Early BR scrap wagons

[Pokemonprime]

Everything I've found so far about scrap-hauling wagons on BR has been either 16T (later 21T) steel-bodied minerals, or later hopper bodied/later era wagons. (like HSA, I think?). I was curious if wood-bodied wagons (5-planks and 7-planks) ever got used in this service, but I haven't been able to find any evidence of such. A friend of mine said that by the time there was any notable scrap metal traffic, wooden opens would have already been phased out. 

So were wooden opens ever used on BR for scrap metal traffic, from 1948 to the early/mid 60s (when they'd all be retired)? Or was it always metal-bodied wagons? If anyone has any knowledge or even better, photographs, that'd be immensely helpful.

[Wickham Green too]

Your friend's about right - scrap metal probably wasn't recycled on the scale it probably should have in those days ...... and a timber-bodied wagon wouldn't last very long being knocked about by great lumps of metal !

[Railfreight1998]

I've definitely seen at least one image of couple of wooden highfits loaded with scrap in the late 60s, but as mentioned above it would not have been a common sight. 

 

Wooden 5 planks lasted until the mid 70s in revenue service, and even longer in engineers use.

[doilum]

I was recently given a book of photos shot in the Doncaster Plant during the scrapping era. There are several steel 16,tonners in new condition being used for steel scrap. The non ferrous scrap is often in wooden 13 ton wagons.

[The Johnster]

The 50s, early BR to us, were a boom time in the scrap business with huge amounts of war surplus materiel available; ships, tanks, big guns, armoured vehicles etc.  It took until the 60s to clear the backlog, by which time some of the bigger scrap dealers turned to the supply of steam locomotives from BR.  Many of the big scrap yards in the 50s were sited near to steelworks, their main customer, and in some cases were directly connected with conveyer belts.  So there was little need for transport of scrap ferrous metal by rail and much of what was conveyed by rail would have been in internal user stock.

 

When the war surplus materiel was all processed, the focus changed to rail accessed yards like Vic Berry's or Cashmore's, and of course Woodham's.  By this time the processed shredded scrap was being conveyed in 16ton steel minerals.  Scrap cars were in the form of crushed cube blocks.  Shredded material is not particularly damaging to the wagons, but the crushed blocks can be. 

 

By the 70s, specialist scrap wagons were appearing and steelworks again became the focus, many of them new build and dedicated to processing recycled scrap ferrous; the smelting industry was by then in a decline due to world market saturation that continues, partly the result of recycling of ferrous material from the scrap industry. 

 

A ship wrecked at Sker Point near Porthcawl (with loss of all hands and the Mumbles lifeboat crew) in 1947, the Samtampa, was broken up on site by a husband and wife team living at the site in a caravan, just the two of them working on their own, with a war surplus Sherman tank sans gun turre dragging pieces of the ship along Kenfig and Margam Sands to Port Talbot steelworks, where they were 'weighed in'.  It took them several years, working outdoors in all weathers, and, on the last trip, the Sherman was weighed in as well.  A tough life...

Edited June 29, 2021 by The Johnster

[Fat Controller]

Another factor was that there were an awful lot of small foundries, who would have scrap delivered by road from the vicinity, occasionally 'sweetening' the mix with pig iron. This would have reduced the amount of scrap travelling long distances.