Jump to content
 

Pick up goods and Working Timetables


MDP78
 Share

Recommended Posts

  • RMweb Gold
16 hours ago, MDP78 said:

 

Using the example of open wagons a roll of 1 would mean 50% of the ones in the train would be dropped off, a roll of 2 would mean 100% dropped off.

 

A 3 means 50% dropped off in the branch exchange sidings and a roll of 4 100% dropped in the branch exchange. 

 

A 5 or 6 means no general wagons dropped off.

 

I dont roll anything to determine which sidings the wagons go to. I have a siding with a goods shed and loading platform, a siding without and a siding with a loading dock. The latter is served in the opposite direction to the other 2. There is also a refuge siding that the goods uses to park the wagons not needed to be dropped off.

 

I shunt vans to the goods shed or loading platform. Open wagons also may go to the loading platform or the siding without the goods shed as do coal wagons. The loading dock has a crane so has wagons like conflats.

 

Presumably you also include some mandatory wagons which arrive every day as would have happened at many places in the real world?   Our local branch terminus received at least two Vanfits every day loaded with goods smalls  and they were mandatory vans from Paddington Goods which by then (the early 1960s) was the smalls transfer station for our branch terminus - thus two vans would arrive even if one of them might be empty or contain very little and obviosuly an additional van would arrive if there was extra traffic.  Officially I think the station 'made' two loaded vans every day for Paddington although occasionally a van might be made for elsewhere if traffic demanded.  The station also received ferry vans from time to time as a local company imported and distributed wooden toys made in Czechoslovakia.

 

When I was working in a goods depot in the mid/late 1960s the same sort of thing happened - we received and made mandatory vans through the goods shed although by then if there was insufficient outwards traffic the vans would be offered as empties and distributed accordingly.  But we also made additional vans if traffic demanded as some of our regular customers didn't despatch traffic every day but had sudden rushes one or two days as week as they fulfilled customer orders.  The same happened with inwards vans - we usually had one or two vans loaded with vulnerable traffic every week (tobacco from Bristol) plus vans loaded with Danish Bacon arriving from docks in London as required for warehousing, and traffic for FWW (Woolworths - who distributed as much as possible by rail) sometimes came as full van loads as well as stuff sent at g Goods rates by mail order companies (some of them forwarded traffic at both Passenger and Goods rates).

  • Informative/Useful 6
Link to post
Share on other sites

There is definitely an art to creating a realistic freight traffic generating system.

My involvement was not until the late 1970s and then the 1980s when I was working in Bristol TOPS,

so I could see the regular traffic patterns as they evolved during the transition between the vacuum braked wagon load network, and the replacement Speedlink Network. 

I think a successful freight system is one that balances the regular daily/weekly traffic with the seasonal fluctuations and one-off special traffics, a system that allows a certain pattern to develop, but with fluctuations.

 

edit - to use the example from Mike above where two vans were mandated to pass daily, then perhaps a dice roll of one to five means the two vans pass normally, a dice roll of six means you receive an extra van that day.

 

cheers 

Edited by Rivercider
Additional info
  • Like 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Presumably you also include some mandatory wagons which arrive every day as would have happened at many places in the real world?   Our local branch terminus received at least two Vanfits every day loaded with goods smalls  and they were mandatory vans from Paddington Goods which by then (the early 1960s) was the smalls transfer station for our branch terminus - thus two vans would arrive even if one of them might be empty or contain very little and obviosuly an additional van would arrive if there was extra traffic.  Officially I think the station 'made' two loaded vans every day for Paddington although occasionally a van might be made for elsewhere if traffic demanded.  The station also received ferry vans from time to time as a local company imported and distributed wooden toys made in Czechoslovakia.

 

When I was working in a goods depot in the mid/late 1960s the same sort of thing happened - we received and made mandatory vans through the goods shed although by then if there was insufficient outwards traffic the vans would be offered as empties and distributed accordingly.  But we also made additional vans if traffic demanded as some of our regular customers didn't despatch traffic every day but had sudden rushes one or two days as week as they fulfilled customer orders.  The same happened with inwards vans - we usually had one or two vans loaded with vulnerable traffic every week (tobacco from Bristol) plus vans loaded with Danish Bacon arriving from docks in London as required for warehousing, and traffic for FWW (Woolworths - who distributed as much as possible by rail) sometimes came as full van loads as well as stuff sent at g Goods rates by mail order companies (some of them forwarded traffic at both Passenger and Goods rates).

At the moment there are no mandatory wagons per day. This is partly because I haven't had chance to work through a full 'week' yet (or 6 turns).  

 

The numbers of wagons allocated by each dice rolls takes account of existing stock levels as well. 

 

There is a mandatory 2 extra vans every other day/turn for the branch though. It is assumed the branch has a creamery like Pickhill near Wrexham that received Cadbury's chocolate crumb deliveries.

 

Whilst that is prototypical to a point I have no idea if vans would have been delivered (and indeed returned) daily. Pickhill also could have two to three times that number delivered. But if I was to replicate that I'd run out of vans for other trains quite quickly!! 

Edited by MDP78
  • Like 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

One I have used the current 'rules' for allocating wagons to trains and to the goods yard I do plan to look into something like chance cards to add an extra dimension. My initial thoughts on this are perhaps an extra wagon or van being delivered, perhaps something more unusual may turn up on a goods train (presflos for example) or a wagon or van needing to be picked up on an earlier train because an urgent delivery is needed.

 

I am looking forward to the release of the KR Models Palbrick wagons. As there were brick works in the Wrexham and North Shropshire areas and my layout is loosely located there, I think I can get away with assuming the branch serves one. That would add another variable for traffic.

Link to post
Share on other sites

A local line to me had a number of small stations without any fixed cranes for handling heavy items.

They did however have a small traveling crane, if required this had to be booked the day before and was worked down as part of the pickup goods, presumably being collected the next day.

This practice probably ceased in the 1920s as road transport took over much general goods.

 

Pete

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
18 hours ago, IWCR said:

A local line to me had a number of small stations without any fixed cranes for handling heavy items.

They did however have a small traveling crane, if required this had to be booked the day before and was worked down as part of the pickup goods, presumably being collected the next day.

This practice probably ceased in the 1920s as road transport took over much general goods.

 

Pete

 

Depends very much on the period modelled as road mobile cranes were very much the thing in BR times.  If somebody is modelling the WR there is the excellent Oxford Diecast model of a Freightlifter.  Some of these were held as Divisional controlled cranes and would be sent, by road, to any station where there was a traffic demand for them although going to lifting a load off a single wagon would be a bit unusual.

 

https://www.oxforddiecast.co.uk/products/shelvoke-and-drewry-freightlifter-forklift-british-rail-western-76sdf001

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
14 hours ago, Railpassion said:

In an ideal world BR would've started freight forwarding and bought lorries to set up a complete logistics business.

 

2 hours ago, corneliuslundie said:

Wasn't that the business which was handed to National Carriers? The GWR and the LMS (the others probably) had comprehensive delivery networks before the Second World War which BR inherited.

Jonathan

Except BR wasn't legally allowed to handle any traffic throughout by road - notwithstanding the fact that it had the largest freight road vehicle fleet in Britain including plenty of large artics which could cover overnight road trunk haulage.  And yes - the road fleet, and the depots and many of the yards, together with all the staff were transferred to National Carriers (and merged with BRS). when it was set up in 1967 - and NCL was permitted to operate road trunking so it gradually took away all the goods small traffic which was still rail trunked and transferred it to road haulage.  

 

And BR had to hire all its parcels collection and delivery vehicles from NCL and originally all BR departmental road vehicles, including cars, had to be maintained by NCL although some of that changed over the years where it could be shown that NCL were not providing a suitable level of service.   At one time when I was working In South Wales I had to spend two successive Sundays sorting out a Mini which NCL had allegedly been servicing regularly - their standards of workmanship varied massively from place to place.

  • Like 1
  • Informative/Useful 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

On 14/11/2021 at 11:55, The Stationmaster said:

 

 

And BR had to hire all its parcels collection and delivery vehicles from NCL and originally all BR departmental road vehicles, including cars, had to be maintained by NCL although some of that changed over the years where it could be shown that NCL were not providing a suitable level of service.   At one time when I was working In South Wales I had to spend two successive Sundays sorting out a Mini which NCL had allegedly been servicing regularly - their standards of workmanship varied massively from place to place.

 

As well as the standards of workmanship varying I think there were allegations of work done that was not required, and work charged for that was not done, (and not by accident either as I understood it!)

 

cheers

Edited by Rivercider
clarification
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
1 hour ago, Rivercider said:

As well as the standards of workmanship varying I think there were allegations of work done that was not required, and work charged for that was not done, (and not by accident either as I understood it!)

 

cheers

You understand correctly if some of what I saw was any indication - definitely jobs not done on cars but charged for and jobs not properly done on other vehicles.  Hence BR played a good hand by making sure it kept Road Motor Vehicle Inspectors who spent a lot of time chasing NCL on servicing issues as well as doing such useful jobs as carrying out Driving tests for BR Domestic Licences.  the WR London Inspector was still keeping busy chasing NCL well into the 1980s.

  • Like 2
  • Informative/Useful 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...