some changes in painting occurred.

Some years ago I found an old website, run by the Picardy group of the Cercle du Zero (the French GOG) which gave a firm lead on some of the old lines wagons. The C du Z now run a more modern website, full of interesting projects, and this looks akin to the Forum LR Presse website, the French version of RMweb. This latter site does have a thread on the subject,  but some entries strike me as contradictory. Towards the end there’s a German handbook dating from 1896 which is as good as anything.

https://forum.e-train.fr/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=28066

Here’s what little I know, tabulated in descending level of vagueness, and if anyone looking in has better sources, please feel free to add your knowledge. (Oh, and everything below solebar level I do in black, or rather charcoal grey, but I’m not too sure about that)

 NORD.  Light grey, I use MR/LMS wagon paint for this.

 MIDI.    Dark grey. GWR wagon grey would be nice, if it wasn’t for the blue tinge you can get.

 PLM.     Medium grey, something around Humbrol 27 or possibly a shade darker.

              The introduction of airbraked RA wagons led to a different paint scheme for these, a red

               brown colour, generally  called ‘sideros’ what we call ‘bauxite’

 EST.     Dark brown. Actually very dark brown, nearly black, but I do like some colour in my

             models, so I use SR umber brown.

PO.      I think medium brown, slightly orange tint, for this era, going by a model I’ve seen.

            Sometime in the twentieth century, the colour for all wagons was changed to light

             grey, a bit darker than NORD wagons.

OUEST.  Fourgons were green, also RA wagons.  The rest were done darkish grey? (I’ve done

              some in dark brown, which I may have to repaint.) 

ETAT. Dennis Allenden states with the drawing I’ve shown “painted grey or brown”, not too

           helpful. The German book  says grey, but elsewhere I’ve seen ’sideros’ mentioned?

Edited May 27, 2022 by Northroader

[Andy Hayter]

I cannot make the eforum link work, which may be more to do with my current internet connection than anything else.

 

A few thoughts though:

 

A couple of years ago I raised the question of the degree of intercompany running of freight wagons.  This was based on a lack of clear pictures of wagons running outside their home territory and a demand from the Midi to have authority to build a line from Cete (Sete) to Marseille because of the slow rate of transhipment by the PLM at Cete.  

 

I could never get a clear indication of when transhipment ended - which clearly depends on wagons being built to standards agreed by both companies - however the clear view was the number of wagons working on foreign lines prior to WW1 would be very small indeed.  Perhaps only a few percent of all wagon movements would involve a foreign wagon.  Much different to the UK.  

[Pacific231G]

On 01/06/2020 at 21:00, Northroader said:

Working off some of those drawings I’ve made up a train. It’s just about the bare minimum of only three coaches, with a fourgon, a first/second composite, and a third.Trains were normally made up with a fourgon behind the engine, I fancy this was legislated for, to give a “crumple zone” in the event of a crash.

 

Hi Northroader

For some reason I've only just discovered your thread and it is very interesting 

 

Your surmise about the fourgon being legislated for is correct. I have a copy of the 1948 SNCF Instruction sur la composition des trains. By then it only applied to rapides and expresses where the first carriage was not of steel construction so it does seem to have been about collisions rather than boiler explosions. For wooden bodied coaches there had to be a fourgon or a fourgon (baggage) compartment between the locomotive and the passenger accomodation. If that wasn't possible, the first three compartments in the first coach had to be forbidden to passengers. The definition of passengers  didn't include grooms, livestock handlers and the like. Conveyeurs (mainly postal workers accompanying mail as postal regulations required) also didn't count as passengers so could travel in the fourgon. postal workers in TPOs did count as passengers though so wooden bodied  bureaux postaux ambulants couldn't be next to the loco but allèges postales could. All relevant to making up trains and I asssume that the regulations had covered a wider variery of passenger trains in the period you're modelling, hence such peculiarities as tank locos  with fourgon compartment built into the end or steam railcars with a fourgon compartment between the engine section and the passengers. On suburban lines requiring fast turnrounds it seems to have been normal practice to have a fourgon at both ends  of a train- that was certainly the case with the Est's double deckers on the Vincennes line out of Paris Bastille. 

The habit of marshalling a fourgon between the loco and train seems to have persisted for some time after it stopped being requred for slower trains and with steel bodied coaches.

Edited July 26, 2020 by Pacific231G

[Pacific231G]

11 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

I asssume that the regulations had covered a wider variery of passenger trains in the period you're modelling, hence such peculiarities as tank locos  with fourgon compartment built into the end

 

There was another reason for this peculiarity. The need to operate less well used lines as economically as possible led to so called Trains Legers (light trains) which I think were first introduced by the C.F. de l'Est though the locomotives-fourgon I know of were on the l'Ouest . Trains Leger were allowed to have a driver without a fireman but only if the conductor could stop the train if the driver was incapacitated. This required access to the cab and the conductor was also expected to assist the driver. I couldn't say whether in practice they actually rode in the fourgon or on the footplate but the fourgon compartment was still there between the locomotive and the passengers. This carried over into electric and diesel trains unless a dead man's device was fitted to stop the train automatically if the driver was incapacitated.  There was a further rule for push-pull steam trains where, if the driver and fireman were at opposite ends of the train, the conductor had to be with the driver or in an adjoining fourgon or passenger compartment and trained to stop the train if the driver was incapactitated. I don't know if there was a rule like this for British push-pull trains and this may anyway be irrelevant to the period you're modelling but trains leger may be more relevant.  

[Northroader]

I think the server was down overnight, Andy. I wonder if transshipment of goods if the wagons went off the parent company lasted that long? Surely the different companies could have got some accepted standards set up sooner or later for inter company traffic, a bit like our R.C.H. There was a Berne Convention at some time relating to international traffic, wagons built to their approved standards were termed “douanable” (customs) and marked with a small white St. Andrew’s Cross, and you can see this in the period I’m on about. Would this have been something basic like door handles capable of having seals attached?

Reference the traffic through Cette (Sete) one of the essays by Clive Lamming in the link I gave is about the growth of the MIDI and their hopes of a line as far as Marseilles.

I agree, David, that steam fourgons and the like were more about economical operating practices, the ETAT and Belgian State had them.  Push pull in France to me suggests my first outing to Paris, huge 2-8-2 tanks shoving a long sets of bogie coaches bedizened with bra adverts at the Gare du Nord, nothing like the Ashburton branch at all.

Edited July 26, 2020 by Northroader

[Northroader]

Using the drawings I prepared, also a few photographs, here’s my EST wagon fleet, although I have to confess I made the numbers up. 

one load i like to do on old wagons is fodder with a sheet over, which to me looks very Victorian. I used to dried flower heads pinched from my wife’s garden, but I think really I should have used thread rather than a single strand of string for the wagon sheet. The van in the fourth picture has one version of a guerite for the brakeman, nicely enclosed, as winters in the Vosges were more severe than the southern lines had.

Heres a builders photo of a van for comparison:

two versions of the goods fourgon, it looks as if the guard stood on top of the dog box to use the lookout.

one private owner van to go with them. Epernay is 140 km east of Paris, and was where the EST had their loco works. There’s a Junction for the main line through nearby Reims, and both places are at the heart of the Champagne region. I saw a model of this wagon on an ETS Trains dealers stall, and copied it on my own version. (ETS are the Czech O gauge tinplate  trains producer, I must mention what you can get up to with them sometime in the future)

addition: I’ve since come across some pukka photos of actual Mercier wagons, so I’d best slip them in here, it seems they worked out of Epernay on the EST system, but also Luxembourg using the Elsass Lothringen Lines, (as it was then, later the Alsace Lorraine system)

Edited October 3, 2022 by Northroader

[cctransuk]

32 minutes ago, Northroader said:

.... fodder with a sheet over ....

 

My representation of hay, straw, etc. is somewhat esoteric, though worth keeping an eye out.

 

If you can get one, a bullrush head can be 'deconstructed' into a mass that very closely resembles those substances.

 

John Isherwood.

[Northroader]

BRUSSELS NORD RAILWAY MUSEUM.

 

Spring of 1978, and the kids were 7 and 4 years old, so we thought they could manage a trip abroad, but keep it simple. Back then, the Regie voor Maritiem Transport was running a direct service with smart modern boats from Dover to Ostend, as they had been doing since 1846 when the railway opened, and that’s what we used. (I’m afraid to say they were wound up once the Channel Tunnel opened)

We liked Ostend, a smart resort with clean beaches, even if it was the same North Sea as you got at Clacton or Cromer, so quite weather conditional. There was a nice small hotel along the quayside, and the staff made a fuss of the kids. One day we managed a trip to Brussels, with a look round the centre, and I managed a quick whizz round the Railway Museum at Brussels Nord, very hurried on account of having the kids with us. It was in an annexe by the station, and has since closed, although I fancy the bulk of what was there is now showing at the new museum at Schaerbeek, the next stop along the line.

I thought I’d lay on a more leisurely tour round the old museum, as a trip out for all the self isolators in lockdown, but I’m afraid  I can’t offer moules and frites with a beer afterwards.

https://www.tassignon.be/trains/musee_nord/musee_nord.htm

Edited May 27, 2022 by Northroader

[TT-Pete]

Aah, memories. We too would take the RMT Ostend-Dover ferry in the 70's/80's, a four and a half hours crossing if memory serves, and all because Dad's dislike of France and the French was such that he refused to set foot in the country and so we couldn't take the quicker crossing from Calais just down the coast. Mind you, he did work for the European Commission at the time so that's completely understandable :^)  I had a quick spin through Ostend when I went back to Luxembourg by car last year, some bits are the same, but the station/ferry terminal area is completely re-developed and unrecognisable.

 

1992-4 I had a flat on Rue Royale, a 5 minute walk from Nord station and was a frequent visitor to the museum. Funny how what goes around comes around, my youngest daughter is in her 3rd year at University in Brussels, I had been planning a trip in the Autumn to visit her and go to the new "Trainworld" museum in Schaerbeek http://www.trainworld.be/en# but with the current insanity that is now not going to happen (gutted to be missing the Paul Delvaux exhibition).

 

[pete_mcfarlane]

2 hours ago, Northroader said:

I thought I’d lay on a more leisurely tour round the old museum, as a trip out for all the self isolators in lockdown, but I’m afraid  I can’t offer moules and frites with a beer afterwards.

https://www.tassignon.be/trains/musee_nord/musee_nord.htm

That's a very interesting virtual tour.  "Pays de Waes" in particular is not the sort of locomotive you see every day, even by the odd standards of Belgian steam locos. 

[Mikkel]

Yes very interesting. I had no idea the Dunalastair class had so inspired the Belgians.

 

I instantly liked The Elephant, must be the origin and livery 

[Compound2632]

41 minutes ago, Mikkel said:

Yes very interesting. I had no idea the Dunalastair class had so inspired the Belgians.

 

I instantly liked The Elephant, must be the origin and livery 

 

As told by John Thomas in The Springburn Story, Neilsons built a batch of typically Scottish 4-4-0s for the Dutch State Railways that, being used on international expresses, made a big impression on the Belgian and German railway authorities; McIntosh's Dunalastairs were being made much of in the technical press at the time. Representatives of the Belgian State Railways came to Glasgow with a truckload of Belgian coal which they requested McIntosh's permission to try out in a Dunalastair. The outcome was an order for five Dunalastair IIs from Neilsons in 1899; these revolutionised the working of the Belgian international expresses. Further orders would have been placed with Neilsons but there was outcry in Belgium against so much money going out of the country, so the engines were built in Belgium. (What I've never understood is what the final financial arrangements were - I assume the Caledonian, Neilsons, and / or McIntosh must have received some license fee or royalty). The Belgian State Railways developed the design until there were 424 Dunalastair-derived locomotives in several classes, including superheater versions and a 4-4-2T version. There were also 82 0-6-0s built in Belgium to drawings for the Caledonian 812 Class and a further 809 to an enlarged design. I make that 1,315 locomotives - rather more than the Caledonian Railway itself had!

[Northroader]

BELGIAN LOCO PRACTICE,  TRANSITION BELPAIRE TO MCINTOSH.

 

It’s quite interesting that through the nineteenth century the Belgian locomotive design had evolved to having large wide firegrates, and very generous cross sectional area chimneys, presumably to give a soft blast to get low quality coal to burn. Then did a complete switch to a Caledonian design of narrow fireboxes and sharper blastpipe arrangements, which must have proved successful to have so many engines of that type produced. Quite a contrast, although to me not so picturesque.

 

Edited October 2, 2022 by Northroader

[Pacific231G]

On 21/08/2020 at 21:08, Northroader said:

Spring of 1978, and the kids were 7 and 4 years old, so we thought they could manage a trip abroad, but keep it simple. Back then, the Regie voor Maritiem Transport was running a direct service with smart modern boats from Dover to Ostend, as they had been doing since 1846 when the railway opened, and that’s what we used. (I’m afraid to say they were wound up once the Channel Tunnel opened)

We liked Ostend, a smart resort with clean beaches, even if it was the same North Sea as you got at Clacton or Cromer, so quite weather conditional. There was a nice small hotel along the quayside, and the staff made a fuss of the kids. One day we managed a trip to Brussels, with a look round the centre, and I managed a quick whizz round the Railway Museum at Brussels Nord, very hurried on account of having the kids with us. It was in an annexe by the station, and has since closed, although I fancy the bulk of what was there is now showing at the new museum at Schaerbeek, the next stop along the line.

I thought I’d lay on a more leisurely tour round the old museum, as a trip out for all the self isolators in lockdown, but I’m afraid  I can’t offer moules and frites with a beer afterwards.

https://www.tassignon.be/trains/musee_nord/musee_nord.htm

My first trips abroad were to Blankenberg with my primary school in the late 1950s. The school was in a fairly poor part of Oxford but they used to take the top two years for a week at Easter.

We travelled via Ostend then a coach to Blankenberg and, though our trips to Zeebrugge and Madurodam in Holland were by coach (shame we didn't use the SNCV/NMVB coast tram for Zeebrugge) we went by train to Bruges where the lacemakers still worked sitting outside their houses. I'm afraid though that I thought the Belgian trains were very boring and rather uncomfortable. Apart from the rather ancient cream trams rattling through the streets and along the coastal road, my strongest memories are of the duck (ex US DUKW) that did trips from the beach (no hovercraft then so it was a strange sensation), ice cream parlours with more than the two or three flavours on offer in Britain at the time, waffles, fresh baguette and non-instant coffee for breakfast in the hotel, and watching Tintin cartoons with two sets of subtitles on the hotel's television. 

[Northroader]

NORD WAGON MODELS.

 

Padding the French wagon fleet up with some from the other main lines, starting with the NORD. This open was displayed as a model at a couple of GOG shows, and I took a real fancy to it, with the combination of slightly longer body, slightly shorter wheelbase,  and an enclosed sentrybox with an arty reverse curve down the end. I’ve never seen any drawings or pictures of the prototype, but should that stop you? I feel whoever made it must have tried, so I roughed out a drawing from a photo I did of the model, and cracked on. It’s got a cast resin load of goodies from Skytrex amended to fit inside, possibly these should be sheeted over in real life.

 

Then a couvert to go with it, starting with a drawing I worked out for a standard NORD van, with a detail showing a cattle van variation. The van I’ve made is based on this, but the “messageries” (parcels traffic)  variant, which is different in having a roof up to load gauge, rather the common “flat” roof, and also a longer body. Presumably this gave maximum space to low density loading. There’s a photo of one in SNCF days with a six wheel chassis, but there’s an earlier photo of a four wheeler in a yard. The NORD wagons with the high roofs are quite distinctive, they can be found cropping up in old photos, and I don’t think any of the other lines tried doing them. The body for this came from a pack from AnD products by Dennis Tillman. (I used to see him at the Winchester Am and Con show, but couldn't say whether he’s still trading). This is a set of thin plastikard sheets part cut (laser?) which assemble in layers for the sides and ends. You’re on your own for the roof, I did this with more layers on transverse formers, but the photo isn’t as flattering as I would have hoped for.

 

 

Edited October 2, 2022 by Northroader