Combe Martin

21 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

I would also check that W3043 is actually W3043.

 

Quite often when you obtain rolling stock they have had all identity such as the plates removed or have gone through numerous number changes as they've came from an industrial owner. So you just find a number that "fits".

 

Jason

Hmmmm ... that one hadn't occurred to me, so it looks like unless it ties up exactly with older photos of other tankers for the diagram it's number is for, it'll be best to ignore it. 

8 minutes ago, BMacdermott said:

Agreed!

 

I don't think I am breaching any confidences, but our submitted paper did contain the word 'filth' on a number of occasions.🙂

 

Brian (on behalf of The 00 Poll Team)

Well that does seem to be the main livery in BR days to well after the end of steam.

1 hour ago, BMacdermott said:

Hello everyone

 

A factor to be considered which I don't think has come up so far is that it is not only a case of having a reasonable number of Milk Tank Wagons of any diagram, but finding one which can have as many accurate liveries applied as possible.

 

Yes, we have all seen liveries 'slapped on' inaccurate vehicles but - hopefully - those days are gone.

 

Brian (on behalf of The 00 Poll Team)

I know this sounds obvious, but it would seem to be for most ... original dairy livery, then BR silver, then dirty versions of both.  I've been studying Somerset & Dorset early 60s colour pictures and they are all dirty with sometimes a bit of what's probably silver showing though.   The David Larkin book that I've been quoting from has black and white pictures from the late 60's to early 70's and they are mostly dirty or slightly dirty silver, with the odd dirty blue Express Dairy livery.  There is also the odd clean St Ivel picture but no one tanker would have had both Express Dairy and St Ivel livery as St Ivel was part of United Dairies/Unigate empire.  Occasionally you can see a bit of the dairies old livery showing through the dirt, examples are IMS and MMB.

9 hours ago, hmrspaul said:

Which the link  I used earlier explains http://www.ws.rhrp.org.uk/ws/WagonInfo.asp?Ref=2678  as I said. 

 

Paul

Sorry, we crossed paths on this one, your post arrived while I was still working on mine.  As you've pointed out, using a preservation era photo for a reference point is fraught with danger.  Apart from the underframe, W3043 is a completely different vehicle to it's original state !

3 hours ago, Rugd1022 said:

Another pic of that St.Ivel tank at Toddington, W3043, this time showing the chassis...

 

 

Two more  questions : 

 

Presumably the paint job is its original from the late '60s / early '70s period?

 

How many received the St.Ivel livery?

 

I cant answer your questions, but I've got a bit of a conumdrum here.

W3043 is, according to 'BR Parcels and Passenger-Rated Stock' by David Larkin a diagram 0.57 tanker, but this book also has a picture of W3048 which is also supposed to be a Diagram 0.57 tanker, and guess what, they're nothing like each other.

W3048 has 6 small tanker support blocks, not 4 as above, and the tank filler is at the left hand end with the associated side platform, frame and ladder, not central with central ladder as above. 

I presume that one or the other has had a tank change ? 

Re Diagram 1994

27 minutes ago, BMacdermott said:

David Jenkinson (in his LMS Coaching Stock book) states that: "There also appear to have been several changes of drawing...but we cannot say how significant these were".

 

 

I think this has to be the understatement of the year !

1 hour ago, BMacdermott said:

 

Hello CM

 

I can save you some time - The 00 Poll Team did that as part of the paper that was submitted.

 

I can't repeat it here (as we noted to the maker that we were sending it to them only) but many of the 6-wheel diagrams do have more than 10 examples. 

 

In summary though (and that can be gleaned from published sources open to all)...

 

If we ignore the circa 180 Milk Tank Wagons built in BR days, then the various companies had:

 

GWR - 236 

SR - 56

LMS - 170 (but 128 of those were from just Diag.1994)

ER - 42 (but only one diagram had more than 10 examples built)

 

For Milk Tank Trucks it was:

 

GWR - 34

SR - 7

LMS -13

ER - 9

 

Note that all figures are plus or minus a small amount as we can't account for every minor variant without massively detailed research.

 

It is fairly clear that the ER is the most likely to miss out.

 

Brian (on behalf of The 00 Poll Team)

 

Hello Brian, thanks for that, however .... The LMS Diagram 1994 tankers

These seem to be mostly shared between the Express Dairies fleet and the United Dairies/Unigate fleet.  However as I've mentioned somewhere before, the non 1994 photos of Express Dairy tankers (apart from one) all show them with full wrap round tank straps whereas the non 1994 Unigate tanker photos (apart from tankers inherited from the smaller 'dairies') show them with the half hidden straps.

I havn't found many diagram 1994 photos, but of those, the Express Dairies photos conform to the above 'rule' but so does the one Unigate photo.  So the Unigate diagram 1994 tanker is therefore different from the Express Dairies diagram 1994 tanker (apart from the underframe they are completely different), something is obviously a 'bit wrong', you surely cant have two different tanker types under one diagram number.  The number of this tanker is M44252 so I'm wondering if the quoted diagram number is wrong (in both the photo and the list).

There are lots of other United Dairies/Unigate tanker numbers listed under diagram 1994 but I have no photos  of them so cant say whether this is just a one off anomally. 

5 hours ago, Pint of Adnams said:

Which may be another way of suggesting the handful that meet your requirements?

 

The underframes may have been similar but not standard. The braking arrangements differed even between the LNER types, the LNER uniquely tended to plate over the underframe, as has been pointed out the wheel types differed as did the axleboxes and presence or absence of a stiffening bar between the axleguards.

 

And are we proposing the earlier 4-wheel as well as 6-wheel underframes, the former lasting well into the 1930s?

Nowhere have I suggested just a 'handful that meet my requirements'.  When I started this thread I suggested making an accurate ex GWR underframe because there were more ex GWR  tankers than any other, plus with BR adopting the GWR underframe for BR built examples this means that this was the most numerous type in use.  After nationalisation all 4 'old' companies tankers could be seen anywhere in the country not just in their old region.

The early GWR underframes had the Dean-Churchward brake gear but this was only up to diagram 0.47 plus possibly 6 diagram 0.51 .   A total of just over 100.   From Diagram 0.52 they were succeeded by the later large brake level style, a total of over 200.   For this reason I suggest the later large brake lever type.  Both types were seen at Bailey Gate and I don't mind which type is produced but if only one is done it surely makes sense to produce the one with the largest quantity.  The other small difference is that BR built examples (after 1948 I believe)  were fitted with rollerbearing axle boxes.  This is only a small difference, and I would have thought could be an easy tooling alternative.  Photos suggest that some earlier individual underframes had rollerbearing axle boxes fitted later in their life (when in the works for maintenance), but you need a photo of a particular tanker at a specific time to say what was fitted and when.  I would suggest making the non BR underframes with the original axle boxes.

If a manufacturer wanted to build LMS underframes I have no problem with that, they were also seen at Bailey Gate, so were the SR ones too, but there wern't many of them.  I wouldn't suggest making LNER types, these were the smallest group, even less ..  only 38 tankers in total, so the comments re LNER differences are irrelevant.  As also are wheel diameter differences, because they are all the same size for GWR types. and a different same size for LMS types. 

By the late 50's there were two big fleets of tankers, the Express Dairies group and the United Dairies/Unigate group.  Bailey Gate was the later.  If a manufacturer was just to make just 2 diagrams it would make sense to make one from each. I would suggest picking tankers from the diagrams that had the largest numbers of tankers but also where there are photos showing which other details the tanker had, ie central ladder, or ladder/frame/side platform and its position, full straps or half hidden straps, top platform style, number and shape of tank supports, etc.  

Given a bit more time, I can produce a short list of diagrams that have ... 10 or more tankers but also where I have a photo too, that's of course provided I'm not accused  of trying to 'swing things my way'.

39 minutes ago, Karhedron said:

 

Actually I am not sure it is correct. W1954 was originally painted in Aplin and Barret's own livery.

 

 

Aplin and Barret were not taken over until 1960 by which time Unigate had already been formed so it is unlikely that W1954 would have been fitted with "United Dairies" plates that were already obsolete. More likely it would have been fitted with "Unigate Creameries" plates like the example below.

 

I wasn't suggesting that W1954 was painted silver or fitted with UD plates (more likely it just became covered in grime) but just that it became part of the UD 'empire'.  I've also since corrected myself and pointed out that the diagram 0.53 tank was fitted to a one foot longer underframe. So this particular Hornby version is wrong.  

9 minutes ago, melmerby said:

1999 is a GWR O55 milk tank of 1946 but the tank doesn't look anything like that!

There's a picture of an O55 in Russell's GWR Coaches appendix volume 2.

Are you sure, my Russell picture of an 0.55 (page 241) only shows numbers going up to 1995, which ties up with the Rumney models list.

44 minutes ago, Chris M said:

At the risk of sounding like a philistine I am going to offer an alternative point of view. To me, whilst a train of six wheeled milk tank wagons is important for my layout, a milk tank wagon is a milk tank wagon. I do N so the details aren't so readily seen, especially on a moving train, but the important thing to me is that the whole train looks right. There are two variations of the top of Dapol N gauge milk tanks which is good.  More importantly I have tried to make my milk trains look right. Firstly by weathering quite severely and secondly by following the train formations in photographs. Milk tanks, like most stock just look so wrong if they are not weathered and I see this as far more important than having exactly the correct diagram chassis and body.  This gives me a milk train that looks somewhere near right and that I find satisfying. I would imagine that most 00 modellers would have similar feelings (although most 00 models that I have seen at exhibitions have not even been weathered) and therefore the market for a more accurate  milk wagon or wagons may well be too small for most manufacturers but I wish you all the best in your hopes.

I accept that with N gauge a lot of the details are too small to see properly, but that's not the case with a 4mm model.

I wont be running a 10 tanker milk train.  At Bailey Gate the most that ever arrived on one train were 3 usually attached to the front of  a down passenger working.  They were then detached and shunted by the train loco into the milk siding.  Later, some other milk tankers going out would be shunted out of another siding and onto the back of an up passenger service, again 3 at the most. So I want about 10 at least, 3 max going in, 3 max going out and 4 maybe already there, and some coming tomorrow or the next train. And yes I'll weather them too.

Why is it ok to expect absolute accuracy with all other types of rolling stock now but not milk tankers, just because there's lots of diagrams.  I'm not expecting dozens of different diagrams to be produced, just a handfull.

As I've pointed out, the underframes are standard for each of the 4 railway companies (with just some small differences in the ex GWR examples which could be 'not modelled' if necessary).

As usual, a dated photo of your prototype is best to work from. 

The Dapol version does at least have brake blocks in line with the wheels and the tank end supports are attached to the front of the buffer beam, neither is the case with the Hornby model, but it does have big 'boiler bands' which may need removing depending on the diagram being produced.  Unigate tankers (Bailey Gate was a United Dairies Milk Factory) mostly didn't have external tanker support bands, which is what the 'boiler bands' are part of.

Trying to improve the current RTR generic tankers will be a bit of a challenge, that I will try.

8 hours ago, KeithMacdonald said:

Here's an Express wagon on Flickr (SR 4409)

 

 

 

 

The livery is authentic for an Express Dairy tanker, and the underframe is definitely an ex SR one (Brake lever near the middle and huge spring dampers), however 4409 was a diagram 3159 belonging to United Dairies !

By the end of the 50's most of the smaller dairy fleets  had merged into either the Express Dairy fleet or with the United Dairies fleet to become Unigate.

Also, apart from one picture of W2596, all the photo evidence of  Express Dairy tankers show them with external strapping round the outside of the tank, whereas the United Dairies tankers were the opposite, all seemed to have the strapping under the top half of the tanker cover.  The exceptions to this were the ex Co-Op and the IMS tankers which had external strapping and went to United Dairies.

There were also the Milk Marketing Board tankers which went to BR who then passed them to both Express Dairies and United Dairies. All the photos I've seen of these hasd external strapping.   

I wonder if the tanker in the above picture has a 'bogus' livery because it looks attractive ? 

Most of my info is taken from 'BR Parcels and Passenger-Rated Stock  Volume 2' by David Larkin, and from the Rumney Models '3000 Gallon Milk Tanker diagrams' list.  

On 21/07/2023 at 11:13, Combe Martin said:

 

My Hornby one is silver and labelled United Dairies with number W1954 which is actually correct for a Diagram 0.53 built for Alpin & Barrett who did become part of Unigate, so is correct.

 

 

Except its not correct for a diagram 0.53

I've just discovered that a diagram 0.53 is one of 4 ex GWR diagrams that have an underframe that's one foot longer than all the other diagrams, ie 21 foot 6 inches.  The rest were 20 feet 6 inches. 

This was to accomodate tanks that had a filler at both ends and also those that had 2 small tanks on the one underframe.

13 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

Has Dapol been reading this thread, or they just got lucky?

 

A Dapol exclusive bundle including A OO Gauge Class 52 & 5 assorted OO Gauge 6 wheeled milk tankers.

 

https://www.Dapol.co.uk/products/4d-003-set1-d1010-western-campaigner-maroon-sye-5-milk-tanker-set?variant=44275610550495

Perhaps they're going to jump in and be the first to announce new 100% accurate ones so offloading the old stock while they can ?

16 hours ago, brightspark said:

And even worse than generic is the markings. I have a Hornby Express Dairy tanker. The printing is lovely, but it has LMS on the solebar and a Great Western running number.

There were some LMS built tankers that were re-numbered with a W prefix in BR days, the only ones I know about though were United Dairies/Unigate and Milk Marketing Board examples, whether there were any Express Dairy ones done so I don't know. But the Hornby model resembles an ex-GWR one, LMS ones had the brake lever in a different [position. 

My Hornby one is silver and labelled United Dairies with number W1954 which is actually correct for a Diagram 0.53 built for Alpin & Barrett who did become part of Unigate, so is correct.

But, I don't have picture of  a Diagram 0.53 tanker so don't know whether any of its other details are correct (ladder type and position, tank supports and number of them, filler position, etc etc). 

12 hours ago, njee20 said:

I never quite get posts like these. You're building a (presumably) faithful recreation of a real place, and you're sufficiently bothered by things like handbrake levers being incorrect, yet you're not actually prepared to build a kit or modify existing RTR. Will you also be appealing for RTP buildings to suit your location?

Well firstly there isn't a kit available now, David Geen has stopped production and whether he'll restart is unknown, and also his kits needed a lot of skill to produce something good and would take me a long time especially as I want a dozen maybe !

However I certainly am prepared to modify the RTR examples and have already bought some Rumney Models etched brass parts sheets to use on the Hornby and Dapol RTR tankers that I've already got, whether they'll fit is another matter, as the Rumney gentleman didn't make them for this purpose.  As far as buildings are concerned I knew when I started that there is nothing on the market (with one small exception) that faintly resembles any structure that I need so I'm already committed to that one.

With all the work this is going to take, I was just hoping for a small short cut in proceedings especially as there are plenty of other modellers who would also like some accurate milk tankers. 

I was hoping to get somewhere before I snuff it !

1 hour ago, ColHut said:

So, like the generic Hornby steel under framed mineral wagons :) ?

 

For me anyway I want the earlier 4 wheel versions.

I don’t like your chances.

regards

 

No, but with just the one accurate underframe, and a couple of different tops. 

1 hour ago, Mike_Walker said:

The big issue is, as already pointed out, there were so many variations.  Look at any photo of a typical milk train and it will usually be a case of no two looking the same.  Therefore if we were to get a hi-fi model would a train formed of many of them be accurate?

Well I don't think that's a good enough excuse not to make them, ie just because someone wants to run a 10 or more tanker milk train and they might all be the same !, if that's the case they're no worse off than they are now, they havn't got them at the moment, in fact they're better off because they could mix them with the 2 current generic ones.  Would most people be running a long milk tanker train ?, even though I want plenty of them the most I've ever seen leaving Bailey Gate on one train is 3, the rest will be on their way in, or already in the milk siding.

But  what I'm suggesting is produce the one standard underframe with at least 2 different tops, and besides thats what weve got now, just 2 slightly different inaccurate generic ones !

There are also at least 2 real ones on preserved lines that can be measured, photo'd and scanned .

Yes, and very nice it is too. It is a combination of a David Gean kit with Rumney models variations added I believe, but lots of us are are not very skilled at producing something of this quality or dont have the time to make loads of them unfortunately.  

I've posted this under Hornby because there isn't a place to address all manufacturers in one go and I have the impression (rightly or wrongly maybe) that out of all the manufacturers, they could possibly produce  a model in the shortest time frame, and I'm getting on in years now and don't want to wait till I'm over 80.  I don't however mind which of our lovely manufacturers does it.   I just hope they all read this Hornby thread even if its not about them.

Please please please can someone produce an accurate Milk Tanker.

I am finally in the process of building my second and much more  spacious version of Bailey Gate on the Somerset & Dorset main line.  For those that don't know, it had a dairy with milk tankers going in and out several times per day (not just the afternoon 'Milky' from Templecombe), so I need lots of them.

I've read all the comments about there are far too many milk tanker diagrams of just a handful of tankers each for someone to do one, and we already have 2 tanker models (Hornby & Dapol) that plenty of people buy.  Well, both are generic, though both are supposed to be based on an ex GWR chassis, but between them there are major errors, and the Dapol one is inclined to derail too easily because it rocks on the centre wheel set, and its not just my one.

I'm not going to go through all the errors here but on both, the most obvious one is the brake lever and what its supposed to connect to, I could be rude about it. I'm not even bothered about underframe details that cant be easily seen from a side on view, just what can be seen.

There are lots of photos online and in books (a good example is 'BR Parcels and Passenger- Rated Stock Volume 2' by David Larkin.  I know that the ex GWR underframe version was the most numerous, it also being adopted for the BR version, and there are more of these than others shown in this book. They were also seen all over the BR network, so why not just produce one accurate ex GWR type underframe with the 'large brake lever' not the earlier Dean-Churchward type of brake.

Variations to what's put on top are ... the number of tank supports, 4 5 or 6 and their shape ... tank fixing straps, either wrap round or short (under an outer cover ?) ... ladder and filler position (central) or combined with a frame and platform about 2/3rds up the side and either placed central or at one end of the tank side.

Using one standard underframe you could initially produce just 2 or 3 different models using a combination of the above variations. Just look at the published photos and pick a couple of different tops to model. I would suggest one with a central side ladder (there are plenty), and one with a side frame at one end (plenty of these too).  Those are the most obvious differences, and then copy what the other variations are for the one you have chosen.  If they sell well you could produce another slight variation next year.

Surely its better to produce a couple of accurate models than the current generic ones using the excuse that there are too many odd feature combinations and too few of one type.  

On 30/05/2023 at 02:30, MartinRS said:

 

Can I suggest that any new form of control would need a killer application. I suspect that this could be the ability to uncouple a locomotive from a rake of coaches or a number of goods wagons anywhere on a layout. Obviously this would need suitable couplings, or some type of modification to existing couplings. I have seen a number of articles on the web about using a DCC function to operate a solenoid which uncouples a loco. I think Kadee couplers were used. Any ready to run implementation of this, whether using DCC or Bluetooth would be a real disruptive technology and could give a manufacturer a real advantage. Until that happens I'm going to stick with analogue control.
 

 The Bournemouth West exhibition layout by Roger Sunderland and his friends uses a loco fitted DCC controlled uncoupling system attached to a Kaydee coupler.  I believe it was a Swiss mechanism.  They had it fitted to the locos they were using as station pilots.  As far as I remember these were a Bachmann Ivatt 2-6-2 tank loco and a B4 0-4-0 tank loco.  They've sold the layout now to another group that is still going to exhibit it, whether this includes these 2 locos, well I dont know.

Does anyone have a working ZTC622 Handheld that they are prepared to sell ?

Many thanks,

Peter.

On 03/04/2023 at 19:32, RailWest said:

In Mac Hawkin's "Somerset & Dorset Then and Now" plate 53 shows 44561 on a Down train passing Moorewood signal-box in a photo credited to RE Toop and dated 20-May-1961. The caption states that by that date the connection to the Down sidings had been removed, yet the official date from Weekly Notice P/EW46 for the removal of that connection was 9-Dec-1964 (quoted also by RA Cooke). Is the photo wrongly dated or - given that the site of the sidings is not visible in the photo anyway - is it simply a case that the caption is incorrect? I suspect the latter.

 

  

Are there 2 versions of this book ?, mine, first published in 1986, has pictures of an empty Masbury in plate 53 !