BR Steel-bodied Highs including Soda Ash conversions, and the Manchester Ship Canal connection

[Mol_PMB]

I'm considering modelling one or more BR steel bodied 'High' open wagons for my Manchester Ship Canal based layout, have started some research and come up with some questions.

 

BR fitted Highs were certainly used for general merchandise to and from Manchester Docks and Trafford Park in the 1950s-1970s period, and appear in quite a lot of photos.

They also seem to have been the preferred rolling stock for railtours of the Manchester Ship Canal Railway in the 1960s and 1970s, and one of the attractions of modelling them would be to have a removable load of gricers!

https://www.branchline.uk/photo-new.php?id=365&pid=1275&seq=26

 

It appears that some Highs were built specifically for Soda Ash traffic, and others were converted for that purpose (strenghened door, sheet rail added, lots of extra branding).

I get they impression that they didn't last long in that traffic as most photographs of Highs branded 'Soda Ash' appear to be in more general use.

 

Can anyone give rough dates for the period when these wagons were in Soda Ash traffic?

Are there any records of which diagrams/lots/number of wagons were converted?

 

Now, @hmrspaul has an excellent gallery of these wagons (thanks Paul!):

https://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/bropenmerchandisesteel

Two of the wagons in that gallery are branded 'EMPTY TO MANCHESTER SHIP CANAL'. These are B480031 and B483055. Both are wagons built as Highs, converted for Soda Ash, but photographed in general use in 1979 and 1981. The branding looks to have been there some time.

For me modelling the MSC Railway, it would be a nice touch to model a wagon with this branding, if it fits within my 1960s period.

Soda Ash was handled by the Manchester Ship Canal Railway; there was a regular traffic exported from the tips at Partington. However, those tips could ONLY handle end-door wagons, and Highs don't have end doors.

And it wouldn't be 'Empty to'... as it was an export traffic.

 

Does anyone know whether the MSC branding was connected with their use for Soda Ash, or were they branded for the MSC earlier or later than the period they were used for Soda Ash?

 

If not associated with Soda Ash, what other traffic from the MSC might have justified the branding? Or perhaps Manchester Docks and Trafford Park always needed Highs for distribution of imported and manufactured goods?

 

I did find an image of a 1960s wagon label which would have been attached to High B482861 carrying goods imported on the ship 'Manchester Renown'. Whatever it was carrying (which might have been associated with pet food?) required a sheet to keep it dry:

 

Final question for now, and this is more of a modelling question (I'm working in 7mm scale).

All three wagons identified so far (B480031, B482861, B483055) were built with the LNER pattern of clasp brake gear.

I believe the Slaters kit for a High has Morton brake gear; some other Slaters kits for BR wagons have BR-pattern clasp brake gear.

There are some Parkside kits for LNER vans with the LNER pattern of clasp brake gear, but these have wooden underframes and many other differences.

Is there a source of 7mm scale LNER pattern clasp brake gear suitable for BR wagons?

 

Many thanks,

Mol

 

 

 

 

[SP Steve]

The first such Soda Ash wagons were converted from LNER Diagram 186 13T all steel opens to their Diagram 215 (Dave Larkin provides a list of 34 randomly numbered vehicles).

 

In BR days Shildon then produced 80 similar vehicles to Diagram 1/046 in 1952 to Lots 2369 / 2466 (B745500 - 579).  Another 80 vehicles of the same diagram (B745580 - 659) to Lot 3000 were cancelled in August 1956  in favour of converting existing vehicles to Diagram 1/046 status. Wagons for conversion (Diagram 1/037 and Diagram 1/041) were predominately equipped with LNER style brake gear but a few came from erstwhile unfitted Diagram 1/041 types equipped with Morton brake gear (which no doubt had been upgraded to vacuum brake).

 

Converted wagons kept their original running numbers with a list of them appearing in a data sheet by Dave Larkin. The list has 137 numbers of a random nature rather than being assigned to a block.

 

One thought re: usage is could they have been used to transfer imported Soda Ash from the MSC docks to local soap producers? Trafford Park had a number of soap manufacturers.

[Mol_PMB]

Many thanks Steve, that’s very helpful.

It is useful to know that the conversions were carried out in the mid 1950s and that they appear to have been confined to BR diagrams 1/037 and 1/041 (plus the LNER types). Also that they seem to have been selected randomly rather than in specific blocks of numbers. 

 

It’s a good thought that they could have been used by the MSC for imported minerals, often unloaded from ships at the Irwell Park wharf. For traffics remaining within the MSC system they would probably have used their own internal-use open wagons, but there may have been other mineral traffics going further afield which would have benefited from the sheet rail of a soda ash or highbar wagon. Sulphur and lamp black were imported in large quantities to Manchester, for example. 

 

Many thanks,

Mol