White painted rims on the wheels of PO wagons - how prevelant?

[magmouse]

I am just finishing a 7mm scale Slaters kit for a Gloucester 6-plank wagon in 'Ocean' livery. Looking in Keith Montague's book on Gloucester RCWCo wagons, I see that the majority of wagons pictured have the wheel rims painted white. I have always assumed this was done just for the official photos (which the pictures in the book almost exclusively are), but then began to wonder. Some pictures show a whole rake of new wagons, all with white rims, suggesting all wagons entered traffic in this way. Then I noticed a few wagons lacked this feature, even in the official photos.

 

I took a sample of a little over 200 pictures in the book (out of 660+), and checked the dates and whether the wagons had white painted wheel rims or not, with the following results:

 

1. Of the 7 photos from the 1870s, 4 had white rims
2. From 1880 to 1890, all had white rims (12 photos)
3. From 1891 to 1895, only 8 out of 37 photos showed white rims - less than a quarter.
4. From 1896 until the most recent photo in the sample (1942), all had white rims (138 photos).
5. My sample also included 18 undated photos. These were mostly quite early wagons with dumb buffers, and/or wooden brake shoes, and/or 5-link couplings. Of these, 14 had white rims.

 

It seems pre 1880, some did and some didn't. During the 1880s, most/all did have white rims. The practice was largely but not entirely dropped in the 1891-1895 period, and then resumed consistently thereafter.

 

So, my questions are:

 

1. Is there any evidence that white rims were applied generally to all Gloucester PO wagons when outshopped? Or was it just for photographic purposes, and so only applied to the wagon chosen to be photographed?
2. What about the practice of other PO wagon builders?
3. Is anything known about the reduction in this practice in the first half of the 1890s?
4. And - pragmatically - for my 1908 period, should I paint the wheel rims of my model white?!?

 

Any thoughts, information or pointers to further sources appreciated.

 

I am planning to keep this pretty much unweathered, as if it had recently had its routine repair and repaint. Since the photo, I have added the GRCWCo maker's plates to the solebar, using the POWsides transfers.

 

Nick.

 

 

[kitpw]

I'm following this with interest:  I too have wondered about white rims but didn't have sufficient reference to carry out any kind of audit - well done Nick for raising the question and for the analysis. 

 

As an aside, is the brake rack a Slater's part or from another source?  I have the "blind" plastic ones (?Parkside and/or Coopercraft) on some of my wagons which look increasingly unconvincing.

Kit Pw

[SR71]

White rims were, as I understand, a practical consideration for wheel tappers in poorly lit yards. So application could have continued as it wasn't just aesthetic decision. I can't see that they would have been actually white for long after being out shopped though!

[magmouse]

58 minutes ago, kitpw said:

I'm following this with interest:  I too have wondered about white rims but didn't have sufficient reference to carry out any kind of audit - well done Nick for raising the question and for the analysis. 

 

As an aside, is the brake rack a Slater's part or from another source?  I have the "blind" plastic ones (?Parkside and/or Coopercraft) on some of my wagons which look increasingly unconvincing.

Kit Pw

Thanks, Kit. The brake rack is an etched component from Ambis - very nice. 
 

Nick.

[magmouse]

53 minutes ago, SR71 said:

White rims were, as I understand, a practical consideration for wheel tappers in poorly lit yards. So application could have continued as it wasn't just aesthetic decision. I can't see that they would have been actually white for long after being out shopped though!

The only thing about that idea is that, if they were for visibility, then you would expect them to appear on company wagons as well as private owner.

 

Regarding their longevity, I am sure you are right. Curiously, when looking through the pictures of the Gloucester wagons, I noticed some of the wheel rims looked completely freshly painted (like the rest of the wagon), but some are decidedly grubby.

 

Nick.

[Caley Jim]

20 minutes ago, magmouse said:

The only thing about that idea is that, if they were for visibility, then you would expect them to appear on company wagons as well as private owner.

CR wagons certainly appear to have had white wheel rims when new, but photos in service show varying degrees of fading/dirt.

 

Jim

[cctransuk]

2 hours ago, magmouse said:

I am just finishing a 7mm scale Slaters kit for a Gloucester 6-plank wagon in 'Ocean' livery. Looking in Keith Montague's book on Gloucester RCWCo wagons, I see that the majority of wagons pictured have the wheel rims painted white. I have always assumed this was done just for the official photos (which the pictures in the book almost exclusively are), but then began to wonder. Some pictures show a whole rake of new wagons, all with white rims, suggesting all wagons entered traffic in this way. Then I noticed a few wagons lacked this feature, even in the official photos.

 

I took a sample of a little over 200 pictures in the book (out of 660+), and checked the dates and whether the wagons had white painted wheel rims or not, with the following results:

 

1. Of the 7 photos from the 1870s, 4 had white rims
2. From 1880 to 1890, all had white rims (12 photos)
3. From 1891 to 1895, only 8 out of 37 photos showed white rims - less than a quarter.
4. From 1896 until the most recent photo in the sample (1942), all had white rims (138 photos).
5. My sample also included 18 undated photos. These were mostly quite early wagons with dumb buffers, and/or wooden brake shoes, and/or 5-link couplings. Of these, 14 had white rims.

 

It seems pre 1880, some did and some didn't. During the 1880s, most/all did have white rims. The practice was largely but not entirely dropped in the 1891-1895 period, and then resumed consistently thereafter.

 

So, my questions are:

 

1. Is there any evidence that white rims were applied generally to all Gloucester PO wagons when outshopped? Or was it just for photographic purposes, and so only applied to the wagon chosen to be photographed?
2. What about the practice of other PO wagon builders?
3. Is anything known about the reduction in this practice in the first half of the 1890s?
4. And - pragmatically - for my 1908 period, should I paint the wheel rims of my model white?!?

 

Any thoughts, information or pointers to further sources appreciated.

 

I am planning to keep this pretty much unweathered, as if it had recently had its routine repair and repaint. Since the photo, I have added the GRCWCo maker's plates to the solebar, using the POWsides transfers.

 

Nick.

 

 

 

A question.

 

Can anyone point to a single photo of a wagon with white wheel rims IN TRAFFIC - as opposed to a photo of an ex-works wagon?

 

If white wheel rims were intended to assist wheel-tappers at night, it would surely have been necessary to renew the white paint on a very frequent basis - and thus this feature would be clearly evident in photos of in-traffic wagons?

 

I'm afraid that a little thought should have led to the conclusion that white wheel rims would be wholly impracticable, other than as a photographic embellishment.

 

CJI.

[hmrspaul]

37 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

 

A question.

 

Can anyone point to a single photo of a wagon with white wheel rims IN TRAFFIC - as opposed to a photo of an ex-works wagon?

 

If white wheel rims were intended to assist wheel-tappers at night, it would surely have been necessary to renew the white paint on a very frequent basis - and thus this feature would be clearly evident in photos of in-traffic wagons?

 

I'm afraid that a little thought should have led to the conclusion that white wheel rims would be wholly impracticable, other than as a photographic embellishment.

 

CJI.

Some on my site, but OT as they are BR wagons. 

 

Paul

[magmouse]

58 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

Can anyone point to a single photo of a wagon with white wheel rims IN TRAFFIC - as opposed to a photo of an ex-works wagon?

 

Well, pictures of wagons in traffic would be interesting, but won't quite address the question. We know that some wagons entered traffic with white rims - at the least, it is the ones so prepared for photographic purposes. My question is, did they all enter traffic that way? It seems reasonable that the white paint was soon so dirty that it didn't show up in photos, so the lack of rims in in-traffic photos doesn't really help - if I am not seeing white rims, it might be that they were never white, or they are no longer white...

 

Nick.

[magmouse]

1 hour ago, Caley Jim said:

CR wagons certainly appear to have had white wheel rims when new, but photos in service show varying degrees of fading/dirt.

 

Thanks - I suspect the CR was unusual in that regard. Certainly the official photos of GWR wagons did not have the rims painted (except in the case I am just now looking at - a 7-plank coal wagon built by Ince, in A J Watts' book on the company. It seems a PO wagon builder is going to paint white rims on for the photo call, irrespective of the purchasing company's normal practice!).

 

Nick.

[33C]

I believe wheels that were a) new, or b) had been re-tyred, had the rims (wheel and tyre) painted white to show if the tyre became loose or shifted, from the wheel in traffic, e.g. the paint between both would be broken/dark line, so the vehicle could then be "stopped/crippled" and not cause a derailment. This was not a vanity thing but an early type of safety feature that could be checked by the train examiner/preparer/guard.

[magmouse]

37 minutes ago, 33C said:

I believe wheels that were a) new, or b) had been re-tyred, had the rims (wheel and tyre) painted white to show if the tyre became loose or shifted, from the wheel in traffic, e.g. the paint between both would be broken/dark line, so the vehicle could then be "stopped/crippled" and not cause a derailment. This was not a vanity thing but an early type of safety feature that could be checked by the train examiner/preparer/guard.

 

Again, the difficulty I have with this explanation is that not all wagons had the rims painted - most of the railway companies didn't do it, and PO wagon manufacturers almost always did, at least for photographs.

[Caley Jim]

2 hours ago, cctransuk said:

Can anyone point to a single photo of a wagon with white wheel rims IN TRAFFIC - as opposed to a photo of an ex-works wagon?

I offer these two, both copyright Scottish Records Office.  A Dia 23 ballast wagon and a pair of Dia 47 twin wagons.

Jim

[chrissy]

Wow how old are those photos. I'm looking at creating buildings from the old Stroud and Stonehouse stations and they're from the 1940s. What year were these photos taken?

 

Christine x

[magmouse]

17 minutes ago, Caley Jim said:

I offer these two, both copyright Scottish Records Office.  A Dia 23 ballast wagon and a pair of Dia 47 twin wagons.

 

Thanks, Jim - confirmation for CR wagons. And for POs, I offer this:

 

 

From https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/this-wagon-is-being-tipped-over-to-pour-the-coal-inside-the-news-photo/90774090

 

But of course, this might have been the one of its kind prepared for photography...

 

Nick.

[Dave John]

Well, Im making some CR ballast wagons atm. 

 

So a bit of a guess . I think 9367 would have been built about 1880 , though it would be photographed for the 1900 wagon register.  There is a drawing for a later CR ballast wagon dated 1890, by which time the CR would be using inside W irons, though still dumb buffered. 

 

I agree with Jim on this, The CR wagons would be white tired when new, fading through shades of grey as time went on. 

 

So I'm going to go out on a limb here.  It has been suggested that white tires made it easier for wheeltappers. Perhaps. But many years ago I remember using a 2 part crack detection system, white sprayed on first then another spray that showed up as black lines if there was a crack.  I'm sure some folk in here will know much more about it , but I do wonder if the painting of white tires was something to do with that ? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[billbedford]

6 hours ago, Dave John said:

The CR wagons would be white tired when new, fading through shades of grey as time went on. 

 

Would that be when the wagons or wheelsets were new?

[cctransuk]

10 hours ago, Caley Jim said:

I offer these two, both copyright Scottish Records Office.  A Dia 23 ballast wagon and a pair of Dia 47 twin wagons.

Jim

 

Dia.23 - very obviously mud / dust from the reballasting work - further evidenced by the discolouration on the RH axlebox cover.

 

Dia. 48- again, almost certainly discolouration from a muddy surface at the point of loading.

 

CJI.

[cctransuk]

10 hours ago, magmouse said:

 

Thanks, Jim - confirmation for CR wagons. And for POs, I offer this:

 

 

From https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/this-wagon-is-being-tipped-over-to-pour-the-coal-inside-the-news-photo/90774090

 

But of course, this might have been the one of its kind prepared for photography...

 

Nick.

 

On the basis of that assertion, the whole wagon is white!

 

The grey tone on the tyres is no different to that on the body; both surfaces are exposed to light at the same angle, and therefore reflect the same tone.

 

One has to be VERY careful in identifying colours in ancient monochrome photos.

 

CJI.

[magmouse]

18 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

The grey tone on the tyres is no different to that on the body; both surfaces are exposed to light at the same angle, and therefore reflect the same tone.

 

I disagree - the rim is a different tone to the spokes, and the axle guard. Of course, it could be rust or some other material, but given the generally clean state of the wagon overall, that seems unlikely. Conclusive proof of white rims? No - but certainly suggestive.

 

In any case - we know some wagons entered traffic with white rims - those that were so painted for photographic purposes. That may have been a small proportion, though the wagon builders' archives include photos of whole rakes of wagons that have been so painted, and some batches would have been small (say, a local coal merchant buying a few wagons), so even if it was only the ones photographed, that could still represent a noticeable percentage going into service with white rims.

 

Certainly in-service photos don't have white rims jumping out in quantity, so that might mean the paint soon dirties to the point it is hard to identify (as our discussion above points to), or that the white rims were very much in the minority.

 

None of which gets us much closer to knowing if white rims were a standard part of the livery, or just for photographic purposes. The answer to this is more likely to come from written documentation of the period (such as a livery specification) than photographic evidence, I suspect.

 

Nick.

[magmouse]

9 hours ago, Dave John said:

But many years ago I remember using a 2 part crack detection system, white sprayed on first then another spray that showed up as black lines if there was a crack.  I'm sure some folk in here will know much more about it , but I do wonder if the painting of white tires was something to do with that ?

 

@33C suggested something similar earlier in the thread. The difficulty with this explanation is that for the most part, railway company wagons did not have white rims, so why would this technique be used by the private builders over many decades, and not be adopted by the major companies?

 

Nick.

[cctransuk]

13 minutes ago, magmouse said:

 

@33C suggested something similar earlier in the thread. The difficulty with this explanation is that for the most part, railway company wagons did not have white rims, so why would this technique be used by the private builders over many decades, and not be adopted by the major companies?

 

Nick.

 

Let's face it - if you are desperate to have white wheel rims on your wagons, Rule 1 allows it.

 

Justifying the practice via debateable monochrome photographic evidence(?) is not necessary.

 

CJI.

[Caley Jim]

I have just come across a photograph in 'Caledonian Liveries', p271, showing the adjacent ends of two Dia34 30T bogie wagons in loco coal service.   One, built by Leeds Forge has white wheel rims, while the other, built at St Rollox, does not.  In the background of a second photo on the same page are a Dia 22 mineral wagon without white rims and an offset door 'bogie' with white rims.  Proves nothing, I know, but goes to show that there was wide variation.

 

The book also quotes an R Y Pickering card order for CR wagons which states inter alia :-

 

Wheels and ironwork one coat lamp black with a little japan added.  Wheel tyres and numberplate letters white.  This would imply that white tyres were a company specification.

 

Jim

[magmouse]

5 hours ago, cctransuk said:

Let's face it - if you are desperate to have white wheel rims on your wagons, Rule 1 allows it.

 

Ah, rule 1 - the thing is, it's my railway and what I want is for it to be both historically accurate, but also looking the way I like it to look.

 

 And actually, from an aesthetic point of view, I would rather not have white rims - too much bling. If I did want them, I could easily justify white rims by saying my wagon happens to be the one prepared for photography - then it doesn't matter if other wagons, not photographed, had them or not. My difficulty is I don't know if it is correct to have a wagon in recently repainted, clean condition without white rims, but that is my aesthetic preference - there's the rub, and hence my original post.

 

Nick.

[magmouse]

2 hours ago, Caley Jim said:

Wheels and ironwork one coat lamp black with a little japan added.  Wheel tyres and numberplate letters white.  This would imply that white tyres were a company specification.

 

Thanks Jim - although specific to the CR and therefore not ultimately useful for answering my specific question, this does point to the kind of documentation that could give an answer.

 

Nick.