Loco and other railway remains from scrapyard to steel works

[TravisM]

I had a interesting conversation with a friend of mine and we were discussing South Wales scrapyards, mainly Cashmore’s, Buttigieg’s, Bird’s, RS Hayes, and to a small degree, Woodham’s.

 

We assumed that the scrap steel would have be loaded into 16t mineral wagons at the time, but wondered to which steel works it would have been forwarded onto?  The obvious choices would have been Ebbw Vale and Llanwern, but did Port Talbot accept scrap, or could it even travelled further?

 

I know Cashmore’s in Newport made big inroads into surplus BR engines and stock, but also the UK’s Royal Navy and merchant marine shipping, but would the steel used in ships been a different grade of steel to that what was used on steam locomotives.  I know Cashmore’s were very efficient and it’s workers being paid by piecework, so a small gang could dismantle a medium sized tank engine within a day.

[chris p bacon]

I only ever remember seeing ore going into Llanwern, never scrap. 3 trains a day, every day with triple headed 37/3's

[Fat Controller]

Don't forget there were more than just the big, integrated, steel plants. There were  many other specialist plants, many taking in scrap by rail. Examples still working in the 1980s included:-

Llanelly Steel (later Duport) Used scrap in Open-Hearth, later Arc, furnaces

Landore (specialist foundry) Scrap from Batchelor Robinson in bales and local scrap yards

Briton Ferry (complementary plant to Llanelly Steel) scrap from local area

East Moors used scrap from various sources

These plants depended on scrap; the larger plants added scrap to the molten iron in the convertors. Much of the scrap in the big plants was 'pre-consumer', things like scrap coils and trimmings, so would not  be noticed from outside.

Edited February 5, 2022 by Fat Controller

[Ponthir28]

Llanwern definitely used some scrap steel don’t know how it got there. Also sad to say I spent some of my youth watching them cut up locos at cashmores and buggigiegs but can’t remember how the scrap was removed rail or road?