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Mystery Cambrian Van


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Just going through some notes I made a good many years ago now and came across some dimensions of a van I can remember nothing about! 

 

According to my notes It is Cambrian Number 290, GWR 35. It has a timber underframe and I made a sketch drawing which I have redrawn to scale here:

 

post-21854-0-82083400-1410876431_thumb.jpg

 

Other details I noted are that the sides have 12 planks, the strapping is Iron and is 7" wide for verticals and 4" tall for horizontals, however my drawing appears to show outside wooden framing. Perhaps I meant that it was faced with iron? I also note that the buffers are of the round base type and overall length is 21". Brakes are vacuum and of the clasp type. 

 

I even noted that the livery cosnsited of the word Cambrian on each panel either side of the door, with the fleur de lis below and the number on the door. 

 

I have no idea if I saw a drawing or scaled from a photo, but I seem to have very precise dimensions noted down!  

 

So can anyone shed any light on what this contraption is? 

 

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It looks like the result of an illicit relationship between a normal 6ton van and a cattle wagon - yet those Mansell wheels suggest passenger use, while the double footboards suggest departmental use.  It must surely have been a one-off conversion, I cannot help feeling that if you'd seen it in a book about the Cambrian it would much better known than it evidently is.  Have you got or ever had a book about breakdown and/or engineering trains?

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As I said, the drawing depicts a CCT. Here are a drawing and photo of an very similar LSWR vans:

 

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/59265041/LSWR%2021%27%20CCT%20of%201904.jpg

 

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/59265041/LSWR%2021%27%20CCT%20of%201904-1.jpg

 

I can see no record of the LSWR selling one of these to the Cambrian, but it's known that private builders would build very similar vehicles for a number of different customers. Which is why the one of the Cambrian goods brake van is almost the same as the MSL/GCR 10 ton van.

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  • RMweb Gold

Got it!

 

It is in R W Kinder, The Cambrian Railways.  It is carriage Van 290, and reclassified by the GWR as 35 but was scrapped before it could carry that number.

 

Sorry would have replied earlier but I misread your diagram and thought you had drawn a birdcage roof!

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • RMweb Gold

A belated catching-up with this thread . . .

 

Chris

Which edition of Kidner?  I've just been through my 1965 reprint of the 1954 version from cover to cover and there is no sign of it - although page 4 is frustratingly blank.

 

Mike,

It is the 1992 second enlarged edition.  It is on page 70.

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