Warren Branch

[figworthy]

54 minutes ago, chuffinghell said:

Do you have to have a weigh bridge hut and a coal merchants office or can you get away with just a coal merchants office?

 

I might be missing the point (again), but if you have a weigh bridge, don't you need somewhere out of the weather for taking the readings ?

 

I would have thought that the weigh bridge was a facility provided by the railway for any customer to use, whereas the coal merchant's hut was their for the sole use of that coal merchant, and probably put there by the coal merchant.

 

Adrian

[chuffinghell]

Perhaps it will be easier to forget about a coal merchants and just have the weigh bridge and weigh bridge office

 

I just assumed the coal merchants would take advantage of the weigh bridge

 

I do hate being fick

 

Edited May 21, 2021 by chuffinghell

[Alister_G]

1 hour ago, chuffinghell said:

Do you have to have a weigh bridge hut and a coal merchants office or can you get away with just a coal merchants office?

 

It would be more usual to have them as separate buildings, don't forget the weighbridge belongs to the GWR and is part of the yard operation, whereas the coal merchant's office was usually a private enterprise.

 

The reason why you see so many coal merchants in station yards is simply one of logistics: coal was delivered to the merchants by rail, so it makes sense to have the coal merchant's premises adjacent to the delivery point. Onward transportation to domestic consumers would most likely be by horse and cart in the period you are modelling.

 

Al.

Edited May 21, 2021 by Alister_G
clarification

[Alister_G]

Just a further thought, if you are going to have a coal merchant's there needs to be a siding where the coal can be offloaded in bulk, either with coal staithes, or, quite often, just a big pile at the side. The coal merchant's office would be next to that.

 

At Bakewell, (which is not GWR, or in the 30s) the station yard looked like this:

 

 

Note the piles of coal (with sidings hidden behind) the coal merchants offices are the larger building, the weighbridge office is the smaller building to the left.

 

Al.

[chuffinghell]

20 minutes ago, Alister_G said:

Just a further thought, if you are going to have a coal merchant's there needs to be a siding where the coal can be offloaded in bulk, either with coal staithes, or, quite often, just a big pile at the side. The coal merchant's office would be next to that.

 

At Bakewell, (which is not GWR, or in the 30s) the station yard looked like this:

 

 

Note the piles of coal (with sidings hidden behind) the coal merchants offices are the larger building, the weighbridge office is the smaller building to the left.

 

Al.

I thought that and being short on space I’m not sure where I could position it

 

I need to set it out really but I’m happy with the position of the weigh bridge office as it’s near the entrance/exit so I imagine the office there also serves as security to the yard

 

Edited May 21, 2021 by chuffinghell

[Alister_G]

Just now, chuffinghell said:

but I’m happy with the position of the weigh bridge office

 

Yep, absolutely, nowt wrong with that.

 

Al.

[chuffinghell]

1 hour ago, Alister_G said:

 

Yep, absolutely, nowt wrong with that.

 

Al.

 

Thanks Al

[teaky]

The building here used to be a coal merchants.

Image courtesy of Google.

 

This is near Droitwich Spa railway station which is ex GWR and still has lower quadrant semaphore signals.  The coal merchants has obviously been remodelled with new doors and windows and a ramp.  The weighbridge is still there underneath the two cars.  It is quite a cramped site.  Just to the left there is a bridge over the railway.  Behind the building the ground slopes downwards to track level where there used to be some sidings.  Further left there is the station approach.

 

It was still a coal merchants less than 25 years ago because I bought a large bag of smokeless fuel from there.  It was unused for a few years before being repurposed.

 

[Waraqah]

55 minutes ago, teaky said:

The building here used to be a coal merchants.

Image courtesy of Google.

 

This is near Droitwich Spa railway station which is ex GWR and still has lower quadrant semaphore signals.  The coal merchants has obviously been remodelled with new doors and windows and a ramp.  The weighbridge is still there underneath the two cars.  It is quite a cramped site.  Just to the left there is a bridge over the railway.  Behind the building the ground slopes downwards to track level where there used to be some sidings.  Further left there is the station approach.

 

It was still a coal merchants less than 25 years ago because I bought a large bag of smokeless fuel from there.  It was unused for a few years before being repurposed.

 

The building, or the large bag of smokeless fuel?

[teaky]

Both.  The building became a takeaway and the smokeless fuel became atmospheric pollution.

[MrWolf]

Just to show that there's a prototype for everything, this is the weighbridge, weighbridge office and other station yard offices of the Bishop's Castle Railway, Shropshire. It has been restored as the last vestige of the company's headquarters.

 

 

[chuffinghell]

Today we visited

 

to go on

 

 

to

 

Which means

 

 

Lovely narrow gauge loco

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oscar enjoyed it too.....

 

....apart from embarrassing us both by barking at every dog there 

 

 

Edited May 25, 2021 by chuffinghell

[Rowsley17D]

Was on it a couple of years ago now, first time since privatisation. Very enjoyable ride, hope the weather was kind.

[chuffinghell]

17 minutes ago, Rowsley17D said:

Was on it a couple of years ago now, first time since privatisation. Very enjoyable ride, hope the weather was kind.

It was dry and sunny at Aberystwyth but started to rain as we got to Aberffrwd but if it wasn’t for rain Wales wouldn’t be so green and picturesque

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 25, 2021 by chuffinghell

[Alister_G]

There's lovely, isn't it.

 

Al.

[Graham T]

Very nice photos.  Verdant, you might even say!

[chuffinghell]

17 minutes ago, Alister_G said:

There's lovely, isn't it.

 

Al.

It’s Lush

 

I'm impressed! I didn’t know you spoke Welsh

 

I do like Wales, it’s such a lovely country

 

 

14 minutes ago, Graham T said:

Very nice photos.  Verdant, you might even say!

 

Not bad considering the journey photos are screen shots from video taken on my phone

 

I'm not usually very good at taking photos

 

Edited May 25, 2021 by chuffinghell

[Tortuga]

1 hour ago, Rowsley17D said:

Was on it a couple of years ago now, first time since privatisation. Very enjoyable ride, hope the weather was kind.

At first I thought it seemed odd to hear a narrow gauge line referred to in that way, but obviously the VoR would’ve been subject to privatisation same as the rest of the national network.

 

Nice photos by the way @chuffinghell

Edited May 25, 2021 by Tortuga
Credit to the topic’s author

[chuffinghell]

I thought this was an interesting looking little building
 

 

[chuffinghell]

The quality isn’t as good as taken, I’m assuming this is something to do with uploading it to YouTube?...I don’t do technology 

 

Edited May 25, 2021 by chuffinghell

[MrWolf]

42 minutes ago, chuffinghell said:

I thought this was an interesting looking little building
 

 

 

You do realise that this is the beginning of the Alice in Wonderland moment when you fall down the rabbit hole?

[AlfaZagato]

For narrow gauge, those sure are great, monolithic things.   I can't wait for the Model Rail exclusive.

[lezz01]

I went on the VoR back in the day with the olds, when it was all in BR blue with double arrows on the side of the locos. I can't tell you the exact year but I must have been around 10 or so which is 50 years back. Happy days!!

Regards Lez.

[MrWolf]

I seem to have got it the wrong way round. I've lost count of the number of times I have been to or through Devil's Bridge and not had the time to travel on the railway. 

It was interesting during the BR blue days as an irrepressible  anachronism. Now that it has been backdated to Great Western livery, it looks really impressive. I think that we will have to pay a planned visit before long.

[NHY 581]

4 hours ago, MrWolf said:

I seem to have got it the wrong way round. I've lost count of the number of times I have been to or through Devil's Bridge and not had the time to travel on the railway. 

It was interesting during the BR blue days as an irrepressible  anachronism. Now that it has been backdated to Great Western livery, it looks really impressive. I think that we will have to pay a planned visit before long.

 

 

I've done exactly the same, pausing at the tea rooms there on numerous occasions.  The closest I came to a trip on the line was popping in to Devils Bridge station yard for a wander about. 

 

They are big old engines and very appealing. 

 

I think there are quite a few 'standard gauge ' modellers who have a suppressed hankering for something narrow gauge. 

 

Mine is definitely that of the Lynton and Barnstaple but I am keeping an eye on the Bachmann quarry Hunslets.........a very close eye.......