One for the "How many van roofs were white at the same time?" question

[Miss Prism]

Despite the official caption description of 'early 1930s', this overview of the Huntley & Palmers' complex at Reading is much earlier, given the absence of post-1922 stock on the GWR mainline. The top of the picture shows the east end of Reading's low-level Kings Meadow goods yard (on the north-east side of the station).

 

http://www.huntleyandpalmers.org.uk/ixbin/hixclient.exe?a=query&p=huntley&f=generic_fullsizeprint_fr.htm&_IXFIRST_=26&_IXMAXHITS_=1&m=quick_sform&tc1=i&partner=huntley&text=railway&tc2=e&s=XvOCtd87J_E

[Mikkel]

A good example. Some of the stock are sheeted over opens, I think. But still, a maximum of one fourth appear to be white - or even less. 

[57xx]

There's more than I expected!

[BR60103]

Interesting: Some goods stock have white roofs; none of the passenger stock does.

 

Edit: Sorry, I missed the whole right side of the photo!  You have to scroll it over. There seems to be one silvery-coloured coach roof there.

Edited March 8, 2013 by BR60103

[Il Grifone]

The period seems to be early twenties. There are wagons with post 1920 smaller lettering and one wagon appears (the photo is not all that clear at this level) to be lettered 'M R'. The coaches are in 1912 - 1922 crimson livery (possible pre 1912 brown but unlikely).

 

Certainly there is evidence that white roofs were far more common than generally suggested - something I've noted in the past from other photos.

[billbedford]

Obviously the photo was taken just after a shower of rain and the 'white' roofs are just showing sky reflections………...

[Barry Ten]

Obviously the photo was taken just after a shower of rain and the 'white' roofs are just showing sky reflections………...

 

There's no "obviously" about it. It's a theory, that's all. There's nothing else in the picture to suggest a recent shower of rain.

[Kenton]

That's going to upset the "lay it on thick" weathering brigade!

[Miss Prism]

I think 1921 could be a distinct possibility for the date of the picture, as other aerial shots were known to have been taken over Reading in that year. If so, some the wagons will have received some '1920' lettering refurbishment, which may also have included a new wash of white for the roofs. Having said that, there is at least one Iron Mink in pre-1920 (large G W) lettering with a very white roof!<br /><br />The 5-vehicle coaching rakes on the main and slow down lines are interesting, each looking like four clerestories sandwiching a Toplight.

[Welsh Yorkie]

Did the other companies outshop with white rooves? If not, and assuming there are some outsiders in this photo, the proportion of white is even greater amongst our lot!

[coachmann]

The roofs were painted with protective white paint and probably tarpaulin dressing. There would little point in washing them as this could damage the protective coating. So common sence tells us the most recently painted roofs would have been white while those roofs that had been in traffic for varying periods had deteriorated from muddy geyish brown to sooty grey-black. This tells me the bodies with light weathering had whiter roofs than the heavily weathered wagons.

 

Coaches with metal roofs were treated differently but they still weathered down in a smilar way to wagon roofs. There is a photo of Old Oak carriage sidings in June 1939 in Great Western Carriages from 1890 by Michael Harris, and of around 90 carriage roofs only 15 are clearly white.

[Il Grifone]

A very interesting photo!

 

There's a MINK D with large lettering and white roof on the extreme left and there appears to be an iron mink with small lettering as well as the one with large. Tantalisingly the definition is not quite sufficient to be certain about identification. Most of the white roofs appear to be GWR but there are some that seem to be foreign vehicles. One of the 'toplights' has a white roof.

Edited March 7, 2013 by Il Grifone

[Mikkel]

Interesting: Some goods stock have white roofs; none of the passenger stock does.

 

Yes, that is interesting. Came across this one of Didcot, nominally in 1928, on Britain From Above:

 

http://www.britainfromabove.org.uk/image/epw024646

 

(if you register you can zoom in)

 

Coaches virtually all have dark/dirty roofs. On extreme left  a van and a Toad, both have white roofs. At rear  three horseboxes, with clean-ish roofs. At the center one of the longer vans with light grey roof.

 

The three horseboxes on the train at front are variously dark grey, white, light grey, perhaps illustrating the point that we should have a good mix.

 

The balance would then shift increasingly in favour of dark roofs the further we get into the thirties, as per Slinn: "By the early 1930s financial stringency had obviously led to longer intervals between painting" (GW Way, original volume p 108 on wagon liveries).

 

Would that be a correct assumption?

Edited March 7, 2013 by Mikkel

[Western Star]

 

Despite the official caption description of 'early 1930s', this overview of the Huntley & Palmers' complex at Reading is much earlier, given the absence of post-1922 stock on the GWR mainline. The top of the picture shows the east end of Reading's low-level Kings Meadow goods yard (on the north-east side of the station).

I have tried to work out "where this photo is" within the H&P site, please tell me how to locate the image from H&P home page.

Thank you, Graham

[coachmann]

The balance would then shift increasingly in favour of dark roofs the further we get into the thirties, as per Slinn: "By the early 1930s financial stringency had obviously led to longer intervals between painting" (GW Way, original volume p 108 on wagon liveries).

 

Would that be a correct assumption?

Despite a longer interval between shopping, I would imagine newly shopped wagons with white roofs would continue to populate yards as before. 

[The Stationmaster]

Apart from all the other, overwhelming, detail there is evidence in the H&P part of the picture as well as there appears to be a loco in steam standing on the siding just to the north west of the Cake factory building which suggests that it pre-dates the arrival of the fireless locos in 1932.

[Buckjumper]

Great photo, but I'd be slightly cautious of jumping to conclusions either way. The high contrast of earlier emulsions still being used at this time could 'white out' - evidenced by the roads and all those shop front awnings (I betcha not all of them were white!). And what about that field in the top right corner?

 

I'd also be interested to know what percentage of the GW wagon fleet were shopped each year then work that against the percentage of vans showing white roofs. Not scientific by any means, but might make an interesting read.

 

Philip Millard of the LNWR Soc. has on occasion pointed out the high proportion of vans in photos, even weathered ones, displaying white roofs.  Does this mean van roofs were re-leaded between repaints or is it those contrasty emulsions again? 

 

Curly Lawrence's autobiography records the roofs of LB&SCR locos were definitely re-whitened by 'fassers' - the army of cleaning lads on shed at regular intervals to reflect the heat of the sun. Could the same have happened to vans carrying perishables?

 

No answers, just questions for the pot

[57xx]

Excellent find Mikkel! Aside from the roof debate, it's also interesting that you can get a feel for the colour of the insides of the open wagons. Also the proportion of LMS opens there is quite high!

 

Yes, that is interesting. Came across this one of Didcot, nominally in 1928, on Britain From Above:

 

http://www.britainfromabove.org.uk/image/epw024646

 

(if you register you can zoom in)

[Il Grifone]

Excellent find Mikkel! Aside from the roof debate, it's also interesting that you can get a feel for the colour of the insides of the open wagons. Also the proportion of LMS opens there is quite high!

It's probable that the inside of wooden open wagons was not painted (Does anyone have any definite data - livery details seem to ignore this detail) and, as the largest operator in the wagon pool, it is logical that most wagons would be LMS.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

I have always gone for wooden open wagon interiors as bare timber, because of reading this 'somewhere' in an account of 1920s UK wagon construction practise.  Sadly no reference: when I was young I really thought I could just remember 'everything'. Every colour photo showing some 'inside' that I can recall confirms this.

The balance would then shift increasingly in favour of dark roofs the further we get into the thirties, as per Slinn: "By the early 1930s financial stringency had obviously led to longer intervals between painting" (GW Way, original volume p 108 on wagon liveries).

 

Would that be a correct assumption?

 There's another factor operating, relating to the source of much of the 'weathering'. The majority of the 'pigment' depositing on the topsides is soot and ash, as it had been from the beginnings of the railway, much of it naturally from locomotive exhaust. But the loco exhaust of the 1930s was not the exhaust of earlier decades: the general introduction of superheating from the first decade of C20th meant that an increasing proportion of the exhaust came with a more potent binder, in the form of the higher temperature cylinder lubricants that superheating requires. The effect of the resulting stickier filth was noticed on loco running sheds, with cleaning became a still more laborious task.

[billbedford]

 There's another factor operating, relating to the source of much of the 'weathering'. The majority of the 'pigment' depositing on the topsides is soot and ash, as it had been from the beginnings of the railway, much of it naturally from locomotive exhaust. But the loco exhaust of the 1930s was not the exhaust of earlier decades: the general introduction of superheating from the first decade of C20th meant that an increasing proportion of the exhaust came with a more potent binder, in the form of the higher temperature cylinder lubricants that superheating requires. The effect of the resulting stickier filth was noticed on loco running sheds, with cleaning became a still more laborious task.

 

Carriage and vans roofs were sealed by embedding canvas into a layer of white lead. White lead is an interesting compound. First it is not really white, depending on the quality of the binders it can be any colour from off white to a sort of grey putty colour. It is certainly a duller colour than the bright white of modern titanium oxide paints.  And then white lead oxidizes to in the presence of sulphur to black lead sulphide. For most of railway history there has been a ready source of atmospherical sulphur in the exhausts of locomotives, and it has long been recognised that a carriage roof could change colour from near white to almost black in a matter of weeks if not days. However photos like the Reading show that for van roofs, not only are some very pale, but there is a complete range of tones from the very pale to the almost black. The explanation for this must include the different usage patterns for carriages and goods wagons. While passenger coaches could expect to be in a train for most of a day, at least six out of seven days a week, a goods van would have a much more leisurely existence. Tavender suggest that the average turn around time for mineral wagons was of the order of 30 days. While it is probable that the turn around for goods vans was quicker than for mineral wagons, but even so their usage was much less than for carriages. Less time travelling in trains would mean less exposure to sulphurous loco exhaust and a longer period for the white lead on the roofs to oxidize.

 

If the Reading photo was taken in the early years of the 1920s then that would have been a time when Swindon was catching up on deferred maintenance following the Great War and there would have been a bigger proportion of ex-works wagons in circulation than in more normal times.

[PatB]

Nothing to do with the stock, but I do like the steeply graded, sharply curved line down to the dive-under below the main running lines.  Shades of CJ Freezer .

[Miss Prism]

Nothing to do with the stock, but I do like the steeply graded, sharply curved line down to the dive-under below the main running lines.  Shades of CJ Freezer .

 

Here's an 1898 map of the site covering what is included in the H&P aerial pic. The GWR station depicted is at the start of the massive '4-line rebuild', and the space for the extra lines and the new station building can be seen. The SE&CR diveunder, connecting to what would become the 'goods avoiding lines' on the north side of the GWR station, is shown, as is the connection from the east end of the Kings Meadow goods yard to the H&P complex. I think the gradient on the SE&CR diveunder was quite steep, which is why many of the transfer freights were often hauled by the heavier goods engines. And is that a brand new Urie H15 sitting to the right of the SE&CR junction box?

[Mikkel]

An intriguing map, especially given the period. Also shows the biscuit factory sidings nicely, I see.

[The Stationmaster]

 

Here's an 1898 map of the site covering what is included in the H&P aerial pic. The GWR station depicted is at the start of the massive '4-line rebuild', and the space for the extra lines and the new station building can be seen. The SE&CR diveunder, connecting to what would become the 'goods avoiding lines' on the north side of the GWR station, is shown, as is the connection from the east end of the Kings Meadow goods yard to the H&P complex. I think the gradient on the SE&CR diveunder was quite steep, which is why many of the transfer freights were often hauled by the heavier goods engines. And is that a brand new Urie H15 sitting to the right of the SE&CR junction box?

Interesting stuff I have a 40ft:1 inch plan of the H&)P works dated 1903 which is basically a plan of fire mains but is complete for the railway layout and the buildings and appears not to have been amended notwithstanding later building alterations - alas far too big to even photograph reliably,

 

As far as the various gradients are concerned those on the Southern side are far less steep than the GW side  due to the substantial difference in levels.  I can't find any details for the Southern side of the dive-under but on the Western side the gradient down to the dive-under (officially Reading high Level to Reading Low Level was 1 in 41 while that of the first 'new' (early 1900s) connection - officially 'Reading Main Line East (but also referred to as 'Old Jcn') to Reading Junction (at the Southern end) in BR days was 1in 79.  The latter was basically the gradient taken over by the new alignment when the Southern station was closed and Platform 4A was first provided although it has subsequently been further realigned and the gradient has most likely been eased.  

 

The original gradient from the Southern station fell at 1 in 100 and the lowest point was probably roughly in line with the Southern end of the dive-under - from which point the line climbs  at 1 in 136.  These changes on the Southern side account for the far less steep descent on the WWII connection from Reading New Jcn on the Western side to Reading Spur Jcn on the Southern - I don't know the gradient there but it is shallower than 1 in 200.

 

I do wonder about through working on the 1 in 41 line?  1960 Instructions refer to traffic being exchanged via the exchange sidings at the SR end of the dive-under which would seem more in common with what I seem to think of as 'usual' Pre-Group practice.  However freight trains might well have worked through in Pre-Group days days via the Reading Jcn (LSW/SEC) - and Main Line East and of course that route was definitely used by through passenger train workings although after it was provided through working of trains was normally via the New Jcn - Reading Spur Jcn connection but some trains did use the older connection as far as I can remember (presumably freights working at Reading on the Southern side would have to go that way).

 

All fascinating stuff and of course the dive-under recommissions later this month with at least one passenger train booked to use it for a couple of days in early April - if you can get up early enough to catch it (it's a temptation ).