LNER coal drops.

[iands]

As @Ken.W mentions, the last two drops at Selby could have been for Lime (as per Goathland), which might also explain why they look a slight different colour (lighter). It would also explain why these two were 'covered', to protect the Lime from the weather. It is possible that  the covered section was removed because it was no longer needed if the Lime traffic ceased, or was damaged in some way. Not sure it would have been damaged by 'enemy action' during WW2 as I've not come across any evidence to suggest this, but then again ......

[doilum]

Almost certainly lime. Perhaps one of our community has more information on the wagons used for this traffic and the extent to which it had to be kept dry. I assume that the lime was collected by the farmers , but was it bagged or simply shovelled onto the cart?

Powsides do a couple of the Micklefield Coal & Lime wagons. Their quarries being only a few miles down the line to Leeds. Were the same wagons used for both traffic according to needs, or were wagons purchased for each specific load?

Edited March 11, 2023 by doilum

[doilum]

Little brother dropped in and gave a fresh pair of eyes to a grainy aerial photograph of the Selby drops. Taken probably just after the war it shows the drops after the lime cells had the roof and walls removed. He asked the question " is that a small locomotive parked over the end cells?" 

His hypothesis being that the coal cells were remodelled due to a change in operational practice whereby a loco would pull six or seven wagons onto the drops and wait whilst they were immediately discharged before returning them to the sidings. This might also explain why the second line on the drops was removed.

There was a sign giving explicit permission for locomotives to enter the coal yard ( drops). Any thoughts? 

[Aire Head]

On 11/03/2023 at 12:26, doilum said:

Almost certainly lime. Perhaps one of our community has more information on the wagons used for this traffic and the extent to which it had to be kept dry

 

Mostly peaked roof PO/ExPO wagons or perhaps some sheeted ones for Lime.

 

On 11/03/2023 at 12:26, doilum said:

Were the same wagons used for both traffic according to needs, or were wagons purchased for each specific load?

 

Extremely unlikely as both coal and lime were goods considered to "contaminate" the wagon used to carry them

 

 

[doilum]

Sweep them out?

Two bits of evidence to consider.

As a small child in the early 60s, one of our neighbours was an independent bargeman. Most of the year was spent moving coal from Castleford to Ferrybridge but in August he would sweep out the barge and move grain to Selby.

Late grandfather spoke of his first day at work for Briggs Whitwood colliery aged 14 in 1913. A London merchant had returned a whole train of coal because, on sweeping out the first wagon they managed to fill a small sack (probably 10kg) with dust.

Maybe pre 1914 sweeping out wagons was a realistic option?

[Aire Head]

Lime was considered such a strong contaminant that it was one of the few goods that the railways could refuse to carry in their own wagons. Having worked with lime through the course of my job I can attest it is really nasty stuff and really hard to clean off anything.

 

Coal as you say was slightly different and plenty of images abound of coal being carried on merchandise vehicles so it was evidently considered they could be cleaned down afterwards.

Edited March 29, 2023 by Aire Head

[Market65]

Hi. I have this photo’ of the coal cells at Beverley, from c1983, which shows chocks at the end of the last cell, number 19. Locomotives were banned from running over the cells owing to the condition of the three tracks - they were three tracks wide.

I hope this might be of some additional help.

 

 

Please excuse the branches, it was not easy getting into place to take the photo’.

 

Best regards,

 

 Rob.

[Wheatley]

As others have implied, you don't need to get the whole wagon on, just the first door. A bloke with a shovel was cheap. 

 

I've often wondered exactly what was stopping something in the lime cells at Goathland ending up in the ticket office if shoved a bit hard. 

Edited March 29, 2023 by Wheatley

[iands]

2 hours ago, doilum said:

.... a fresh pair of eyes to a grainy aerial photograph of the Selby drops.... 

Any chance you could share the photo?

[doilum]

14 hours ago, iands said:

Any chance you could share the photo?

Having brought the photo into the house and laid it out on good light I must confess I am not convinced. It appears to be an open wagon of some type. This is the best I could do with my tablet.

[iands]

10 minutes ago, doilum said:

Having brought the photo into the house and laid it out on good light I must confess I am not convinced. It appears to be an open wagon of some type. This is the best I could do with my tablet.

Thanks for posting. Can't be 100% certain from the image, but it doesn't look like a loco to me. Would you happen to have a date for the photo? Just wondering if it was taken the same day as an aerial photo I have from 1948, a panoramic view rather than overhead, which shows two open wagons in the same position.

[doilum]

1948 seems about right. The wagons are clearly painted as NE and the local stopping train is still LNER. A J39? The mystery of why the drops were singled remains. Had it been bomb damage I am sure the story would have been well recorded in local folk law and repeated in every railway book on Selby. Possibly, the timbers were condemned and under wartime "make do and mend" were repaired using the best surviving materials. Wartime coal rationing would have greatly reduced the demand and pressure to return wagons quickly meant they could manage with a single drop line.

[Compound2632]

18 hours ago, Aire Head said:

Lime was considered such a strong contaminant that it was one of the few goods that the railways could refuse to carry in their own wagons.

 

Although as noted in the other thread, there's good evidence for Midland opens being used for lime traffic.

[doilum]

1 minute ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Although as noted in the other thread, there's good evidence for Midland opens being used for lime traffic.

Handy that I already have one from one of my earliest 7mm layouts!

[iands]

2 hours ago, doilum said:

1948 seems about right. The wagons are clearly painted as NE and the local stopping train is still LNER. A J39? The mystery of why the drops were singled remains. Had it been bomb damage I am sure the story would have been well recorded in local folk law and repeated in every railway book on Selby. Possibly, the timbers were condemned and under wartime "make do and mend" were repaired using the best surviving materials. Wartime coal rationing would have greatly reduced the demand and pressure to return wagons quickly meant they could manage with a single drop line.

I'm not aware that Selby was bombed during WW2, my mum was born and brought up in Riccall not far away, and she never mentioned any local bombing although she remembered when York was bombed, she happened to be there at the time! That said, there was a tragedy in 1944 when a Halifax bomber on a training flight took the spire off St James church resulting in about 15 deaths all told.

 

If the stopping train you refer to is in the Up platform (e.g. heading south) and the third coach has a white roof, then it is very likely the photos were taken on the same day (also a local train (for Goole?) is in the Up Bay platform.

 

I suppose we'll never really know why the covered section was removed (as I speculated previously, the lime traffic may have ceased by rail and probably transferred to road transport). As for the rationalisation/singling of the drops is open to speculation. By 1948 the railways had been nationalised and there may well have been a drive to cut costs wherever possible. No need for two lines on the drops when one is more than adequate for the volume of traffic at that time.

 

Attached is an extract of a 1945 diagram of the track layout at Selby clearly showing two tracks on the drops. The one that was removed being '18' and I suspect a fair length of track and some point work, and no doubt together with quite a bit of rationalisation of other sidings in the area, that would have been a sizable saving on the maintenance budget.

 

Selby 1945 map extract.pdf

[doilum]

1 hour ago, iands said:

I'm not aware that Selby was bombed during WW2, my mum was born and brought up in Riccall not far away, and she never mentioned any local bombing although she remembered when York was bombed, she happened to be there at the time! That said, there was a tragedy in 1944 when a Halifax bomber on a training flight took the spire off St James church resulting in about 15 deaths all told.

 

If the stopping train you refer to is in the Up platform (e.g. heading south) and the third coach has a white roof, then it is very likely the photos were taken on the same day (also a local train (for Goole?) is in the Up Bay platform.

 

I suppose we'll never really know why the covered section was removed (as I speculated previously, the lime traffic may have ceased by rail and probably transferred to road transport). As for the rationalisation/singling of the drops is open to speculation. By 1948 the railways had been nationalised and there may well have been a drive to cut costs wherever possible. No need for two lines on the drops when one is more than adequate for the volume of traffic at that time.

 

Attached is an extract of a 1945 diagram of the track layout at Selby clearly showing two tracks on the drops. The one that was removed being '18' and I suspect a fair length of track and some point work, and no doubt together with quite a bit of rationalisation of other sidings in the area, that would have been a sizable saving on the maintenance budget.

 

Selby 1945 map extract.pdf 1.1 MB · 5 downloads

Many thanks for that . It does show how much more there was to Selby. Our scenic section starts at the road over bridge where we have a 50% compression to the platforms. The main station buildings and the river bridge are full scale before curving round into the storage area.

[doilum]

On 26/03/2023 at 12:55, Michael Edge said:

Some photos of the finished 517

It doesn't look as clean as most of my work, mainly because of the necessity of soldering from the outside with all the overlays but it will be fine when it's painted.

I modified the frame design to simple compensation, beams between the driving axles and a rocker over the trailing one, power is a small Chines motor on a High Level Roadrunner+, all hidden in the tanks and boiler.

The kit is a valiant effort to enable the production of all sorts of 517s and I'm not sure any two of them were exactly alike, this one will be 544.

 

Not sure why this has popped up on the Selby thread . I thought they were GWR, ie forbidden fruit.....