Castle Aching

[Edwardian]

As mentioned, I think your Swansea Vale anthracite wagons are good for CA - as Thomas T. Pascoe says, "malting, hop drying and horticultural coals" - anthracite was preferred for any industrial process where you didn't want to end up killing your customers by arsenic poisoning. However, unless there are a variety of such industries in West Norfolk, I doubt you'd see such a variety of collieries / factors? (Hoping someone proves me wrong.) I think United is a post-Great War amalgamation (United Anthracite Collieries). I seem to recall something of the sort, which is why, for the 1930s, I recall I developed doubts that the pre-amalgamation livery would be extant.  I did do quite a bit of research specific to that project 'back in the day'. Trouble is, I've forgotten most of it.

 

Are those South Yorkshire / Nottinghamshire wagons all RCH 1923?  I believe the larger ones are likely to be intended to be RCH 1907.

 

There's a Great Western 4-plank open in there too, with cast number and GWR plates; as the cognoscenti know, this should be in red lead for CA's date. Well, now, those built with the cast plates are, in my view, in debatable territory. The essentially similar pre-diagram 5-planks (non-DCI brakes) would, I am confident, have been red.  The livery on the O5 as built, however, rather depends upon whether you accept that the change in livery did not occur until the large lettering was adopted in 1904.  This is the view to which many have come recently, but previously most thought that the change was mid-late 1890s.  Personally, I'd probably plump for 1904 and re-paint it red, but I don't think it could be said with any certainty that grey is wrong  for this wagon. No doubt the debate will continue ....

 

There are many more Lincolnshire & Yorkshire Tar Distillers wagons around than the company ever had in practice but I think that must be down to paucity of information on other firms. Also available in red lead. CA has a gas works? No, but there's one at Achingham, on the branch from CA.

 

Thanks Stephen and everyone for the helpful responses so far. Comments in red above.

 

I was intrigued by the idea that there would have been a route and purpose for S. Wales wagons, so thank you very much for that (http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/131803-school-project-the-victorian-railway/?p=3141221).

 

To re-post here: "ideal for anthracite to the West Norfolk breweries ... Route: Midland (Swansea Vale) - Neath & Brecon - Cambrian - Midland (Hereford Hay & Brecon) - Worcester - Birmingham - Wigston - Leicester - Syston - Lynn all by Midland train"

 

As we know, a small brewery is planned for CA.

 

Pictures of the wagons might help, so ....

[Hroth]

Collieries pop up, as it were, in the unlikliest of places and often give rise to railway activity as a consequence.

 

One of the more "local" efforts were the Neston collieries, which followed coal seams on the Wirral and out under the Dee estuary.  Coal transportation was initially by sea to North Wales and the Isle of Man and later via the Hooton and Parkgate (later extended to West Kirby) branch of the Joint Birkenhead Railway, operated by the GWR and the LNWR.  West Kirby and Birkenhead Woodside were probably the most "northerly" directly operated points of the GWR!

 

https://www.neston.org.uk/about-the-area/things-to-see-and-do/coal-mining-in-the-neston-area/

 

I draw the attention of the Parish Council to the photograph at the bottom of the page showing railway operations at the colliery.  Given the goings on at Neston, I also suggest we keep an eye on those rascally coal-owners and their employees.....

[runs as required]

I found that link to the collieries at Neston most interesting because of an earlier Scouse phase of my life from 1956-66 as a undergrad/post grad then office experience requirements before full qualification. So I knew the Deeside coast well (and always enjoyed rides from Seacombe ferry into Wales at Wrexham in former LNER tains).

 

What I hadn't heard about were the underground canals - and the underground explosive feuds between the mineowners (was Stanley Lord Derby ?).

 

Brindley's Bridgewater canal led from the coal face at Worsley - using floating tubs - into the centre of Manchester/Salford. There is also Speedwell cavern lead mine at Castleton Derbyshire which has an underground canal.

But I cannot immediately work out how one can have an under-sea canal without some very sophisticated hydrology, impermeable linings and pumping.

dh

 

Edit (with the benefit of Hroth's post below on geology ) I don't want immediately to go way OT on my first post on CA for sometime....but:

Just to speculate on the hydrology of an undersea canal - if I remember school geog aright about sections through the Carboniferous - coal and shales overlay sandstone which overlays carb limestone (which I used to enjoy caving in) and both these are permeable.

So presumably the C18 engineering of the Neston mines would have used puddled clay as a liner to the underground transport canal system as was common practice on the surface network - perhaps with weirs to sumps which pumped to the surface above the high tide line.

Cornelius Vermuyden would no doubt have been aware of all the dodges in West Norfolk - note subtle leverage back ON T

Edited April 28, 2018 by runs as required

[Hroth]

I found that link to the collieries at Neston most interesting because of an earlier Scouse phase of my life from 1956-66 as a undergrad/post grad then office experience requirements before full qualification. So I knew the Deeside coast well (and always enjoyed rides from Seacombe ferry into Wales at Wrexham in former LNER tains).

 

What I hadn't heard about were the underground canals - and the underground explosive feuds between the mineowners (was Stanley Lord Derby ?).

 

Brindley's Bridgewater canal led from the coal face at Worsley - using floating tubs - into the centre of Manchester/Salford. There is also Speedwell cavern lead mine at Castleton Derbyshire which has an underground canal.

But I cannot immediately work out how one can have an under-sea canal without some very sophisticated hydrology, impermeable linings and pumping.

dh

Just thinking out aloud, but the "undersea canals" were probably drainage channels to the pumps that someone had the bright idea of using as a means of transporting coal from the face to the lift shafts.  I suppose, the system just growed.....  Wirral is mainly Triassic sandstone with boulder clay spread over the top.  Around Neston there is some Carboniferous sandstone and shales, hence the colleries.  Sandstone is pretty permeable stuff so a water supply for underground boating wouldn't be a problem!  To bring things up to date, I think there is currently prospecting for fracking taking place.

 

As for Stanley, that would be Stanley of Hooton Park (which became Hooton Aerodrome and then Vauxhall, Ellesmere Port).  Probably a branch of the Stanleys of Lathom in Lancashire (ruddy turncoats) who became Lord Derby.

Edited April 28, 2018 by Hroth

[RedGemAlchemist]

And I will abstain from conversation on collieries for the simple reason that I'd have no bl**dy clue what I'd be talking about. 

[Edwardian]

And I will abstain from conversation on collieries for the simple reason that I'd have no bl**dy clue what I'd be talking about. 

 

That's never stopped me!

[Guy Rixon]

Concerning the wagons seen at CA...

 

Hickleton Main Colliery is covered in Turton v5, p97, and Hudson 4, pp107-108. Wagon 1401 was built by Chas. Roberts in 1908, the first of a batch of 50. There seem to have been two variants of the livery, one as modelled on 1401 and another with the word MAIN added on the door, the number written large at bottom left and Empty to Doncaster at bottom right.

 

Manvers Main Colliery is in Turton 5, pp111-113. Wagon 1811 was built by Chas. Roberts c.1907.

 

Old Roundwood Colliery, United of Swansea, and Pascoe I have no information for.

 

United National Collieries of Cardiff are in Turton v3, pp93-99. The company formed by merger apparently some time in the 1870s (Mr. Turton is not very clear about events here). The livery shown in the model matches wagon 1301 built in 1892 (first of an order of 400) by Glouster except: lacks the wording No 1301 on bottom plank left; lacks a Gloucester "big G" plate on bottom plank left between the number and the washer plate for the side knee. Later wagons, c.1905, had a different livery on a black ground. United National were merged with the Ocean Steam Coal Company in 1935. This colliery group did send much coal by sea, so it is not unthinkable that it could have come to East Anglia.

 

Caerbryn Colliery is in one of the volumes of Turton I can't find at the moment.

 

Prince of Wales Colliery I have nothing for.

[RedGemAlchemist]

Concerning the wagons seen at CA...

 

Hickleton Main Colliery is covered in Turton v5, p97, and Hudson 4, pp107-108. Wagon 1401 was built by Chas. Roberts in 1908, the first of a batch of 50. There seem to have been two variants of the livery, one as modelled on 1401 and another with the word MAIN added on the door, the number written large at bottom left and Empty to Doncaster at bottom right.

 

Manvers Main Colliery is in Turton 5, pp111-113. Wagon 1811 was built by Chas. Roberts c.1907.

 

Old Roundwood Colliery, United of Swansea, and Pascoe I have no information for.

 

United National Collieries of Cardiff are in Turton v3, pp93-99. The company formed by merger apparently some time in the 1870s (Mr. Turton is not very clear about events here). The livery shown in the model matches wagon 1301 built in 1892 (first of an order of 400) by Glouster except: lacks the wording No 1301 on bottom plank left; lacks a Gloucester "big G" plate on bottom plank left between the number and the washer plate for the side knee. Later wagons, c.1905, had a different livery on a black ground. United National were merged with the Ocean Steam Coal Company in 1935. This colliery group did send much coal by sea, so it is not unthinkable that it could have come to East Anglia.

 

Caerbryn Colliery is in one of the volumes of Turton I can't find at the moment.

 

Prince of Wales Colliery I have nothing for.

Hmm. Interesting.

[Compound2632]

Post WW2,  I worked in a laboratory using chemicals supplied in Glass Carboys which were inside a wire cage packed with straw. I have no idea when the wire cage was introduced, but it made handling and moving the carboys relatively easy for the junior members of staff ( usually 16-y-old Boys).  Wikipedia says they held 20 (USA)gallons. weight would be about 1.25 cwt.

 

Unloading them, in the CA time-frame, from a straw packed open wagon onto a horse drawn flat -bed would have been difficult and dangerous. As I understand it, the railways were "Common carriers" (terminology?) and had to take anything offered for transit. I assume there was an Act of Parliament enforcing this, but when was it enacted?  

 

For straw-packed carboys modelled in 4mm, see Paul Gallon's marvellous Rosedale East.

 

Pictures of the wagons might help, so ....

 

That Hinckleton wagon must have one of the longest and most florid copperplate "Empty to" instructions around - a very well-connected colliery, I make it Midd' & L & Y D V & H & B Rys, which being translated is: Midland, Lancashire & Yorkshire, Dearne Valley, and Hull and Barnsley Railways. Here's the relevant RCH map. The Midland is in fact the Swinton & Knottingley Midland and North Eastern Joint Line; the H&B is that company's Wath Branch (1902); the DVR was worked by the L&Y from its opening. Good news for CA is that the western part of the DVR was open by 1904 - see the 25" map. I read that Hinckleton Main Colliery was the first to exploit the Barnsley seam, starting production in 1894. Guy's told us that the wagon dates from 1908 though, which is disappointing. From the number, they must have had plenty of wagons already! I wonder, did wagons painted before 1905 include the full ... & H & B & W R J R & D Co...

 

There is a Thomas T. Pascoe wagon in the Keith Montague Gloucester book, 6-plank end door but painted "lead color" [sic] i.e. grey with black ironwork, No. 8 of Dec. 1889. That one is Empty to Ammanford Colliery, G.W.R., but nevertheless registered by the Midland. For those who care about such things, this has the rectangular Gloucester 4S axleboxes (MJT whitemetal castings available from Dart), rather than the round-bottomed 4N type Slater's provide.

 

The United and United National wagons are based directly on photos in the Montague book but the real United No. 1409 of March 1892 was to an unusual 16' (internal) length. The United National photo is of No. 1301 (on bottom left plank) of June 1892 [Edit: apologies, repeating Guy here.]. Both these do have the round-bottomed 4N axleboxes. The various Gloucester builder / owner / for repairs advise plates can be got as rub-down transfers from POWSides.

 

You might want to lose the funtionless V-iron on the nearside of the Manvers Main wagon.

 

What other rabbits do you have in your appropriately-shaped hat?

Edited April 28, 2018 by Compound2632

[Edwardian]

 

 

You might want to lose the funtionless V-iron on the nearside of the Manvers Main wagon.

 

 

 

I intend to. 

 

Also, I need to make a decision concerning brakes. 

 

Most of these kits were built with brakes both sides. My belief is that, as built, the prototypes would have been braked only on one side, but may have received a second set later in life.

 

Before removing the brakes (and v-irons), I would have preferred to check this against the prototypes.  As several have been identified from photographs, can I ask Stephen and Guy to check the braking arrangements shown?

 

So far, Manvers and Hickleton are out date-wise, but the Uniteds, United National and Pascoe are in, date-wise.

 

Further, there appears to have been a route for the Pascoe wagon to reach CA via the Midland.

 

Thanks for the information; I have no PO books at all!

[Annie]

I have to say all the information coming to light about coal and coal tar and the substances that were made from it are very interesting and instructive.  Since I have an environmental disaster factory on one of my layouts that takes in these substances and does awful things with them I now feel much better informed as to the type of traffic I might run too and from this factory.

 

As to PO wagons I have a huge collection of digital models of PO wagons and I do find it difficult to know sometimes whether a certain wagon would have been likely to have been found in the area I possibly might be claiming to be modelling.

[Compound2632]

Most of these kits were built with brakes both sides. My belief is that, as built, the prototypes would have been braked only on one side, but may have received a second set later in life.

 

Before removing the brakes (and v-irons), I would have preferred to check this against the prototypes.  As several have been identified from photographs, can I ask Stephen and Guy to check the braking arrangements shown?

 

Both the United and United National wagons were built with brakes on one side only, as one would expect for 1892. Take note: the brakes are on the side which has the end-door at the LH end, i.e. the brake handle is at the fixed end. Pascoe likewise - this seems to be a general though not universal rule, at least for Gloucester wagons*. I can see that it might make operational sense. 

 

According to A.J. Watts, Ince book, the BoT regulation requiring both side brakes was in 1911. New construction had to conform within six months but for retro-fitting, larger fleet operators - private as well as railway companies - were given very long compliance timescales, with extensions up to 1938.

 

For CA, assume single-sided unless there's evidence to the contrary.

 

EDIT: *The Midland's sole end-door wagon design of the single-sided brake era, the D351 end-door variant of D299, of which 9,000 were built in the 1890s, had the brake lever at the end-door end. 

Edited April 28, 2018 by Compound2632

[Compound2632]

I do find it difficult to know sometimes whether a certain wagon would have been likely to have been found in the area I possibly might be claiming to be modelling.

 

It's a MINE-field...

[Regularity]

That was the pits!

It seams we might have a deep vein of humour to dig out here...

[Edwardian]

That was the pits!

It seams we might have a deep vein of humour to dig out here...

 

He had to dig deep to come up with that one, so no need to wind him up.. 

 

He's found a rich seam of humour.

[Guy Rixon]

Some extra details about the United national wagon. The model has reversible blocks (i.e. with an eye at each end) whereas the original was built with non-reversible. The model has the safety loops hanging vertically, whereas the original had them angled in towards the horizontal centre of the wagon from top to bottom; i.e. they were fixed to the outer faces of the middle bearers rather than the inner. The form of the V-hanger is correct on the model; i.e. Gloucester's normal form, without a set to bring the legs vertical on the solebar. The original wagon has a Gloucester "big-G" plate on the solebar between the legs of the V-hanger, which I suspect is the builder's plate and another, which might indicate that it was hired by the colliery from Gloucester Wagon, on the body.

[Compound2632]

I'd noticed the variation in safety loop orientation but not understood the reason - thanks Guy!

 

The Gloucester V-hangers are quite distinctive and unusual in being V-shaped all the way.

 

Gloucester "G" plates: Wagons could have up to three of these: builders, worn by all wagons actually built by the Gloucester C&W Co (alternatively suppliers - I presume for second-hand wagons passing through their hands); owners, worn by Gloucester-owned wagons supplied on hire terms - very common; and for repairs advise (on the bodyside at the LH end on this wagon), worn by wagons either on hire or sold outright but where there was a repair contract with the Gloucester company. The Stockingford wagon linked there is an example of a Gloucester-built wagon bought outright by the owner (oval owner plate - also a standard design) but maintained under contract. The builder and owner plates seem always to be on the solebar, though exact position varies; the repairs plate can be on the solebar or quite often on the body side. POWSides provide all three plates, though the writing isn't legible! The c. 1892 wagons have bigger bulders plates than later standard - from at least 1897.

 

All PO wagons had to be inspected by a representative of the railway company with which they were to be registered before the circle-and-cross-bar registration and load plate could be fitted. Quite a few photos in the Gloucester book show wagons without these, because the official photo was taken before the inspector called. Slaters quite properly mould a representation of this on the solebar of their Gloucester wagons.

Edited April 28, 2018 by Compound2632

[Northroader]

One point about coal traffic, as we’ve mentioned the railway companies “common carrier” obligations already, is that general merchandise was charged for at a scale for whatever commodity and weight it was. Coal traffic, and some other bulk materials such as building items, bricks or sand, were charged on the distance the item had been carried, the mileage rate, consequently why a siding in a goods yard could be referred to as a mileage siding, this being where you find coal wagons in particular. As a result, if you wanted “bog standard” coal, it was cheapest if it had come from the nearest collieries, and so you’d expect faraway colliery wagons to be much rarer, unless it had some particular specialist quality such as anthracite from the Swansea area.

[Andy Hayter]

 As I understand it, the railways were "Common carriers" (terminology?) and had to take anything offered for transit. I assume there was an Act of Parliament enforcing this, but when was it enacted?  

 

I thought I had posted a reply earlier but cannot find it - senility setting in perhaps.

 

I am currently reading the Railways by Simon Bradley - long book but well worth the read - where I had thought I had seen reference to common carrier.  If so I cannot find it (senility again?) however he does mention that the 1840 Act of Parliament required railways to publicise their rates for carriage of all goods types.  I think tis would be concurrent with becoming common carriers or perhaps slightly afterwards.  so this would confirm Hroth's posting last night.

[Compound2632]

Yes, but... [in reply to Northroader] There's the tale (possibly told on here somewhere) of the WW2 Ministry of Supply Transport (?) trying to reduce coal wagon mileage by directing gas works to source their coal locally; the gas works managers replied "if you give us this coal we cannot make gas". I'm beginning to pick up the idea that East Midland / South Yorkshire coal was good for gas-making. It's worth googling "rmweb coal gas" - this throws up some interesting threads more efficiently than using the RMWeb site search.

Edited April 28, 2018 by Compound2632

[Regularity]

Pictures of the wagons might help, so ....

Other than taking the brakes away from one side (with one exception, on the side nearest the camera) they look the part - nice variety of heights, collieries and coals. Also, I agree about the route.

 

Incidentally, the “brakes both sides” came into effect in, iirc, 1911 (dumb buffers banned in “interchange service” as the Americans call it in 1913 in England & Wales, Scotland 10 years later) and retrospectively, existing wagons were to be fitted with a brake lever on the other side, but photographic evidence suggests it didn’t happen much. Also, the 16t minerals usually didn’t have brakes both sides, unless vacuum fitted or intended for future vacuum fitting which never happened, but that’s decades ahead for us!

 

And I will abstain from conversation on collieries for the simple reason that I'd have no bl**dy clue what I'd be talking about.

 

That's never stopped me!

Whilst everyone else is far too polite to mention it, I will adopt my usual blundering persona and add that we had noticed...

 

Those wagons are very nice, though.

[Regularity]

I'm beginning to pick up the idea that East Midland / South Yorkshire coal was good for gas-making.

As an East Midlander married to a West Yorks lady, I feel it only appropriate but also immaturely glib to observe at this juncture that she thinks anything from the East Midlands seems to be “good” at making gas...

[Compound2632]

Also, the 16t minerals usually didn’t have brakes both sides, unless vacuum fitted or intended for future vacuum fitting which never happened, but that’s decades ahead for us!

 

Is that what you meant to say? Do you mean independent brakes? Any wagon built after 1911 had to have brakes on both sides but they could be independent - i.e. the brake lever on one side acted only on the brakes on that side. From the grouping, wagons with cross-shafts and the Morton arrangement to reverse the action of the brake lever on one side became more common, but not for mineral wagons where dropping the load through the bottom doors would soon knock the cross-shaft out of shape.

 

The L&Y wagons I've built from David Geen kits have the unusual Horwich arrangement of a cross-shaft and levers on both sides but at the same end of the wagon - an arrangement the BoT came to frown upon. They wanted the brake to be applied from the right-hand end of the wagon and only to act on one side - they didn't like the idea that the brake could be released from the other side of the wagon to that from which it had been applied. (The Great Western's Dean-Churchward brake in its first version also fell foul of this.) At some later date the MoT must have changed the regulations, witness the Morton brake.

 

Addendum: Bah! I thought I'd successfully dragged myself away from this to get on with sheeting some wagons but lo! on the page opposite my reference photo of sheeted Midland D299 and D351 wagons at Gurnos [in Miles, Thomas and Watkins, The Swansea Vale Railway (Lightmoor Press, 2017)] is a Gloucester official photo of Thomas T. Pascoe No. 319 of Oct 1891, like your model in all things but number and position of the tare weight (6-3-2 above Load 10 Tons on the bottom RH plank) - and angled safety loops per. Rixon.

Edited April 28, 2018 by Compound2632

[Regularity]

Thank you for saving me the need to edit my post.

[runs as required]

As an East Midlander married to a West Yorks lady, I feel it only appropriate but also immaturely glib to observe at this juncture that she thinks anything from the East Midlands seems to be “good” at making gas...

I'd have thought this applied to all of you - back to school geog once more: we in 3B had to sharpen our red pencils and neatly print Yorks Notts & Derbys coalfield along that side of our maps of the Pennine chain.

(And the only working mine I have ever been down was in the East Midlands: Markham Main when I was in school leaving year at New Mills and the NCB was hoping to recruit us! It is now Markham Vale warehouse park.)

I don't recall ever having to draw a map of E Anglia...

dh