Mixed Train Formations

[edcayton]

I've just looked at a video of the Southwold Railway mixed train with the freight vehicles behind the loco and the carriages bringing up the rear. I believe that the Far North trains with the container wagons did this also. What happened to carriage heating?

 

I think that the common arrangement was to have the (unfitted?) wagons and a goods brake behind the coaches but would like more information.

 

Any help gratefully received, TIA

 

Ed

[The Bigbee Line]

I've just looked at a video of the Southwold Railway mixed train with the freight vehicles behind the loco and the carriages bringing up the rear. I believe that the Far North trains with the container wagons did this also. What happened to carriage heating?

 

I think that the common arrangement was to have the (unfitted?) wagons and a goods brake behind the coaches but would like more information.

 

Any help gratefully received, TIA

 

Ed

In the video, can you see if the Southwold loco has steam heat?  Also does it have a separate goods brake van?

 

EDIT Just had a quick Google and looks like thick coats were the order of the day for the Southwold

[buffalo]

You may find these topics of interest:

 

Mixed Trains and Tail Traffic

 

GWR short and mixed trains

 

Nick

[keefer]

the far north trains had a container flat which was air braked, vacuum piped and had a through steam pipe so the coaches were braked/heated.

[Pacific231G]

I've just looked at a video of the Southwold Railway mixed train with the freight vehicles behind the loco and the carriages bringing up the rear. I believe that the Far North trains with the container wagons did this also. What happened to carriage heating?

 

I think that the common arrangement was to have the (unfitted?) wagons and a goods brake behind the coaches but would like more information.

 

Any help gratefully received, TIA

 

Ed

Interesting.

I did once travel on a mixed train in North East Austria and the goods wagons were marshalled between the loco and the passenger carriages. This was probably more to do with convenience in shunting, which was carried out remarkably quickly, than any rules on formation. The goods wagons though brake fitted wouldn't have had heating pipes so I did wonder whether the formation would have been different in winter.

[byron]

Interesting.

I did once travel on a mixed train in North East Austria and the goods wagons were marshalled between the loco and the passenger carriages. This was probably more to do with convenience in shunting, which was carried out remarkably quickly, than any rules on formation. The goods wagons though brake fitted wouldn't have had heating pipes so I did wonder whether the formation would have been different in winter.

It was fairly common in Austria for the coaches to have their own heating, either coke or oil.

 

Mike

[The Bigbee Line]

It was fairly common in Austria for the coaches to have their own heating, either coke or oil.

 

Mike

Some DB wagons were fitted with ETH (electric train heating) cables for running in mixed trains.

[The Bigbee Line]

In the video, can you see if the Southwold loco has steam heat?  Also does it have a separate goods brake van?

 

EDIT Just had a quick Google and looks like thick coats were the order of the day for the Southwold

The Lynton and Barnstaple had vacuum brake and steam heat pipes.  In the summer steam heat flexible pipes were often removed.

[edcayton]

Thanks for all the replies guys. I can see that having the wagons first means that the coaches can be left in the platform during shunting, which would be more pleasant for the passengers.

 

Ed

[The Stationmaster]

Judging by various postcards I have seen the Southwold made a habit of running its mixed trains in this fashion and it wasn't the only light railway to do so if - again - photographic evidence is to be believed but the other one was standard gauge.  This latter point has always interested me because unless the Railway concerned had been given specific authority to do by the Railway Inspectorate the usual requirements in respect of Mixed Trains also applied to light railways.  I can understand how a narrow gauge line might have managed it but find it not so explicable that a standard gauge line could do so.  Maybe nobody ever looked?

[MarkAustin]

I've seen similar pictures of the Soutyhwold, but it was most definately not normal or approved practice. The rules quite clearly state that any non-fitted stock in a mixed train had to be behind the last fitted stock with a brake van at the end. I'm pretty sure this was law, brought in after the Armagh accident in 1889. This did not preclude shunting operations on empty trains, but was a pretty near absolute rule for passenger services. I don't think (but am not sure) that the Southwold stock had through brakes, so they probably got away with it for that reason, though the Board of Trade insisted on a continuous brake for the 3ft Ravenglas and Eskdaye in the 1870s/1880s.

 

Fitted or piped stock could go at the front, but there were increasing restrictions on these in the 1920s and 30s.

 

Mark Austin

[Siberian Snooper]

I believe that one of the Welsh narrow gauge lines (possibly the Tallylyn) did not have continuous until relatively recent times on any rolling stock.

[Pacific231G]

Thanks for all the replies guys. I can see that having the wagons first means that the coaches can be left in the platform during shunting, which would be more pleasant for the passengers.

 

Ed

I'm pretty sure that in most of Europe, though shunting of occupied passenger stock was allowed, it had to take place on running lines not on sidings.*

In France (and I think the rest of mainland Europe as well) running lines used by passenger trains had to be protected from stock on sidings by derails, trap points or headshunts and passenger trains could normally only travel on running lines which were specifically forbidden to have derails or trap points. That would have made it far simpler to leave the carriages, and probably most of the goods wagons, in the platform while dropping and picking up in the yard. With the normal yard layout accessed from a trailing point and a backing move you could drop and pick up wagons at an intermediate station in just six moves provided you'd marshalled the train properly. With all fitted or piped stock there would be no particular problem with having the coaches at the rear of the train provided the train didn't get too long.

 

* Shunting of occupied carriages was common in Europe especially on international expresses but relatively unknown in Britain. It used to cause panic amongst British passengers at junctions who'd got off to get food and drink when the carriages occupied by their loved ones or just their luggage suddenly chuffed off out of the station long before departure time. The carriages then of course reappeared on another platform to be joined onto another train.

[The Stationmaster]

Slightly OT but I wouldn't describe shunting of occupied carriages as 'relatively unknown in Britain' whereas in point of car it was quite common at some places with portion working and of course there were slip coaches which were shunted while loaded.

 

The big difference is that in Britain it went from being quite usual to be virtually unknown to barely happening at all in a relatively short space of time as BR modernised, rationalised and finally went over to unit trains.  I can remember being in coaches shunted at York from the Scarborough bays onto the rear end of a London train and equally being shunted from a bay at the south end onto the front of a London train; I was on a train at Glasgow Queen Street where an occupied portion was shunted onto the end of it from an adjacent platform, a move which took place every morning.  

[DCB]

Shunting of occupied passenger stock still continues at Edinburgh Waverley every night except Saturday as the London to  Ft William, Aberdeen and Inverness sleepers combine and divide.