Mineral Railways - Modelling & Musings

[Edwardian]

As I have an interest in several, not least the Brampton and the numerous private railways of the North East, I thought the advent of suitable pre-and post-Grouping rolling stock in the form of Accurascale Chaldrons might warrant the convenience of a dedicated topic.

 

Of course, we also had the announcement of a private mineral railway tank from the North West in the form of Bellerophon. 

 

RTR continues to take new and interesting directions. 

 

As I may have mentioned, I have a particular fondness for the Pontop & Jarrow, a typical NE private mineral line in that it was built to bring coal from a network of collieries to river staiths, in this case at Jarrow, on the Tyne.  Also pretty typically, the line was divided by inclined planes, so, on the P&J, loco-worked stretches at each end were worked separately due to intervening inclined planes.  As I think is well-known, at a place called Marley Hill, the P&J had its shed for the western end of the line, and here the P&J crossed on the level the NER's Tanfield Branch, originally part of the Brandling Junction Railway, a company that must be celebrated if only for naming itself after its progenitors rather than its locality; Brandling was the name of people, brothers, not a place.

 

 

 

Anyway, back to chaldrons, colloquially referred to as 'black wagons' for obvious reasons.  I have heard tell that they survived in places even into the 1960s, but, on the P&JR, their demise was relatively early. The P&JR was an 'early adopter' of larger capacity 'mainline' mineral wagons and made a dramatic pyre of the remaining 'black wagons' in 1911. 

 

 

I actually have a P&JR locomotive and itch to have a mirco or diorama based at or near Marley Hill. The chosen period would be c.1904. Thus, I was delighted to note that among the many and varied chaldron packs to be offered by Accurascale is 'Pack D: Pontop & Jarrow Railway - Two ex-NER P1 style Chaldrons and an S&DR style Chaldron in pre-1932 lettering, circa 1910'.  In the last years of their use on the P&J, it is believed they were confined to the western end, so, I suppose, 'internal user' duties around the collieries, rather than up and down the inclines to the staiths. This makes them ideal for my purposes.

 

 

Edited October 1, 2021 by Edwardian

[sir douglas]

the Charles Brandling of the same family also owned Middleton colliery

[F-UnitMad]

The photo of P&JR No. 7 in the OP, is the centre driver blind? (i.e. flangeless?) Wouldn't be surprised, given how close it is to the rear set!!

6 hours ago, Edwardian said:

 I was delighted to note that among the many and varied chaldron packs to be offered by Accurascale is 'Pack D: Pontop & Jarrow Railway - Two ex-NER P1 style Chaldrons and an S&DR style Chaldron in pre-1932 lettering, circa 1910'. 

Almost got your name written on that pack specially, eh?

[Caley Jim]

57 minutes ago, F-UnitMad said:

The photo of P&JR No. 7 in the OP, is the centre driver blind? (i.e. flangeless?) Wouldn't be surprised, given how close it is to the rear set!!

It certainly looks as though it is.  The driven wheels on the HR Jones Goods were the same.

 

Jim

[CKPR]

As I've got a rake of Smallbrooke Studio  P1s waiting to be built, I'll pass on the caldrons and wait for the S&DR long boiler 0-6-0 that must surely be in the pipeline...the mineral lines of the north east are a long-standing interest of mine and my hypothetical project would be the Waskerley line ( perhaps just a working diorama of the loco shed ?) 

[Edwardian]

13 hours ago, CKPR said:

As I've got a rake of Smallbrooke Studio  P1s waiting to be built, I'll pass on the caldrons and wait for the S&DR long boiler 0-6-0 that must surely be in the pipeline...the mineral lines of the north east are a long-standing interest of mine and my hypothetical project would be the Waskerley line ( perhaps just a working diorama of the loco shed ?) 

 

Waskerley is a firm favourite of mine. I love the shed building and the utter bleakness of the location.  Nearby Hownes Gill viaduct I'd love to model.

 

There is possibly a sweet spot in the 1850-1860s (if Hownes Gill viaduct included, not before 1859) when you could find the early conventional S&D 0-6-0s working alongside the last generation of Hackworth-type twin-tender 0-6-0s. That would be fascinating.

 

As I dimly recall, more conventional 0-6-0s started to appear on the S&D from the late Forties, and by 1852 or so you had the first of the 'iconic' Bouch long-boilers.  The S&D had been ordering/building Hackworth twin-tender types up to the late Forties, probably Tory/Miner classes, like Derwent IIRC, so there is probably a period of 10-15 years where both ancient and modern types could be seen together.  I seem to recall that Waskerley was one of the last strongholds of the Hackworth types. 

[CKPR]

Well, as I need both NER hoppers (P5 or earlier) and an NER brake van for  my interpretation of  'Brampton Town', a perusal of the Furness Railway Co. catalogue for the former and dusting down plans of the  O/F 'Waskerley brake van  for the latter would seem to be in order. I've always wanted to build a model of the Waskerley van ever since I saw a photograph of one running on Bill Tate's 'Millport & Selfield' layout (from which I first read of the North Sunderland Rly.).

Edited October 2, 2021 by CKPR