Rapido OO Gauge LMS Dia1666 5-plank open

[Wickham Green too]

10 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

Not really - Accurascale MO seems hell bent on only issuing ‘packs of 3 identical (save running number)  wagons. ...

... unless they're banana vans of a certain vintage ! 

[MartinTrucks]

On 25/08/2023 at 19:34, Wickham Green too said:

Well, the Southern and Western vans had conspicuous diagonals from new ............ the LNER kept theirs hidden but you can often see an 'X' of bolts !

The other factor IMHO is that GW and SR designs had a steel cantrail. I cannot speak for LNE types as I have never dealt with them.  The LMS seemed to like to use a hardwood board the length of the vehicle to hold the body together with all the problems that produced.

Martin

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

On 26/08/2023 at 01:41, Aire Head said:

D1891 onward is what is typically considered "the LMS van" and with over 20,000 produced which is more than most companies had vans altogether I'd say it's unfair to say the LMS wasn't consistent.

Quite so. The LNER had about 40,000 12T vans in traffic at nationalisation, most of their own design, and also with plentiful variations; especially the final third of that number built under the exigencies of wartime and after materials restrictions.

 

The two big groups (with 80% of the UK freight by rail mileage between them) were also necessarily coping with a rail served premises customer requirement for sliding doors, and there was both a weight penalty with that, and less structural support to the van side against longitudinal racking, when compared to cupboard doors, which fill the 'gaping hole' and brace it. Sometimes there's nothing for it but to experiment before settling on a design ...

 

On 25/08/2023 at 17:21, Wickham Green too said:

Looks as described ( arched body on straight solebar ) in my copy of the book ..... though relying on nothing more sophisticated than Mk1 eyeball ............................... admittedly, there is a little distortion in the track below - but I think that's only a dipped joint.

 

As already observed this might have been the product of any number of stages between the camera lens and the the printed rendering. 

 

But photographic lenses with 'barrel' distortion were fairly common back in the day, and if the solebar happened to be pretty much on the lens axis and thus recorded straight, then the body 'bulging' upwards, and if the rails (which I cannot see in the posted image) were sagging downwards, that's a likely culprit.

[Nick C]

6 hours ago, MartinTrucks said:

 The LMS seemed to like to use a hardwood board the length of the vehicle to hold the body together with all the problems that produced.

I was chatting a couple of weeks ago to the guys restoring an LMS van at Medstead, they were somewhat unimpressed with that aspect of the design! 

[Wickham Green too]

3 hours ago, 34theletterbetweenB&D said:

... lenses with 'barrel' distortion were fairly common back in the day, and if the solebar happened to be pretty much on the lens axis and thus recorded straight, then the body 'bulging' upwards, and if the rails (which I cannot see in the posted image) were sagging downwards, that's a likely culprit.

The only distortion visible on the train is that one wagon body - locomotive, tender and at least seven wagons behind the D1666 look perfectly straight. I think the rail joint ahead of the nearest D1666 wheel is slightly dipped.

[gwrrob]

On 26/08/2023 at 10:24, rapidoandy said:

Not that my new hobby is boat spotting….

 

but I can say that they have left Hamburg and are on their way to Antwerp before heading to the UK. 
 

Not long to wait!

 

I take it they are on the same vessel as the 15xx then as it’s going to be an expensive month. @rapidoandy

 

 

[rapidoandy]

Believe it or not they are on different ships!

 

Sadly I have just been informed they are about a week later than hoped which will make for a very busy time at HQ when they arrive a few days apart.

 

Andy

[Dunsignalling]

On 28/08/2023 at 12:32, MartinTrucks said:

The other factor IMHO is that GW and SR designs had a steel cantrail. I cannot speak for LNE types as I have never dealt with them.  The LMS seemed to like to use a hardwood board the length of the vehicle to hold the body together with all the problems that produced.

Martin

Thanks, I wasn't aware of that, and it last satisfies my enduring curiosity as to why the LMS kept adding, deleting or moving the strapping on various Diagrams, and switching between vertical and horizontal planking. They were clearly searching for a pattern that offered better long-term stability, but somehow failed to spot how others achieved it. 

 

It also explains why BR needed to reinforce many of them, but begs the question as to why that solution wasn't found much sooner. After all, it was a simple duplication of the arrangement that was already present at the other end of many of them.

 

BR van design seems to have been strongly influenced by GWR practice, so did it just take an outsider's eyes to see beyond "that's the way we've always done it here" ?

 

John

 

 

 

 

[Oldddudders]

12 hours ago, rapidoandy said:

Sadly I have just been informed they are about a week later than hoped which will make for a very busy time at HQ when they arrive a few days apart.

And only a stone’s throw from where Graham Farish had their factory, long since a station car park. 

[Aire Head]

2 hours ago, Dunsignalling said:

BR van design seems to have been strongly influenced by GWR practice, so did it just take an outsider's eyes to see beyond "that's the way we've always done it here" ?

The corrugated end of the BR van is very LMS so I'd say it's a solid blend of the two.

[Dunsignalling]

1 hour ago, Aire Head said:

The corrugated end of the BR van is very LMS so I'd say it's a solid blend of the two.

Agreed, but nothing else is!

 

One has to wonder if the LMS placed too much store in its ability to add strength to their own vans.

 

 

Edited September 5, 2023 by Dunsignalling

[Compound2632]

A curious discussion. Of course it is understood that when personifying the LMS, GWR, etc., what is meant is, the staff of their C&W Drawing Offices, working to a specification laid down by their Operating or Traffic Department staff. I feel sure, though, that as professional engineers, the DO staff at Derby or Swindon were perfectly aware of what their colleagues elsewhere were doing. nothing "hush-hush" about a 12 ton van! 

[MartinTrucks]

7 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

And only a stone’s throw from where Graham Farish had their factory, long since a station car park. 

Please pardon my ignorance, but I always thought that GF was based at Holton Heath, Dorset. 

Best regards,

Martin

[Wickham Green too]

They started out in Bromley - long before they became involved with model trains.

[Oldddudders]

2 hours ago, MartinTrucks said:

Please pardon my ignorance, but I always thought that GF was based at Holton Heath, Dorset. 

Best regards,

Martin

In recent years that's true, but they had started in Bromley, I think, and then moved to Staplehurst, occupying the large former goods shed. Their name was emblazoned on the side. After the move to Dorset I'm not sure who took the place over, but by 1983 it was run by a chap called Rodney Mumford, who sold petfoods and had some of the biggest cats you've ever seen, which were often to be found in the station waiting room, dribbling on some commuter's office best clothes. 

 

The shed was demolished ca 1990, and Rodney operated from his home in Chainhurst. The site became a much-needed overflow station car-park, but for some years was not surfaced, so was the car-park of last resort. 

[Rowsley17D]

Just paid for my order of 2 wagons.

[RapidoCorbs]

These are in the warehouse and are in the process of being despatched now as payments come in.

 

Was a bit of a squeeze with the 15xx pallets arriving 2 days before!

[The Johnster]

On 05/09/2023 at 09:21, Aire Head said:

The corrugated end of the BR van is very LMS so I'd say it's a solid blend of the two.

It’s pretty much the later form of GW van with corrugated ends and a single vent each end, very much more GW influenced and quite possibly the way Swindon was going anyway.  LMS vans were a different profile, different framing, slightly taller sides and a flatter roof arc, and had sliding doors. 

[gwrrob]

I hope @Graham_Muz doesn't mind me using an image from Kernow but these look rather splendid indeed.

 

 

 

[The Johnster]

My BR liveried wagon is dispatched, due to arrive in the post tomorrow morning.  I had a bit of an acquistive frenzy on Wednesday, with some rail joiners and an eBay Parkside unopened kit LNER Plate also pending, I like these all-steel all-welded animals and this is a pure Rule 1 wagon!  It'll be finished in BR unfitted grey.  It won't see much use, an occasional heavy casting of indeterminate lumpy shape for some sort of treatment or other at Dimbath Metals (Galvanising & Electroplating Specialists) perhaps.  The LMS 5-planker will take up duties in the general merchandise fleet, with the occasional load of pitprops for the colliery.

 

Exciting times for Dimbath Valley Railway's C&W department, but it's sensible now to not buy anything else until next pension day....

[Pre Grouping fan]

2 hours ago, gwrrob said:

I hope @Graham_Muz doesn't mind me using an image from Kernow but these look rather splendid indeed.

 

 

 

 

I always thought LMS bauxite was similar in colour to what BR ended up using. That looks very similar, if not the same as SR brown to me?

[RapidoCorbs]

33 minutes ago, Pre Grouping fan said:

 

I always thought LMS bauxite was similar in colour to what BR ended up using. That looks very similar, if not the same as SR brown to me?

Ours is mixed to be a close match to this:

https://www.phoenix-paints.co.uk/products/14p39

[Wickham Green too]

1 hour ago, Pre Grouping fan said:

I always thought LMS bauxite was similar in colour to what BR ended up using. ...

A popular misconception .... I've still got a tin of the original Precision Paints alleged Bauxite and it's far too light .... in fact as a dead flat finish it dries almost pink ! .............. fortunately whoever was in charge at the time saw the error of their ways.

Try page 83 of 'The Big Four in Colour' for a slightly faded example.

[MartinTrucks]

1 hour ago, Pre Grouping fan said:

 

I always thought LMS bauxite was similar in colour to what BR ended up using. That looks very similar, if not the same as SR brown to me?

The LMS Banana Van at Kingscote is in LMS bauxite.  Assuming they did what I advised them to, they prepared a 2 foot square plywood swatch using Precision paint, let it weather for a fortnight and then got a Brewers colour match for it.

 

When you next go to the NRM (or online within screen colour limitations) look at the colour of their LMS 3-plank.  LMS Bauxite (which is actually called 'bauxite') is more of a brown than a red oxide although it faded to a colour more akin to Indian Red (as used by the Santa Fe RR on their freightcars.

 

There is a fair amount of confusion over LMS bauxite as, IMHO, the old Humbrol never produced it in a tinlet, so modellers have nothing to use as a guide.

 

Whatever you do, DO NOT try to match it to anything on BS381C!!!!

 

Cheers,

Martin

[Compound2632]

3 minutes ago, MartinTrucks said:

The LMS Banana Van at Kingscote is in LMS bauxite. 

 

This:

 

 

[Embedded link to Bluebell Railway stock lists page.]