Identify these tenders please

[Mim]

Another C&HPR question. I am modelling a section of the Cromford and High Peak Railway for the 2mm Scale Association diamond jubilee layout challenge. A feature of this line were the old converted locomotive tenders used to supply water to the drier locations on the line. I've identified most of them as ex LNWR McConnel and Webb designs of various types and now have drawings available. There are a couple of identical newer six wheel tenders which have me stumped, so I'd like some help from the experts here. Other six wheel tenders on the line had their centre wheels removed, presumably to help them get over the gradient transitions on the rope worked inclines and on the railways sharp bends. These two have kept their centre wheels and are considerably larger than the other bowsers. I am guessing they were worked from the Friden end of the line after the Middleton incline was closed.

 

Links to pictures here, here and here. They are part of a page of excellent pictures of the line.

 

Any suggestions what they are and the locomotive types they might have come from? If I am really lucky there might be a 2mm, or N gauge kit or RTR version available.

 

Thanks, Mim

[Marshall5]

The Midland Rly is not my area of expertise but they look like standard Johnson tenders to me and used on variety of M.R. locos e.g. 3F, some 4F and some 2P's.

Ray.

[Mim]

The Midland Rly is not my area of expertise but they look like standard Johnson tenders to me and used on variety of M.R. locos e.g. 3F, some 4F and some 2P's.

Ray.

Thanks Ray,

I think you are right. I looked at later Midland tenders, but didn't go back far enough in time. Further reading suggests there are a lot of different capacity Johnson tenders, 3250, 3500 gallon and so on. Some had the tank side divided in to two panels. The C&HPR ones appear not to have this feature. They look high sided, so I suspect are larger capacity versions, but anyone able to narrow it down?

 

   Mim

[Michael Edge]

They are MR tenders, probably 3500 gallon but the 3250 are very similar. The only real difference between these tenders is the height of the tank which gives the differing capacities - careful measuring is the best way to distinguish 3500/3250. This is fairly late in CHPR history, originally old LNW tenders were used for water carrying, by this time there would have been plenty of old MR tenders available from scrapped 4F, 2P etc.

[Mim]

Thanks Michael,

I've found a photo in a book, again from the last few years of the line. This shows a Johnson tender, but this time coupled loco side to loco side with a Fowler tender. It is hard to tell for certain from the photos, but it doesn't look like these later tenders had been modified with conventional buffers, couplings and a hand rail fitted to the locomotive end, as the earlier LNWR tenders had. They couldn't be coupled to any other stock at this end unlike the ex LNWR ones, only an appropriate loco, or another tender. The fact that different tenders are shown in photos within a couple of years of each other suggests that whatever tenders were spare, or about to be scrapped were sent from Buxton on to the C&HPR.

 

Does this make sense? Anyone know any more?

 

Mim