Aston On Clun. A forgotten Great Western outpost.

[MrWolf]

On 28/11/2022 at 06:06, Moxy said:

One of the 517 tanks ended up on the Bishop's Castle Railway, my kind of light railway.

 

BCR Number 1, bought from the GWR in1905, I don't know what her GW number was, but Number 555 was rebuilt in 1902 with an R2/3 boiler, extended smokebox and those 1850s looking wing plates.

 

Here's Number 1, hitched to the outside frame GW brake van that the company also purchased. Note the half cab has been partially enclosed with a section of cab salvaged from who knows what, apparently there was a gap in the middle!

 

Picture: Bishops Castle area history.

[Graham T]

Now there's a train brimming over with character!

 

[MrWolf]

13 minutes ago, Graham T said:

Now there's a train brimming over with character!

 

 

The original plan, something over twenty years ago was to build a light railway with the occasional train coming in from the GWR, but it was going to involve a good deal of scratchbuilding,  at least the way I am doing things now means that progress has been been pretty quick.

[NHY 581]

1 hour ago, MrWolf said:

 

BCR Number 1, bought from the GWR in1905, I don't know what her GW number was, but Number 555 was rebuilt in 1902 with an R2/3 boiler, extended smokebox and those 1850s looking wing plates.

 

Here's Number 1, hitched to the outside frame GW brake van that the company also purchased. Note the half cab has been partially enclosed with a section of cab salvaged from who knows what, apparently there was a gap in the middle!

 

Picture: Bishops Castle area history.

 

 

Great picture, Rob. 

 

Originally built in 1869, No.1's G.W.R number was 567. As you say, bought by the Bishops Castle Railway in 1905 but not released by the G.W.R until the cheque had cleared !

 

Rob. 

Edited December 1, 2022 by NHY 581

[MrWolf]

52 minutes ago, NHY 581 said:

 

 

Great picture, Rob. 

 

Originally built in 1869, No.1's G.W.R number was 567. As you say, bought by the Bishops Castle Railway in 1905 but not released by the G.W.R until the cheque had cleared !

 

Rob. 

 

At that sort of build date (Beginning 1868) she would have originally looked like this with saddle tank, spectacle plates and 7'4"+6'3" wheelbase:

 

J H Russell, A pictorial history of Great Western engines.

 

 

 

Edited December 2, 2022 by MrWolf

[MrWolf]

A little AA16 progress, floor fitted, brake standard in the correct place for the 16 tonner, wheels bearings and axleboxes together.

 

[stevel]

7 hours ago, MrWolf said:

Would any of you happen to know what the height of the sandboxes on the verandah was? The D&S instructions give plan dimensions of the boxes as being 24" x 18"

 

This is the only drawing I've been able to find:

 

The drawing from the back of the GW wagons plan book, shows them as being 1' 9-1/2" high, for a 20 ton later version brake van. This seems to match when scaling the drawing you have, of the locker in the cut away, bottom R/H side. 

[MrWolf]

10 hours ago, stevel said:

The drawing from the back of the GW wagons plan book, shows them as being 1' 9-1/2" high, for a 20 ton later version brake van. This seems to match when scaling the drawing you have, of the locker in the cut away, bottom R/H side. 

 

Thanks for that @stevel, I can get the verandah area completed and painted now.

Which means that I can get on with figuring out the clasp braking system for the 16tonner. Shoes are provided, but it will involve adapting the rodding from the 1880s set up. At least there's a figure for the axle centres of 46mm to work from.

I got the buffers in earlier which are actually rather nice and the sprung couplings, there's plenty of room for those at least.

[Siberian Snooper]

18 hours ago, stevel said:

The drawing from the back of the GW wagons plan book, shows them as being 1' 9-1/2" high, for a 20 ton later version brake van. This seems to match when scaling the drawing you have, of the locker in the cut away, bottom R/H side. 

 

8 hours ago, MrWolf said:

 

Thanks for that @stevel, I can get the verandah area completed and painted now.

Which means that I can get on with figuring out the clasp braking system for the 16tonner. Shoes are provided, but it will involve adapting the rodding from the 1880s set up. At least there's a figure for the axle centres of 46mm to work from.

I got the buffers in earlier which are actually rather nice and the sprung couplings, there's plenty of room for those at least.

 

The question that follows on from that, is do the sand boxes have the dome shaped pieces on top with the filler lids?

 

I took the sand box height from the Frogmore AA3 kit, which matches the 1ft 9 inches, but the Frogmore kit also has a dome shaped rectangle on which the lid sits.

 

 

[MrWolf]

Like this? Early ones don't have the continuous box, rather two separate items.

 

CLAG 

[Siberian Snooper]

Yeah, that's them! I realize that the boxes are separate on the AA16, as the brake standard is between them.

 

 

[Limpley Stoker]

Is the upright member attached to the inside of the verandah end a lamp bracket ?

[longchap]

26 minutes ago, Limpley Stoker said:

Is the upright member attached to the inside of the verandah end a lamp bracket ?

I rather suspect it's the actuation lever to release sand, due to the end being painted white.

[MrWolf]

32 minutes ago, longchap said:

I rather suspect it's the actuation lever to release sand, due to the end being painted white.

 

It certainly is, it operates the cross shaft fixed to the front wall of the verandah and by linkages the release on the sand boxes. @chuffinghell went to great pains modelling the mechanism on a brake van that is still in the pipeline. I found a picture taken from the opposite side of the verandah via the Didcot railway society, but it's in some weird format that this site can't upload.

 

2 hours ago, Siberian Snooper said:

Yeah, that's them! I realize that the boxes are separate on the AA16, as the brake standard is between them.

 

 

 

For some reason the early brake arrangement had the brake standard further back and offset to the left (when viewed from the outside front of the verandah) it was moved when the vans were upgraded to 16 tons and fitted with clasp brakes. 

[MrWolf]

Found a picture showing the operating system for the front sand boxes showing the lever pivot.

 

Poser content.com

 

And another showing the lever for the rear sand boxes. (The white handle next to the cabin door handle) This is pivoted at its top end and presumably pulls a rod along the inside of the van roof to another cross shaft with long operating rods down the rear corners of the van to the actuating levers on the rear boxes?

 

GWR.org

[simonmcp]

Does anybody know please what the two, taper ended, wooden poles stood upright in corners are for?

[MrWolf]

38 minutes ago, simonmcp said:

Does anybody know please what the two, taper ended, wooden poles stood upright in corners are for?

 

I can only think that they are sprags, which were thrust through the spokes of a wagon wheel to jam the axle and stop the wheels rotating where the hand brake wasn't enough. It would be handy to get a professional opinion. 

Has anyone seen @The Stationmaster? Or is he down at The Kangaroo organising the next darts match with the Young Farmers and the RAF?

[drmditch]

44 minutes ago, simonmcp said:

Does anybody know please what the two, taper ended, wooden poles stood upright in corners are for?

Sprags?

[franciswilliamwebb]

39 minutes ago, drmditch said:

Sprags?

 

Or Vlad's?😏

[MrWolf]

27 minutes ago, franciswilliamwebb said:

 

Or Vlad's?😏

 Or possibly Van Helsing's?

[Siberian Snooper]

8 hours ago, MrWolf said:

Found a picture showing the operating system for the front sand boxes showing the lever pivot.

 

Poser content.com

 

And another showing the lever for the rear sand boxes. (The white handle next to the cabin door handle) This is pivoted at its top end and presumably pulls a rod along the inside of the van roof to another cross shaft with long operating rods down the rear corners of the van to the actuating levers on the rear boxes?

 

GWR.org

 

The lever by the cabin door operates the sand boxes at the cabin end, I would assume that it was used when the cabin end was leading.

 

 

[Thorness]

8 hours ago, drmditch said:

Sprags?

a simple brake on a vehicle, especially a stout stick or bar inserted between the spokes of a wheel to check its motion.

[MrWolf]

4 minutes ago, Thorness said:

a simple brake on a vehicle, especially a stout stick or bar inserted between the spokes of a wheel to check its motion.

 

And very effective they are too. When I was about eight, a boy of eleven or twelve shoved me in a patch of stingers.

A few weeks later, I was sat on the kerb with a friend and the same boy came past on his bicycle, aimed a kick at my friend and missed, so he came back for another go.

I'd been messing around with a big stick from a chestnut fence and as he came past, I shoved the stick through his front wheel.

Still makes me laugh forty years later.

[MrWolf]

Back with the AA16, I've been trimming the solebars to fit and find that to get them to fit far enough in I needed to trim the excess metal from the buffer location pegs where they protrude through the buffer beams.

 

[Winslow Boy]

18 minutes ago, MrWolf said:

 

And very effective they are too. When I was about eight, a boy of eleven or twelve shoved me in a patch of stingers.

A few weeks later, I was sat on the kerb with a friend and the same boy came past on his bicycle, aimed a kick at my friend and missed, so he came back for another go.

I'd been messing around with a big stick from a chestnut fence and as he came past, I shoved the stick through his front wheel.

Still makes me laugh forty years later.

 

Hmmm.