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Morris Cowley car trains


Michael Delamar
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That was a bit calm for Kings Norton loading.

The loading ramp is clearly seen on Old~maps.co.uk.  Do you know how the cars got from Longbridge to Kings Norton?

I'm assuming they must have been driven?

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The loading ramp is clearly seen on Old~maps.co.uk.  Do you know how the cars got from Longbridge to Kings Norton?

I'm assuming they must have been driven?

From what I remember seeing on trips from Bristol to Birmingham in the early/mid-1970s, the loading compound usually had road car-transporters standing around, so I suspect the cars were brought in on these. I believe there were other loading facilities within the Longbridge plant, on the site of the old station.

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 I believe there were other loading facilities within the Longbridge plant, on the site of the old station.

That's what made me ask. I've seen phots of BMC cars being loaded onto Tierwags at both Cowley and Longbridge. Maybe there just wasn't the capacity at the factory. Must have been inefficient and costly loading/unloading them up onto car transporters for such a short journey.

*Light bulb above head moment*. That's currently how Nissan get new cars the few miles from Washington to Tyne Dock for export.

Nissan seemed very anti when it came to the proposals of loading straight onto trains at the factory.

 

P

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That's what made me ask. I've seen phots of BMC cars being loaded onto Tierwags at both Cowley and Longbridge. Maybe there just wasn't the capacity at the factory. Must have been inefficient and costly loading/unloading them up onto car transporters for such a short journey.

*Light bulb above head moment*. That's currently how Nissan get new cars the few miles from Washington to Tyne Dock for export.

Nissan seemed very anti when it came to the proposals of loading straight onto trains at the factory.

 

P

I don't know about Nissan, but in the days when lots of factories sent cars by rail, the road drivers kept a very tight grip on things, obliging even rail-borne vehicles to be carried on road transporters for some of the journey.

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The loading ramp is clearly seen on Old~maps.co.uk.  Do you know how the cars got from Longbridge to Kings Norton?

I'm assuming they must have been driven?

A lot were brought on transporters from Longbridge until the drivers went on strike then the loading ramp at the works was put in so they could move them direct from the assembly line.

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I saw Evening Star at Snow Hill several times on the Cowley workings. Another unusual one was 70054 on the Bathgate. The first vehicle was a GUV. http://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrbsh1248.htm

I found a reference in Modern Railways early in 1963 to Evening Star passing Wellington the 1.50pm Morris Cowley - North Mersey Class 4 Freight on 19 November 1962. I don't know how far it worked the train.

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interesting Brian.

 

Im going to see if my dad will let me have some of his prized minix cars,I think he has enough to do something a realistic train of either 1100's, ford anglias or Imps.

 

trains of Imps are out of my area, but Fords where built round here and there are recollections of seeing them, I can actually see myself building a Morris Cowley train and also a Ford train, would take a few years mind.

my dad remembers trains of Anglias but on individual 4 wheeled wagons and strangely, heading away from Liverpool docks towards Halewood.

 

Ive been rummaging out old lima mk1s among other things to see if I can use them for converting.

 

my Dads got loads of those triang Tierwags too, he just likes collecting them and ive only just seen a photo of the real thing. I think he hunts them out for the cars moreso.

 

pics from a few years back, hes collected more since

Picture031.jpg

 

 

Picture051-1.jpg

 

How did I forget this thread!!!??

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Reviving an old topic...

 

My layout is set at Kidlington, north of Oxford in the late 1940s. The 1948 service timetable shows two class E freights in the morning from Bordesley and Gosford Green to Morris Cowley and return workings to the same in the evening. Would these be associated with the Morris works or general freight? If car traffic, what would be used in this period, MOGO vans?

 

Thanks in advance for any information

 

Jon

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The GWR had a good selection of specialised car carrying vehicles - CARTRUCK, DAMO A & DAMO B, ASMO and BOCARS for car bodies between Oxford and the Midlands. I have some wagon usage statistics and they are also some of the most intensively used wagons that they owned. The BOCARS were noticeably successful with BR building more of them. 

 

Paul 

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48 minutes ago, hmrspaul said:

The GWR had a good selection of specialised car carrying vehicles - CARTRUCK, DAMO A & DAMO B, ASMO and BOCARS for car bodies between Oxford and the Midlands. I have some wagon usage statistics and they are also some of the most intensively used wagons that they owned. The BOCARS were noticeably successful with BR building more of them. 

 

Paul 

How late did these survive in use? My car is a 1969 Minor, first registered in London (not far off Kenny O). It was built at Cowley in late 1968, so assuming it was delivered by rail, could it have been in one of these?

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1 hour ago, rodent279 said:

How late did these survive in use? My car is a 1969 Minor, first registered in London (not far off Kenny O). It was built at Cowley in late 1968, so assuming it was delivered by rail, could it have been in one of these?

Unlikely. BR had a good feel for how little could be earned out of short distance rail traffic by that time and had thrown in the towel. Oxford to London is nothing - men with the red and white registration plates used by delivery companies were common site hitching by the end of the 1960s.

 

Also by then BR had a large fleet of GUVs and CCTs all with end doors, as well as keeping more modern vans such as the LMS CCTs (built until c1955). Carflats were becoming more numerous (but mostly used for Motorail)- and the BR Bocars had been converted to Carflats. Lowfits were also numerous and used a lot for individual cars, as well as block loads. 

 

I admit I've seen little about the Morris traffic, it doesn't seem to have been so noticeable as some other car and small van flows. But it may have faded away. BR proved the concept of the Cartic and it was the privately owned Cartics that came on stream from c1968 which introduced long distance new car carrying. It solved the problem that cars are very bulky and very light. 

 

Paul

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My recollection of car trains from Morris Cowley and Abingdon were based on workings to Bathgate, Scotland and Harwich for export. We had many car delivery companies with large yards dotted around the Kidlington/Bicester/Thame area where disused airstrips were ideal and fairly secure for storage of vehicles. Most vehicles that needed to be delivered within a short mileage range of about 100 miles or less were delivered on trade plates by one way drivers who would then hitch a lift back home. Many of course went out on car transporters, Autocar, BRS and Toleman Group are familiar names I can remember. Where I lived in Kidlington we had a car collection company and a few of my school chums parents were employed delivering new cars. I even had a few rides in one or two of them especially when the Mini was first introduced. There was a known scam by some of the drivers called 'milking' whereby they would syphon petrol from the new cars for their own use, leaving just enough in the tanks to get them to the dealers!  I also remember seeing the Morris 1100's covered in wax being driven down our road months before they were announced in 1962. My father actually ordered one in Fiesta Yellow before the garage had even listed them as being available, thus we had one of the first that was on the road in our village, can even remember the reg. no. 161RWL! I digress sorry!

It was normal practice for the export cars to be driven to the MAT Transport Terminal in Garsington Road, Cowley adjacent to the closed Morris Cowley station and the cars driven on to the car flats. Once a train had been loaded it was then shuttled down the branch to Hinksey Yard by a 61XX or later on a D63XX or D7XXX and remarshalled with carflats from Abingdon which were loaded with MG's . Apart from the Bathgate trains, which usually ran at night, there wasn't much evidence of car traffic going north through Oxford Station. Export trains for Harwich ( I don't know whether much BMC product went to Southampton) would then travel south from Hinksey Yard and not be seen by us train spotters on Oxford Station. We had the last batch of Britannia's with the Scottish Firth names serviced at Oxford depot 81F for the Bathgate jobs, later EE Type 4's in the D3XX range and after that Brush Type 4's. I think this traffic had almost ceased by the 1980's.

Another factor which may have bearing on the use of road transport was the volatile state of car production at Cowley during the sixties and seventies. There was a strike nearly every week as far as I can remember, mainly by the women in the trim shops so I'm told, and sometimes incomplete cars would get driven to the car delivery compounds just to get them out of the factory. It was almost impossible to order a car from the factory for a specified delivery day. My father waited from October 1962 to May 1963 for his 1100, disgusting when you think it was only produced five miles from where we lived. But yes I would say that most home market cars went by road transport or under their own steam...........literally in some cases!

Edited by BrushVeteran
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5 hours ago, The Great Bear said:

Reviving an old topic...

 

My layout is set at Kidlington, north of Oxford in the late 1940s. The 1948 service timetable shows two class E freights in the morning from Bordesley and Gosford Green to Morris Cowley and return workings to the same in the evening. Would these be associated with the Morris works or general freight? If car traffic, what would be used in this period, MOGO vans?

 

Thanks in advance for any information

 

Jon

The Gosford Green train would have been from Pressed Steel at Cowley, destined for the Rootes plant. It would have been body pressings. Pressed Steel (who were to become part of BMC) made bodies for various other firms, including Rolls Royce.

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11 hours ago, Fat Controller said:

The Gosford Green train would have been from Pressed Steel at Cowley, destined for the Rootes plant. It would have been body pressings. Pressed Steel (who were to become part of BMC) made bodies for various other firms, including Rolls Royce.

Yes I remember the completed and painted Hillman Minx, Singer Gazelle, Sunbeam Rapier and Humber Hawk bodies being transported by road, eight at a time, on specially built transporters either a Leyland Beaver or a Commer TS with trailer. These lorries were owner by BRS but painted in blue Pressed Steel livery, some in the lighter blue with Prescold lettering. The Commers were significant as they had two stroke engines which would 'crackle' under power and throw sparks and flames out of the engine exhausts, very visible at night. My former stores drivers at Oxford Bus Co. used to drive these things when he worked for BRS and he said that your feet would always be warm as the exhaust used to be emitted from the front of the cab! The Rolls Royce & Bentley bodies would leave on similar lorries but were unpainted and partly covered with tarpaulins, I assume they were heading for Crewe.

Whatever trains took the various goods to Gosford Green was probably in normal revenue wagons and vans which I probably wouldn't have been aware of from my viewpoint on Oxford station or Kidlington. I have lived in Kidlington and its surrounds since 1955 and the railway was always busy with freight, despite the many closures affecting local traffic i.e. Harris Bacon, Blue Circle Cement, Banbury Cattle Market (which was apparently one of the largest in the area and used rail to a large extent). 

There are still a few people still alive living in Kidlington who often tell me a few stories involving their connection with the local railway scene, even the son of Kidlington's last stationmaster, who I occasionally enjoy a pint with at our local!

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22 hours ago, BrushVeteran said:

Yes I remember the completed and painted Hillman Minx, Singer Gazelle, Sunbeam Rapier and Humber Hawk bodies being transported by road, eight at a time, on specially built transporters either a Leyland Beaver or a Commer TS with trailer. These lorries were owner by BRS but painted in blue Pressed Steel livery, some in the lighter blue with Prescold lettering. The Commers were significant as they had two stroke engines which would 'crackle' under power and throw sparks and flames out of the engine exhausts, very visible at night. My former stores drivers at Oxford Bus Co. used to drive these things when he worked for BRS and he said that your feet would always be warm as the exhaust used to be emitted from the front of the cab! The Rolls Royce & Bentley bodies would leave on similar lorries but were unpainted and partly covered with tarpaulins, I assume they were heading for Crewe.

Whatever trains took the various goods to Gosford Green was probably in normal revenue wagons and vans which I probably wouldn't have been aware of from my viewpoint on Oxford station or Kidlington. I have lived in Kidlington and its surrounds since 1955 and the railway was always busy with freight, despite the many closures affecting local traffic i.e. Harris Bacon, Blue Circle Cement, Banbury Cattle Market (which was apparently one of the largest in the area and used rail to a large extent). 

There are still a few people still alive living in Kidlington who often tell me a few stories involving their connection with the local railway scene, even the son of Kidlington's last stationmaster, who I occasionally enjoy a pint with at our local!

Thanks, that's interesting. That the Gosford Green train would have been normal wagons and vans reduces the amount of scratchbuilding required for the more specialised stock; I have got some ideas for that from other topics on here, adaption of kits for Pythons for instance.

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Jon, you may wish to look at this page from Warwickshire Railways - there is a description of the traffic at Gosford Green from 1952/3 from someone who went to school adjacent to there - at that time (which slightly post dates your period), it's described as two sidings receiving train loads of bogie, curtain sided wagons loaded with car bodies which seem to have been transferred to road vehicles for the short distance to the Rootes works at Humber Road. There is a photo of a Humber Hawk body on a rack on the back of a truck - I've attached the link but you need to page down a bit to get to Gosford Green.

 

In terms of the route taken, certainly in later years via Leamington and along the LMS to Coventry and Three Spires Junction, reversing down the loop line (as Humber Road junction at the southern end was closed during the WMCL electrification.

 

NB Morris Engines also had a set of sidings off the Coventry avoiding loop line (further north) so would presumably have generated traffic to Cowley in some, if not the same period. The BMC merger with Austin clearly changed things, as did the subsequent BL merger. Below are a couple of links which also show Gosford Green in the late 60s/early 70s, and you can see train loads of Morris Marinas, Hillman Avengers (made at Rootes' Ryton factory out on the A45) - as well as the gantries for loading containers of Rootes part for Hillman Imps, transported to Linwood (bodies built at the adjcent Pressed Steel factory at Linwood). In the background can be seen car transporters, seemingly unloading and the BL car trains have Triumph Dolomites as well as Marinas - presumably these were transported down from their works near Canley, Coventry - the train appears to be 4S64 (0S64 for light engine on the rear cab) which is clearly to one of the destinations in Scotland - there is also a train of Ford vehicles bound for Gosford Green. in 1984 a further example from the Derby Sulzer site shows a class 46 (a couple of days before withdrawal) on 4S64 which by then, was Cowley to Bathgate, and is loaded with Montegos and Maestros.

 

In terms of the traffic to Bordesley, the yard at Bolton Road (between Tyseley and Bordesley) was immense and an interchange point. However there was a SInger Motors factory in Coventry Road, Small Heath and also traffic could have been going to Longbridge (presuming Pressed Steel made bodies for Austin in 1948). The Birmingham area tended to be dominated by car body traffic (on car transporters) from Fisher and Ludlow in Castle Bromwich, which firm was merged with Pressed Steel after the BMC merger in the early 50s.

 

NB you have to page a way down the pages to get to the correct bit. Fascinating subject!

 

It sounds to me like your trains might be covered vans - but would rule 1 let you have completed cars?

 

Cheers, Don.

 

Gosford Green Warwickshire Railways

 

Derby Sulzers 1

 

Derby Sulzers 2

 

Derby Sulzers 3

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1 hour ago, MidlandRed said:

It sounds to me like your trains might be covered vans - but would rule 1 let you have completed cars?

 

 

2 minutes ago, Fat Controller said:

The most likely vehicle to carry car-body pressings would be Bocars; redundant coach underframes with fixed roofs and ends, and tarpaulin sides.

 

Thanks, both. Yes, from what is described yes BOCARS. Photo of one at Leamington on right of this picture. 

 

Now, will have to give thought as to how I could model these... 3d printer may be resurrected.

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12 hours ago, The Great Bear said:

 

 

Thanks, both. Yes, from what is described yes BOCARS. Photo of one at Leamington on right of this picture. 

 

Now, will have to give thought as to how I could model these... 3d printer may be resurrected.

Looking at the drawing in 'A History of GWR Goods wagons', it should be easy enough from plastic card and sections. They're basically a flat wagon, with van-type ends and roof, and three square-section pillars to stop the roof sagging from the weight of the tarpaulin.

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On 29/08/2018 at 13:45, Porcy Mane said:

Not Cowley car trains but motorail in general.

 

 

Fascinating bit of film.  i wonder if the Rover, WLN 519, was a BR officer's official car?  One or two of those on the train look vaguely familiar on their journey from Kennsington (O) to Newbury Racecourse and back.  Some slightly odd continuity because after the train apparently arrives at Newbury from the west (actually it looks like it is departing back to Kemmy)  it has already  passed Southcote Junction heading west towards Newbury and subsequently  it is seen approaching Reading from the east then, after the road traffic jam, it is passing Reading Main Line West heading east towards London.   Looks like film continuity was as bad back then as it often is nowadays ;)

 

Now back to Moscow and the WR April 1966 to March 1967 Sectuion L1 WTT which lists the following Q (runs as required) paths for secials to/from Morris Cowley.  I presume it is complete because it also shows sections of route which were not in Section L1 of the WTT at that timepaths.  But it is for the Q paths so will NOT include regularly booked trains. trains.

4V24  18.12 SX Hull - Moscow, arrives 01.10 MX

4O01  19.30  SX Morris Cowley and Knowle & Dorridge - Southampton. Light Eengine to work the train is ex Oxford R&M Depot at 18//22.

4O10  17.50 SX Knowle & Dorrididge - Southampton (does not run when 4O01 runs), arrives Kennington Jcn at 20.30.

3V45   15.15 SX Widnes - Moscow, arrives 21.18

4O05.  21.22 SX Hinksey - Dover, departs Moscow 22.00 (arrives Dover 05,45MXi

 

4V01    22.59 SX Dover - Moscow, arrives 04.45 MX

3M45   05.15 SX Moscow - Widnes

4N42    19.30 SX Moscow - Hull

4V02     Southampton Docks - Moscow - no times given

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