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Clasp brakes [and roller bearings] were fitted to those built late 1959 and after. All earlier than that had 4-shoe Morton and oil axleboxes, according to David Larkin, apart from some of the Medfit conversions, of which three lots out of four had LMS clasp brake chassis and oil boxes. It's an awkward prototype to model, so I was pleased to see the prototype photo, but very disappointed to see that the model was the late version as it's too late for me [as well as being far less common]. Either of the earlier versions would definitely be interesting, though.

Not particularly relevant, but just for info, the main GWR sheet store was at Worcester, with others at Saltney, Cathays [post-grouping] and Bridgwater. Possibly you were thinking of the Provender Store for horse feed, which was at Didcot?

In S Wales there were branches with a maximum speed for all freight trains of 20 or 15 mph, sometimes with intermediate locations where the maximum was reduced to 10 or even 5 mph (BR Cardiff District Branch Lines WTT). Working 5-600 ton unfitted coal trains downhill with an 0-6-2T and one 20T brake meant that very low speeds for the whole trip were essential to maintain control of the train, even with quite a few wagon brakes pinned down.

Only the roller bearing vans carried the blue spot, as far as I know...

Block trains would indeed convey one company's stock only, but, for example, Cleveland tanks would appear with Esso tanks, as they belonged to Esso from the 1930s, and National Benzol tanks with SMBP tanks after the 1957 takeover. Barrier wagons were required for Class A traffic, but not Class B. However block trains in the 1950s would convey a mixture, and even if the outbound train was all Class B on a particular day, there would be no guarantee that the returning empties would be, so the barrier vehicles were presumably always present. Liveries were Class A silver tanks [later grey] with red solebars [but not buffer beams] and Class B black, which, for convenience, was also applied to those carrying loads with a flash point above Class B, which includes both Heavy Fuel Oil and Bitumen. The requirements for barrier wagons [how many, what type of vehicle and where] varied over time, especially after the demise of steam.

The third character of TOPS codes shows the type of brake A = Air, B = Air + Vacuum pipe, O = unfitted, P = vacuum piped only, V = vacuum braked, W = vacuum brake + air pipe, X = dual braked. Some of these are now obsolete. The first T = tank wagon, but I don't know what the second T shows. The wagons in the photo you posted are all unfitted.

Shark was the code for 20T ballast plough brakes; lighter PW plough brakes were coded Oyster [LMS/BR 16T, the design from which the BR Shark was derived] and Cockle [LNER 12T]. The problem with bad riding was, as indicated, the result of the short wheelbase with ploughs outside the axles in the LMS/BR design. The SR used 20T ballast brakes with the ploughs inside the normal wheelbase, also coded Shark, which did not have the same issue with bad riding. The ploughs on the Cockle were also within its 13ft wheelbase; the LNER also had a 20T PW design with 16ft wheelbase, not produced until after Nationalisation, but this was a riding and brake van without ploughs. The GWR plough brakes were older 24/25T vehicles, again with the plough within the normal wheelbase. Why the swb design was perpetuated by BR I don't know, but it must have restricted train speeds, as, even travelling out of use, it had to be taken to the work site.

SR auto-fitted locos also had a Westinghouse pump on the offside of the smokebox, to maintain the air pressure in the control system.

After WW2 there was a shortage of paint for several years, so even new wagons were turned out of shops with only the metalwork and patches for the lettering painted. It is possible that the body metalwork here is all very rusty, but the wagon is carrying its BR number on a patch, so it is possible that it was last fully painted by the LMS just before the change to small lettering, saw no new paint until some time soon after nationalisation, with just the metalwork repainted then, along with the patch for the number. If so, it may now be overdue for shops, especially since it's a vacuum fitted wagon. It would have been very unusual for 1957, but not, I think, altogether impossible. A very interesting picture, to me anyway. If only it had been in colour!!

As a one time resident of South Devon, I am impressed by the modelling so far, and will be interested to see how this develops. I would offer some thoughts, though, hopefully constructive - The native trees are mostly deciduous at the elevation at which the actual line ran. Retaining walls are normally not vertical, as it maximises the loading on them. Sandstone is both permeable and porous, so a wall may need weep pipes to avoid water building up behind it. The area inside the railway fence will get wider as the tunnel is approached, and the fence will be placed at the top of the cutting, or a short distance away from it, then sweeping round behind the tunnel mouth. There won't be any trees within that fence, and minimal overhang beyond the fence (railways don't like bits of tree, or even whole trees, falling on the track). Railway infrastructure was often well over a century old by the 1950s/1960s. This meant maintenance, for which staff needed access, including above tunnels. Part of the job in that era was removing anything growing between the stones before it got too big, as it would otherwise potentially cause problems. Things are rather different now, with much more limited staff numbers available to do such work, and less concern about inflammability.

No. It would have been a mammoth task, as there were over 250,000 of them.

I am aware of these. I can't judge the accuracy of the BR version as they only show the LMS version, but that doesn't have any dates [the low number suggests it would only have the issue date, as return dates were added in the mid-1920s], and the "Return with wagon" wording was not generally present [sheets were common user from 1917]. I'm afraid that my illustration was just to show the appearance of BR sheets; you can't buy one like it, so far as I know. A few years ago I was so fed up with the useless offerings from the trade that I did my own artwork, so I can change numbers and dates as I want.

BR wagon sheets carried lettering and numbers, more or less like this. The small yellow and white numbers are return and issue dates.

Cost and speed of transit mostly. The limits on size and weight were much lower for passenger rated items, in general. Much traffic was always goods rated for obvious reasons, but some items were always passenger rated - small numbers of small livestock such as caged birds, cats, dogs, sheep or goats, for example, travelled with the guard for welfare reasons, along with small consignments of perishables such as fish or dairy products. Passenger rated, incidentally, also included items in parcels trains, such as the thousands of catalogues sent out by mail order companies or the Siphon loads of cut flowers.

Main Line and City brake thirds W3755W and W3756W converted to gas lighting and given an additional central droplight window in the brake end for the driver [the other two end windows are original] and a warning gong. There was no through regulator gear, so they were never true auto-trailers. Initially there had also been an all third W3910W. They replaced the previous clerestories at about the end of 1957. They worked Glyncorrwg to British Rhondda colliery, and, like all their predecessors were were always propelled uphill to the colliery because of the gradient involved. Info from John Lewis' "Great Western Auto Trailers" Vol.2.

In the 1960s and 1970s using a single or a double decker would largely depend on the likely traffic, so sometimes doubledeckers in the country and singledeckers in the city. There could also be problems with low bridges, so the operator might be forced to use singledeckers , or reduced height [lowbridge] doubledeckers. I suspect that Buxton - Sheffield probably used singledeckers. Coaches might also appear on longer routes from time to time, as they had more comfortable seats. I have a photo of a 1950s Sheffield JOC coach showing route number 84. Low hanging trees were just lopped by the bus company - most had an old vehicle modified with an open top deck for doing the job.

Sheffield JOC ceased operating the 84 31/12/69, after which NWRCC operated it alone. South East Lancashire and North East Cheshire Passenger Transport Executive [SELNEC PTE] was set up with effect from 1/4/69 and took over NWRCC's operations in its area on 1/1/72, after which NWRCC was wound up and its services in the Miller's Dale area passed to Trent.

Services on the main road in the mid-1960s would probably, mostly at least, been operated by the North Western Road Car Company from Buxton garage, although the period you quote is one of great change [by the end of the period the NWRCC didn't exist any more], and there were other more local operators. However, the main road is about 80 feet lower than the railway, and is mostly hidden by trees currently [and probably was then as well, I would think]. The access road to the station itself is a steeply inclined, narrow local road which I doubt ever saw a bus service. A brief history of NWRCC and a basic fleet list is here http://www.lthlibrary.org.uk/library/PDF-043-1.pdf

Yes. Sorry about the confusion.

It's actually TDB... The first character identifies the operator, the second is the identifier for a Departmental vehicle, meaning it is an internal user, not intended for traffic use [at least not normally] and the B, as ever, means it was built by or for BR. In this case T means it's allocated to the Operating Department. These are not TOPS codes, which identify the vehicle type, but are to identify the department responsible for it.

The branding is greatly faded, whereas the number is not. This rather suggests that it probably relates to an earlier incarnation of the van. Anything with a TDB number was allocated to the engineers [the T shows which type of engineers]. As such they would have been surplus as far as the Traffic people were concerned before being released.

7751 is listed as fitted with LMSR mechanical system at an unknown date, replaced by vacuum system 2/1934. 58925 [ex-7794] is listed as given LMSR mechanical system 11/1925, no removal date and no date for fitting the vacuum system. The second loco in the picture is unidentifiable, so it is difficult to comment. It is possible that the pipe has been removed by shed staff for repairs. (2)7586 is listed as given the vacuum system 3/1934. It was withdrawn 9/1948 without ever carrying its BR number, its last shed being Tredegar, which had no auto workings [as far as I know - I'm open to correction].

Locomotives Illustrated 158 - LNWR Special Tanks and Coal Tanks - has photographs of the rear of the following autofitted locos: 7769 - 1939, the area under the bunker is in deep shadow, so presence of a tank can't be determined 27830 - 1948, large tank visible 27605 - 1937, large tank visible Interestingly it lists locos autofitted with the LNWR mechanical system, the LMSR mechanical system [presumably the same] and the LMSR Vacuum system. 7833 is shown as having the mechanical system from 7/1925, but no removal date is shown, and it is not listed with the vacuum system. Given the absence of quite a few removal dates in the tables and your photograph, this is most likely down to lack of records. The use of a vacuum reservoir tank for the control system would make sense, as the control system would have to be kept separate from the braking system.

Circa 1958 any given coal train had a very small, usually very random, sample of the coal wagons in traffic [something roughly of the order of 300,000+ in total, from memory] so statistically speaking, almost any selection would do, including 21T as well as 16T and 13T, even a few with wood underframes still. It would be true that steel minerals would normally outnumber wooden ones. Peter Fidczuk in Modellers Backtrack Vol. 1 no. 5 reckoned about 2/3 to 1/3. The cattle vans are an issue, though. Your comment about vegetable traffic is reasonable, but this was perishable so used VB vans only, as did the Irish cattle traffic from Holyhead. I think unfitted ones were fairly thin on the ground by 1958. The Plate looks OK for the final LNER all welded Plate diagram, apart from the number, which belongs to something else, and the brake push rods, which should both be the same way round with a cross shaft [the kit mouldings are wrong]. The nearer set are the wrong way round. The Boplate B was essentially war surplus from 1918/19, and BR built a lot of bigger capacity Boplate Es, so how long they lasted on BR is an open question. Assuming it is the Kirk kit it lacks a good part of the substantial internal end bracing, although that is not too difficult to remedy.

Peco produce the former Ratio kits and sell the bogies separately. They also sell the former Parkside bogies separately.