wagonman

I can vouch for the pain of gallstones – excruciating is the word that comes to mind. Glad you’ve had yours removed too.

Don’t take Edwardian era tinted postcards as a guide for anything. As the aboutcards.blogspot.com says: “The postcards began as a conventional black and white photograph and were painted by hand prior to production. In the early days the colouring took place in the photographers studio. As demand expanded factories were established employing large numbers of women to hand tint photographic images prior to postcard printing. The paints were oil based and transparent and their chemistry was such that many of the colourists were to suffer illness as a result of licking their brushes to form a point.” The LPC might have taken a bit more trouble than most, but they were working with a limited palette.

For what it's worth, I read somewhere that they used poplar wood for the brake blocks as it is more fire resistant. Of course, for our purposes wood is wood is....

Me again. I've found no.12: built by Met, reg GER 4093 in October 1904. 10-ton coal wagon with the entry annotated "Built to new specification Height of lowered door from rail level". Make of that what you will.

To answer my own question: no I can't. Colman's wagons nos.13 and 14, built Sept 1911 by the Met etc and given GER reg plates 5298-9, were recorded as 10-ton Grain Wagons. Looking back through this thread to the photo of the string of Colman's vans, the odd one out with the darker roof must be no.40, the sample wagon delivered 3 months earlier. If roofs darken that quickly the photo must have been taken soon after delivery – presumably milking the investment for all its publicity value. Stephen's reply has just arrived so 27 coal, 20 vans and 2 grain bought between 1904 and 1911. Looks like I've found them all – except no.12 which must be another coal wagon, probably a 10-tonner built by Met etc. But why was no.35 photographed by Gloucester, and when? I note it has brakes both sides... I think I'll rest from my labours... Richard

Well, I've found a few: A solo wagon, no.11, was a 10-tonner built by "Met Amal R C & W Co" in October 1904 and given GER restoration no.3926 Nos.15-34 built Hurst Nelson Feb 1907 and registered by GER, nos.8-27. They were rated 12-tons so I am assuming the GER, like the GWR, had separate number series for different capacity wagons, though unlike the GWR they lumped them all into the same book. Several of these entries have later annotations stating that they were withdrawn from main line service in the mid '30s. I'll spend a bit more time scouring the GER register but if I'm looking for individual wagons it may take a bit longer. Can I assume there was nothing later than 1908? Richard

Colmans' wagons numbered 35-39 were 12-ton coal wagons but built by Hurst Nelson in September 1908. The register gives them GER nos 80-83 – marked in red. I'm not yet familiar enough with GER matters to understand the significance of this! Wagon no 40 (GER 4702 of 17/9/1908) was a sample van supplied by Harrison & Camm. I haven't found any of the earlier wagons as yet.

Indeed he can – after a bit of ferreting around I have found the relevant details. The van was part of a batch (J&J Colman nos 41-59, GER reg 4796-4814) built by Harrison & Camm and registered in December 1908. The post-1887 GER registers are at York, but the earliest ones have suffered some damage over the years.

Ah! That puts me in mind of Ambrose Bierce's great work: "PAINTING, n. The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critic."

The only 7mm scale NSR loco kit I'm aware of is the TaffVale/Dragon kit for the M class 0-4-4T http://www.taffvale.wales/page1.php though I have not idea as to the quality of these kits. There's rather more available in 4mm...

But never when there was a photographer in the neighbourhood...

Did this change occur round about the time the RCH was trying to encourage Private Owners to locate the wagon number at the bottom left hand side? Pure speculation – no evidence.

Where's the 'groan' button when you need it? :-)

The general rule of vaccines in the UK seems to be that those given (like mine) by local GPs are likely to be AZ as those sites don't have the necessary deep refrigeration required for the Pfizer. Ignoring the 'correlation/causation' thing for a moment, Jim's figures imply the AZ vaccine reduces the risk of clotting... My sister in law in Hamburg tells me there is mounting frustration in Germany about the slow and chaotic roll out of the vaccination programme. I suspect the UK roll-out is so successful precisely because the government is not directly involved.

Not beyond the Shatt al Arab methinks. Ah, that was the Euphrates...

Pig iron loading at Westbury. You can just about make out the haphazard loading.

Yes, Ian was far more involved in the day-to-day stuff than Robin ever was. I think as a group we managed to salvage most/all of the valuable stuff. At least I hope so!

The Westbury Iron Co had a batch of wagons specifically designated as 'Pig Iron' but alas the GWR register didn't give the dimensions. On the other hand, the (post bankruptcy) New Westbury Iron Co had just the one batch of wagons and these were described as 'Coal and Pig Iron'. As they were standard Edwardian era Gloucester 10-ton 7-plank opens, the iron pigs can have done little more than cover the wagon floor.

I did some work at 30 Porchester Road in the '80s but don't recollect seeing anything like that. Mike Jolly and Colin Waite were trying to catalogue the drawings for the BGS, David Hyde was there and we found the three old Freighters' Registers and sundry other bits, albums of Rating Plans and several boxes of cartage agreements were put aside for Kew or Swindon/Chippenham, someone else was doing extensive work on personnel records, but most of the rest was just a giant haystack of miscellaneous correspondence that may or may not have had the occasional needle. I reckon Robin Linsley saved all the best bits.

I realised my error just as you were replying. So apologies to @Asterix2012 for my omission. It seems a form of feudalism was still rife in the Scottish coal industry in the C19 in that miners were in bond to the mine owners for a year at a time, and often involved their entire families in the work, even underground.

Ah yes, 'Thirling' was the word I was groping for. Thank you Stephen and Asterix.

Mmm, so not so rare at least in Scotland. From memory there was only one MSWJR wagon declared irretrievably lost. A lot of these figures do seem to come in around 1920 – presumably part of the run-up to Grouping? Could part of the problem in Scotland be due to the practice of hiring out wagons to collieries? There's a word for it which I have temporarily forgotten...

I've waded through mountains of official bumf in the course of my research and have come across a few cases of wagons being written off as 'lost'. Rare, but it did happen. One could speculate endlessly as to how...

Ah, the ineluctable spread of Estuary English...

I was brought up to believe the North started at Potter's Bar. Actually the word was that civilisation ended at PB which I took to be much the same thing... I now live in Norfolk AKA the North East.