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Waverley Route Freight Flows


Guest Max Stafford

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  • 3 months later...

06.30 Carlisle to Craiginches at Hawick with Captain Cuttle in charge.  Is that the Riccarton school coach immediately behind the pacific?  Imagine this as your morning haulage to classes.

 

Pass the Kleenex.

 

http://www.railbrit.co.uk/imageenlarge/imagecomplete.php?id=42631

 

 

EDIT: the date is 31/8/64, which was a Monday.  Would the children have been back at school on this date?

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06.30 Carlisle to Craiginches at Hawick with Captain Cuttle in charge.  Is that the Riccarton school coach immediately behind the pacific?  Imagine this as your morning haulage to classes.

 

Pass the Kleenex.

 

http://www.railbrit.co.uk/imageenlarge/imagecomplete.php?id=42631

 

 

EDIT: the date is 31/8/64, which was a Monday.  Would the children have been back at school on this date?

Schools would have been well back in action by 31 August, but I believe the Newcastleton to Hawick school train ended in 1962 and pupils came by bus to Hawick from then on.

 

However, it wasn't just pupils that used the "school train" but workers for Hawick as well ~ perhaps the coach was still attached for them? The pupils went back home by school train but the workers by a scheduled train later in the afternoon.

 

Looking at the position of the coach relative to the signal, I'd guess it's very close to being on the slope at the end of the platform as the signal base was in the ground.

 

Perhaps someone with access to a 1964 WTT could say what time the 0630 freight was due in Hawick? I'm guessing that 0630 would have meant a very early start for pupils joining at Copshaw.

 

A bit of a "nice" mystery!

 

Bruce

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  • 1 month later...

I have a Sept63-June64 WTT which shows a note against the 6.36am Carlisle-Craiginches (4S43), Sats Excepted - it says "Mixed Train Class 2 Riccarton Jn to Hawick".  Times are Riccarton Jn dep 7.53, Hawick arr 8.19 (water stop), dep 8.40 - this and the "light print" Newcastleton time of 7.30 suggests that pupils didn't join there.

 

Related to this topic - published pics of WR freights sometimes feature a couple of Presflos or Prestwins (as distinct from block workings) in the consist - does anyone know what traffic they conveyed, and where from and to?

 

Alasdair  

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  • 1 year later...

I have a Sept63-June64 WTT which shows a note against the 6.36am Carlisle-Craiginches (4S43), Sats Excepted - it says "Mixed Train Class 2 Riccarton Jn to Hawick".  Times are Riccarton Jn dep 7.53, Hawick arr 8.19 (water stop), dep 8.40 - this and the "light print" Newcastleton time of 7.30 suggests that pupils didn't join there.

 

Related to this topic - published pics of WR freights sometimes feature a couple of Presflos or Prestwins (as distinct from block workings) in the consist - does anyone know what traffic they conveyed, and where from and to?

 

Alasdair  

Does anyone know if Presflos / Prestwins were used to transport gypsum powder? Gypsum is an important component of cement and quite by chance I came across a reference to gypsum being supplied by rail from New Biggin on the S&C to Oxwellmains cement works. The proportion of gypsum in cement appears to be about 4% so, in round terms, for every train-load of cement leaving Dunbar there would have to have been one wagon-load of gypsum going in, making it a regular and significant flow, which would certainly have been routed over the WR.

 

Bill

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Does anyone know if Presflos / Prestwins were used to transport gypsum powder? Gypsum is an important component of cement and quite by chance I came across a reference to gypsum being supplied by rail from New Biggin on the S&C to Oxwellmains cement works. The proportion of gypsum in cement appears to be about 4% so, in round terms, for every train-load of cement leaving Dunbar there would have to have been one wagon-load of gypsum going in, making it a regular and significant flow, which would certainly have been routed over the WR.

 

Bill

The gypsum would have travelled initially in sheeted 16t minerals, and later in APCM's purpose-built fleet of 'mini MGR' hoppers that had been built for traffic from Mountfield to Northfleet; we used to see these on the Newcastle and Carlisle in the 1980s. Gypsum in the form supplied to cement works is a bit too 'cludgy' for a pressure-discharge wagon.

I'd suggest one of several possibilities:-

Soda-ash or sand for glass-making.

Soda-ash for Grangemouth refinery.

Empty wagons that had been sent south with alumina from Burntisland; a number of places used this for abrasive manufacture.

The Presflos might have also been used for wagon-load delivery of special cements to terminals in the south.

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06.30 Carlisle to Craiginches at Hawick with Captain Cuttle in charge.  Is that the Riccarton school coach immediately behind the pacific?  Imagine this as your morning haulage to classes.

 

Pass the Kleenex.

 

http://www.railbrit.co.uk/imageenlarge/imagecomplete.php?id=42631

 

 

EDIT: the date is 31/8/64, which was a Monday.  Would the children have been back at school on this date?

Thanks to Landscapes for checking this post and reminding me of such a fantastic photo.

 

And I say again - can you imagine travelling to school by THIS method on a daily basis!!?!

 

Lovely social testament. Wonderful railway. Lamented lifeline.

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  • 7 months later...

I'm sat in the pub, mid-commute, reading Hansard transcripts from the Lords in November '68.

There's clearly furious opposition to the closure, seemingly from all quarters bar one.
Anyway, to the point of this post and my questions:

It is reported that 'block trains of sugar beet pulp' delivered animal feed to the railheads in reputedly large volumes. Anyone got any ideas?

Also approx 300 tons of house coal per week was delivered to Gala and a further 400pw to Hawick. First, what length rakes do others believe those numbers amount to?
Where did the trips originate - Millerhill one presumes. And did anyone photograph such a working BEFORE 6th Jan '69? We know of the post closure freight only period. Were these trains unchanged?

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  • 9 months later...

"Galashiels lyes, Sulzer looms on continental wagons for Gardiners, Selkirk."  That's the description written on the back of the print, no more, no date, no extra detail I'm afraid.  

 

Bruce

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"Galashiels lyes, Sulzer looms on continental wagons for Gardiners, Selkirk."  That's the description written on the back of the print, no more, no date, no extra detail I'm afraid.  [/size]

 

Bruce[/size]

I couldn't make any sense of the caption of that picture when I saw it on Railscot. I was looking for a Type 2 lurking in the background!

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I couldn't make any sense of the caption of that picture when I saw it on Railscot. I was looking for a Type 2 lurking in the background!

 

From what I can make out, Sulzer (or the machine tool part of it) licensed the manufacture of these weaving looms to various parts of Europe.  The one I pictured is a Russian-made one from 1975, seemingly.  

 

I find it amazing, somewhat shame-facedly I freely admit, to see pictorial evidence of the Borders being equipped for the region's longstanding economic prosperity, by wagonload rail consignment.  Incredible photograph.

 

 

EDIT: I expect one of those looms weighs several tons.  As the Selkirk branch was either a) closed by then or 'b') had no craneage worthy of the name, do we think BR transhipped the looms in Gala Goods for local delivery by mechanical horse, perhaps?

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Not sure whose wagons those are, Richard; my money's on German or Swiss railways, as the SNCF low-sided Ferry opens had shorter stakes.

Possibly German diagram 259 as shown in this Ferry Wagon diagram book taken from the 12" = 1 foot Section of the Barrowmore Model Railway Group?

 

If you don't mind the scale difference then perhaps these http://www.fleischmann.de/de/product/226582-0-0-4-1-0-0-003001/products.html or http://www.piko-shop.de/index.php?vw_type=artikel&vw_id=195 could be suitable for modelling, though with the higher end stakes they're nearer to the diagram 061 vehicles

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  • 3 months later...

Possibly German diagram 259 as shown in this Ferry Wagon diagram book taken from the 12" = 1 foot Section of the Barrowmore Model Railway Group?

 

If you don't mind the scale difference then perhaps these http://www.fleischmann.de/de/product/226582-0-0-4-1-0-0-003001/products.html or http://www.piko-shop.de/index.php?vw_type=artikel&vw_id=195 could be suitable for modelling, though with the higher end stakes they're nearer to the diagram 061 vehicles

 

As illustrated here http://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/germanstake

 

Paul

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 4 weeks later...

Bruce tells me the print records the loco as Sir Visto which is impossible (German smoke deflectors). From various details I've have narrowed it down to four locos of which 60087 Blenheim is perhaps the most likely although 60048 Doncaster is possible if the number did end in an 8. GN line locos were rare but not unknown on the WR.

 

Bill

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