Pre-war iron ore wagons

[t.s.meese]

Was iron ore ever carried in wooden bodied wagons? All the photos I can find are for steel bodied tipplers and hoppers; most (all) look post-war. I'm wondering how these looked pre-war? For example, were the 4mm wooden bodied PO iron ore wagons we see used only for carrying coal to the plant?

[Arthur]

 

 

Iron ore was still being carried in wooden bodied wagons well into the 1950s. Trains often consisted of the most motley collections of 5 and 7 plank wagons.

 

They never looked full as, owing to the density of ore, the wagons were at their maximum weight capacity well before maximum volume capacity.

 

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[Nick Holliday]

The Furness Railway, and probably others such as the North Eastern, built wooden hopper wagons for ore carrying, as produced in 7mm by the eponymous Furness Wagon Company, their Number 3. It would seem unlikely that normal 5 or 7 plank opens would be used for this traffic, as emptying the ore with a flat floor would be onerous.

[eastglosmog]

The Ministry of Munitions in 1917 had large numbers of wooden bodied 7 plank wagons built, by Glos RC & W Co.  These were used in the Oxfordshire ironstone field and many passed in to private ownership after 1918.  There is a picture of one in Jenkins, Brown and Parkhouse's "The Banbury and Cheltenham Direct Railway".  Same book has a picture of a rake of what look like 9 plank Baldwins PO iron ore wagons on passage with iron ore from Wroxton to South Wales (planks may be a bit narrower than normal)

Edited December 2, 2017 by eastglosmog

[Arthur]

 

First photo in this post shows a typical iron ore train heading north from the East Midlands ore fields.

 

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/69274-dave-f-more-photos-added-21-june-from-1947-to-1955ish/?p=1056603

 

Tipplers, steel minerals, 7 planks, hoppers, more 7 planks.....

 

Trains consisting of nearly all wooden bodied wagons were not unknown.

 

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[t.s.meese]

The Furness Railway, and probably others such as the North Eastern, built wooden hopper wagons for ore carrying, as produced in 7mm by the eponymous Furness Wagon Company, their Number 3. It would seem unlikely that normal 5 or 7 plank opens would be used for this traffic, as emptying the ore with a flat floor would be onerous.

That was my thought too - but then, why any different from coal?

Edited December 2, 2017 by t.s.meese

[Guy Rixon]

The NER built metal hoppers for iron ore from an early date. The LNER, however, seems to have used some ex-NER, wooden, 20-ton hoppers (originally intended for coal) for ore. There is a picture of a train at Frodingham where some wooden hoppers are mixed in with the Appleby Iron Company PO ore-hoppers.

[Arthur]

It would seem unlikely that normal 5 or 7 plank opens would be used for this traffic, as emptying the ore with a flat floor would be onerous.

Certainly onerous but that was how it was done in earlier days. Later, tipplers were installed at many works and they were used to empty not only tippler wagons but steel and wooden minerals, and hoppers too. I have a photo of a 24t ore hopper being tippled at Skinningrove ironworks.

 

By the 50s and 60s many works has rationalised their ore transport operations, installing tipplers or hopper unloaders, with ore wagons used to suit.

 

In the 1960s there was a trend to using tipplers for home ores, they tended to be wet, sticky and lumpy, and hoppers for imported ores which were drier, often pre-treated and freer running. No point shipping several tons of water half way across the world with the ore.

 

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Edited December 2, 2017 by Arthur

[MarcD]

Just found this thread. Hopefully I can add something to the discussion. The movement of iron ore and the wagons used to move it depends on the type of ore being mined. The term Iron ore is a bit of a catch all for a number of different minerals. So the types of wagon used will have different factors effecting them

1. Each of these different types have a different amount of iron in it and therefore a different density.
2. The method of discharge of the ore depends on the infrastructure at the Iron/steel works.   
3. If the the ore contained high levels of Sulphur it would need roast the ore.

The company's approach to moving the ore are different

• Furness moved High iron content  Haematite and Magnetite, very heavy, 85-90% iron and required hopper or side discharge. using mixture of wooden and all steel ore hoppers or side tipping wagons.
• NER moved Iron stone/Lemonite  20-50% iron, some requiring roasting, no roasted ore transported in P5 mineral hoppers, roasted ore in the S1-S4 hoppers.
• NBR simular to NER.

Marc    

[Guy Rixon]

The company's approach to moving the ore are different

• Furness moved High iron content  Haematite and Magnetite, very heavy, 85-90% iron and required hopper or side discharge. using mixture of wooden and all steel ore hoppers or side tipping wagons.
• NER moved Iron stone/Lemonite  20-50% iron, some requiring roasting, no roasted ore transported in P5 mineral hoppers, roasted ore in the S1-S4 hoppers.
• NBR simular to NER.

Marc    

 

 

NER P4 was the 10.5-ton wooden hopper, yes? And P7 was the archetypical 20-ton coal hopper.  What was P5? I know that the S diagrams were steel hoppers.

[eastglosmog]

In addition to what Furness Wagon has mentioned the main type of iron ore in the East Midlands (Oxfordshire to Lincolnshire) was Siderite (Iron Carbonate).  This is only about 33% iron and quite open texture, so not so very dense - hence 7 plank wagons to move it about.  It was also sometimes calcined at the quarry (e.g. Early of Dudley's quarries at Hook Norton) to drive off the CO2 and water and make a product with higher iron content.  Economics of calcining always seems to have been marginal.

[MarcD]

NER P4 was the 10.5-ton wooden hopper, yes? And P7 was the archetypical 20-ton coal hopper.  What was P5? I know that the S diagrams were steel hoppers.

The P5 hopper NER Central Division's standard mineral hopper. It was a development of the Stockton and Darlington 11ton hopper with end-brake. See the photo. All non roasted ore looks like it was moved in them the S1-S4 hoppers were built for carrying hot roasted ore from the likes or rosedale mines. The NBR used standard mineral wagon on the whole but the did have some iron bodied hoppers about the same size as the NER's S1 hoppers 

Marc