Mixing BP tank wagons

[russ p]

I've got 8 45t shell/ BP tank class B wagons,  would these have mix mixed with 35t BP tank wagons? I've seen pictures of esso class A 35t tanks mixed with 45t ones 

[Wickham Green too]

Probably ............................. and if anyone can prove it never happened, you can plead 'Rule 1'.

 

Try https://hmrs.org.uk/oil-on-the-rails-book.html for details of likely traffic in your area.

 

[cctransuk]

10 hours ago, russ p said:

I've got 8 45t shell/ BP tank class B wagons,  would these have mix mixed with 35t BP tank wagons? I've seen pictures of esso class A 35t tanks mixed with 45t ones 

 

I'll be happy to be proved wrong, but I understood that BP did not have any 35Tglw (Airfix kit) tank wagons.

 

The Dapol iteration of this kit has been issued with BP transfers, but I believe this to have been a marketing ploy rather than a reflection of reality.

 

CJI.

[Wickham Green too]

Rule 1 then !

[hmrspaul]

13 hours ago, russ p said:

I've got 8 45t shell/ BP tank class B wagons,  would these have mix mixed with 35t BP tank wagons? I've seen pictures of esso class A 35t tanks mixed with 45t ones 

SMBP was very slow to accept that rail transport was the way forward for fuel movement. They continued to use very elderly wagons into the later 1960s. Therefore it managed to avoid the mess BR made of the introduction of power braking for tank wagons, and the increase in permitted Gross Laden weight from 35t, through 40t briefly to 45t for a while before 50t. And at the same time changing from vacuum to air brake as standard. The 1960s is a big problem for modellers and historians alike. Esso was caught by all of this as it did the opposite, bringing in new batches of wagons year after year to the latest standards, and being involved with several experiments for bogie tanks as well, before SMBP scooped the pool and bought many hundreds of 100t bogie tanks. 

 

Paul

https://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/fueltankwagons

[russ p]

Thanks guys , I'd better order some more esso decal kits.

Was it only esso that ordered the35tb tank portrayed by the airfix/Dapol kit?

[BernardTPM]

No, other companies bought them too, but not BP.

[cctransuk]

3 hours ago, russ p said:

Thanks guys , I'd better order some more esso decal kits.

Was it only esso that ordered the35tb tank portrayed by the airfix/Dapol kit?

 

Regent and Fina had them too, amongst others; I can supply the transfer - see Sheets BL11 and BL12 at the Cambridge Custom Transfers website.

 

John Isherwood.

[JeremyC]

On 09/06/2022 at 12:50, hmrspaul said:

SMBP was very slow to accept that rail transport was the way forward for fuel movement. They continued to use very elderly wagons into the later 1960s.

On the age of SMBP tank wagons it is interesting to read the report on the 1964 Henwick Hall accident where one of the tank wagons that derailed dated from 1903. (The wagon was actually owned by the Oakbank Oil Company who were part of Scottish Oils which was a BP subsiduary)

It's also interesting to note the quoted annual mileages of a tank wagon (24,000-30,000 miles) compared to a normal BR goods wagon (2,700 miles).

Edited June 10, 2022 by JeremyC

[hmrspaul]

SMBP files show they had identified the very old wagons (say pre-Grouping) and separated them to a fleet for local use only. How clearly that was followed I don't know, and have some doubts. I'm too young to have seen many early tank wagons before they went into internal use, but here is a 1922 tank in revenue use in Feltham in November 1967, https://PaulBartlett.zenfolio.com/smbptank/e60409f69

https://PaulBartlett.zenfolio.com/smbptank/e65b0adab  By that time, elsewhere, Pickering, Powell Duffryn, Hurst Nelson, Met Cammel were all producing class A and B 100T GLW air braked bogie tanks for SMBP. 

 

Paul

[russ p]

1 hour ago, JeremyC said:

On the age of SMBP tank wagons it is interesting to read the report on the 1964 Henwick Hall accident where one of the tank wagons that derailed dated from 1903. (The wagon was actually owned by the Oakbank Oil Company who were part of Scottish Oils which was a BP subsiduary)

It's also interesting to note the quoted annual mileages of a tank wagon (24,000-30,000 miles) compared to a normal BR goods wagon (2,700 miles).

 

That report is interesting,  that was a long train and only 3 operable fitted wagons. I didn't realise those oil fields supplied that much oil. 

Weirdly I worked an HOBC train to Tuxford yesterday and were shunting in Tuxford loop which I believe was on the site of the former oil terminal 

[russ p]

12 minutes ago, hmrspaul said:

SMBP files show they had identified the very old wagons (say pre-Grouping) and separated them to a fleet for local use only. How clearly that was followed I don't know, and have some doubts. I'm too young to have seen many early tank wagons before they went into internal use, but here is a 1922 tank in revenue use in Feltham in November 1967, https://PaulBartlett.zenfolio.com/smbptank/e60409f69

https://PaulBartlett.zenfolio.com/smbptank/e65b0adab  By that time, elsewhere, Pickering, Powell Duffryn, Hurst Nelson, Met Cammel were all producing class A and B 100T GLW air braked bogie tanks for SMBP. 

 

Paul

 

That's interesting Paul, I have a few of those and wasn't sure if they were still around in my period 

Do you know when the Berry wiggins ones finished 

[Fat Controller]

1 hour ago, JeremyC said:

On the age of SMBP tank wagons it is interesting to read the report on the 1964 Henwick Hall accident where one of the tank wagons that derailed dated from 1903. (The wagon was actually owned by the Oakbank Oil Company who were part of Scottish Oils which was a BP subsiduary)

It's also interesting to note the quoted annual mileages of a tank wagon (24,000-30,000 miles) compared to a normal BR goods wagon (2,700 miles).

Someone must have been doing some miles! Our local steelworks (Duport's) used to receive a block train of unfitted Class B tanks with heavy fuel oil for the furnaces and soaking pits. They'd stay on site until the train was empty; between one and two weeks. When they were supplanted by more modern stock, they stayed on site, serving as scrap carriers, with the upper half of the barrel burnt off. This would be about 1969

[hmrspaul]

Interesting because I thought it was BP that operated this oilfield not the joint sales operation of SMBP, and also that Youngs still owned one tank. 

The wagons noted for operating these trains were the very unusual for Britain bogie tanks built c1908 which continued in use through the 1960s - photo here 

 

 

There were other wagons only plated for BP https://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/solbp1135

 

Paul

 

[hmrspaul]

42 minutes ago, russ p said:

 

That's interesting Paul, I have a few of those and wasn't sure if they were still around in my period 

Do you know when the Berry wiggins ones finished 

I'm not aware of any unfit BWs being TOPS coded, Dave Larkin has some operating in March 1970. The files at the HMRS study centre may tell you more accurately. 

 

Paul