Sliding windows in the end of vans

[BlackFivesMatter]

Hi, can anyone advise why some vans usually pre grouping or grouping, had a sliding solid window in one of the ends? I have also seen them in pregrouping brake vans, and not for access to lamps (which would have been on the sides).

It was suggested for outside items, but I find that unlikely. 

Anyone know? 

[Compound2632]

3 hours ago, BlackFivesMatter said:

Hi, can anyone advise why some vans usually pre grouping or grouping, had a sliding solid window in one of the ends? I have also seen them in pregrouping brake vans, and not for access to lamps (which would have been on the sides).

It was suggested for outside items, but I find that unlikely. 

 

There would be a tail lamp as well as side lamps. So I think that what you say was not the reason was very probably in fact the reason.

 

 

[Aire Head]

11 hours ago, BlackFivesMatter said:

Hi, can anyone advise why some vans usually pre grouping or grouping, had a sliding solid window in one of the ends? I have also seen them in pregrouping brake vans, and not for access to lamps (which would have been on the sides).

It was suggested for outside items, but I find that unlikely. 

Anyone know? 

 

Are we talking brake vans or merchandise vans?

[BlackFivesMatter]

Hi, both merchandise vans and also brake vans. 

 

I have seen a photo on Pete's blogspot of a g&swr brake van with an open verandah above where the lamp can simply be accessed from the verandah. No need to go via the doors. 

 

Any constructive reason? 

[Gordon A]

General merchandise vans do not have windows. It would be helpful if you were a bit more specific as to railway / region and era as each had it's own design of brake vans.

Putting the tail lamp on a brake van from the ground is a tricky job hence the open verandas on brake vans.

Brake vans always show a tail light but if vacuum / air braked would not show side lights.

[Dunsignalling]

Some merchandise vans had sliding shutters in the ends for checking if the vehicle was loaded or empty without needing to open the door(s) but those were not glazed. This seems to have been fairly common practice on the LNER and some of its constituents, but relatively rare elsewhere.

 

Single ended goods brakes needed an opening window or shutter in the non-veranda end for adding/removing the tail lamp. Lamp irons mounted low enough to access from track level were largely a BR thing introduced on fitted goods vehicles which (once the Rules permitted it) might find themselves the last vehicle in the train.

 

Side lamps on brakes were generally accessed from a veranda if removeable or, on some pre-group designs where they were fixed in position, a small hatch from inside the van.

 

John

[Compound2632]

I'm interpreting that G&SW brake as having cupboard doors low down in the verandah end. That's not a feature I've seen elsewhere - looking through the books I have, which cover English LMS, LNER, and Southern constituents, the only similar thing I've seen is on design of GER brake, which had a hatch in the verandah end. This van had a lamp iron low down at floor level. So I think the question becomes much more specific: why did this particular design of G&SW brake have this feature?

[Dunsignalling]

1 minute ago, Compound2632 said:

I'm interpreting that G&SW brake as having cupboard doors low down in the verandah end. That's not a feature I've seen elsewhere - looking through the books I have, which cover English LMS, LNER, and Southern constituents, the only similar thing I've seen is on design of GER brake, which had a hatch in the verandah end. This van had a lamp iron low down at floor level. So I think the question becomes much more specific: why did this particular design of G&SW brake have this feature?

 

To enable the guard to uncouple a banking engine, perhaps?

 

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, Dunsignalling said:

 

To enable the guard to uncouple a banking engine, perhaps?

 

 

I was wondering whether uncoupling might have something to do with it but I admit banking hadn't occurred to me. The G&SWR had some hard roads for working goods trains. 

[BlackFivesMatter]

Yes sliding hatch is a better term than window. I stand corrected. It's fair enough I suppose to check if a van is loaded or unloaded, but not much light. Certainly a LNER thing. 

 

As regards the brake van - uncoupling bankers? I would have thought if this were so other companies with a lot more banking would have done this, and would banking engines have been coupled to the train? I thought not. 

[Dunsignalling]

1 hour ago, BlackFivesMatter said:

Yes sliding hatch is a better term than window. I stand corrected. It's fair enough I suppose to check if a van is loaded or unloaded, but not much light. Certainly a LNER thing. 

 

As regards the brake van - uncoupling bankers? I would have thought if this were so other companies with a lot more banking would have done this, and would banking engines have been coupled to the train? I thought not. 

Whether banking engines had to be coupled or not was laid down in local instructions and varied between locations even within the same company/region. 

 

As a rough guide, companies that built brake vans with verandas extending to the end of the vehicle (e.g. LMS), insisting on coupling more than those who preferred end-platform vans (e.g. SR/LNER). The GWR, as ever had to be different, but theirs did have an opening in the non-veranda end that could be so used. A good indication that a line had one or more banked locations where coupling was required would be the continued use of older brake vans after the introduction of the BR standard type.

 

Uncoupling would be achieved by the bank engine driver closing up to the van so the coupling went slack and the guard lifting the it off the van using a pole with a hook on the end.

 

I don't quite understand the need for the "cupboard doors" on the GSW vans. Maybe a preference for using a shorter pole because a longer one might be awkward to use on the unusual verandas? I can't think of any other purpose for them.    

 

John

Edited March 11, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[Compound2632]

13 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

Whether banking engines had to be coupled or not was laid down in local instructions and varied between locations even within the same company/region. 

 

I understood that coupling was a Board of Trade requirement, except for locations where the case had been made for an exception - but this may only have applied to passenger trains. I'm saying this on the strength of my memory of something Mike @The Stationmaster posted relatively recently; my apologies if I am misquoting him. 

 

There was an accident at Falahill in 1899 when a banking engine ran into the rear of the passenger train it had been banking, having been uncoupled by means of a slip coupling. In his report, Col. von Donop criticised the use of slip couplings for banking engines, as it meant that the train was not brought to a stand to uncouple the banker. He would rather have banking of passenger trains entirely prohibited. But this does demonstrate that coupling of bankers was normal, at least for passenger trains.

[Dunsignalling]

2 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

I understood that coupling was a Board of Trade requirement, except for locations where the case had been made for an exception - but this may only have applied to passenger trains. I'm saying this on the strength of my memory of something Mike @The Stationmaster posted relatively recently; my apologies if I am misquoting him. 

 

There was an accident at Falahill in 1899 when a banking engine ran into the rear of the passenger train it had been banking, having been uncoupled by means of a slip coupling. In his report, Col. von Donop criticised the use of slip couplings for banking engines, as it meant that the train was not brought to a stand to uncouple the banker. He would rather have banking of passenger trains entirely prohibited. But this does demonstrate that coupling of bankers was normal, at least for passenger trains.

 

I must admit that I was ignoring passenger trains as the enquiry related to a goods brake van, but yes.

 

John

[Compound2632]

11 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

I must admit that I was ignoring passenger trains as the enquiry related to a goods brake van, but yes.

 

Thanks - I knew I was at risk of going OT discussing banking of passenger trains but just trying to establish if the rules were different.

[Michael Hodgson]

52 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

 

Uncoupling would be achieved by the bank engine driver closing up to the van so the coupling went slack and the guard lifting the it off the van using a pole with a hook on the end.

 

 

If the bank engine isn't already closed up to the brake van, it isn't helping push the train up the hill, the train engine is doing all the work.

[Dunsignalling]

1 hour ago, Michael Hodgson said:

If the bank engine isn't already closed up to the brake van, it isn't helping push the train up the hill, the train engine is doing all the work.

But if it was still needed to push, it wouldn't yet have got to the top of the hill. When it did the train engine would gain speed, pulling the coupling tight unless the banker accelerated, too.

Edited March 11, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[The Johnster]

1 hour ago, Dunsignalling said:

he GWR, as ever had to be different,

 

The GWR was the same, everone else was different (according to the view from Swindon, anyway).  They had a specific attitude to banking/assisting locos, and, as my local railway in the form of BR(W) is what I am most familiar with.  Where banking was provided at the rear of a train (e.g. Abergavenny-Llanvihangel), it was always uncoupled for freight or passenger trains, and the banker simply dropped off the rear as the train breasted the summit.  Where couplings were used, the assisting loco was coupled at the head of the train, and in some cases (Dainton, Hemerdon) marshalled inside the train engine because it was considered that the train engine driver was in charge of the running of the train and needed the best view of signals and the line ahead.  This was not universal, and assisting engines in the Severn Tunnel, which sometimes worked through beyond Pilining to Stoke Gifford or even Badminton in the up direction, were coupled ahead of the train loco.  In each case, local instructions in the Sectional Appendices authorised the practice.

 

The Severn Tunnel and the Lickey Incline were special cases that were worked according to specific rules that took the particular conditions at those locations into account; familiarisation with these local rules was part of the route knowledge of crews working over them.  Uncoupled banking in rear carries it's own risks and close attention is needed from the crew of the banker, especially in poor visibility and at night.  The banker is 'controlled' to an extent by whistle code from the train engine.

[The Stationmaster]

Can we please cut out the oft repeated nonsense about engines assisting front on the GWR having to be marshalled inside the train egine,.  I don't know who started it off but it's been kicking around for years and it is a load pf rubbish.  

 

Assisting Passenger Trains from the bottom to the top of an incline - any engine with driving wheels greater than 4'6" diameter may be used to assist at the front and must be coupled in front of the train engine

 

Assisting or double heading passenger Trains on level or falling gradients.  This also applied where the assisting engine would 'run some distance'  before or after the  ascending incline

a. Any 4-6-0  or  4-4-0 type may be used and must be coupled in front of the train engine.  Normally engines of these wheel arrangements should be used to assist in such circumstances.

b. Additionally in various nominated locations/sections of route any 2-6-0 or 2-6-2T with a driving wheel  diameter of at least 5'8" could be used to assist front (again coupled in front of the train engine unless it was a 'King' ).    Assistance in this manner was permitted in either direction through the Severn Tunnel.    In some cases only a 2=6-0 or a 2-6-2T was permitted to be used in this way.  

 

Note however that there were various additional restrictions in respect of assisting 60XX 'King' class engines.

 

c. Until October 1948 in addition to a and b above any engine which was not a 4-6-0 or 4-4-0 which assisted a passenger train had to be marshalled inside the train engine.  From October 1948 this instruction was revised to permit any engine with a leading pony truck to be marshalled in front of the train engine provided it was more powerful than the train engine.  If the train engine was the more powerful of the two then the assisting engine had to be marshalled inside the train engine.

 

A some date between 1948 and 1960 the status of 4-4-0s as assisting engines onpassenger trains was changed and they were lumped in with the general listing of engines with leading pony trucks except on the Cambrian where 'Dukedogs' were permitted, still, to assist front when coupled to a 'Manor'.   This all otherwise remained unaltered right up to the end of WR steam.

 

BUT these instructions were subject to e amplification or alteration in the Sectional appendices.  thus for example in some places passenger and parcels train were permitted to be assisted rear over a continuously rising gradient. For example while parcels trains were subject to the same Instructions as passenger trains a parcels train could be assisted rear from Totnes to Rattey by an engine which was not coupled to the train.

 

Assisting Freight Trains from the bottom to the top of an incline - any engine with a driving wheel diameter greater than 4 feet was permitted to be used.  The position in which the assistant engine was marshalled was noted in the various (Sectional) S Appendices to the WTT

 

Assisting or double heading Freight Trains on level or falling gradients.  This also applied where the assisting engine would 'run some distance'  before or after the  ascending incline -

 

a. If the assisting engine was not of the same type as the train engine or was a 4-6-0 or a 4-4-0  it had to be marshalled between the train engine and the train.

 

b. Partly Vacuum Fitted Freight trains were not permitted to be assisted except from the bottom to the top of an incline or through the Severn Tunnel

 

 

[Compound2632]

56 minutes ago, The Stationmaster said:

Can we please cut out the oft repeated nonsense about engines assisting front on the GWR having to be marshalled inside the train egine,.  I don't know who started it off but it's been kicking around for years and it is a load pf rubbish.  

 

It is, I believe, well-established that this was the practice on the NBR.

 

Perhaps the similarity of the initials has confused people?

[Wheatley]

The G&SWR tended to follow Midland practice and pilot rather than bank, its routes tending to be more 'up-down-up-down-up ... etc' than a long slog  up to a summit followed by  a long coast down the other side. It's been a long time since I  read David L Smith's "Tales of the G&SWR" but I can't recall banking being mentioned other than  to assist failures.  

 

On the only photo I can currently find of a G&SWR goods brake the cupboard doors are right next to the lamp irons, maybe it was to save leaning over the veranda ?

[BlackFivesMatter]

I agree that piloting was far more common than banking on the sou West. I cannot think of any regular banking. Although entry of steep climbs, not the slogs like Slochd, Ais Ghyll, Lickey etc. 

 

Would it not be easier to put the lamp on in a dropping motion from the verandah?

 

We are talking Peter Drummond here. He did not to my knowledge do anything like this on the Highland before he came to the sou West, not did father Dugald on the Caley, NB or LSWR. They were very much a brain picking family. (Not meant to sound like zombies!)

 

Hmmm more food for thought. Thanking all who have contributed thus far. 

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, BlackFivesMatter said:

We are talking Peter Drummond here. He did not to my knowledge do anything like this on the Highland before he came to the sou West, not did father Dugald on the Caley, NB or LSWR. They were very much a brain picking family. (Not meant to sound like zombies!)

 

Brother. 

[Pandora]

On 10/03/2022 at 20:37, BlackFivesMatter said:

Hi, can anyone advise why some vans usually pre grouping or grouping, had a sliding solid window in one of the ends? I have also seen them in pregrouping brake vans, and not for access to lamps (which would have been on the sides).

It was suggested for outside items, but I find that unlikely. 

Anyone know? 

An escape route? Or is it for when the Guard wanted to stop the train?  The Guard would show a lamp to attract  the attention of the footplate crew or the signaller

Edited March 13, 2022 by Pandora

[JeremyC]

I'm sure I've seen it stated somewhere that one reason for the end hatch in LNER goods vans was to allow the loading of items too long to be loaded through the side door. (Obviously they would have to be small enough in cross section to pass through the hatch)

Edited March 13, 2022 by JeremyC

[Dunsignalling]

9 hours ago, JeremyC said:

I'm sure I've seen it stated somewhere that one reason for the end hatch in LNER goods vans was to allow the loading of items too long to be loaded through the side door. (Obviously they would have to be small enough in cross section to pass through the hatch)

I've seen that too. I can see it might be very handy where a mixed load included a few long thin items, but suspect that might have been an opportunity spotted by goods depot staff presented with such a thing rather than being planned by the designer. 

 

It would be a time-consuming faff to load (or unload) an appreciable quantity of long items that way. Large amounts would have just gone into an open wagon and been sheeted over if necessary.

 

John

Edited March 14, 2022 by Dunsignalling