“BEYOND DOVER”

[sncf231e]

On 04/03/2022 at 22:37, Northroader said:

Whilst I was looking through the Anton Pieck pictures for that last idea, I found one new to me, which i’d like to share:

The overweg wachter is genuine enough, with in her uniform hat, cloak, and clogs. The barriers were raised upwards in an arc from the post on one side by winding a handle. Suitable for a cake box type of tableau, if not at one end of the layout?

 

Found this

Regards

Fred

[Northroader]

EUROPEAN BLOCK BELLS - (+Subsequent posts)

 

Thank you, Fred, that’s a lovely clip showing the operations. I was particularly interested to see the large block bells on the platform, and how they worked. They are a very obvious feature in photos of old French stations, and that made it clearer what happened. Nice to see the railway issue cloaks being worn.

Edited May 20, 2022 by Northroader

[Northroader]

Here’s a link to the French railway block bells, as it looks quite involved:

http://peynichout.rene.pagesperso-orange.fr/cloches.htm

[Northroader]

And to add to that, here’s a picture of a station on the MIDI equipped with them. You’ll see they’re spaced out, I think that’s so that the station staff can distinguish which one “donged”.

 

 

 

They could be found in France, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, and Switzerland. Faller do a set of castings for HO scale, in French “sonneries d’annonce”, in German “lautewerke”.

Edited October 22, 2022 by Northroader

[Drotto]

I discovered this topic quite by chance. As a modeller of anything that runs on rails, from anywhere in the world I found the French goods wagon drawings very exciting to the extent that I have already made one of them and I am about to start on another. So far I have buit the EST open wagon in 4mm (1/76) as that is the scale that I work in - mainly. Two photos, painted and unpainted.

Edited April 3, 2022 by Drotto

[SteveyDee68]

This is a seriously useful thread - I do hope the contributors may be able to repost their photos in due course (as the thread is now mainly empty of images due to the recent crash of the forum)

 

HOURS OF FUN! REBUILDING!!

[Northroader]

Well, I must admit I felt a pang when picking up after the crash and realising the amount of photos that are missing. I think patience is the watchword, last time it happened things slowly picked up and a lot of the illustrations returned. Give it a couple of weeks then I might have to plod through and try and restore what I can that will be still missing.

 I’m glad that you’re trying to use the drawings to make some rolling stock, which looks really good. Try and follow the links I give to follow through to some of the other sites, such as Forum LR Presse, the French equivalent of RMweb, and you should find some very good information. Best wishes, Bob.

 

p.s. Your open might need a footboard under the door, something missing from British wagons.

Edited April 3, 2022 by Northroader

[Northroader]

“GARES BELGES D’AUTREFOIS”

 

BELGIAN GOODS WAGONS

 

“Grandad, what did you do when the web went down?”

Well, I pushed on with a couple of vehicles to go with the Belgian beer van. The source for the first is a bit unusual, a painting by Paul Delvaux (see page one) “le train du soir” (yes, he should have used Templot, but apart from that...)

just right of centre you’ll spot a tasty little open, which reminded me of Dennis Allenden’s drawing for an Etat open, (also featured near the start of this thread) but with rounded ends and a different profile guerite:

so push on with brass strip underframe, and a plastikard body. I’m rubbish at scribing planks, so there’s an overlay of Evergreen vee groove sheet. It’s also gained a Skytrex load of long boxes:

 

To go with it I did a brakevan or fourgon. This was the standard Etat Belge one from the 1880s, usually referred to as a “ballon” because of the profile of the very curved lookout duckets. One good source is “Gares Belges d’autrefois”, http://www.garesbelges.be, a collection of old postcards of station views, and here’s one with just such a vehicle on view. One interesting thing is that it is marshalled at the back end of the train, just like Britain, rather than at the front, usual Continental practice.

The other source was a builders catalogue picture from the Tassignon site, but can I hell find it now for this post. So I did a search, and instead stumbled across a mind boggling source:

https://nmbs-asp.adlibhosting.com/Content/GetContent?command=getcontent&server=pdf&value=2018\201805\C3462.pdf

A compilation of Belgian wagons, type, build date, fleet numbers, dimensions, drawings, and so on. This is volume three, flats, lowsides, brake vans, odds and sods. If you go down you’ll find a great drawing for a ballon, and you may spot I’ve missed a side window, and got an oil lamp instead of a stovepipe. I tried to import the drawing, but instead got the whole bloody volume in computerspeak, and it’s been hell getting it off this post.

construction much the same as the open, but the duckets were formed in nickel - silver sheet.

The two of them can now form up with the beer van into a small train, so it’s coming along.

Funnily enough I managed to sup some of this a few weeks back, Chimay blue at 9% ABV, and Chimay red at 8% ABV. I felt it was only fair to try both, but never fear, you’d have to work hard to get plastered, as it’s in those dopey little third litre bottles. It’s also quite pricey, but the good fathers assure you on the label all the proceeds go to charity, so you can drink it with a clear conscience. I was using it to wash down a pan of moules marinieres with frites dipping into a bowl of mayo, refreshing my inner Flamand. (The “Lowlander” in London’s Drury Lane, since you ask)

Edited October 26, 2022 by Northroader

[islandbridgejct]

I remember the first time I had a couple of Vlaamse tripels before dinner alright. (Well, I don’t exactly remember, but I think I was in a similar state to monsieur Delvaux when he modeled that tandem.

 

The good fathers didn’t mention which charity the proceeds go to, did they? I’m sure the Société d’Anciens Brasseurs de Chimay is a noble cause. 

[Mikkel]

11 hours ago, Northroader said:

“Grandad, what did you do when the web went down?”

Well, I pushed on with a couple of vehicles to go with the Belgian beer van. The source for the first is a bit unusual, a painting by Paul Delvaux (see page one) “le train du soir” (yes, he should have used Templot, but apart from that...)

just right of centre you’ll spot a tasty little open, which reminded me of Dennis Allenden’s drawing for an Etat open, (also featured near the start of this thread) but with rounded ends and a different profile guerite:

so push on with brass strip underframe, and a plastikard body. I’m rubbish at scribing planks, so there’s an overlay of Evergreen vee groove sheet. It’s also gained a Skytrex load of long boxes:

 

To go with it I did a brakevan or fourgon. This was the standard Etat Belge one from the 1880s, usually referred to as a “ballon” because of the profile of the very curved lookout duckets. One good source is “Gares Belges d’autrefois”, http://www.garesbelges.be, a collection of old postcards of station views, and here’s one with just such a vehicle on view. One interesting thing is that it is marshalled at the back end of the train, just like Britain, rather than at the front, usual Continental practice.

The other source was a builders catalogue picture from the Tassignon site, but can I hell find it now for this post. So I did a search, and instead stumbled across a mind boggling source:

https://nmbs-asp.adlibhosting.com/Content/GetContent?command=getcontent&server=pdf&value=2018\201805\C3462.pdf

A compilation of Belgian wagons, type, build date, fleet numbers, dimensions, drawings, and so on. This is volume three, flats, lowsides, brake vans, odds and sods. If you go down you’ll find a great drawing for a ballon, and you may spot I’ve missed a side window, and got an oil lamp instead of a stovepipe. I tried to import the drawing, but instead got the whole bloody volume in computerspeak, and it’s been hell getting it off this post.

construction much the same as the open, but the duckets were formed in nickel - silver sheet.

The two of them can now form up with the beer van into a small train, so it’s coming along.

Funnily enough I managed to sup some of this a few weeks back, Chimay blue at 9% ABV, and Chimay red at 8% ABV. I felt it was only fair to try both, but never fear, you’d have to work hard to get plastered, as it’s in those dopey little third litre bottles. It’s also quite pricey, but the good fathers assure you on the label all the proceeds go to charity, so you can drink it with a clear conscience. I was using it to wash down a pan of moules marinieres with frites dipping into a bowl of mayo, refreshing my inner Flamand. (The “Lowlander” in London’s Drury Lane, since you ask)

 

I'm always amazed at the speed of your work, and the resulting high standard. It would have taken me months to build just one of those wagons.

 

I very much like the rounded look-outs on the brake van. Makes the whole vehicle look delicious. Edible, even.

[Northroader]

Well, Mikkel, I’ve had the two chassis mouldering in a storage box for yonks, so it was just detailing and making new bodies, and started several weeks before the great crash. Although there is simultaneous tinkering besides.

Edited April 9, 2022 by Northroader

[Schooner]

..."just"...!

 

[TT-Pete]

On 08/04/2022 at 20:57, Northroader said:

 

 “le train du soir” (yes, he should have used Templot, but apart from that...)

 

 

Trying to follow the track through with my eye in that picture always gives me the same disorientated, slightly queasy feeling that I get with Escher;

 

 

Edited April 16, 2022 by TT-Pete

[Donw]

Loveley work on the wagons. A for Delvaux and Escher, well I've made c*ckups in my modelling but not quite to that scale. Escher will have fun when he tries to build to that drawing.

 

Don

[pete_mcfarlane]

So is there going to be a square chimneyed pannier tank to go with those rather nice Belgian wagons?

[Northroader]

It is something I’m looking at, i do have the necessary wheels and motor ready, but then I’ve got bits ready for about another god knows how many jobs.... I’m also thinking if I could cut a corner and save some time by adapting a Dapol  08 Gronk chassis for this, it looks a bit nearer than using it to do a class 25 0-6-0 i was on about on another thread?

I was going on about Belgian pannier tanks some pages ago, but I find it’s very dispiriting going back through here with all the pictures missing, so here’s a link into good old Wiki. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgian_State_Railways_Type_51

Edited April 15, 2022 by Northroader

[Northroader]

BELGIAN FOUR WHEEL COACHES LINK

 

I’ve been doing some diligent searching this evening, fired up by that link I gave recently about Belgian wagons. That link gave a downloadable pdf with all the poop on ‘wagons marchandises’, part 3,  namely flats and brakevans.

So here’s another gem, all the Belgian four wheeled passenger coaches, built up to about 1880, when sixwheelers and bogies started to appear:

https://nmbs-asp.adlibhosting.com/Content/GetContent?command=getcontent&server=pdf&value=2018\201805\C3538.pdf

Looking through, there is some quite amazing vehicles in there. Keep going past the funerary ones, when it looks like you’re getting to the end, there’s then another wodge for light railway type use (not vicinal, although described as tramway)

i have to confess that I’ve been shaping a passenger train mainly on distant old photos and Delvaux pictures, but this source is obviously much better, and I’m afraid the two coaches I’ve done so far will need extensive surgery to match up. Still, no excuses now.

 

Edited October 22, 2022 by Northroader

[Mikkel]

What a gem. Were there ever such small post office vans on British railways?

 

There's a grim commentary on the human deroute condition in the sequence. First you're a voyager, then a prisoner, then sick and finally dead!

 

10 hours ago, Northroader said:

wodge

 

My new English word for the day, thank you for yet another one.

 

Edited April 16, 2022 by Mikkel

[Donw]

There are enough coach drawings in that link to last a lifetime.

 

 

Don

[NeilHB]

The light railway ones are rather delightful, and quite tempting to model, not that Ffarquhar Road needs any more balconied stock at the moment! Thanks Northroader for sharing. 

[Northroader]

I’ve put in a link to a piece on the London and Birmingham Railway, Mikkel, where the use of four wheel coach type vehicles for mail traffic is mentioned, corresponding to the Belgian ones.

https://tringlocalhistory.org.uk/Railway/c13_operational.htm

I think the term “tramways” is misleading, an English word that was picked up and used to denote local / suburban railway working, but not the street running we think of. “La Plaine- Tramway” on the North side of Paris is an example of this.

Easter weekend, Don, get the plastikard out!

[Northroader]

More digging, and here’s three hundred pages worth of the rest of the passenger coaching stock. Six wheelers and bogies, main line and local, home grown and reparations, peasants and royalty. Photos show the six wheelers built in 1880s were still running around in block sets in the 1950s. You’ll see they had quite long bodies for six wheelers, known as G C, Grand capacite, but their length is a bit off putting for a micro layout. The ones shown with vertical wooden strips were finished teak.

https://nmbs-asp.adlibhosting.com/Content/GetContent?command=getcontent&server=pdf&value=2018\201805\C3456.pdf

[Northroader]

BELGIAN FREIGHT WAGONS LINK

 

Filling in the picture some more, here’s another download, this time for Belgian State freight rolling stock. This one covers the whole lot through to modern times, rather than a 1920s cutoff, so it is more selective, but even so there’s enough material to do plenty of modelling for whatever your era, plus some very useful detail such as suspension and brakes.

https://nmbs.adlibhosting.com/Content/GetContent?command=getcontent&server=pdf&value=2018\201805\C3468.pdf

 

edit: looking through at leisure this evening, I find that there’s also a good set of drawings for German Railways goods vehicles included in here as well, due to the post WW1 reparations to Belgium. They’re mainly based on KPEV Prussian  items, but by WW1 the old Landebahner were getting fairly standardised.

Edited October 22, 2022 by Northroader

[Andy Hayter]

two excellent finds @Northroader . Not my area but I can appreciate the data.

[Compound2632]

On 16/04/2022 at 13:38, Northroader said:

More digging, and here’s three hundred pages worth of the rest of the passenger coaching stock. Six wheelers and bogies, main line and local, home grown and reparations, peasants and royalty. Photos show the six wheelers built in 1880s were still running around in block sets in the 1950s. You’ll see they had quite long bodies for six wheelers, known as G C, Grand capacite, but their length is a bit off putting for a micro layout. The ones shown with vertical wooden strips were finished teak.

 

Those 1888 thirds are real knee-lockers at just 4' 6" between partitions. The seconds match contemporary British thirds at around 5' 8" and the firsts are still pretty parsimonious at 6' 10" or thereabouts. 

 

I see that the Royal Train continued the Berline and Dilligence terminology of the 4-wheel firsts (possibly some of the same carriages). A Berline seems to be one that preserves the several-coach-bodies-on-one-underframe look where a Dilligence seems to mean something a bit more saloon-like; this seems, as far as I can work out, to match the contemporary road vehicles of those names, on the continent.

Edited April 18, 2022 by Compound2632