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Pre Grouping general discussion


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The solution in those days was a draughtsmans pen, but a few LSWR insignia transfers were on the PC Models 7mm scale Southern Railway transfer sheet. Gold Blick or Letraset was handy too when hand-shaded. The commisions I dreaded were Lancashite & Yorkshire or Midland & Great Northern Railway that had to be hand written in an arc across tank sides. A shame Bachmann didn't go for this attractive variant on their LYR 2-4-2T, as I'd have bought one for the mantlepiece.

Within the Brighton Circle, we spent some years debating the problems of lining and lettering before encountering Wessex Transfers. Doing some analysis of the likely market, we commissioned a batch of loco transfers which solved the problem of the Stroudley passenger livery (which is possibly one of the more challenging) and then the goods livery. We provided the research and Rob Horton then confirmed the colours and arranged the sheet layout, before printing the batch. The outcome was a very cost effective solution to a major stumbling block for many of us. My only connection with Wessex Transfers is as a satisfied customer and my apologies to those who earn their crust by custom painting models.

Best wishes

Eric

PS Those who look up the contact details may be surprised to see how far south the boundary of Wessex now extends.......   

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 in 50 years, mass production of anything other than tablet browsers, flexible screens and 3d printers will be an amusing anecdote from the past...

 

Just imagine. You design a layout with Scarm v.23 then put the baseboard under the roving print-head and leave it a while to 'grow' the track, landscape, buildings, trees, trains, etc.  How boring :)

 

On the matter of lining, I make my own transfers using ink-jet printable transfer film.

 

Mike

Edited by MikeOxon
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For Mike Oxon

I don't want to 'grow' my own layout but would appreciate some detailed guidance on how you create your own lining.

I have transfer sheet and am reasonably computer 'literate' but my efforts to create lining have not been successful.

I have Photoshop and countless other programmes for graphic creation, but would be grateful for some instruction.

My needs would be SER/LCDR/SECR and other pre-grouping lococ/tenders

Thanks

Michael dJS

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but there would be no compulsion to do it that way.

 

True - most people will go for a hologram.- much less hassle and never any need for "the big hand in the sky" :)

 

All those 19th century workmen and horses will be faithfully represented, too

 

Mike

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I am quite surprised that neither Bachmann or Hornby followed up the success of the City class loco with another pregrouping GWR loco in Indian red/ green. It is a popular colour scheme that appeals to both pregrouping modellers and the many people who model the later GWR.

 

A decent Dean Single would be a good place to start and not that awful  ''Lord of the Isles'' from the 60's. Even better might be a 2-2-2 as some have converted the LOTI into one of these and it is a very smart looking loco. Perhaps a Dean Goods with round boiler or even a 517 class tank loco...all in red/green of course !

 

I prefer the Midland Railway but I can live with the red/green colour scheme of the GWR.

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Suppliers must realise that not having a ready means of communication with their customers can put them out of business. Ask themselves how much time does the average shopkeeper spend liaising with his customers, either face to face, on the phone or Internet ? Modelling say, the pre-grouping era, doesn't mean you have to have a horse and cart era approach to dealing with customers. Get real and get "with-it". Producing high-quality products won't bring the customers in if you are difficult to contact.

 

I know this is somewhat off topic, but some suppliers obviously need a tender behind, as one might say, which can be kicked.

 

Dennis

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Suppliers must realise that not having a ready means of communication with their customers can put them out of business. Ask themselves how much time does the average shopkeeper spend liaising with his customers, either face to face, on the phone or Internet ? Modelling say, the pre-grouping era, doesn't mean you have to have a horse and cart era approach to dealing with customers. Get real and get "with-it". Producing high-quality products won't bring the customers in if you are difficult to contact.

 

I know this is somewhat off topic, but some suppliers obviously need a tender behind, as one might say, which can be kicked.

 

Dennis

Dennis,

 

while you are undoubtedly right that ineffective communication will damage a businesses chance of success in today's demanding market place, many small traders are lack time, marketing skills or IT expertise. Often they got into business to create and manufacture kits some years ago because they weren't available elsewhere (or not good enough) and haven't been able, or in some cases willing, to cope with the sort of communications some customers demand. I believe that's one reason why the S4Society set up the "Hosted Traders Pages" section of their website, from which several traders also have spun of with their own bespoke sites.

 

I know one of those S4Society  traders very well and a couple of the others slightly. The one I know well does more sales at the eight or so shows he attends each year than in twelve months through postal and internet orders. What does that prove? Nothing in particular I suppose, other than possibly that those modellers that are interested in his products tend to go to those shows anyway. So perhaps a good range of kits and bits is the most important ingredient in a traders business. I also expect a reasonable percentage of the online/postal orders come about following a conversation at a show, reinforcing your comment that face to face liason is important. Ironically, that is something one or two high profile traders are know as being poor at (no names, etc.).

 

Jol

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Because there is so little available?

Mike,

 

if you look at the websites of kit manufacturers, you will find a very wide range of pre-grouping locos, coaches, wagons, infrastructure, etc. It is only when you look at RTR items that the choice becomes very limited.

 

Jol

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Mike,

 

if you look at the websites of kit manufacturers, you will find a very wide range of pre-grouping locos, coaches, wagons, infrastructure, etc. It is only when you look at RTR items that the choice becomes very limited.

 

Jol

 

I model the Southern after about 1930, so I'm not a pre-group modeller, but I've certainly built lots of pre-group Southern stock from kits and a few from scratch. The reason I chose this period is that there's very little available as RTR. To misquote JFK - We chose to model pre-grouping locomotives and rolling stock not because they are easy, but because they are hard.

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There used to be an Early Railway Group, promoting early railways funnily enough. I saw them at a couple of Guildex shows at Telford. I think they may have folded now, whether that was due to lack of interest in pre-grouping or something else I am not sure. At Telford they had a short plank with Scottish  trains running back and forth (pun intended) and I thought the attractions of early railways was evident for all to see. My own thoughts were towards narrow gauge, or I could have been tempted by those little 2-4-0s and single wheelers. At the same shows were Bob Harper's GWR broad gauge layouts, kits available from the BGS, showing what could be done in broad gauge. 

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For Mike Oxon

I would appreciate some detailed guidance on how you create your own lining.

I'll write something up on my Pre-Grouping Blog, rather than clutter up this thread.  Give me a day or two to put something together :)

 

Mike

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Because there is so little available?

 

Not as far as I can tell. Most of them seem to be interested in "the railways when I was small" or "right now". Same to be honest the RTR folks say, same the heritage railway folks seem to say. Fortunately lots of fun pre-group stuff survived into the 1950s/60s !

 

 

Alan

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I model the Southern after about 1930, so I'm not a pre-group modeller, but I've certainly built lots of pre-group Southern stock from kits and a few from scratch. The reason I chose this period is that there's very little available as RTR. To misquote JFK - We chose to model pre-grouping locomotives and rolling stock not because they are easy, but because they are hard.

 

Pete,

 

how much Big 4 and early BR stock was actually per-group? As you point out, quite a lot in fact.

 

As an occasional kit designer though, I would disagree that modelling pre-group is hard, unless you are comparing it with just opening box.

 

Jol

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This is really a bit of idle curiosity but how much pre-grouping or even pre First World War stock, particularly locos, remained in service into the dawn of the "modern" era i.e. the final few years of the steam era in the 1960s. Apart from the Isle of Wight, which was a wonderful living museum of Edwardian railways, I was probably a bit unaware of it at the time because I was focussed on the GWR which didn't have such a marked pre and post grouping era as the others. So, to what extent was the late steam BR still a pre-grouping railway?

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There were still a couple of 4F on the S&D in the mid sixties which had been built for the S&D in 1922.....

 

Rob.

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Circa 1962 was the cut-off point for most pre-group classes in England, although the Midland 2Fs, 3Fs and 4Fs soldiered on a couple of more years, no doubt due to commonality of spares between the classes. Scotland had a similar situation.......Probably the Drummond factor.

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I've also been wondering what were the oldest main line steam locos in Britain during the final decade or so of steam. Apart from the GWR's Dean Goods from the end of the nineteenth century that survived until 1957, were there any other survivors from the Victorian era?

In countries like Spain there were some very old steam locos around into the 1960s and in the final years of steam in France there were some remarkably ancient survivors.

The one that really struck me was class 030 C on the SNCF West Region. These 0-6-0 tender locos with outside Stephenson valve gear were built between 1867 and 1885 but a few of them survived until the mid 1960s. One is preserved at the Mulhouse museum and 030 C 757, withdrawn from Le Mans Depot, is fairly familar from its spectacular end in the 1964 movie "The Train".

The very last SNCF steam locos in service were a bit younger but definitely from our pre-grouping era. These were from the 140 C "consolidation" class. They made their final commercial run in November 1975 while hired out to the CFTA company. Apart from the first 70 built before the First World War, the vast majority of this large class of 340 locos were built in Britain during the First World War. Most were built by North British in Glasgow but there were other builders as well. The final service was made by 140 C 38 which had been delivered from Vulcan Foundry in Newton le Willows in 1919. Happily this loco has recently returned to steam and no less than eight locos from the class- the other seven built by North British- have survived.

Edited by Pacific231G
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Depends what you mean by Main Line.  If you mean BR, as opposed to industrial, then the Beattie Well Tanks and the Brighton Terriers are good candidates.  Both classes were built in the 1870s and survived until the early 1960s.  The LSWR T9s, O2s and early batches of the M7s were Victorian, but younger than the BWTs and Terriers

That's always a difficult definition but by main line I really mean the standard gauge national network including all its branch lines but not including light railways and industrials. So, though it's always been a public railway, I wouldn't include the Talyllyn whose original locos from 1864 and 1866 are still in regular service. Light railways generally seem to have kept locos in service for far longer than national networks, not least because they lacked the resources to buy new motive power, but it seems more suprising to find Victorian locos on main line ralways surrounded by modern motive power. 

Being self contained, the Isle of Wight felt like a wonderful living museum in any case but, even in the 1950s, really old locos like the SNCF 030C look like they've been borrowed from a museum rather than being in normal service.

This is the one that has survived in the Mulhouse museum.

http://citedutrain.com/en/dossiers/panorama-ferroviaire?galerie=1#prettyPhoto[gallery1]/4/

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The ex. L&Y 3F 0-6-0s on the Lanky side of the Pennines at Bolton, Bury, Oldham and Manchester had no peers and their niche job was pilot work. The term 'pilot' in railway parlance was applied to shunting and trip working. They got around quite a bit even to the other side of Manchester to Ordsal Lane sidings, then in 1961 it seemed every survivor in the North West was despatched to Lees Shed. So for the first half of 1961 these venerable 0-6-0's were like flies working out to Diggle, Delph, Mumps and Clegg Street, Ashton, and Royton and Rochdale. Then all of a sudden it was all over except perhaps for a survivor or two in Yorkshire. Funny thing is, this scene does not translate into pre-grouping days seeing as Lees was really an LNWR shed that fell under Central Division control in't 1930's and had most of its LNW allocation replaced by L&Y designs. It was all to do with carrying spares and brake blocks.

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This is really a bit of idle curiosity but how much pre-grouping or even pre First World War stock, particularly locos, remained in service into the dawn of the "modern" era i.e. the final few years of the steam era in the 1960s. Apart from the Isle of Wight, which was a wonderful living museum of Edwardian railways, I was probably a bit unaware of it at the time because I was focussed on the GWR which didn't have such a marked pre and post grouping era as the others. So, to what extent was the late steam BR still a pre-grouping railway?

Just locos, you can representatively chart the last ten years on 0-6-0s, the quintessential freight machine of the pre-group era. In very round numbers BR had about 3,000 running in 1958. Since the groups had built 1,000 to their various designs (over half of which were broadly pre-group in appearance!) that leaves 2,000 which must be pre-group build in service, getting on 20% of the loco stock. That then runs down fairly linearly to about a hundred at the end of 1965, with a few survivors making it into 1967. Only four classes by then three of which are pre-group, a very few of each of LNER J38 (lineal development of the NER J27), ex-NBR J36 and 37 on the Fife coalfield, and twenty-some ex-NER J27 on the North Eastern coalfield.

 

These latter are the final group of working pre-group designs, 65811 built 1908 the oldest in the final group withdrawn September 1967. Rather fitting that the 0-6-0 with its lineage all the way back to the Stephensons should have finished on the same territory, and on the same job hauling coal that led to the construction of the Stockton and Darlington line.

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The ex. L&Y 3F 0-6-0s on the Lanky side of the Pennines at Bolton, Bury, Oldham and Manchester had no peers and their niche job was pilot work. The term 'pilot' in railway parlance was applied to shunting and trip working. They got around quite a bit even to the other side of Manchester to Ordsal Lane sidings, then in 1961 it seemed every survivor in the North West was despatched to Lees Shed. So for the first half of 1961 these venerable 0-6-0's were like flies working out to Diggle, Delph, Mumps and Clegg Street, Ashton, and Royton and Rochdale. Then all of a sudden it was all over except perhaps for a survivor or two in Yorkshire. Funny thing is, this scene does not translate into pre-grouping days seeing as Lees was really an LNWR shed that fell under Central Division control in't 1930's and had most of its LNW allocation replaced by L&Y designs. It was all to do with carrying spares and brake blocks.

Did that include any of the Barton-Wright rebuilds into saddle tanks Larry? My books are packed away but I thought one of them lasted into the sixties.

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