Fat Controller

My friends in Beaujolais still use their grey Fergie; it's one built under licence by Hotchkiss, more usually known for Jeeps and guns. built in the late 1950s, it's their second tractor. Their workhorse is a 1961 Fordson....

On 18/08/2019 at 11:24, Captain Kernow said:

It might just be a means of 'marking the spot!'

 

In my experience, the legends 'MT' or 'ETY' were often used to convey the meaning 'empty'. This also applied in a kind of shorthand when writing memos etc.

 

'X' (sometimes wiyhin a circle), was often to be seen on condemned stock in the 1960s. Confusingly, the LMS (I think it was) used it as a marking in conjunction with restrictions over the Widened Lines.

I still use 'MT' on my time-space graph at work- French colleagues look askance until I tell them to say it aloud. Likewise 'CANX'...

Those vans are a tidy job..

Tidy job.

These were the last operational main-line steam engines in France, being operated on secondary lines near Dijon until 1975; SNCF hired them to one of the quasi-private operators. They were based at Gray, which is now part of the Eurotunnel empire.

There's a colleague of mine who has several in his attic; part of his childhood trainset. Given what I know of him, they'll still be in their original boxes.

Brian

At some of the bigger locations, as many as eight front-loaders may be working at the same time; the buckets on these things probably load ten or more tonnes with each bite. The driver needs to get the bucket into the top of the wagon, or else there's lots of dust, along with the risk of half the load falling on either side of the wagon.

The partitions are as much to keep the sides apart as anything, I suspect- I wonder what the long-term result of the damage to them will be?

The original MGR hoppers had 'breaker-bars' across the top, to break up loads dropped from overhead hoppers; these ended up broken or missing as well.

Brian

There were some, used on the Burry Port and Gwendreath Valley until the demise of passenger services in September 1953, that were repainted by BR (sources suggest the repaint was either all-over brown or carmine); I doubt that your directors would have appreciated the sixty years of accumulated coal-dust, however..

Brian

There are a series of photo albums called 'The Heyday of ******'', with volumes dedicated to the Warships, amongst others. Photos in there show such things as:-

individual Carflats with examples of several British Leyland cars and vans of the period.

Lowfits carrying compressors (from Compair at Redruth)

Various types of vans and opens carrying MoD supplies from locations such as Ernesettle.

Other traffic I know of included pig iron (on Plate wagons) to Compair's plant, some form of rock from Liskeard (was it Serpentine?), sundries traffic in former 'Blue Spot' fish vans; you might also have caught the tail end of the vegetable traffic from the Penzance area.

There was a web-site with quite a lot of shots of Devon and Cornwall in the period in question, but it may have disappeared with Fotopic.

Brian

Lovely work. I remember these at Longport in 1980, bringing in rod coil for a place at Stafford. The ones I remember were all partially sheeted; as no-one could untie the knots holding the sheets, someone would take a knife to the ropes. After a while, the wagons would be festooned with odd lengths of blue nylon rope trailing from buffer stocks and wagon frames alike.

The first shot is of one of the new 'Transilien' units designed for use within the Greater Paris area.

The apparently four-wheeled coach in the carriage sidings is the generator van from the Talgo variable-gauge sleeper train which runs between Austerlitz and Barcelona- the other vehicles in the train are articulated, with a single-axle 'bogie' at one end only.

The various grey locos previously carried the 'En Voyages' livery, which SNCF hurriedly abandoned, possibly because of licencing difficulties. The services would have been to Orleans and beyond, possibly to Toulouse and even Perpignan.

The red and grey TGVs are 'Thalys'; Thales are a French-owned firm which took over parts of BR's Telecommunications business.

Brian

Are you going to do one of the vac-fitted types with cast bogies from Cambrian?

They do two cast types which could be used (Gloucester and Davies & Lloyd), as well as the plate-frame with roller bearings style. They should all be one-piece mouldings by now.

http://www.cambrianmodels.co.uk/4mmbogies.html

You've done a nice job of the bolsters- these were the best part of the old Lima Bolster E, which I re-used on a 'C'.

Duports of Llanelli used ex-Shell-Mex-BP 14t tanks, with the top half of the tank burnt off, as scrap-carriers for their open-hearth furnaces.

Ever the cheap-skates, they also had a selection of Bulleid tender underframes (from locos scrapped at their sister plant in Bynea) as billet and roll carriers. These, having three axles, had been intended to reduce the axle-loading on some of the lighter-laid track- unfortunately, they had trouble going round the very tight curves within the plant (the noise could be heard in our house, half-a-mile away), and so the centre axles were removed.

Body removal was often unintentional- BSC Landore had several 16-tonners which had been denuded by the scrap-bay electromagnets.

I don't think the rolls would get very rusty, as they would have been used in a hot, dry, envirionment- there might be superficial rust if they were stored outside prior to re-turning. The colour would be more akin to a dark steel colour. The rolls were cast steel, with different shapes depending on what sort of section they were being used to roll. Chocks would have been hefty chunks of wood, to avoid damaging the surface of the roll.

My father served his time as a roll-turner at RT&B's Machynys Foundry in Llanelli (or Llanelly, as it was when he started)- he used to say that the rolls were very precisely machined, especially as the ones he worked on would be used to make thin plate for tinplating.

Brian

ABS are still around, and producing some useful bits, especially for carrige and wagon modellers. The main drawback to using them is the lack of a web presence; you have to use pen and ink to order...I'm actually building one of their SR Banana vans at the moment.

Not sure how common private road-hauliers were on MoD work back then- I spent a lot of my childhood summer holidays at various MoD establishments during the 1960s, as my father was on the 'preferred tender' list for things like repairs to hangar doors. I can't say I remember noticing any non-military vehicles being used, though the drivers were often civilians. Larger loads seemed to be in the hands of Ergomatic-cabbed AEC/Leylands, hauling flatbeds or, sometimes, 'Queen Mary' trailers. Smaller loads might be carried in tilted Bedford TKs, or sometimes Karrier Bantams or Scamell Scarabs.

This should be a link to a aerial view of the Transhipment Shed at RNAD Ernesettle:-

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&q=Ernesettle,+Ernesettle+Lane+RNAD+(NW-bound),+Plymouth+PL5+2,+United+Kingdom&aq=4&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=10.706311,28.081055&ie=UTF8&geocode=FRxJAQMdsh_A_w&split=0&hq=&hnear=Ernesettle,+Ernesettle+Lane+RNAD+(NW-bound)&ll=50.417802,-4.194546&spn=0.002817,0.006856&t=h&z=17

Brian

Possibly ABS, Chris- I think they're ex-GWR Mites. Not many wagons with such a short wheelbase (8')that I can think of, the others being some of the BR-built Single-Bolsters and Match wagons, which were probably Mite-derived anyway.

Brian

I think you might have a formatting problem- the bulk of the latest entry is hidden behind something showing what the latest postings are, which would normally be to its right.

brian

Just had a look at some colour pictures of various Coastal Command aircraft taken during WW2. Upper surfaces (as seen in plan view) were either in a grey/green (Temperate Waters) camouflage pattern, or in plain grey- some aircraft did seem to just be all-over white.

I've visited a few aircraft graveyards over the years- St Athan used to break V-bombers, and we used to park in their shadow for BoB Day displays. The undercarriages on these were kept relatively tidy, to facilitate moving the machines for cannibalisation. These days, Manston, near us, breaks Jumbos. In all cases, engines are removed fairly quickly- at Manston, some of the locals helped themselves to a couple.

Cockpits would normally be tarp'ed over until anything worth having had been removed.

Resist the temptation to have 'rust' patches- not much ferrous metal in aircraft. What you might well get is a lot of mould/lichen build up over time.

I saw the 'Bullets' at Frethun yesterday- someone must have spent their Christmas hols polishing them. Still, they'll soon look like your models again- you've done some beautiful weathering there.

Nice work. The 'RR' refers to Round Oak Rail, I think, being the West Midlands terminal that many of these wagons work to- there were some in the hybrid VTG/Tiphook livery which had 'Local' in the same position, which worked between Llanwern and Newport Docks.

These wagons never seem to work to and from the Continent anymore- all the export/import traffic has gone over to the SNCF wagons.

I was going to upgrade my 92 in similar fashion, but it's gone on to long-term loan to the chaps who maintain them for Europorte2. If anyone's tempted to try an upgrade, I would suggest contacting East Kent Models, or one of the other specialist Hornby spare parts specialists, and just buying the bits required. The part numbers can be found by going to the relevant 'Service Sheet' page on the Hornby web-site.

Just one caveat. In both the article on modelling the MTV (using the Dapol chassis and scratchbuilt body) in the most recent edition of 'Update', and in the chapter on modifying one of the tanks to represent a Class A one in Geoff Kent's 'The 4mm Wagon; Volume 2', mention is made of the axle-centres not being the same on both solebars. The discrepancy is fairly small, but sufficent that, if left unmodified, the two axles will not be parallel to one another, thus causing problems with the running and trackholding qualities.

I remember the originals being introduced in South Wales, just before the 16xx panniers stopped running past my primary school! You've done a lovely job there, Adam. 'Sound'

Very interesting wagon. Dont suppose you have any more information on them? Not a clay wagon I have seen before.

Rich,

If you go back to the main blog, look on the second page- you'll find an entry on wagons which has about ten comments posted. There's a list of wagon numbers and some other comments there.

Brian

I found the book in my library and you're quite right about the container colours. A trip to the paint shop beckons...

 

I haven't found the reference I was looking for though have found a reference to 5 types of converted Boplate. I'll keep looking if only to confirm my sanity status...!

The conversions ranged from the type you've modelled, through ones with sides removed, to ones with sides and floor missing (though retaining the ends). All the ones we looked at at Tees Yard were on cast bogies, as these were capable of 60 mph rather than 50. In latter years, many received air-pipes, as there was a regular flow to Avonmouth or Severn Beach from Boulby.