Looking for help with China Clay info

[Earl Bathurst]

Hi

I am after some help researching china clay, e.g. loading facitilies, make up of trains and type of locos which would have worked this. I have tryed the internet and aint really found out much about how it was moved by rail or the loading facilites in steam and early diesel days. Can anyone help me with this?

Thanks

Scott

[Gwiwer]

"Steam days" gives a very broad timespan but as you add "early diesel" I am making an assumption you are looking at the 1950s-60s.

 

Much china clay was moved from and within Cornwall but by no menas all. It is closely associated with the area around St. Austell but was also railed from workings at Lee Moor (behind Plymouth and railed from Tavistock Junction), at Marland (railed frmo Meeth) and around Bovey Tracey (railed down the Heathfield line).

 

Loose dried clay would be railed in the tarpaulined wagons which later gained the well-known hoods. Back in the 50s and 60s they had flat tarpaulins. These were used to rail clay from the loaders to the ports at Par and Fowey and for longer trips to the potteries around Stoke-on-Trent.

 

Bagged clay could be found in short wheelbase vans (probably what ever was on hand and invariably in bauxite) and there was a variety quarried in Devon known as Ball Clay which nominally had its own fleet of wagons within the main pool. Some could be found stencilled "ball clay only" and when hoods were introduced in the mid 70s the ball-clay hoods had a yellow band. Bachmann represent both the hooded (and unhooded) types and the flat tarp wagons have been released by Kerbnow MRC as a special but are sold out.

 

Locomotives that I remember on clay traffic are 08, 22, 42 and 52 though no doubt others appeared in the time frame in question. Once the hydraulics were gone then classes 25, 37 and 66 became associated with the workings. I'm not quite old enough to remember steam working the clays - only those delightful cut-down tanks worked by the Port of Par.

 

I hope that's a start in the right direction.

[Earl Bathurst]

Thank you very much for that. Its very helpful. The period i meant sorry was as you rightly said is 1950/60's so that would have been a mix of steam and hydraulics.

There seems to be very limited info about china clay on the internet. Where would i get pictures of the loading facilities as to gain a more accurate picture of how it was loaded into wagons for transportation.

 

Thanks

Scott

[Gwiwer]

You could try searching by location name. Parkandillack, Carbis Wharf, Treviscoe, Burngullow and others. There are plenty of images from at least some of those widely available. Don't forget that within the earlier part of your timeframe there was also the well-known Wenford Goods worked out of Wadebridge to the clay dries at Wenford Bridge. That famously saw opeartion by the ancient Beattie well-tanks until 1961 then by GWR panniers (unsuccessful) class 03 shunters (not very successful) and finally 08 shunters (which then ran the trip until it closed despite being considered too large from the branch).

[TomJ]

Many of the John Vaughan books focus on china clay - good ones for the steam era are 'Branchlines and Byways of Cornwall' and 'The Newquay Branch and it's Branches'. Not exclusively steam but lots good pictures.

The Middleton Press books 'Mineral Railways of East/West Cornwall have some good pics as well

 

In the 50/60s the clay works were mostly the traditional coal fired dries - long low sheds with a pitched roof and a chimney at the end. Wagons were usually loaded direct from the dries into open wagons in a siding alongside. Bagged clay was transported in vans. Some works weren't directly rail connected so clay was transported to nearby loading wharfs.

 

Loco wise it was mostly exGWR tanks, pannier and small prairies. The 16xx panniers were lightweight and used extensively on some of the clay branches. The larger 42xx 2-8-0 tanks were mainly used St Blazey to Fowey or up the 'main' Newquay branch, being too heavy for most of the mineral lines. These were replaced by the diesel hydraulics and 08 shunters I believe.

[Karhedron]

I suggest picking up a copy of Illustrated History of West Country China Clay Trains by John Vaughan. This is a good introduction to the subject and has plenty of photos of both trains and dries.

 

The period you are looking predates the introduction of the china clay "hoods" but the wagons were introduced in 1954 (without hoods). They replaced an earlier (but very similar) GWR design of wagon which had a short 9' wheelbase and an end loading door for easy tipping at Fowey docks. Work on the branches was usually in the hands of tank engines as TomJ says. Some flows on the mainlines existed and these were sometimes in the hands of mixed-traffic tended engines or the 2800/2884 classes but these are not well photographed.

[Joseph_Pestell]

Thank you very much for that. Its very helpful. The period i meant sorry was as you rightly said is 1950/60's so that would have been a mix of steam and hydraulics.

There seems to be very limited info about china clay on the internet. Where would i get pictures of the loading facilities as to gain a more accurate picture of how it was loaded into wagons for transportation.

 

Thanks

Scott

 

As I recall, Cornwall, like some other regions of BR, made a very swift and complete changeover from steam to diesel. So you would have a very restricted timespan during which both ran together. But you could certainly have steam-operated sessions and diesel-operated sessions on the same layout as the infrastructure in Cornwall changed very little after dieselisation.

[Tim V]

A visit to Cornwall would be a good idea, I went to the Wheal Martyn Museum - well worth a visit and it will tell you loads about the process up to loading.