Westinghouse brake pipes

[corneliuslundie]

I am currently building some Rhymney Railway carriages. The Rhymney was a Westinghouse line.

Is there any information about the colour of the brake hoses? They look dark in photos, but that could mean almost anything as they are often in shadow.

I know that the LB&SCR had colour coding, and much later there were standard colours for vacuum brake hoses to indicate braked or through piped.

Jonathan 

[Steamport Southport]

One locomotive I can think of that does still have a Westinghouse brake is GER 490. As opposed to one which had them removed and then refitted such as any Caledonian locomotives.

 

The hoses themselves seem a brown colour. Leather?

 

https://preservedbritishsteamlocomotives.com/62785-ger-490-lner-7490-lner-7802-lner-2785-br-62785/

 

But look grey on the J69. Could that just be dirt though?

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/rgadsdon/4951169240

 

https://preservedbritishsteamlocomotives.com/68633-ger-87-lner-7087-lner-8633-br-68633/

 

 

Jason

[Nick Holliday]

19 hours ago, corneliuslundie said:

I am currently building some Rhymney Railway carriages. The Rhymney was a Westinghouse line.

Is there any information about the colour of the brake hoses? They look dark in photos, but that could mean almost anything as they are often in shadow.

I know that the LB&SCR had colour coding, and much later there were standard colours for vacuum brake hoses to indicate braked or through piped.

Jonathan 

Brake hoses, in general, were probably made out of vulcanised rubber, and this was usually black in colour, as carbon black is added for extra strength, although they would appear as dark grey from any distance. Westinghouse pipes did not require reinforcement, as they only had to withstand internal pressure, and hence plain tubing could be used, with a smooth surface. Pipes for vacuum brakes had to withstand external pressure, requiring wired reinforcement to prevent the hose collapsing, hence the ribbing to the pipe, and sometimes, I think, a fabric covering. "The Big Four in Colour" is an excellent source for such details, including a thirties photo of a GER 0-4-0ST.

Paint probably wouldn't last long on a flexible pipe anyway, but there is a picture of a Lord Nelson class, prepared for Royal Train duty, with a white painted front brake hose.  The LBSC colour coding mentioned wasn't applied to the pipe itself, just the connectors (brass?), and I think the later standard was applied to the colour of the rigid section of the brake standard.

[Wickham Green too]

19 hours ago, corneliuslundie said:

...... standard colours for vacuum brake hoses to indicate braked or through piped.

Depends whether we're talking about 'hoses', couplings or standpipes. The hose, itself, would have been rubber with some sort of woven reinforcement incorporated - so probably brownish / blackish / greyish. Standpipes would have been painted and the colour might signify the use - though this would have varied from railway to railway and probably varied over time too ..... the hose couplings might have been plain cast aluminium ( or similar ? ) or could have been painted to match.

[corneliuslundie]

Thanks to all for your answers. Yes, I meant the metalwork as I had worked out that the rubber would be a grey or dirty colour.

It sounds like one of those areas where the only way of finding out is to paint some and wait to be told I am wrong.

Jonathan

[Wickham Green too]

Yes,  the LB&SCR had colour coding for their motor train hoses - but possibly only after an incident in 1912 when hoses were incorrectly connected. A 1909 drawing suggests that red or brown* were used for the Westinghouse connector and orange or yellow for the 'storage' line ..... presumably the incident resulted from confusion between orange and brown. 1911 & 1913 drawings showed black for the Westinghouse line ( and green for 'storage' ) - so I'd guess black was in general use thereafter. [ Yes, the dates are confusing - it's suggested ( LB&SCR Carriages vol.3 ) that the 1909 drawing might have been back-dated.]

* might these have been loco frame colours at the time ?

[corneliuslundie]

Yes, that's where I reads about the LB&SCR practice, while preparing the book for publication.

Jonathan

[The Stationmaster]

The GWR Appendix does not note any exception or additional information in respect of Rhymney Railway vehicles so it looks as if RR standpipes would have been painted in the standard colours i.e. black for brake fitted vehicles and red for through pipes not actuating a Westinghouse automatic brake on that vehicle. 

[Nick Holliday]

The instructions for the LBSCR (a Westinghouse Brake line) for working with the Vacuum Automatic Brake state:

All pipes operating Brake-blocks are painted Black, and all Pipes not operating Brake-blocks are painted a bright red.

 

It is interesting that in BR days, a number of Southern and pre-Grouping coaches, after about 1955, had the metal work of the brake hoses painted a bright red, and some had a red band around the flexible hose as well. Presumably a different convention, as it is unlikely that these coaches were not automatically braked.

[roythebus1]

Luckily the later standard is simpler, red ends for automatic brake pipe, yellow for main reservoir pipe. Except LT who used red for brk pipe and blue for min res. The difference is also in the pipe coupling heads. The brake pipe has a hole, the main res has a star valve. It the train breaks away, you want the brake to apply, so air vents to atmosphere. On the main res pipe, the star valve closes with air pressure behind it to prevent the main res pipe leaking. 

 

Westinghouse fitted steam locos operated on the single pipe system. There's only a couple of heritage railways that use Westinghouse, the notable example being the IWSR.

Edited July 27, 2021 by roythebus1

[jim.snowdon]

37 minutes ago, roythebus1 said:

Luckily the later standard is simpler, red ends for automatic brake pipe, yellow for main reservoir pipe. Except LT who used red for brk pipe and blue for min res. The difference is also in the pipe coupling heads. The brake pipe has a hole, the main res has a star valve. It the train breaks away, you want the brake to apply, so air vents to atmosphere. On the main res pipe, the star valve closes with air pressure behind it to prevent the main res pipe leaking. 

 

Westinghouse fitted steam locos operated on the single pipe system. There's only a couple of heritage railways that use Westinghouse, the notable example being the IWSR.

And even if you are totally colour blind, the brake pipe and the reservoir pipes cannot be connected by virtue of having opposite handed couplings. (The same is true of the two-pipe vacuum system used on the DMUs).

 

The whole issue of colours was essentially immaterial until diesel locomotives came along, with more air pipes than just the brake main and reservoir pipes. Until then, the only potential problems were with the air operated push-pull systems.

 

[The Stationmaster]

12 hours ago, jim.snowdon said:

And even if you are totally colour blind, the brake pipe and the reservoir pipes cannot be connected by virtue of having opposite handed couplings. (The same is true of the two-pipe vacuum system used on the DMUs).

 

The whole issue of colours was essentially immaterial until diesel locomotives came along, with more air pipes than just the brake main and reservoir pipes. Until then, the only potential problems were with the air operated push-pull systems.

 

Not really immaterial Jim as there was a rather important need to know if a vehicle had an automatic brake or if the pipe was simply (to use the vernacular) 'a blow through'

[Wickham Green too]

And not really immaterial if you're an air-brake railway and you install an air-operated pull & push system which is physically capable of mis-coupling ............... like wot the Brighton done !

[45125]

On 27/07/2021 at 21:26, jim.snowdon said:

And even if you are totally colour blind, the brake pipe and the reservoir pipes cannot be connected by virtue of having opposite handed couplings. (The same is true of the two-pipe vacuum system used on the DMUs).

 

The whole issue of colours was essentially immaterial until diesel locomotives came along, with more air pipes than just the brake main and reservoir pipes. Until then, the only potential problems were with the air operated push-pull systems.

 

The main res and brake coupling heads are not handed, they can be coupled. This led in the early days of twin pipe air brake working to an incident on a service from Newcastle.

[Right Away]

8 hours ago, 45125 said:

The main res and brake coupling heads are not handed, they can be coupled. This led in the early days of twin pipe air brake working to an incident on a service from Newcastle.

 

Also at Littlehampton, Sussex on August 4th 1920 when an ex-LBSCR 0-4-2 after being incorrectly piped to its train at Ford, decided it wanted to have a look around the town!

(Sources: Railway Archives website and “The Other Side of the Southern” Issue 8)
 

[jim.snowdon]

On 28/07/2021 at 23:39, 45125 said:

The main res and brake coupling heads are not handed, they can be coupled. This led in the early days of twin pipe air brake working to an incident on a service from Newcastle.

I'll plead age related amnesia on this one - it's 25 years since I had anything to do with traditional air braked vehicles and handing them is such an obvious thing to do, rather akin to the way in which left hand threads are standard for pipe fittings for certain gases, oxygen being a notable example.