Did any pre-grouping mineral wagons survive into early BR days?

[t.s.meese]

Just for the record on this thread, the David Larkin Acquired wagons... series V3, promises to look at this topic in V4. 

 

[HGR]

On 06/08/2020 at 20:14, Wickham Green too said:

Ironically, oil-lubricated rolling stock is now very much in the minority !

Apologies for replying to something from a while ago, but ... (that's what you get for reading back through the thread I guess !)

 

Bear in mind that 'grease' has evolved quite a lot in the timeframe under consideration. Early grease 'box lubrication would be often some concoction of animal origin, fat, tallow, etc. and very loosely specified or its consistency controlled. Oil of the time was often of plant origin. CASTROL name = castor bean oil. This is why the very characteristic smell of old classic cars. It had undesirable side-effects on the drivers of said vehicles but that's another story !

 

Mineral based oils brought much more quality to lubricants. The oil used in axleboxes soon became mineral oil, but with esters added to make it 'sticky' like the old stuff. Grease is effectively a blend of a lubricating oil with a base soap used to obtain the desired consistency / thickness depending on what you wanted to use it for. Early (WWII) through into British Railways the grease used for the new roller bearing axleboxes would need to be a defined mineral based grease. Originally there were two distinct grades - a very expensive (at the time) grade based on a lithium soap that was specified for such as Timken roller bearing sets. The other grade was a cheaper, more general purpose grease but was not up-to-scratch for such as Timken RB boxes.

 

B.R. started initially painting the covers on grease boxes red to discourage attempts of filling them with oil. This soon changed to yellow so as to remain visible in black / rust coloured grime for longer. They typically get re-greased every two years so the covers might at least get an occasional clean from time to time. To identify the boxes needing the fancy lithium based grease, a horizontal red stripe was painted on the yellow cover. Depots were instructed to use the lithium grease only for these boxes so marked and not 'waste' it using it on anything else that didn't need such good stuff.

 

More recently, as the cost differential of grease types has become less relevant, the lithium base is now very much the general purpose grease - the 'Regular Lubricant' or 'RL' grades. There are now other more expensive / exotic grades for those special applications where extremes of high speed, loading, etc. necessitates.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[keefer]

On 02/05/2021 at 09:26, HGR said:

It had undesirable side-effects on the drivers of said vehicles but that's another story

Also affected the pilots of the early bi-planes, including I believe during WW1 - as if you wouldn't have enough to worry about being up in a rickety crate anyway!