GWR 4 Plank Open (O21)

[Harlequin]

7" high, I think.

I can work out the proportional size of the lettering from photos but it would still be nice to have an engineering drawing if such a thing exists.

 

(Is this veering off-topic???)

 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Harlequin

[Simond]

Do we have plate dimensions, and know the correct typeface?  Apologies if I missed it.

 

I can do a CAD model, but I don’t have a printer (yet…)

[Annie]

Would this help?

 

[Steamport Southport]

Ah, forgot the CC version is an O5 rather than the undiagrammed version later rebuilt into the O21.

 

Another one who probably has too many of the things seeing as there was only something like 200 of them. 😁

 

I had planned on doing some in the earlier guise (just pre grouping with the large lettering), some 1930s and maybe one or two later condition.

 

Add a couple of these then that will do for my 4 plank needs I would think.

 

 

Jason

[Craigw]

12 hours ago, Mikkel said:

 

I look forwarding to seeing those 19 four-plankers in one train, Craig - should be quite a sight, if that's the plan.

 

And I can see your point: I like building wagon kits, but as you know all too well the Coopercraft kit had various issues in the construction.  Also, who says the RTR versions can't be modified for variety, as per the kits.

 

 

 

 

I have been given approval to use our Granny Flat as my modelling room - a double garage that has been lined, floor etc. So, is comfortable and also secure too. More importantly, it means I finally have the space to do my long cherished Didcot, Newbury and Southampton railway station. I have my heart set on Burghclere or Highclere but my interest is the very early 1920s so the 4 plank wagons are important to me. I can have 4 or 5 in a train and have passing goods trains, so more than 20 of them is not unreasonable. The other thing is that while others like different locos, I like wagons!

 

My 4 plank wagons have been built using the CooperCraft sides and ends with Morgan Design under frames, a new floor etc. I enjoy building them but it takes a lot of time and the tarpaulin bar is a huge issue because they are very hard to find. So, I am hoping that the Rapido 4 plank wagon has the short door bang springs and also includes an optional Tarp mechanism for us to fit. Given the lack of availability of the Coopercraft kits and the work involved in building them to a standard that pleases me, this RTR is a no brainer. I have 6 of the Jeremy Suter Iron Minks to build, so if I add the Rapido ones to that I will have 10 of them which is probably way too much. 

 

I am looking forward to seeing what modifications you can do to these. May I suggest that Railtec may be worth contacting about the numberplates?

 

Regards,

 

Craig W

Edited April 3, 2022 by Craigw

[Compound2632]

6 hours ago, Annie said:

Would this help?

 

 

A photo was posted a good while ago on my wagon building thread - it may not be back yet - possibly of the same plate but I think squarer on. Anyway, this survivor shows how they were made - the pattern was a frame with number blocks inserted. This number belongs to a DD3 tank wagon according to my notes but I don't have a note of the build dates of these; but being on a special wagon would perhaps explain its survival. 

 

6 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

Ah, forgot the CC version is an O5 rather than the undiagrammed version later rebuilt into the O21.

 

It can, I think, be built into either guise (within its limitations) since it has parts for conventional brakes as well as DC1. In fact given the lack of swan-necked lever and quadrant ratchet, it's more complete for conventional brakes.

 

O5 is rather an odd diagram assignment, since it applied to a single lot of 200 wagons that as far as I'm aware were in no fundamental way different to the preceding 24,000 4-plank wagons, many of which in the later lots were built with oil axleboxes and, as I understand it, some with DC1 brakes. Why weren't the whole lot put on O5? After all, all Iron Minks were assigned V6, regardless of their condition at the time the diagram book was started, as far as I'm aware.

[Annie]

50 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

A photo was posted a good while ago on my wagon building thread - it may not be back yet - possibly of the same plate but I think squarer on. Anyway, this survivor shows how they were made - the pattern was a frame with number blocks inserted. This number belongs to a DD3 tank wagon according to my notes but I don't have a note of the build dates of these; but being on a special wagon would perhaps explain its survival. 

 

Yes I remembered that you'd posted a slightly different view of this plate some time ago Stephen.  I have no idea where I got this particular image from, but I thought it would be worthwhile posting it just in case your own copy was still lost in the outer darkness.

[Miss Prism]

My simplistic rule of thumb for the 4-plankers is:

- O5, with a sheet supporter and DCI;

- consolidated under 'O21' if they were lever brake and didn't have a sheet supporter.

 

[Craigw]

12 minutes ago, Miss Prism said:

My simplistic rule of thumb for the 4-plankers is:

- O5, with a sheet supporter and DCI;

- consolidated under 'O21' if they were lever brake and didn't have a sheet supporter.

 

 

So what were they if they had lever brake and sheet supporter, which prior to the early to mid 1920s seems to have been the vast majority?

 

Did the work fitting of the additional lever brake also involve the removal of the sheet supporter?

 

It seems incongruous that such a large part of the wagon fleet did not have a classification.

 

Craig W

 

[Miss Prism]

4 minutes ago, Craigw said:

So what were they if they had lever brake and sheet supporter, which prior to the early to mid 1920s seems to have been the vast majority?

 

Did the work fitting of the additional lever brake also involve the removal of the sheet supporter?

 

It seems incongruous that such a large part of the wagon fleet did not have a classification.

 

Can't disagree with any of that. Hence my stress on a simplistic rule of thumb!

 

[Compound2632]

I'm now slightly confused since the Coopercraft kit, labelled O5, does not include parts for the sheet supporter, although the diagram labelled O5 in Atkins et al. does show it.

[Miss Prism]

On 03/04/2022 at 08:27, Compound2632 said:

I'm now slightly confused since the Coopercraft kit, labelled O5, does not include parts for the sheet supporter, although the diagram labelled O5 in Atkins et al. does show it.

 

The contents of the Coopercraft kit 1004W was never an O5. It could become an O5 with a supporter and new (DCI) brakes.

 

Which reminds me, I need to rewrite Graeme Pettit's para on the kit.  (Edit: now done.)

 

Edited April 4, 2022 by Miss Prism

[Harlequin]

Many thanks to @Annie for the clear photo. Here's my estimate of the plate design:

 

 

The quarter inch thickness of the plate and the extra quarter inch for the lettering is as per the known design of the signal box nameplates.

Other dimensions derived from the photo by assuming that the plate is 7" high. They all fall onto nice imperial units, which gives me some confidence in them.

 

Having looked at more photos in "Great Western Wagons Appendix" I don't think the above is correct. The plates are less than 7" high. I'll post a revised drawing somewhere else.

 

Edited April 4, 2022 by Harlequin

[57xx]

My comment on buffers on the Mink thread obviously apply here. There looks to be too much girth and not enough length on the housings compared with the pics I'm looking at in Atkins et al.

[Compound2632]

2 hours ago, Miss Prism said:

The contents of the Coopercraft kit 1004W was never an O5. It could become an O5 with a supporter and new (DCI) brakes.

 

With apologies to Rapido, who though they were starting a topic on their nice new RTR wagons but failed to realise that they would inevitably attract the tribe of 4-plank obsessives, here's a recent Ebay purchase, one that has been maturing nicely in someone's stash for three or four decades and is now ripe for building:

 

 

The original Coopercraft thought they were making a kit for an O5!

[Miss Prism]

True, but scale diameter buffer stocks in plastic is asking for trouble. Go MJT for skinnier.

 

[Compound2632]

2 minutes ago, Miss Prism said:

True, but scale diameter buffer stocks in plastic is asking for trouble. Go MJT for skinnier.

 

I have taken to doing so, having rebuilt several second-hand built-up examples where the buffers were the first casualty when the electric toothbrush met the paint stripper.

[Steamport Southport]

£2.99?

 

Went looking for my "new" ones, one has the slightly odd price of £1.27 and another has the extortionate price of 79p! 

 

Which confirms my memories of them being what you could call "Pocket Money Kits".

 

 

Jason

[Miss Prism]

2 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

The original Coopercraft thought they were making a kit for an O5!

 

Hands up anyone who knew what an O5 was 45 years ago.

 

[Compound2632]

4 minutes ago, Miss Prism said:

Hands up anyone who knew what an O5 was 45 years ago.

 

Theoretically, anyone with a copy of that interesting new publication A. G. Atkins, W. Beard, D. J. Hyde and R. Tourret, A History of G W R Goods Wagons, Vol. 1 (David & Charles, Newton Abbot, 1975). 

 

For myself, 45 years is pushing it but say 40 years ago I would have known that an O5 was what Coopercraft kit 1004 made! And from the instructions therein, I knew of the 200 built in 1902 but was ignorant of the 24,000+ built previously:

 

[Miss Prism]

I've forgotten the name of Mr Original Coopercraft.

 

[57xx]

4 hours ago, Miss Prism said:

True, but scale diameter buffer stocks in plastic is asking for trouble. Go MJT for skinnier.

 

 

With the metal shank though the middle they should be stiff enough. It's something that visibly spoils the look IMO, if you're going to do it, do it right.

[Michael Hodgson]

1 hour ago, Miss Prism said:

I've forgotten the name of Mr Original Coopercraft.

 

It would be reasonable to expect it was Cooper!  But it's explained here :

 

http://cooper-craft.co.uk/Pages/2/About-Us.html

[Miss Prism]

Of course, Colin Heard. Brilliant tool maker. If only he had paid more attention to the brakes.

 

[Steamport Southport]

2 hours ago, Miss Prism said:

 

Hands up anyone who knew what an O5 was 45 years ago.

 

 

Not quite 45 as I was seven!

 

Not long afterwards though as I got the GWR, MR and LMS Wagon books from the Railway Book Club about 1980ish as part of the introductory offer. I was allowed to join in my mum's name as long as I paid, but my mum never asked for the money and refused when I offered it.

 

They were also covered in the RM in the late 1970s in the articles by Brian Huxley.

 

Open Secrets August 1979 was Part Two. Can't find the date of Part One.

 

https://www.magazineexchange.co.uk/cw/railway-modeller-magazine-august-1979-issue.html

 

 

There was also articles on the Minks, GPVs, Banana Vans and Coal/Mineral Wagons, as well as an article on building the oddball 39XXs.

 

January 1979 for the Minks.

 

https://www.magazineexchange.co.uk/cw/railway-modeller-magazine-january-1979-issue.html

 

 

Jason