How realistic are your models? Photo challenge.

[33C]

41 minutes ago, NHY 581 said:

 

 

A quiet moment..........

 

Rob. 

I love the brooding sky and the hint of melancholy with the yard lamps in the mist. 

[D9502]

[jcredfer]

9 hours ago, D9502 said:

 

That's a great subject picture to attempt to make a model...  thank you for showing us.

 

 

...   Ok, I do know really, just depressed a little more by feelings of inadequacy........      again.

 

 

 

[DavidMcKenzie]

[Gallows Close]

2N15

 

[westerner]

Ben caught the Bedford witing for its load

 

[saxokid]

Colmore traction depot br blue class 08 …

[PayntersDocks]

The mixed goods awaiting pick up in the main road at Tinley Rose Sidings

 

The brake van is ready, just waiting for the guard

 

 

[The Johnster]

It's not ready, it's waiting for the guard to get it ready.  He will put the lamps in their correct positions and orientations on the brackets and the guard rails in position, then possibly light the stove, but from the look of the tree it's summer and if this is a pickup he may only be in it for a short time and not bother; it may already be lit, of course.  If he is boarding the van for the first time in the duty, he must also check that the prescribed equipment is present; a shunting pole, brake stick, lamps, lamp burners filled with paraffin and with wicks correctly trimmed, and paraffin, usually in a milk bottle.  By the 70s, a pair of track circuit clips mounted on wooden blocks screwed to the wall as well. 

 

He will also want to see that the stove has been cleaned, and that firewood kindling and coal for the stove is supplied, and may well have to spend some time hunting these items down.  If his train is to be running any distance at speed (by which I mean 30mph+), he'll check the side lamp brackets; if they are loose, this is a sure indication that the van is a rocker, and he is in for an uncomfortable ride.  Not just this, but a cold one in winter as the rocking motion has 'worked' all the wooden joints and there are numerous draughts; an essential part of his equipment in his bag, along with up-to-date detonators (the first thing the guards' inspector checks if you encounter him), up-to-date General and Sectional Appendixes (to the Rule Book), and any other publications he needs like WTT and load books, is yesterday's newspaper, preferably a broadsheet.  He will spend the first half hour or so of the journey stuffing pages of this in the gaps to block up the draughts.  If the van is a bad rocker, he will have to repeatedly relight the lamps, especially the side lamps, which will have been put out by the shaking. 

 

Nobody likes a rocker, but complaining is just a waste of breath.  In the 70s, repairs were only authorised for brake vans if they cost 50p or less; many vans were not fit for purpose and some outright dangerous.  A decline in their general condition can be dated to the 1969 single manning agreement with the unions, which resulted in guards booking on duty at loco depots instead of goods yards, and having to rely on the yard staff to oversee matters.  The BR standard brake van, derived from LNER practice, was in any case IMHO a poor design with concrete ballast set out towards the ends from the axles, a recipe for rocking.  At least the cabin doors opened outwards, though, so the headwind sealed them shut and draughtproof, unlike the better riding LMS vans which had inward-opening doors, very welcoming for your guests but very draughty.

 

Other draught points were the duckets, floorboards, and the brake standard; on a bad van you could have the stove glowing orange hot and still be miserably cold, then overhot as soon as the speed reduced!  Your relief would board and comment on the heat, and you'd give him the 'just wait until you're moving, mate' look.

[Northroader]

We got the brakevans from Radyr into Cathays shops, and quite frankly we had to ignore the repair limits laid down from Derby, or you would never been able to run a train service. Usually it was broken footboards from shunting come togethers, and vandalism, smashed castings in the stoves and broken windows. For the latter we replaced the glass with makrolon, unbreakable but easily scratched.

[The Johnster]

Much the same story at repair shops throughout the country in those days I imagine, Northroader.  I remember the makrolon replacement windows, as you say easily scratched and ‘hazed’, better than nothing and at least they kept the vans in service. 
 

I was in a brake van attacked by vandals on the road overbridge at St.Julian’s, on the Hereford road out of Newport; they dropped a chimney pot (!) on the roof.  Came through the roof and took out the rear windows, leaving me ‘shaken not stirred’, uninjured.  Redflagged a train on the up road and was stopped at Llantarnam Jc, where we decided that the van, and the train, would be left in the refuge siding at Pontypool Road, light engine back to Canton and end of sports for that day!  Transport police were notified from Llantarnam box, but of course the miscreants had long gone by the time they got to the bridge.  Van was scrapped, shame because it was a good rider…

 

My best vandal story concerns a stone thrower on the river bridge parapet at Birdie’s Lane.  It was just before xmas 1974, and I’d worked a train of empty oil tanks down to Llanelli for relief.  As the loaded back working was delayed, we had time to kill in Llanelli and went for a walk around the town centre, during which the secondman bought a plastic Winchester repeating rifle, Billy the Kid’s gun, as an xmas pressie for his nephew, in Woolies.  
 

Birdie’s Lane connects the big council estates of Ely and Fairwater each side of the SWML in western Cardiff, and passes beneath the railway by a low bridge, then crosses the River Ely on a footbridge. It’s the sort of place where youths gather and get up to no good, and the entire section from St.Fagan’s to this point, alongside Plymouth Woods and crossing the river several times, was well known ‘indian country’ for stone throwers, air rifle attack, and such.  
 

Anyhoo, we’re all in the front cab of a 47 seeing off the last of the driver’s tea, and as we approach the Birdie’s Lane river bridge rolling along nicely at a steady 60 with 1,100 tones of oil behind the loco, there is a likely looking specimen on the up side parapet with a brick in hand ready to take a pop at us.  The secondman, a bit of a character by the name of Johnny Brewer, picked up the Winchester, passably realistic at a distance and the light was starting to fade, dropped his window, leaned out, and took a bead on chummy.  
 

Chummy’s reaction was high comedy, perfectly timed and expertly

executed; a professional clown could not have bettered it.   A look of something like a combination of amazement and terror appeared on his face and, still with the brick in a ready-to-throw stance, he instinctively took a step backwards from the diesel monster with a bad man with a gun bearing down  on him.  Not much room for that on top of a bridge parapet girder; cue comedy wobble, comedy arms flailing to regain balance, comedy slow tipping, and comedy spreadeagled pratfall backwards into the river about 15’ below, with a satisfyingly large splash.  Horn blowing and gesticulating in triumph, we passed along our rightful and unattacked business, still laughing when we were relieved a few minutes later Canton Sidings.  
 

There was a noticeable drop in attacks at Birdie’s for a while after that, and I like to think there was a rumour doing the rounds in the area that traincrews were being armed with rifles…

Edited September 22, 2022 by The Johnster

[Ruston]

An unusual Barclay shunting the sidings at Watery Lane. Rumoured to have been built for Dorman Long's steelworks in Middlesborough, it turned up at Charlie Strong's yard but instead of being scrapped it went on to work at the Harboro Stone Co. in the Peak District, where its low height was suited to working the quarry line and its restricted clearance tunnel.

 

[43110andyb]

Celebrity class 33 008 ‘Eastleigh’ rests in the sidings between engineers duties.

[westerner]

[chriscleveland]

Lord Nelson and Cheltenham arrive on shed at Ropley after terminating and leaving the coaches at Alresford station 

[43110andyb]

47076 ‘City of Truro’ heads 1C04 Nottingham Central to London Marylebone south towards Charwelton!

[ste234]

37025 working a PCA train at dusk 

 

[6990WitherslackHall]

A BR 0-6-0ST crosses a bridge on its way to pick up a couple of open wagons. 

 

[whart57]

Is this tramway still operating?

 

[Gloucester Road]

A chill in the air

[chriscleveland]

Evening at Ropley 

[Gallows Close]

7H43 Spirited departure for Drax

 

[Paul G]

08818 sits in the head shunt with brake vans.

[Paul G]

Short rake of Illmenite wagons make their way to the Tioxide works.

[ullypug]

WC&PR Dübs 2-4-0T Clevedon arrives at Weston-super-Mare terminus in the summer of 1936 with the ex Taff Vale Railway brake 3rd coach no 18 and a mixed train.