More Pre-Grouping Wagons in 4mm - the D299 appreciation thread.

[jamie92208]

35 minutes ago, Andy Hayter said:

 

Yes - but perhaps no.

 

So Binegar quarry was quarrying limestone.  The limestone needs to be calcined (heated to drive off carbon dioxide).  At the time that would have been with coal/coke - available just done the road from the Mendip coal mines.

 

However your just down the road supply of chalk (same as limestone chemically but prone to contain more water and will require more heat to calcine).  So where would the coal come from? 

Kent?  There seems to be a lack of direct links.

Mendip?  so saving nothing in miles travelled.  I am not sure however how much coal you need to produce 1t lime but I suspect it is more than 1t.  In which case it is more efficient to transport the lime than the coal.

South Midlands - most likely I would suggest but you have certainly lost any mineral miles advantage.  The same comment applies about coal to lime ratio.

The Yorkshire Dales limestone quarries used the same wagons to send lime out and bring coal back.  They also acted as local coal merchants so uthrir wagonsvprobably did very little empty mileage apart from the steelworks of Sheffield to the Yorkshire collieries.

 

Jamie

[Nearholmer]

One of the pits I thought might be able to win orders in Cranleigh was Buriton, and this write-up gives a good description, the key point being that it seems to have started when the railway made import of coal viable (its inland and up a big hill, so no good for boats!). http://buriton.org.uk/history/buriton-lime-works/

 

Amberley I think started earlier, using river transport, then went “big time” once the railway was available. Dorking/Betchworth was contemporary with Buriton, and very much a railway operation. Oxted was a much smaller operation, but railway based. Maybe the earliest rail-based lime works in the SE were those connected to the Surrey Iron Railway (Well, CM&G technically), which dragged coal from Wandsworth basin.

[Nick Holliday]

20 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

It is. There is no mention of a brickworks either in the appendix discussing the ledger data or at the entries for Cranleigh merchants in the text.

 

Thirteen different wagon numbers are noted for the Mendip Granite Works, Binegar. 1894 seems a little early for roadstone? Two wagon owners are suggested to be suppliers of Portland cement.

 

What is notable for its absence, both at Cranleigh and at Sheffield Park I believe, is lime. 

Just for the record, in 1918 the Cranleigh Gas Company received, on average, 18 wagons a month.

The large number of wagons from Mendips Granite suggest some sort of major project, with deliveries concentrated over a limited period. This extract from Wikipedia might be an explanation: 

"Stephen Rowland was a resident who had a major role in the development of the infrastructure of the village. He formed the Cranleigh Gas Company in 1876, and arranged for a mains water supply in 1886. In 1894 he laid out an estate between the Horsham and Ewhurst Roads, building New Park Road, Avenue Road, Mead Road, Mount Road and Bridge Road. He also set up a grocery store. His name is commemorated in that of Rowland Road"

In Richard Kelham's book on Somerset PO Wagons, he has reproduced a Mendip Mountain Granite advertisement, coincidently from 1894, which notes they can supply a range of building materials:-

Mendip Granite - "The very best material for Macadamizing on heavily trafficked roads"

Black Rock - "Especially adapted for ordinary Macadamizing"

Building Stone - "A stone for Quoins,  Plinths, Base-Courses, Kerbing, Paving, Guttering, &c. ...at a comparatively low cost"

"Prices quoted or delivery free at all railway stations"

Mr. Rowland may have taken advantage of durable building materials - at a comparatively low cost - resulting in a bulk delivery to his development.  There might have been sources of stone from nearer to hand, such as Portland and Bath stone, but they could have been much more expensive, and perhaps less suitable for the tasks in hand. Local stone was not exactly noted for its durability, generally more suitable for lime making. 

 

[wagonman]

The Mendip limestone was particularly hard and non-friable – hence its popularity for roadstone and railway ballast uses. "Granite", however, it was not, though Wainwright's quarry at Moons Hill works a basaltic intrusion, the Andesite produced being very hard.

 

 

Richard 

[Compound2632]

1 minute ago, Nick Holliday said:

In Richard Kelham's book on Somerset PO Wagons, he has reproduced a Mendip Mountain Granite advertisement, coincidently from 1894, which notes they can supply a range of building materials:-

 

Ends very nicely tied up!

 

6 minutes ago, Nick Holliday said:

Just for the record, in 1918 the Cranleigh Gas Company received, on average, 18 wagons a month.

 

There is nothing in Turner's book that one can directly link to this - if consumption was the same in 1894, this would account for around 70 wagons over the four month period*. There are a handful of numbers recorded from appropriate collieries - Monckton Main, Wath Main, possibly Newstead - but not enough. So are we looking at a large number of Midland and Great Northern wagons? The 1890s are the period when PO wagon numbers dipped on the Midland as a consequence of the PO purchase scheme, only to rise again in the Edwardian period as coal output peaked. (Some way back dividing the national coal output by the population was suggested as a crude method for estimating consumption but this overlooks the enormous quantity that was being exported.) 

 

*Any growth in population and hence gas consumption over the quarter-century is quite likely matched by an increase in wagon capacity, with more 12 ton wagons and fewer 8 tons.

[Nick Holliday]

On 20/07/2022 at 09:40, Compound2632 said:

He also has similar data for 1894-5 from Cranleigh, pop. c. 2,000, which received 160 wagon loads of coal in PO wagons over four months compared to Sheffield Park's 45. Here there was a local coal merchant whose eight wagons account for 64 loads, mostly from Linby Colliery, Notts. (An average turn-around time for each wagon of about two weeks.) Turner gives a list of the coal merchant and colliery wagons received; in addition to the local merchant's wagons, 46 are given. Assuming that each of these wagons appeared once only, and taken together with the local merchant's 64 consignments, we're left with 50 wagon loads unaccounted for. I'm going to have to ask...

 

As the Cranleigh Gas Company's sidings, which also served Messrs. Elliott and Son, were private and were remote from the station itself, perhaps deliveries were not recorded for the station yard itself, or maybe only the quantity of wagons recorded; as they were not left in the station yard there was no need for their numbers to be recorded for siding charges etc.

[Compound2632]

3 minutes ago, Nick Holliday said:

As the Cranleigh Gas Company's sidings, which also served Messrs. Elliott and Son, were private and were remote from the station itself, 

 

... and not mentioned - either the firm of Elliott or the sidings - by Turner.

 

Your explanation sounds plausible, in which case the per capita or per household coal consumption previously calculated excludes coal for gas production.

[WFPettigrew]

26 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

Your explanation sounds plausible, in which case the per capita or per household coal consumption previously calculated excludes coal for gas production.

 

As a very rough benchmark for coal gas consumption levels, the small gas works for Appleby in what was Westmorland (and is to become Westmorland again next year under local government reorganisation!) served a population of getting on for 2000 in Edwardian times, and consumed getting on for two tons of coal per day (https://www.cumbria-industries.org.uk/a-z-of-industries/gasworks-in-cumbria/gasworks-in-cumbria-the-early-years/).

 

So one ton per day would provide gas for 1000 people... 

[Andy Hayter]

6 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

I think the High Weald farmers probably burned lime using wood, rather than coal, and I even wonder if the resultant lime/wood-ash mixture might be a better soil breaker for the “plasticine” clay in the area than lime burned with coal.

 

 

 

 

Wood?  No.  Charcoal maybe.  And if you have to do more work to get your lime, maybe another reason to buy in - provided you can afford it.

 

Various references I looked at suggested calcining at 800-1000C and wood fires just don't get that hot.  Which incidentally is the answer to the miracle of the gold cross in Notre Dame Paris - which survived the intense fire.  It was simply because wood fires do not get hot enough to melt gold.

[Nearholmer]

Wood, yes.

 

Its still used as a fuel in lime kilns in some countries, and apparently there is a new process using powdered wood in what I guess amounts to a ‘blast kiln’, but that isn’t farmer-tech.

 

Wood is the traditional fuel for limeburning and from a technical point of view is ideal. It produces a long flame which is able to penetrate further into the limestone mass and throws off heat slowly and uniformly promoting even firing. In addition wood, on being fired, generates a considerable amount of steam which tempers the flame temperature. It is therefore almost impossible to overburn any of the lime when using wood as a fuel.

The use of wood is particularly effective in batch kilns. Dry or green wood can be used, preferably of the hard, dense varieties. It should be cut into lengths of approximately 250 mm if it is to be used in a mixed feed kiln, and if in an updraught type to lengths which suit the particular requirements.

 

 

Edited July 22, 2022 by Nearholmer

[wagonman]

Here is a bit of number-crunching I did for the Swindon United Gas Co:

 

"A few statistics may be of interest: in 1908 the Swindon United Gas Co carbonised 10,286 tons of coal, and used 165,000 gallons of oil and 1,300 tons of coke. From that they produced 126,447,000 cu.ft. of coal gas and 50,962,000 cu.ft. of water gas. Their 8,718 consumers used 140,630,500 cu.ft of gas and the 741 public lamps 905,500 cu.ft. There were some fifty miles of gas main. On average a ton of coal would produce about 10,000 cu.ft of coal gas. Water gas was produced by passing steam over very hot coal or coke and was a way of boosting the hydrogen content of ‘town’ gas. It was also used in the commercial production of ammonia. Swindon United added up to 28% water gas to their supply."

 

 

[Compound2632]

9 minutes ago, wagonman said:

carbonised 10,286 tons of coal, and used 165,000 gallons of oil and 1,300 tons of coke. 

 

To get everything into the same units, taking a typical density of oil of 800 kg/m^3 = 0.004 ton/gallon, that's about 660 tons of oil.

[Regularity]

10 minutes ago, wagonman said:

8,718 consumers

How does that break down? How many households? How many business customers? What size of household, etc?

[wagonman]

20 minutes ago, Regularity said:

How does that break down? How many households? How many business customers? What size of household, etc?

 

The Gas Co didn't keep those sort of records. 1 Consumer = 1 Bill payer.

 

 

[Regularity]

About 54,000 in 1901, and about 51,000 in 1911.

That averages out at about 6 people per customer unit. I presume the GWR produced their own gas, etc, for the works.

[wagonman]

1 hour ago, Regularity said:

About 54,000 in 1901, and about 51,000 in 1911.

That averages out at about 6 people per customer unit. I presume the GWR produced their own gas, etc, for the works.

 

Yes, the GWR had its own gas works which also supplied the GWR 'village'. Don't forget that Swindon was still using gas for much of its street lighting – the original reason for building gas works as domestic consumers came later. The switch from lighting to cooking/heating came later still.

 

How many customers were private and how many commercial is difficult to quantify at this remove. Not entirely convinced of the usefulness either.

 

 

Edited July 22, 2022 by wagonman
2nd para.

[Compound2632]

This discussion got me thinking along a different tack. the LNWR had around 1,000 D64 loco coal wagons, along with some others of different designs; I have reason to suppose that the Midland may have had a similar number of wagons set aside for this purpose. The Great Western had rather more - over 2,500 c. 1905. But that's in all cases somewhat less than one wagon per locomotive. A typical tender engine of the turn of the century carried 4 tons of coal; a tank engine around 1 - 2 tons. In most cases, I suppose that would be the supply for a days' work. So that's very roughly one wagon load servicing two engines per day - maybe two-and-a-bit. But we've got maybe as few as one loco coal wagon per two-and-a-bit engines. That means each loco coal wagon would need to have a turn-around time of one day. If one allows for non-loco coal wagons being used as well, or a ratio of loco coal wagons to engines nearer to that of the Great Western, one might stretch that out to a two-day turn-around. But that does seem unfeasibly quick, given what we know about the turn-around time for coal merchants' wagons.

 

So what's wrong with my reasoning?

[Andy Hayter]

Some thoughts Stephen.

 

1.  What was the ratio of tender engines (4t capacity) to tank engines (1-2t capacity)?  If it were 1:1 than a 10t coal wagon would serve 2 locos for about 2 days.  That still makes the logistics of supply very tight.

2.  You have not taken loco availability into account.  I am sure I read somewhere that steam locos were taken out 1 day every week for clean down/clean out and minor repairs.  Add to that major maintenance intervals.  Helps a bit but still does not solve the conundrum.

3.  Wagons marked loco were for the (exclusive?) supply of coal to steam depots.  Are we sure that ordinary mineral wagons could not also be used?  Of the pictures I have seen of freight trains (and there are not that many pictures sadly), I have seen the odd one with a loco label wagon in it but I don't recall ever seeing anything like a block of loco minerals in any picture. 

[kitpw]

1 hour ago, Compound2632 said:

So what's wrong with my reasoning?

I don't know, but there are a lot of variables!  As a start on reducing the number and quoting from the GWR.org website....

"In 1884 a single tender to a new 3000g design was built. This had the new feature of springs below the footplate. 396 more were built between 1890 and 1906 to basically similar designs, with various detail improvements in suspension, changes in fittings and so on. Such was Swindon economy of design that the principal dimensions of these tenders were still present in the Hawksworth 4000g tenders, 80 years later. Coal rails were introduced in the 1890s, the front of the body flare became unrecessed from lot A45 of 1900/1, and solid fenders were fitted from lot A54 of 1903. The nominal coal capacity was 5 tons. Approximate weights were 17.5 tons empty, 37 tons full."  

 

The GWR 54XX tank engine is quoted as carrying 3 tons 4cwt (Wikipedia). 

 

I suppose the next question would be an estimate of how many locos were in service on a daily basis (rather than overall lnumber on the register) and an approximate rate of consumption per day for each loco type - broadly tank or tender engines.  I'll have to look that up but last time I tried - I forget why - I didn't find any sensible answers.

 

 

[Nearholmer]

22 minutes ago, Andy Hayter said:

Wagons marked loco were for the (exclusive?) supply of coal to steam depots.  Are we sure that ordinary mineral wagons could not also be used? 

I’m sure that in another thread pictures of ordinary mineral wagons doing this duty were shown.

 

For the southern companies things get a bit confusing because they tended to buy loco coal through factors, notably Stephenson Clarke, who delivered it in their branded wagons. There are lots of photos of LBSCR and SR engine sheds showing SC branded wagons, and I think the same applies to LSWR and SECR but am less sure.

[Compound2632]

12 minutes ago, kitpw said:

I don't know, but there are a lot of variables!  As a start on reducing the number and quoting from the GWR.org website....

"In 1884 a single tender to a new 3000g design was built.

 

The numbers I use were, naturally enough, for Midland engines around the turn of the century.

 

On the LNWR, the Webb 1,800 gal tender - the commonest size I think - had a capacity of 4.5 tons; the bunker of a 5'6" 2-4-2T 2.25 tons, so a bit bigger than on the Midland.

 

15 minutes ago, kitpw said:

I suppose the next question would be an estimate of how many locos were in service on a daily basis

 

i recall reading that S.W. Johnson thought 80% was the ideal figure but that in practice it was 85%, so he was complaining this lead to insufficient maintenance.

[Compound2632]

30 minutes ago, Andy Hayter said:

1.  What was the ratio of tender engines (4t capacity) to tank engines (1-2t capacity)?  If it were 1:1 than a 10t coal wagon would serve 2 locos for about 2 days.  That still makes the logistics of supply very tight.

2.  You have not taken loco availability into account.  I am sure I read somewhere that steam locos were taken out 1 day every week for clean down/clean out and minor repairs.  Add to that major maintenance intervals.  Helps a bit but still does not solve the conundrum.

3.  Wagons marked loco were for the (exclusive?) supply of coal to steam depots.  Are we sure that ordinary mineral wagons could not also be used?  Of the pictures I have seen of freight trains (and there are not that many pictures sadly), I have seen the odd one with a loco label wagon in it but I don't recall ever seeing anything like a block of loco minerals in any picture. 

 

1. About 2:1 tender to tank on the Midland and LNWR, about 1:1 on the Great Western.

2. Yes, say 80% availability as a ballpark figure.

3. Yes, PO wagons and ordinary railway company coal wagons were used, though I think this varied over time (or the proportion did). I've not really got to the bottom of the idea of the loco coal wagon, whether there was simply operational convenience (which the Midland situation might suggest) or an accounting advantage. But why have a fleet of loco coal wagons if they were only a small proportion of the wagons actually engaged in the traffic?

 

You want a block of loco coal wagons?

 

 

[Embedded link to catalogue thumbnail of MRSC item 32445, accident at Great Longstone, 15 July 1909.]

 

They're usually seen in groups of at least four in the background of posed shots of engines on shed or at the coaling stage.

[Miss Prism]

9 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

about 1:1 on the Great Western.

 

I'm sure that's wrong.

[Jol Wilkinson]

On 20/07/2022 at 12:08, Rail-Online said:

Yet another edge of a neg image, D299 I think but I cannot quite work out the wagon number. Initially it looks like 196753 but surely that is too many digits?  Therefore I think the leading 1 may be a smudge.

Willesden Jcn around 1928 - the coal tank has no LMS on its tender but 8261 in Crewe style hand painted script (but has lost its lamp sockets for lamp irons).  The two railway staff are looking suspiciously into the wagon! 

 

What do you think the wagon number is?

 

Cheers Tony

 

Rather a delayed comment but I have only just caught up with the topic.

 

Photo doesn't show a LNWR Coal Tank but a LNWR tender (probably 1800 or 2000 gallon) so possibly attached to a Coal Engine or a Cauliflower.

[Compound2632]

49 minutes ago, Miss Prism said:

I'm sure that's wrong.

 

Fair enough; I'll bow to the data. But it's my understanding that the Great Western had a higher proportion of tank engines than any other of the larger companies, at least c. 1900?

Edited July 23, 2022 by Compound2632