philwaglab

Yes..he also removed the wagon labels and advised WFC of arrivals.This stopped suddenly in 1982 when he was moved to Temple Meads because it was felt that TOPS would take over all reporting etc.WFC then took the wagon labels off.I got a shed load off them in 1982 !!

Jim passed away in 2008.

I remember Jim, it was he that phoned through the details of the empty wagons for the departing trains to us in the TOPS office at Bristol,

 

cheers

Yes..he also removed the wagon labels and advised WFC of arrivals.This stopped suddenly in 1982 when he was moved to Temple Meads because it was felt that TOPS would take over all reporting etc.WFC then took the wagon labels off.I got a shed load off them in 1982 !!

Anyone know if the coke to ISC at Six Pit came in coke hoppers or 16 ton minerals ?

I remember seeing a report of a shunter at Ogilvie Colliery refused to shunt a train to get a vac head.He was given a verbal and told he had to do it next time.It was 2 am in the morning with limited siding lights and he was up to his boots in water because it was raining heavily...good oldl South Wales sidings !!!

As the title.

 

I'm working on my Scottish themed layout based 'somewhere north of Inverness' on the Kyle or Far North lines in the flexible time frame of between 1978 and 1985. 

 

I'm trying to re-create some wagonload freight trains and wondered when the last MCO's (or other unbraked vehicles) would have been used on these lines.

 

Thanks as always for any help.

I have a memo issued by the NCB saying that no unfitted minerals were to be loaded to Scotland or the Southern region from 1977 onwards.If a wagon arrived at STJ and was unfitted to these destinations instructions were given to reconsign the wagon else where

CTT stands for Consigned Through TOPS, which as you say did away with most wagon labels and a lot of other paperwork.

Thereafter we in Bristol TOPS had more direct contact with freight customers who reported directly to us when loading out traffic.

When declaring a wagon(s) released to traffic from customer A to customer B we no longer had to input the destination, commodity code, weight, dangerous goods UN number, or any special handling codes as all these details were all included within the unique 'Flow' number that applied to traffic between A and B, all that was required was the Flow number, the wagon number(s) and the weight of the contents,

 

cheers

CTT was a bit of a body blow for me as I used to collect wagon labels from various yards when they had been removed by BR for checking/booking in !!

Thanks Mike,

Thats interesting - id assumed there must be something like that, but from my limited time on the railway, a lot of TOPS knowledge seemed to be passed on from experienced guys to the new lads, through had written notes, or note books passed on from their predecessors!  There never seemed to be any proper guides or paperwork, so I wasn't sure if it existed!

 

I've a whole host of paperwork from Tees Yard thats dated 1981, and concerns the time where customers were being introduced to TOPS, through CTT (Consisting Through Tops) rather than wagon labels etc, as we were discussing on another thread, but that doesn't help with the reports and enquiries!

 

Anything you find would be appreciated if you have time.

 

Cheers

Rich

We went over to CTT at Ebbw Vale in 1981 for outward tinplate.No wagon labels attached and the traffic seemed to get to the destinations !!

Regarding coal traffic, particularly in the west country, there was a big change in 1967, up until that date most domestic coal arrived at local yards in 16t mineral wagons. Once the Exmouth Junction CCD (Coal Concentration Depot) opened in 1967 (there was also another CCD at Taunton) coal arrived 21t hopper wagons (later TOPS code HTO and HTV), it meant the closure of all the local coal sidings in the Exeter area. Coal in 16t mins and 21t mins was still conveyed to St Austell and I think Penzance Ponsandane until the early 1980s.

Penzance Ponandane was one of the last yards to handle MCO and MCV wagons.It closed in 1984.

Graig Merthyr colliery used coal brought in from elsewhere. Graig Merthyr was an anthracite pit and the local coal burnt through the firebars so 16 ton mineral wagons were used to bring in more suitable coal which was put onto the loco footplate with a big fork, not a shovel. The bunkers on the austerity locos at Graig Merthyr were just somewhere to put the fire irons!

 

I know that at Bedlay colliery with the 0-6-0Ts and also at Bickershaw the locos were bunkered by backing under the screens.

At Ladysmith Washery, Whitehaven if the line under the loading hoppers was clear the loco could back up for bunkers but often the method of coaling was shoveling from a heap on the ground or getting a mechanical shovel to do it.

Nantgarw and Astley Green used a crane with a clamshell bucket.

Loco coal for the Graig Merthyr locos came from Ogmore Central washery 

I wasn't blaming the miners (at the time our house served as a collection point for monies and food for a miners' support group) ,rather that the combination of a year-long absence of domestically-produced coal, and BR's insistence on a purely air-braked freight network, signed the death-warrant on most coal depots. If the miners' strike hadn't happened then the demise of the small coal depot might have taken a year or two longer, but it would have happened.

Quite right.Air braked hoppers were being used before the miners strike of 84.It was planned to phase out the old coal depots from 1980 onwards.

These are 4 relevant pages copied from the 'BR TOPS PRE-IMPLEMENTATION SURVEY' August 72 Edition

Bristol West Depot Yard & I.S.C. (What does I.S.C. stand for?)

 

 

Plan of Ashton Meadows Sdgs

scan0070.jpg

 

Bristol Wapping Wharf

scan0071.jpg

 

P.B.A Princes Wharf/Bathurst Wharf P.S.

scan0072.jpg

 

Plan of Bristol Wapping Wharf

scan0073.jpg

 

 

On another page, giving totals of train arrivals/departures, Wapping Wharf has 2 arrivals,

whereas Ashton Meadows is listed as 1 departure. Does this mean the incoming coal is brought to Wapping by the mainline loco,

but it then goes light to Ashton Meadows to pick up empties already tripped out and formed up?

 

Wapping Wharf had a staff of 1 grade A Suoervisor (07.00 - 16.00), 4 Senior Railmen, and 4 Railmen,

there was no staff at Ashton Meadows.

 

 

cheers

From 1978 only one railman on site....Jim Trudgeon.He dealt with all the paperwork,weighed wagons and liased with Western Fuel 

So, that's it then..........back in 1971 there were at least twenty engines based here, working around the clock bringing in up to 100 coal trains a day from places like Abercwmboi, Tower, Aberamman, Penrhiwceiber, Lady Windsor, Ty Mawr, Abercynon, National, Maerdy, Bargod Pits, Britannia, Ogilvie, Ocean, Taff Merthyr, Penallta, Windsor and Nantgarw....with coal products leaving for destinations like Margam, Filton, Wapping Wharf, Cheltenham, West Drayton, Acton, Willesden, Bletchley, Norwood Junction, Eastleigh, Shotwick, Corby, Normanby Park, Workington, Penshaw.

 

66511 brings the penultimate coal train through the housing estate that was once the Radyr Yard complex, at 12:35pm on Friday 24th. February, 2017. R.I.P. The Welsh coal industry.

And don't forget the coal from Wales & the Phurnacite Plant to Scotland............Worked to Bamfurlong in the 70's !!!!!!

Very true, and often a good source of revenue even at 2/6d a time (1960s price).  Some goods yard weighbridges spent far more time weighing non-railway items than they ever did railway traffic - don't forget a sign by the yard gate announcing 'Public Weighbridge'.

The weighbridge at Newport Lliswerry was often used to weigh non rail scrap traffic

I don't think size matters, weighbridges more likely to be provided for traffic being loaded out rather than traffic being received. 

Bridgwater and Lawrence Hill both retained working weighbridges into the 1980s.

The weighbridge at Lawrence Hill was used to weigh 16t minerals of scrap which were loaded in nearby yards,

 

cheers

The weighbridge at Wapping Wharf also weighed scrap in transit.It was also used to check weigh loaded coal hoppers inwards for Western Fuel and weigh out the duff from Wapping Wharf to Uskmouth Power Station

The nearest one looks like a Shockhood (i.e. shock open with a sheet rail) 

Yes shocks and highs brought in coil from Llanwern....usually sheeted

I remember meeting the chargeman at Wapping Wharf a few times........he was Jim Trudgeon.....a real gentleman.He did all the clerical work and removal of wagon labels.He also operated the weighbridge on site,one of only a few left in the country.The weighbridge was used mainly to check weigh coal into wapping Wharf for WFC,but he did weigh scrap enroute from the west country to their destination ie South Wales,the midlands etc

Well thank you Phil (I assume its Phil?)

 

Blimey, I've just realised it is nearly a year since I originally posed the question -  doesn't time fly when you're failing to get any modelling done!  Useful information though and one less topic to track information down on.

 

 

Regards

Steve

 

[Edit 1 = corrected spelling!]

Yes every colliery had a weighbridge.Most in South Wales were on ground level but there were a few with overhead weighing facilities.These were at Beynon,Celynen North & South,Six Bells and Lady Windsor.The buildings used to vibrate when weighing was taking place.Its a wonder how they never fell down !!!

The tall building at Beynon Colliery is the outward traffic weighbridge.Once the wagons had been filled they were gross weighed and from the tare painted on the wagon it was possible to calculated the weight of the coal inside the wagon.The weighbridge had the dials in the building and these were connected by rods to the weighbridge plate on which the wagon ran.The weighman would then make out the wagon labels and invoices in this building.Coal from this colliery went for washing at either Abertillery or Hafodyrynys with a small amount going to local merchants

The man who looked after the yard from 1972 until closure was a railman called Jack Horwood.I think he moved from Silvertown to Upton Park in 1972 as a senior railman.Anyone know of him now ?

Well, my old man's checked his slides and confirms the phot of D6973+D9544 is definitely at Abergwynfi, not Glyncorrwg.

 

Thinking about I doubt it could have been at Glyncorrwg as I suspect 37's were banned there due to the weak viaduct at Cymmer. That would also explain why 08's took over from Teddy Bears, not something bigger and faster.

There were two derailments in the area.The one was when a class 14 ran away from Avon Colliery and ended up through the catch points at Gelli Groundframe.The other was at Glyncorrwg when a Class 14 ended up going over the bank at the weighbridge.I suspect that the photo is at Glyncorwg as two cranes were brought in to put the loco back on the track.The derailment at Gelli was only a matter of lifting the loco back on but there were a few wagons piled up around the junction

The coal siding at Dorchester South lasted until the early 80's .The main merchant was T.Burt who had an office just inside the coal yard.

In the Bridport Branch book it shows a recovery train on November 11th 1975 that year recovering the stop block at Bridport Station.

When I visited Dorchester South Station in 1972 there was trainloads of coke being unloaded on a siding adjacent to the down (Weymouth) platform.This originated from Cwm Coke Ovens at Llantwit Fardre and were destined for the Ministry of Works mainly schools etc in the area

Rose Heyworth Signalbox opened in 1960 and closed in October 1964.It then was used as a rather posh shunters cabin until March 1984.The structure was dismantled by a private buyer(I Think) in 1986.The internal stairway was made of good quality timber and the upper floor was polished right up until closure in 1984.

I wore a donkey jacket and had a British Rail badge which I bought at a station kiosk.Got away with almost anything !!!!