Wright writes.....

[Dunsignalling]

1 hour ago, Tony Wright said:

 

As far as I know, all these are Peterborough-Grimsby (nominal) five-sets, so nowhere near the SR. 

 

And, here's a Grimsby-Peterborough.

 

 

Could that be an ex-GW 'Fruit D' at the front? 

 

Again, please respect copyright.

 

Food for thought? 

 

 

It is indeed, but possibly one of the BR-built batch. The BR designation was "PasFruit D".

 

John

[Headstock]

1 hour ago, Tony Wright said:

With comments regarding ex-SR vans being ubiquitous, how about these?

 

Good morning Tony,

 

I cant let you get away with that one. Ubiquitous on freight workings I think was the conversation. Those examples look amazingly like passenger trains and not untypical of the kind of timetabled NPC diagrams I was describing up thread. Anyway, they can't have been ubiquitous because they were entirely absent from my own area and era of railway model land, a fair few GWR NPC's and lots of LNER six wheelers though.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Headstock
make space.

[PMP]

1 hour ago, LNER4479 said:

Any interesting selection, Tony. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of time this morning but, from a quick look through just now, I don't see too many wooden-bodied MINERAL wagons. Plenty of wooden-bodied open goods wagons (eg photo 12) but they're different animals.

 

A good deal depends on the traffic flow and location you’re modelling. For me doing the Forest of Dean 55-65 there are plenty of images of 7 plank minerals well into the early 60’s. Notable is their replacement by and heavy use of the 16t steel mineral, rather than 21tonners/hoppers etc.
 

Looking at mixed freight there’s plenty of LMS/BR types extant, in addition to GW. Also of note reference the above discussion are both LNER and the distinctive SR build ply sided vans. Very little in the way of ‘special’ types,

 the most frequent unusual type in images is the ‘French’ cupboard door type mineral. Whilst researching trains one I found of interest was regular workings of orange juice in barrels in standard opens and without tarpaulins. The fitted opens above from a mix of Airfix bodies and Parkside chassis’ representing that traffic.

[LNER4479]

1 hour ago, Tony Wright said:

 

Interestingly, the loco in photo two (which I think is at Portobello) is lamped-up as a pick-up goods. 

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Yes, I did note quite a few of the trains depicted were lamped thus - technically speaking a Class K 'Freight, mineral or ballast train stopping at intermediate stations'. That certainly describes the beloved (of modellers) 'pick up goods' but I believe the category was intended to be a bit more broader than that.

[Atso]

Hello everyone,

 

All this talk about various company's wagons making their way around the system is interesting. May I please share my latest efforts building various plastic kits of non-LNER wagons.

 

 

Some Southern Railway vans (since painted) build from N Gauge Society kits. These will be fitted with 2mm Association etched chassis (but with N gauge wheels) rather than the generic Peco ones. These vans (and/or variations of them) seem to crop up quite often in photographs of 1930's LNER fitted goods trains.

 

 

A pair of 2mm Association LMS vans, also awaiting etched underframes. Due to the slight difference in scale between N and 2mm scale, these will run next to some open wagons.

 

 

An LMS cattle wagon from the same source as above. I understand that the LNER build versions were not highly regarded and that other company's wagons ran where possible.

 

 

An LMS tube wagon built from a Roger Chiver's kit (plastic filings since removed from the end!).

 

Some nice quick builds to pass the time over the last few days.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Atso

[Dunsignalling]

11 minutes ago, PMP said:

A good deal depends on the traffic flow and location you’re modelling. For me doing the Forest of Dean 55-65 there are plenty of images of 7 plank minerals well into the early 60’s. Notable is their replacement by and heavy use of the 16t steel mineral, rather than 21tonners/hoppers etc.
 

Looking at mixed freight there’s plenty of LMS/BR types extant, in addition to GW. Also of note reference the above discussion are both LNER and the distinctive SR build ply sided vans. Very little in the way of ‘special’ types,

 the most frequent unusual type in images is the ‘French’ cupboard door type mineral. Whilst researching trains one I found of interest was regular workings of orange juice in barrels in standard opens and without tarpaulins. The fitted opens above from a mix of Airfix bodies and Parkside chassis’ representing that traffic.

Interesting, I've just prepared a batch of Base Toys barrels as loads for a couple of Hyfits...

 

As time went on, such traffic as continued to be carried in open wagons became increasingly slanted toward loads that didn't require sheeting.

 

Oil or chemicals in drums, various building materials, packing cases and cable drums spring to mind as alternatives. Not to mention the odd container where there was no Conflat handy to carry it....

 

John

Edited December 28, 2021 by Dunsignalling

[Headstock]

4 minutes ago, PMP said:

A good deal depends on the traffic flow and location you’re modelling. For me doing the Forest of Dean 55-65 there are plenty of images of 7 plank minerals well into the early 60’s. Notable is their replacement by and heavy use of the 16t steel mineral, rather than 21tonners/hoppers etc.
 

Looking at mixed freight there’s plenty of LMS/BR types extant, in addition to GW. Also of note reference the above discussion are both LNER and the distinctive SR build ply sided vans. Very little in the way of ‘special’ types,

 the most frequent unusual type in images is the ‘French’ cupboard door type mineral. Whilst researching trains one I found of interest was regular workings of orange juice in barrels in standard opens and without tarpaulins. The fitted opens above from a mix of Airfix bodies and Parkside chassis’ representing that traffic.

 

I've liberated some of those bodies from the likes of 'Devises Sand' myself. Its like watching 'Born Free'.

[Dunsignalling]

4 minutes ago, Atso said:

Hello everyone,

 

All this talk about various company's wagons making their way around the system is interesting. May I please share my latest efforts building various plastic kits of non-LNER wagons.

 

 

Some Southern Railway vans (since painted) build from N Gauge Society kits. These will be fitted with 2mm Association etched chassis (but with N gauge wheels) rather than the generic Peco ones. These vans (and/or variations of them) seem to crop up quite often in photographs of 1930's LNER fitted goods trains.

 

 

A pair of 2mm Association LMS vans, also awaiting etched underframes. Due to the slight difference in scale between N and 2mm scale, these will run next to some open wagons.

 

 

An LMS cattle wagon from the same source as above. I understand that the LNER build versions were not highly regarded and that other company's wagons ran where possible.

 

 

An LMS tube wagon built from a Roger Chiver's kit (plastic filings since removed from the end!).

 

Some nice quick builds to pass the time over the last few days.

The thing with the Southern ones is that the unique roof profile makes even a single one present way back in a photo of a train impossible to ignore!

 

John

[Headstock]

14 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

Interesting, I've just prepared a batch of Base Toys barrels as loads for a couple of Hyfits...

 

As time went on, such traffic as continued to be carried in open wagons became increasingly slanted toward loads that didn't require sheeting.

 

Oil or chemicals in drums, various building materials, packing cases and cable drums spring to mind as alternatives.

 

John

 

That's true but 1960 was hardly the pinnacle of railway achievements, freight and its steam era wagons were in serious decline. Personal, I shall be disappointed if Shipley Model Railway Societies 1930s Clayton layout, doesn't have a big chunk of General merchandised wagons piled high with sheeted wool.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Headstock

[Northmoor]

10 minutes ago, Headstock said:

 

I've liberated some of those bodies from the likes of 'Devises Sand' myself. Its like watching 'Born Free'.

The Airfix mineral wagon bodies are crisply-detailed on the outside.  Unfortunately like so many wagons of that era, they have no representation of the doors on the inside, so unless disguised with dummy loads, they apparently needed to be craned upside to empty them.

[Compound2632]

12 hours ago, bbishop said:

WAGONS

 

I've extracted most of this data from the work of Essery and Rowland.  I presented most of this information earlier in the month but some people have already forgotten it.

 

Freight Wagons - it took perhaps three years for BR wagons to appear in any numbers so my starting point is 1950, when the percentages of company wagons was LMS 44%; LNER 33%; certain other railway 17%; SR 6%.  Then wagon building was cyclical and the LMS built many thousand open wagons in the 1920s to replace the D229 (o D299?) wagons inherited from the MR; meanwhile the SR barely built a wagon between 1923 - 29. 

 

Wagon building was disrupted by WW2 so a good proportion of company stock  would need to be replaced by 1960.  I'm going to say 50% but would be happy to see a better figure.  So perhaps 50% of wagons would be BR in 1960, so halving the percentages of company wagons given above.

 

Then somewhere between 80 -90% would be vans or containers, less than 10% opens, way less than 10% specials.

 

Mineral wagons - the huge majority would be either 13 ton wooden wagons or 16 ton steel wagons.  13 ton would be mainly 7 or 8 plank and marked E, M or (the great majority) P.  16 ton would be marked B, with a tiny number of M (I run an LMS D2134 wagon!).  At some point there were more 16 ton than 13 ton, I reckon this happened in the late 1950s, again happy for someone to provide a more precise date.

 

So how are freight trains made up?  I accept there will be differences between fast and slow trains, but I shall keep things very simple.  If one analysed every train running through (say) Little Bytham for a week then the figures should be close to those expounded above.  But individual trains will not agree with these figures.  Four consecutive trains of 25 wagons should have a total of 3 SR wagons.  But they won't - they could have zero or they could have six or more. Almost purely random.

 

So the same arguments apply to the model of Little Bytham.    Tony is culling wagons that are "wrong".  But the wagons that are "right" should not be run in statistically precise trains, it's not how the railways were operated.

 

Bill

 

 

D299. 

 

To add a bit more on the LMS side, which is all I really know anything about:

 

As Bill, says, there was a slump in LMS wagon building in the early 1930s - understandable from an economic perspective. (As I mentioned a couple of days ago, at the end of 1931, LMS-built wagons accounted for just 34% of LMS wagon stock.) The numbers built once production picked up again were only on average half as many per year as in the 1920s, so that by the end of 1946 62% of LMS wagon stock had been built since 1922. Wartime production held up surprisingly well. 

 

But I find it interesting that on the Midland, there was a similar slump thirty years earlier. This may have been due to a slowing in economic growth after the Boer War but I wonder if there was another factor at work. Thirty years earlier, the late 1860s/early 1870s, was a period of great growth for the Midland, with new lines to Manchester, London, and Carlisle, and correspondingly the following years were a period of great growth for its wagon fleet. If one supposes a thirty-year book lifetime for a wagon, one starts to see a cycle: vast numbers of 8 ton open goods and mineral wagons built 1882-1902 (D299 and its relatives), with replacement but 10 ton and later 12 ton wagons built 1911-1930 by the Midland (D302/D663A plus mineral types) and LMS (D1666/7 and mineral types). The cycle is broken by the second world war (the first had upset it a bit, too) so that large-scale replacement was delayed by a decade or so. A similar pattern can be seen with 3-plank dropside wagons (low sided wagons in Midland-speak, LMS medium goods); these were the earliest Midland standard type, built continuously up to 1888; apart from a couple of batches in 1897/8, large-scale production did not resume until 1905, continuing until 1916. It's notable that the LMS didn't build any more of this type until 1935 (D1927) with bulk production continuing until 1945 - this looks like a 30-year renewal cycle to me!

 

It can be objected that the LMS inherited more than just the Midland wagon fleet. The proportions at 1922 were: Midland, 40%; LNWR 27%; Caledonian, 17%; L&Y, 12%; G&SWR, 7%. I haven't analysed the LNWR or L&Y wagon books in detail but I have a hunch there was a similar early-century slump in wagon building on the LNWR as on the Midland. It's evident from the sheer quantity of D1666/7 opens and undiagrammed mineral wagons built by the LMS in the 1920s that they weren't renewing solely the 40,000 or so 19th century Midland 8 ton wagons not already replaced by the Midland itself in the decade before the grouping, but such replacement did account for at least the 40% proportionate share.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Compound2632

[Dunsignalling]

22 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

The Airfix mineral wagon bodies are crisply-detailed on the outside.  Unfortunately like so many wagons of that era, they have no representation of the doors on the inside, so unless disguised with dummy loads, they apparently needed to be craned upside to empty them.

On the 5-planks, along with weathering the interiors, sticking a vertical bit of 5 thou microstrip either side of the (supposed) door openings creates an adequate illusion from normal layout viewing distances.  Whatever livery those were produced in, they are LMS merchandise wagons, though.

 

The only Airfix 16-ton mineral was the kit, with separate doors and it's easy enough to scribe the other shut lines on the inside before assembly. An old pal of mine used to make paper liners for the RTR 21-tonner, with the lines drawn on; paint and weathering did the rest.

 

There is only one place for the Airfix 7-plank wagons, the plastics recycling bin. Their only correct feature is the number of planks....

 

John

Edited December 28, 2021 by Dunsignalling

[Headstock]

12 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

The Airfix mineral wagon bodies are crisply-detailed on the outside.  Unfortunately like so many wagons of that era, they have no representation of the doors on the inside, so unless disguised with dummy loads, they apparently needed to be craned upside to empty them.

 

I'm not too familiar with the Airfix mineral wagon, they did some double door ones I believe. The 5 plank GM wagon was the same but it wouldn't be to difficult to represent the inner door if you wanted to run them empty. With sheeting, you don't see much of the body at all.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Headstock

[bbishop]

1 hour ago, PMP said:

A good deal depends on the traffic flow and location you’re modelling. For me doing the Forest of Dean 55-65 there are plenty of images of 7 plank minerals well into the early 60’s. Notable is their replacement by and heavy use of the 16t steel mineral, rather than 21tonners/hoppers etc.
 

Looking at mixed freight there’s plenty of LMS/BR types extant, in addition to GW. Also of note reference the above discussion are both LNER and the distinctive SR build ply sided vans. Very little in the way of ‘special’ types,

 the most frequent unusual type in images is the ‘French’ cupboard door type mineral. Whilst researching trains one I found of interest was regular workings of orange juice in barrels in standard opens and without tarpaulins. The fitted opens above from a mix of Airfix bodies and Parkside chassis’ representing that traffic.

The 21 ton mineral wagons may not have fitted under the screens.  In earlier days some of the collieries in the Somerset coalfield could only accept 5 plank mineral wagons;  Jerry Clifford may be able to advise.

Bill

[bbishop]

43 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

As Bill, says, there was a slump in LMS wagon building in the early 1930s - understandable from an economic perspective. (As I mentioned a couple of days ago, at the end of 1931, LMS-built wagons accounted for just 34% of LMS wagon stock.) The numbers built once production picked up again were only on average half as many per year as in the 1920s, so that by the end of 1946 62% of LMS wagon stock had been built since 1922. Wartime production held up surprisingly well. 

 

 

And the SR began a replacement cycle in the late 1920s.  This was funded, to a significant extent, through the refund of the Passenger Duty by the government which had to be spent on the capital account.  You didn't expect Sir Herbert Walker to get too hung up by the distinction between capital and revenue accounts, build the new wagon as capital, scrap the replaced wagon 366 days later, Treasury happy.

But remember the SR would have recovered more Duty than the northern companies, being primarily a passenger company.

Bill

[65179]

1 hour ago, Atso said:

Hello everyone,

 

All this talk about various company's wagons making their way around the system is interesting. May I please share my latest efforts building various plastic kits of non-LNER wagons.

 

 

Some Southern Railway vans (since painted) build from N Gauge Society kits. These will be fitted with 2mm Association etched chassis (but with N gauge wheels) rather than the generic Peco ones. These vans (and/or variations of them) seem to crop up quite often in photographs of 1930's LNER fitted goods trains.

 

 

A pair of 2mm Association LMS vans, also awaiting etched underframes. Due to the slight difference in scale between N and 2mm scale, these will run next to some open wagons.

 

 

An LMS cattle wagon from the same source as above. I understand that the LNER build versions were not highly regarded and that other company's wagons ran where possible.

 

 

An LMS tube wagon built from a Roger Chiver's kit (plastic filings since removed from the end!).

 

Some nice quick builds to pass the time over the last few days.

 

Hi Steve,

 

Some lovely work there as usual. Can I suggest the SR van body stl files available through the 2mm Scale Association 3D CAD exchange as an alternative to the chubby NGS kits as you have a 3D printer? Here's a couple of the plywood vans: 

 

produced by @Sithlord75 and printed by my brother at 1:148.  

 

Best wishes, Simon

[Chuffer Davies]

1 hour ago, Headstock said:

 

That's true but 1960 was hardly the pinnacle of railway achievements, freight and its steam era wagons were in serious decline. Personal, I shall be disappointed if Shipley Model Railway Societies 1930s Clayton layout, doesn't have a big chunk of General merchandised wagons piled high with sheeted wool.

Noted

[Tony Wright]

2 hours ago, Headstock said:

 

Good morning Tony,

 

I cant let you get away with that one. Ubiquitous on freight workings I think was the conversation. Those examples look amazingly like passenger trains and not untypical of the kind of timetabled NPC diagrams I was describing up thread. Anyway, they can't have been ubiquitous because they were entirely absent from my own area and era of railway model land, a fair few GWR NPC's and lots of LNER six wheelers though.

Thanks Andrew,

 

I'm not sure that the conversation was only with regard to goods trains and the ex-SR vans.

 

Speaking of such vans, and assuming that your 'own area and era of railway model land' means LSGC, are you saying that ex-SR vans never ran on the ex-GC during BR days, whatever the type of train? 

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

[Tony Wright]

7 minutes ago, Chuffer Davies said:

Noted

Noted as well, Frank,

 

But how many Shipley Model Railway Societies are there?

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Edited December 28, 2021 by Tony Wright
to add something

[Dunsignalling]

1 hour ago, bbishop said:

The 21 ton mineral wagons may not have fitted under the screens.  In earlier days some of the collieries in the Somerset coalfield could only accept 5 plank mineral wagons;  Jerry Clifford may be able to advise.

Bill

There are published photos showing 21-tonners in trains on the S&D. However, they might have just been passing through rather than carrying Somerset coal outbound.

 

One I've seen includes a tantalising partial glimpse of one of the slope-sided ex-LNER loco coal type (Diagram 125) after it had gone into general traffic.

 

John

[Headstock]

34 minutes ago, Tony Wright said:

Thanks Andrew,

 

I'm not sure that the conversation was only with regard to goods trains and the ex-SR vans.

 

Speaking of such vans, and assuming that your 'own area and era of railway model land' means LSGC, are you saying that ex-SR vans never ran on the ex-GC during BR days, whatever the type of train? 

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

 

Good afternoon Tony,

 

Never assume, that's not what I said at all, with regard to either LSGC or SR NPC's.

[PMP]

2 hours ago, bbishop said:

The 21 ton mineral wagons may not have fitted under the screens.  In earlier days some of the collieries in the Somerset coalfield could only accept 5 plank mineral wagons;  Jerry Clifford may be able to advise.

Bill

There was almost certainly room for the 21t variant under the screens, the 16t version fitted and there is at least one image showing a 21t version at Eastern United. End tipping was carried out at Lydney until relatively late, colliery output volume was low compared to Welsh/Midlands/N.E., and  maximum train lengths of roughly 30 wagons are likely factors in the use of smaller types.
 

In addition there was little infrastructure development in the FoD collieries, wagons were frequently gravitated through screens and onto weigh bridges manually, larger, heavier wagons would have made those operations far more dangerous, and likely would have required new weigh bridges too to accommodate the larger/longer wagons.

Edited December 28, 2021 by PMP

[Dylan Sanderson]

14 hours ago, Jesse Sim said:

I’m sick of these upside down Australian Jokes. 

I took the photo with my phone upside down… RM Web in all their wisdom seem to think that’s how I want to post the photo! Despite it showing the correct way up on my phone! 

[Chuffer Davies]

54 minutes ago, Tony Wright said:

Noted as well, Frank,

 

But how many Shipley Model Railway Societies are there?

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Really?

[Tony Wright]

17 minutes ago, Chuffer Davies said:

Really?

Good afternoon Frank,

 

I think the earlier post was meant to read Society's.

 

Once a teacher....................

 

Regards,

 

Tony.