21D

As promised I've located a further source for information about the GWR/BR Pallet vans to V40: Great Western Journal No 10 of Spring 1994: this includes lots of data about which vans were converted from Diagram V12, speculation on building dates AND a 1:120 scale/TT scale plan of the rebuilds. According to the article at least one was marked ‘Return to ROF Glasoed Usk’ which suggests military usage at some time as well as others returning to Kirkcudbright ScR and Port Sunlight LMR for traffic streams previously mentioned on the forum. As noted earlier The 4 mm wagon Part 2 by Geoff Kent contains several pages on the V40 including construction notes and other information on the mainstream BR Palvans. Geoff used information in the Great Western Journal to construct his model. The Historic wagons register lists two wagon bodies rotting on farms in the UK but I don’t know if they are still extant. And that's all I know about the elusive V40 conversions. However, there are the three prototype BR Pallet van(s) to D2177 converted from standard LMS vans in 1950 mentioned on page 179 with a 4 mm scale plan and photo in Essery’s Illustrated History of LMS wagons. I think someone mentioned these vans ‘up-thread’. These had double sliding doors and seem to be a ‘proof of concept’ for the later BR ‘Vanwides’. A 4 mm body and 7 mm sides are made by 5D Stoke on ‘Shapeways’ Regards Martin

I found it ! Pallet van W114301 at Thames Haven, 1961. Theres more about lot numbers and running numbers which i'll look out plus there is an article in Part 2 of the 4 mm wagon by Geoff Kent if you have a copy. Regards Martin The chimney doesn't belong to the van but some Thames-side factory!

Hi! I found this https://www.solwaymilitarytrail.co.uk/trail-attractions/dundrennan-ranges/ but the rest was a flight of fancy about Kineton etc. I've a feeling the website on disused stations said something about traffic at the station. The MOD would hardly publicise military traffic during the cold war or nowadays by helpfully marking vans up. I'm sure the railwaymen and ex-railwaymen on the forum know something. It depends how many shells went into each wagon as to how many wagons were needed? As a former Territorial I can vouch a lot of stuff gets used on a training exercise and how heavy it all is! I've got a photo of a plywood variant lurking at Thameshaven i'll post sometime tomorrow. Regards Martin

Saw the palvans on display at Ally Pally and very good they looked. Bachmann should have released one of these beasties! The GW Mink A converted into Pallet vans by BR. If the BR version on a 10 foot chassis were unstable then these vans on a 9 foot wheelbase must have run like a pig on roller-skates! They appear to have congregated with the later BR Palvans at Kirkcudbright station loaded with munitions for the nearby military ranges at Dundrennan. The mind fairly boggles at the thought of all these pallet vans loaded with tank shells oscillating between Kineton CAD in Warwickshire and the south of Scotland! Prototype photo from my copy of Dave Larkin’s excellent book of ‘Pre-nationalisation freight wagons on BR’, which I hope he won’t mind me reproducing here. I built one from a chopped up Keyser/K’s GWR Meat van kit some while ago but never painted it. Regards Martin

Hi! Just discovered this thread. Page 40 of the book ‘British Railway Goods Wagons in colour’ by Robert Hendry (Midland Publishing 1999) contains a broadside colour view of one of the batch of 40 iron ore tipplers built for Stewart & Lloyd by BC&W and Hurst Nelson in 1940. These seem to have a 10 foot wheelbase and similar underframe to LNER large coal hoppers. They pre-dated the smaller LMS/BR tippler design by five years. Midland Publishing are part of Ian Allan so the photo is copyright but if you are desperate to see it the book is on Abe Books for £8. Actually it’s a very good book full of colour pics and some 4 mm plans of sundry goods wagons from the 19th century on. Regards Martin

Hi! Many thanks for the information about Butterley wagons. I’ve ordered a copy of the Model Railway News of December 1970 from ebay to get the wagon plan. I note what you say about the replacement of bolt together body panels (Which is nicely demonstrated by the wagon on page 19 showing the original body panels and the wagon on page 15 with riveted panels in ‘The Acquired Wagons of British Railways Volume 2’) by fixed panels by BR. I have another query involving Butterley steel mineral wagons. I discovered an interesting photo on Picturethepast.org.uk which contains many railway subjects including the photo below which is a Butterley steel wagon body on what appears to be a standard 1923 RCH wooden solebar chassis. It came from: https://picturethepast.org.uk/image-library/image-details/poster/dchq503849/posterid/dchq503849.html The site notes: ‘A 'Butterley Patent' wagon body, which is unusually mounted on a wooden underframe. Production wagons had steel underframes. This may be a temporary pairing for the photograph, or a short trial of the steel body on an underframe that would later have a wooden body fitted. The body appears to be black, whereas the wooden parts of the underframe are grey or red, which indicates that the body and underframe are not intended to run as 'one' - wooden underframes almost invariably were the same colour as the body.’ so perhaps this is just a posed photo with the steel body merely placed on a standard RCH chassis? I can’t see any angle irons securing the two parts at the sides but the end stanchions are seemingly bolted to the wooden buffer beams? Sources say Butterley took out their patent in 1925 so maybe the photo dates to this year? Anybody have any further information or ideas? It would make an interesting model for an inter-war layout. Regards Martin

Hi. Can you help? Does anybody have a basic plan of the early Butterley Company patent steel bodied mineral wagons introduced in 1925 and constructed until 1940 or know of a source for a plan. I’ve seen the weights given as 12 or 13 tons (although the latter weight was probably up-rated due to war?) and I suspect the wagons grew in height after the Cambrian Wagon company introduced a slightly larger competitor in 1935. They would have surely conformed to the RCH 1923 standards in regard to wheelbase, brake gear and overall length? 4 mm scale would be ideal but its not important. Many thanks in advance. Martin

I’ve recently bought two 3D prints of 4 mm scale wagons from Ian at ‘Siop y Wageni’ on Shapeways and thought I’d share with you my construction of the wagons. For those unfamiliar with Shapeways products what you get is a 3D print of the wagon body and you add the underframe and details such as handrails etc. Wagons printed in 3D are reasonably robust but cutting and drilling needs to be undertaken with more care than is usually needed with polystyrene kits. Certainly you cannot bend or soften parts like you could with an Airfix/Dalpol kit. I used Slaters Melpack for kit plastic to 3D printing plastic. The two wagons I worked on are both early all steel mineral wagons. The Cambrian 13T coal wagon dates to the mid 1930s and the Hurst Nelson wagon to 1943. The Cambrian at 13 tons is almost ‘pygmy’ riveted version of the later ubiquitous BR 16 tonner and the Hurst Nelson is a full sized 16 tonner but with extra side stanchions which didn’t appear in later types. Cambrian 13T coal wagon I used the following bits to complete both wagons: Cambrian C35 16' 6" / 17' 6" RCH Steel Underframe (9' wheelbase – 36mm): https://www.cambrianmodelrail.co.uk...H-Steel-Underframe-9-wheelbase-36mm-p94497733 Alan Gibson OO Gauge 12mm 3 hole Disc Wheels with his waisted pinpoint wheel bearings: https://www.cambrianmodelrail.co.uk/store/OO-Gauge-12mm-3-hole-Disc-Wheels-p94293655 C35 allows the correct double independent brake gear to be fitted because as far as we can tell these wagons all had bottom doors in the floor at least when built. The solebars will need a small amount of trimming at each end to fit between the headstocks which are printed as solid (for strength reasons I'm sure) whereas in reality they were thinner rolled steel troughs. I also used the Bill Bedford CES052_4 Wagon Safety Loops from Wizard Models on each wagon but they are currently unobtainable (although I'm assured they will appear again in due course) so I’d try use fine staples in the interim. I fitted commode handles at the non-opening end of the Cambrian wagon and also two lifting handles in the end door which are shown in a Paul Bartlett photo of the now broken up ‘Goodyear’ wagon on the Severn Valley. Hurst Nelson wagons didn’t have any door handles until some received replacement welded end doors in BR days. Hurst Nelson wagon of 1943 ‘Modellers Backtrack" Volume 1 Number 3, 1991’ contains pictures of both of the types of wagon as does ‘The Acquired Wagons of British Railways: Volume 2’ by David Larkin. A search of Paul Bartlett’s useful site will also turn up a few photos. Unfortunately no actual wagons now survive. Regards Martin

I have the exact same scenario as T.S.Meese. I have 42 unfitted iron ore tipplers - a mix of second hand Bachmann and rebuilds from Airfix mineral wagon kits from Ebay which need drop or lift link brake levers. These are on the 9 foot wheelbase chassis. As he notes fitted tipplers have different arrangements on each side of the cranks to the unfitted ones as well as a 10 foot wheelbase and two different vacuum cylinders. These need the cranks reversing on one side for Tipplers. Not too difficult with Mek-pack. Again as he observes the Red Panda 10 foot underframe has drop/lift link brake levers but at £3.90 a pop it’s a bit pricey just for two brake levers! I think Bill Bedford has a suitable etched underframe but that will be even more expensive! My suggestion is that he obtains the underframe fret from Parkside Models PC63 Dia 1/185 Iron Ore tippler wagon. Peco will supply spares from their kits. These kits use drop/lift link brake levers (which still needing fettling as noted above) but have a late 10 foot chassis. The frets only are £3 each from Peco as against £13 for the whole kit. I have two 4 mm Iron Ore tippler wagons with a 9 foot wheelbase which appear to be kits. They have the correct brake gear. Did Parkside once make a 9 foot wheel base tippler kit? Once I've finished all these tippler wagons I can run them on my as yet unbuilt late 50s Stratford Midland Junction layout using 9F power! Regards Martin

Hi! I've found several ancient catalogues stashed away which are free to a ‘good home’ . See photos. 1. ABS Models Catalogue. I’ve searched throughout this catalogue but there is no date. It refers to emails and the postal address is 36 Field Barn Drive, Weymouth, Dorset so I’m thinking early 2000’s (?) as I know Adrian Swain moved to Poole sometime before he sadly died. 2. Parkside Dundas OO/4 mm scale illustrated catalogue from 1996. 3. Parkside Dundas price list of 2009. Regards Martin

I’m new to this forum so excuse any howlers I make. As a further observation on the Ratio ‘5 plank’ coke wagon kit found by Dad-1 I offer these thoughts. I bought this wagon (see below) wheel-less and unloved as part of a job-lot of wagons on the bay of E (I only wanted the Palvan!). Above the solebars my wagon seems identical to Dad-1’s kit but below is completely different apart from having a 10 foot wheelbase. It has no sub-floor ‘frame’, the floor is in two halves and without plank marks. Dad-1’s kit has a steel solebar and what seems to be a hole for capstan/horse haulage. My wagon has the steel solebar but no hole! I also think the buffers are quite different, mine being more spindly as if for a fitted van and not stubby RCH mineral. I think someone broke off the coupling hook on my model too. If I didn't know it was Ratio I’d say my wagon was early Parkside or Kirk in origin. Page 8 of Ian Rice’s ‘Getting the best from plastic kits’ has a photo of this kit but he’s tinkered with it to use a Ratio 10 foot underframe kit. I’m wondering if that’s happened to my wagon. As I'm modelling 1955-60 BR I’d just give it a random P number and weather it a lot as by 1963 nearly all these Private Owner wagons and LMS/LNE wooden wagons had been dumped in sidings or burnt according to Dave Larkin. I've subsequently found two pictures. One of an unknown prototype and one a model of an LNWR wagon at the NRM which suggest that these type of coke wagons were once quite common but as beyond living memory have been forgotten. If I've en-fringed any copyright please let me and I'll credit you or remove them.