More Pre-Grouping Wagons in 4mm - the D299 appreciation thread.

[Compound2632]

A punishing weekend schedule of fun:

Friday, National Archives;

Saturday, Swanwick Junction;

Today, Railex.

 

The Saturday jaunt was for the Pullman Weekend at the Midland Railway Centre, helping on the Midland Railway Society stand and admiring the exhibits on loan from the Midland Railway Study Centre. (Is it any wonder people sometimes fail to distinguish between these organisations?) The Pullman weekend continues through Bank Holiday Monday and includes guided tours to see the mortal remains of the first Pullman Car to run on British rails, 150 years ago, 'Midland'. The Midland Railway Study Centre's contributions to the exhibition in the station building at Swanwick Junction include an original Pullman chair, whilst the Midland Railway Centre has numerous items from the Brian Radford collection, including something that got me very excited, especially once I learned there were boxfulls of them, rescued from Litchurch Lane works by Brian Radford...

 

Well worth a visit today or tomorrow, if you're in striking distance of Ripley.

[Compound2632]

At ExpoEM, I bought the London Road Models whitemetal and brass kit for the early 7 ton LNWR ballast wagon. At RailEx, I bought the Prickly Pear whitemetal and brass kit for the dumb-buffered LNWR loco coal wagon. With two pairs of old Ratio kits I had started a few weeks ago and the 'hoard', I think I have twenty-one LNWR wagons waiting to be completed. I'll need to order some more split-spoke wheels...

[Tricky]

16 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

At ExpoEM, I bought the London Road Models whitemetal and brass kit for the early 7 ton LNWR ballast wagon. At RailEx, I bought the Prickly Pear whitemetal and brass kit for the dumb-buffered LNWR loco coal wagon. With two pairs of old Ratio kits I had started a few weeks ago and the 'hoard', I think I have twenty-one LNWR wagons waiting to be completed. I'll need to order some more split-spoke wheels...

You’ll be needing a layout soon….

[Compound2632]

9 minutes ago, Tricky said:

You’ll be needing a layout soon….

 

As I said to you on Sunday, I need a group of people in the Berks - Bucks - Oxon - north Hampshire area, all highly motivated to build an 00 layout representing the Midland / LNWR / GWR in the Birmingham / Black Country area c. 1902...

Edited May 28 by Compound2632
Struggling to know what day of the week it was.

[Penlan]

19 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

........ I need a group of people in the Berks - Bucks - Oxon - north Hampshire area, all highly motivated to build an 00 layout representing the Midland / LNWR / GWR in the Birmingham / Black Country area c. 1902...

   Simples

[Compound2632]

I've started. The LNWR Society has a Modellers' Day at the Kenilworth Study Centre on 20 July, so that's a target!

 

First up the two D64 loco coal wagons - one from the early white body period of manufacture, the other from the grey period, which must have followed on fairly quickly, since the loco coal half of kit 753 was discontinued early on. One thing I don't have many of from the hoard is floors, so I'm going to put plain plasticard ones in these - as they will be loaded, the appearance of the floor won't matter. So I've started by assembling pairs of sides and ends, using the magnetic clamps, and then pairing them up into boxes, again using the clamps, together with a flat surface to make sure all is square:

 

 

Another thing I'm short of is the turned buffers with built-in collar. Several possibilities come to mind - I've had suitable turned buffers from H & A Models and plenty of spare collars from Cambrian kits. I wonder if the genuine Ratio articles are at all obtainable from Peco or elsewhere as spares, though?

[Nightlad]

3 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

I've started. The LNWR Society has a Modellers' Day at the Kenilworth Study Centre on 20 July, so that's a target!

 

First up the two D64 loco coal wagons - one from the early white body period of manufacture, the other from the grey period, which must have followed on fairly quickly, since the loco coal half of kit 753 was discontinued early on. One thing I don't have many of from the hoard is floors, so I'm going to put plain plasticard ones in these - as they will be loaded, the appearance of the floor won't matter. So I've started by assembling pairs of sides and ends, using the magnetic clamps, and then pairing them up into boxes, again using the clamps, together with a flat surface to make sure all is square:

 

 

Another thing I'm short of is the turned buffers with built-in collar. Several possibilities come to mind - I've had suitable turned buffers from H & A Models and plenty of spare collars from Cambrian kits. I wonder if the genuine Ratio articles are at all obtainable from Peco or elsewhere as spares, though?

I wish Ratio would produce the loco coal wagon half of kit 753 again.  I own 1, plan on reworking it with the London Road Models LNWR spring w-irons.

 

Speaking of London Road, you’ve mentioned you recently purchased from them. I have been emailing them for months now for an order inquiry but never get a response. Are they still operating?  I need to order a set of LNWR W-irons/UF and a Rhymney Railway box van, and probably a MR ballast brake

[Compound2632]

18 minutes ago, Nightlad said:

Speaking of London Road, you’ve mentioned you recently purchased from them. I have been emailing them for months now for an order inquiry but never get a response. Are they still operating?  I need to order a set of LNWR W-irons/UF and a Rhymney Railway box van, and probably a MR ballast brake

 

John Redrup was at ExpoEM and RailEx with the London Road Models stand and is due to be speaking at the LNWR Society Modellers' Day. Are you using the contact imformation on the new website? 

http://londonroadmodels.com/

 

 

[drduncan]

On 28/05/2024 at 16:26, Compound2632 said:

 

As I said to you on Sunday, I need a group of people in the Berks - Bucks - Oxon - north Hampshire area, all highly motivated to build an 00 layout representing the Midland / LNWR / GWR in the Birmingham / Black Country area c. 1902...

Not EM? Please…

D

[Compound2632]

6 minutes ago, drduncan said:

Not EM? Please…

 

I dare say all those Alan Gibson wheels could be pushed out on their axles but the brakes! The brakes!

[Jol Wilkinson]

15 hours ago, Nightlad said:

I wish Ratio would produce the loco coal wagon half of kit 753 again.  I own 1, plan on reworking it with the London Road Models LNWR spring w-irons.

 

Speaking of London Road, you’ve mentioned you recently purchased from them. I have been emailing them for months now for an order inquiry but never get a response. Are they still operating?  I need to order a set of LNWR W-irons/UF and a Rhymney Railway box van, and probably a MR ballast brake

I was talking with John Redrup about this yesterday. It had been raised by someone at Railex last weekend.

 

Are you trying to contact LRM through the website contact link? It may be that this is an issue and John will be talking to his website specialist.

 

 I always use the londonroadmodels@btinternet.com address when emailing John and have not had a problem over many years. He usually looks at emails twice a day as that is how people place online orders.

 

If you continue to have a problem, PM me with your email address and I'll phone him with your details.

[Compound2632]

22 minutes ago, Jol Wilkinson said:

I was talking with John Redrup about this yesterday. It had been raised by someone at Railex last weekend.

 

Thanks Jol - I was about to link to your comment on the Samall Suppliers thread only to find you had got here first!

 

LNWR Society AGM today - having had a succession of early Saturday starts, I've opted not to go to Dudley but will be joining in by Zoom and building LNWR wagons at the same time.

 

[Compound2632]

So here's where I'd got to by the end of the talk following the LNWR Society AGM.

 

Two D64 loco coal wagons largely complete:

 

 

On the left, in early white and black, sporting the toggle brake, 1885 according to LNWR Wagons Vol. 1, and on the right, in the later grey and beige, with the more conventional double vee-hanger brake, per the 1899 GA in LNWR Wagons Vol. 3. This wagon has the Ratio grease axleboxes whereas the earlier version has my home-bodge ones, using the kit's oil axleboxes, but as yet lacking the refinement of the circular moulding. Rummaging in my box of wheels, I found a packet with a dozen of the Ratio turned buffers and a short length of fine chain, all in bare brass, so I've used two thirds of those buffers here. One thing I've taken to doing with these kits when fitting the brake lever is to cut a small notch out of the bottom corner of the headstock for the lever to sit in; this not only makes for a stronger joint but means the brake lever also makes contact with the spring shoes, so a bit of solvent can be applied there too for extra support. The brake lever is well over scale thickness, of course. More sophisticated modellers would replace it with an etched brass item.

 

Two white-period D1 open wagons. These must originally each have come hand-in-hand or sprue-in-sprue with a D62 ballast wagon, but I only have the parts for one of those. It was fortunate that I had two sets of parts, as the magnetic angle clamps are two wide to hold one pair of side and end but two sit nicely back-to-back:

 

 

For these two wagons, I've used floors from the hoard:

 

 

I'll shortly have to tackle the mass-production of wooden brake blocks.

 

Finally, the body of the white-period D62 assembled, seen here propped up on an assembled D62 from the hoard:

 

 

The latter is the one that appeared before, painted and lettered PWD. It's been stripped, the oil axleboxes are slated for modification and the double vee-hanger brake gear will go. This is the only brown plastic body in the hoard; I don't know quite where that fits in the white - grey - beige succession. 

Edited June 1 by Compound2632
grammar tidy

[MarcD]

Stephen I do a wooden brake block which goes on our kits for our LNWR wagons.

Marc

[Chas Levin]

16 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

...It was fortunate that I had two sets of parts, as the magnetic angle clamps are two wide to hold one pair of side and end but two sit nicely back-to-back:

 

 

 

Morning Mr. L, nice builds, but also, nice clamps! I saw these on a thread ages ago and made a note to investigate but never did. Looking on Ebay, there are quite a variety: which ones - as in made by whom - are these, please?

[Compound2632]

11 minutes ago, Chas Levin said:

 

Morning Mr. L, nice builds, but also, nice clamps! I saw these on a thread ages ago and made a note to investigate but never did. Looking on Ebay, there are quite a variety: which ones - as in made by whom - are these, please?

 

Smart Models. I have medium and small sizes. The ones in the photo are the small size, just small enough to fit inside a 4 mm wagon but large enough that the outside clamp goes over both end pillars, otherwise they wouldn't clamp so well.

[Mikkel]

Stephen, we sometimes come to take things for granted on here - so I just wanted to say that I do like the way you combine your wagon builds with (proper) research to demonstrate pregrouping wagonry and bring railway history to life.

 

Detailed model building and archival research both take a lot of time. I'm impressed that you manage both, and well understand why a layout isn't on the cards.

 

Edited June 2 by Mikkel
Danglish

[Compound2632]

6 hours ago, Mikkel said:

Detailed model building and archival research both take a lot of time. I'm impressed that you manage both, and well understand why a layout isn't on the cards.

 

You are very kind. I should emphasise that there's a good deal of bone idleness in the mix too!

[drduncan]

On 31/05/2024 at 20:39, Compound2632 said:

 

I dare say all those Alan Gibson wheels could be pushed out on their axles but the brakes! The brakes!

Oh the horror, the horror….

[Compound2632]

Steady progress with the two D62 ballast wagons:

 

 

The white one has the single iron block push-rod brake and the brown, double brakes - which do seem to have been fitted to some ballast wagons by the end of the 19th century. The brake levers have been cut and shut to represent the joggle in the end of the lever where it passes under the door stop. The leather (or canvas) axlebox dust flaps are cut from 5 thou plasticard. 

[magmouse]

Stephen - I am sure I am not alone in wondering how you decide what wagons to model, within your chosen period and location. Is there a master plan to represent all relevant diagrams, or an aim to represent a sequence of trains, or…?

 

Nick.

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, magmouse said:

Stephen - I am sure I am not alone in wondering how you decide what wagons to model, within your chosen period and location. Is there a master plan to represent all relevant diagrams, or an aim to represent a sequence of trains, or…?

 

There is no plan, or at least, if there is, I'm not working to it. All these LNWR wagons I'm doing now are what became available through the purchase of part of the sale of a modeller's estate - not someone known to me, but through a friend - so it's all rather opportunistic.

 

If there was a plan, though, it would be for a Midland line on the north side of Birmingham, with North Western and Great Western running powers. Here's a scenario:

 

In the early 1860s, there were rival proposals for a branch line from Birmingham to Sutton Coldfield. The 'Western Line', branching off the Grand Junction at Aston and running to the west of the turnpike road (later A38, currently A5127), was promoted by the Rector (a great power in the land) and his Tory cabal and sought the backing of the Tory  London and North Western. This was of course the line actually built. The 'Eastern Line' would have branched off the Midland near Saltley, and run to the east side of the road, in part along much the same alignment as the later Wolverhampton, Walsall & Water Orton line. It was promoted by Baron Webster, of the firm of Webster & Horsfall, whose wire mill at Penns would be on the line (after wire-drawing moved to Hay Mills, the Horsfall family home was nearby); a liberal non-conformist, he naturally looked to the Midland for backing. Let's suppose that in Committee, Parliament preferred the Eastern rather than the Western line. [See R.M. Lea, Steaming up to Sutton (1984).] Let's further suppose that this was later extended to join the South Staffs at Lichfield (as the North Western's Sutton line was, in 1884) and also that it was the springboard for a line to Walsall and Wolverhampton (per the WW&MJR). Further, we'll bring the Warwickshire coalfield a bit further west, almost running into the Cannock Chase coalfield. 

 

The South Staffs line, which at various periods could have become an extension of the Old Worse & Worse or a Midland line providing a direct route to Worcester and Hereford (the W&HR having been a joint Midland and L&NW project, before falling to the GW following the West Midland amalgamation), we will suppose did fall to the North Western, per reality. Thus by running powers over our line the North Western was still able to operate its Derby - Lichfield - New Street - Walsall - Derby passenger service, while the Midland had, we suppose, running powers over the South Staffs, then from Lichfield via our line, as a secondary Derby - Birmingham route - to this day the actual route is used as a diversion for Cross-County services when there is engineering work on the Birmingham & Derby Junction line.

 

So for goods services, there would be several Midland trains - a couple of minerals perhaps, ordinary goods, and a express goods, justifying L&Y and CLC wagons going back to Manchester (cf the Whitacre accident of 1903) (various 0-6-0s). The LNWR has running powers - local minerals (Coal Engine) and a general goods and mineral (Class A 3-cylinder compound), plus, it seems, a ballast train (SDX?); also the GWR, general goods, working from Wolverhampton. The GWR did in fact have running powers for a twice-daily goods train over the Midland Wolverhampton & Walsall line (850 or similar saddle tank), which we're just extending a bit further east - do they even run through to Bordseley? (Dean Goods.)

 

The Midland passenger service would be between New Street and Walsall and Wolverhampton, as in fact (1532 Class 0-4-4T, or 156 Class 2-4-0), and fictionally to Lichfield - this might just be shuttle from Sutton, a bit like the Aldridge - Brownhills shuttle (Class A 0-6-0T), the principal Lichfield trains being those of the LNWR (Improved Precedent, or 5' 6" 2-4-2T - but wouldn't a Dreadnought be just the thing?). The pièce de résistance, though, would be the Bristol - Newcastle postal - on diversion or maybe even crossing the West Coast Postal at Lichfield Trent Valley rather than Tamworth? I have a complete set of Trevor Charlton etches for this train in its late 1890s / early 1900s formation... (Probably a 1400 Class 2-4-0 but possibly a 4-2-2 - most likely a slide-valve engine of the 1853 Class but just possibly, on your lucky day, Bristol's No. 127 or 128, or Saltley's No. 126 - 115 Class piston-valve engines, the true 'Spinners', purring along like something out of Wagner. I hope you noticed the ease with which she recovered from the p/way slacks there.)

Edited June 3 by Compound2632

[magmouse]

10 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

There is no plan, or at least, if there is, I'm not working to it.

It seems you do very much have a plan, even if you aren’t working to it!

 

Thanks - that provides an interesting and useful context to what you (aren’t) working towards.

 

Nick.

[Penlan]

Compound2632, not all Ballast wagons looked grey all over, it seems the body side metalwork soon showed through as very dark or is that some intensive shadow?
Most of the Ballast wagons show a strong dark area to the metalwork.
Also note a wagon from Tipton too.  This is part of the Penmaenmawr accident recovery train, there's NWD's, CD's and these private Tipton wagons in the mix, also don't forget, Ballast trains had their own dedicated Ballast Brake Vans as per this one at the Preston Accident with additional lettering.

 

 

Edited June 5 by Penlan

[Compound2632]

52 minutes ago, Penlan said:

Compound2632, not all Ballast wagons looked grey all over, it seems the body side metalwork soon showed through as very dark or is that some intensive shadow?
Most of the Ballast wagons show a strong dark area to the metalwork.
Also note a wagon from Tipton too.  This is part of the Penmaenmawr accident recovery train, there's NWD's, CD's and these private Tipton wagons in the mix, also don't forget, Ballast trains had their own dedicated Ballast Brake Vans as per this one at the Preston Accident with additional lettering.

 

This was 1899 (not 1950!) - excellent sharp photos of fish trucks here: 

https://www.nwmes.org.uk/penmaenbach-rail-disaster-1899/.

Also a pair of D1s, one No. 17804. So I think too late for this to be an older style of painting? Some loco coal wagons were tarred rather than painted, I gather, so maybe some ballast wagons were treated the same way. On the other hand, it may just be wear and tear of the paintwork - compare, for instance, the two photos of D53 coal wagons on p. 14 of LNWR Wagons Vol. 3. (Actually, I think this is two photos of the same wagon in the same place - Jim Richards took a second photo after the deal wagon in the foreground moved.) Also, the South Wales Division ballast wagon on p. 99.

 

That link says breakdown gangs from Bangor, Crewe, Chester, Liverpool, and Warrington were involved in the clear-up and reinstatement of the line. So in principle there could have been ballast wagons of the North Wales, Central, and Western Divisions - NWD, CD, and WD - but no sign of the latter?

 

1 hour ago, Penlan said:

Ballast trains had their own dedicated Ballast Brake Vans as per this one at the Preston Accident with additional lettering.

 

Yes, I was thinking I might have to get another LRM D16 kit... The veranda end needs modification - I have half an idea that the kit provides for this but the website description doesn't mention it. Perhaps @Jol Wilkinson can clarify whether or not I'm raving?

 

Vermillion ends! While one might think that's what one's seeing in the Preston photo, looking at the sides of that van I think it's in the two-tone style - lighter grey with darker grey framing.