16t minerals

[Fat Controller]

MINERAL or just MIN pre dates the use of the TOPS codes MCO and MCV which were introduced in the 1970s. Some were labeled COAL, or if fitted with vacuum brakes COAL VB. Without trawling through hundreds of photos I am sure some vacuum braked examples were labeled MINFIT. The use of MINERAL and COAL came in to use post 1964 when the lettering on wagons started to be boxed.

 

Many, if not most did not carry a code until the introduction of the TOPS codes.

 

The wagon in the photo you refer to looks like one of the few that received bauxite livery in 1964 when some bright spark decided to swap the liveries around. Non fitted were grey, and fitted were bauxite up to 1964 when they changed so unfitted were bauxite and fitted grey, this lasted only a short while as someone sensible realised that swapping the liveries around only led to confusion when trains were being marshaled, so things were swapped back. The wagon in question is unfitted as it has bottom door "V" markings, no fitted wagons had bottom doors as the brake gear got in the way of the doors. I cannot see the number but I think this wagon is a Diagram 1/104.

From a long time spent looking at mineral wagons, even being paid for it for an entire summer..

'COAL' and 'COAL16VB' seemed to be the commonest lettering on those (relatively few) wagons that carried this style of lettering. I also saw 'MINERAL', 'MIN' and 'MINFIT', but never 'COALFIT' or 'MIN16VB'. Two oddities I did see were one lettered 'SAND', with 'CIRCUIT' label in yellow, and one marked 'DMxxxxxM' (such a number would indicate a former passenger-rated vehicle in Departmental use)

Clive- I think that, during the period when unfitted wagons were painted 'bauxite' or whatever it was called, fitted wagons were painted the same, hence the confusion. I suspect that all wagon bodies were painted in some form of red primer (which was normal for steelwork) after completion, with a second coat of either grey or Freight Red, and the brief 'paint it red' period simply meant the second coat wasn't applied on unfitted wagons. This would certainly fit with how quickly these wagons rusted.

Edited February 7, 2017 by Fat Controller

[Michael Delamar]

There hasnt been a lot of model shots in this thread for while, I spotted these lovely mineral wagons on Ellesmere in 00 at the Stafford show last weekend.

 

[Killybegs]

Here's a few more!

 

 

and thanks for all the help provided on this thread.

 

 

[Enterprisingwestern]

Here's a few more!

 

16T minerals 01.jpg

 

and thanks for all the help provided on this thread.

 

Very nice, but far too much grey paint on show for me .

Presumably you model the earlier "pre rustbucket" era?

 

Mike.

[Killybegs]

Correct!

[HeavyDuty]

Can I assume that unfitted grey 16T minerals would still be in fairly decent condition ca. 1961? I need to weather my Lionhearts..

[Killybegs]

I would guess a mix with a reasonable proportion of relatively clean wagons. My layout, for which the above minerals were weathered, is set in 1959.

[Metr0Land]

44571 Farm Bridge by Phil Waterfield, on Flickr

 

48101 Branston by Phil Waterfield, on Flickr

 

47643 wagon wks by Phil Waterfield, on Flickr

[The Johnster]

Killybegs, wagons used for coal traffic got very dirty very quickly, and there was little need to ever clean them.  This is not the same as rust, but as a very general rule of thumb, if you are modelling BR steam era, 1961 in your case, I would make steel minerals dirty more than rusty, and avoid the 'full rustbucket' look as more suitable for blue diesel haulage and 'panel' numbers, and especially for TOPS.  Wooden bodied 7 plank minerals were fairly common up until about 1960, and very common before about 1955, but note that those are 'about' dates, and not to be taken as definitive information.  If you make 90% of your minerals, steel or wooden, very dirty, and split the remaining 10% into about half and half new, clean, just out of paint shops, and filthy, on their last legs, missing planks, falling to bits woodens, you'll be not too far out for most of BR steam era layouts.

 

If you model the very end of steam, and include blue/grey coaches, and blue diesel or electric with full yellow ends, or any with full yellow ends, I would avoid wooden mineral wagons or at least make them very rare.  Include an increasing amount of bauxite liveried fitted steel wagons as the period progresses; it should be a ratio of about half and half by the mid 70s at which time more block trains of fitted wagons without brake vans were about, especially on main lines.  Brake vans were more or less eliminated by the mid 80s.  At least one ex-works bauxite fitted in a block train is good on steam era layouts, even in the middle of an unfitted train.

 

If you use scale couplings, instanters should be in the long position for local or class 9 traffic, and shortened for anything else; by and large, class 9 trains would only run for short distances on main lines as they were difficult to find paths for because of the 25mph speed restriction.  I do not know much about the Great Central's 'Windcutters' and 'Annesley Runners', which ran fast(ish) because they could be guaranteed a clear road for long distances, but I imagine they ran with instanters in the short position given that the attrition rate on guards does not seem to have been abnormally high...

[Killybegs]

Killybegs, wagons used for coal traffic got very dirty very quickly, and there was little need to ever clean them.  This is not the same as rust, but as a very general rule of thumb, if you are modelling BR steam era, 1961 in your case, I would make steel minerals dirty more than rusty, and avoid the 'full rustbucket' look as more suitable for blue diesel haulage and 'panel' numbers, and especially for TOPS.  Wooden bodied 7 plank minerals were fairly common up until about 1960, and very common before about 1955, but note that those are 'about' dates, and not to be taken as definitive information.  If you make 90% of your minerals, steel or wooden, very dirty, and split the remaining 10% into about half and half new, clean, just out of paint shops, and filthy, on their last legs, missing planks, falling to bits woodens, you'll be not too far out for most of BR steam era layouts.

 

If you model the very end of steam, and include blue/grey coaches, and blue diesel or electric with full yellow ends, or any with full yellow ends, I would avoid wooden mineral wagons or at least make them very rare.  Include an increasing amount of bauxite liveried fitted steel wagons as the period progresses; it should be a ratio of about half and half by the mid 70s at which time more block trains of fitted wagons without brake vans were about, especially on main lines.  Brake vans were more or less eliminated by the mid 80s.  At least one ex-works bauxite fitted in a block train is good on steam era layouts, even in the middle of an unfitted train.

 

If you use scale couplings, instanters should be in the long position for local or class 9 traffic, and shortened for anything else; by and large, class 9 trains would only run for short distances on main lines as they were difficult to find paths for because of the 25mph speed restriction.  I do not know much about the Great Central's 'Windcutters' and 'Annesley Runners', which ran fast(ish) because they could be guaranteed a clear road for long distances, but I imagine they ran with instanters in the short position given that the attrition rate on guards does not seem to have been abnormally high...

 

From photographic evidence, I have to beg to disagree. Somewhat dirty yes but not filthy. All my minerals get a light wash of grubbiness.

 

P.S. Worseter is set in 1959 not 1961.

Edited February 8, 2017 by Killybegs

[The Stationmaster]

Killybegs, wagons used for coal traffic got very dirty very quickly, and there was little need to ever clean them.  This is not the same as rust, but as a very general rule of thumb, if you are modelling BR steam era, 1961 in your case, I would make steel minerals dirty more than rusty, and avoid the 'full rustbucket' look as more suitable for blue diesel haulage and 'panel' numbers, and especially for TOPS.  Wooden bodied 7 plank minerals were fairly common up until about 1960, and very common before about 1955, but note that those are 'about' dates, and not to be taken as definitive information.  If you make 90% of your minerals, steel or wooden, very dirty, and split the remaining 10% into about half and half new, clean, just out of paint shops, and filthy, on their last legs, missing planks, falling to bits woodens, you'll be not too far out for most of BR steam era layouts.

 

If you model the very end of steam, and include blue/grey coaches, and blue diesel or electric with full yellow ends, or any with full yellow ends, I would avoid wooden mineral wagons or at least make them very rare.  Include an increasing amount of bauxite liveried fitted steel wagons as the period progresses; it should be a ratio of about half and half by the mid 70s at which time more block trains of fitted wagons without brake vans were about, especially on main lines.  Brake vans were more or less eliminated by the mid 80s.  At least one ex-works bauxite fitted in a block train is good on steam era layouts, even in the middle of an unfitted train.

 

If you use scale couplings, instanters should be in the long position for local or class 9 traffic, and shortened for anything else; by and large, class 9 trains would only run for short distances on main lines as they were difficult to find paths for because of the 25mph speed restriction.  I do not know much about the Great Central's 'Windcutters' and 'Annesley Runners', which ran fast(ish) because they could be guaranteed a clear road for long distances, but I imagine they ran with instanters in the short position given that the attrition rate on guards does not seem to have been abnormally high...

 

Ah, a man clearly not au fait with the 'Great South Wales Wagon Cleaning Scandal of 1973'.  Cleaning of 16 ton mineral wagons was actually quite a common occurrence although basically it was confined to the interior of them with, I would agree, little attention to the exterior.  The reason was simple - they were used for different sorts of traffic and therefore residual material from a past use had to be cleaned out or problems could occur - one such problem was the tipping of some large bits of scrap metal into the coal transfer system (in part a sort of Archimedes Screw arrangement) at Uskmouth power station completely 'mucking up' the station's ability to unload coal for several days.  So wagons which had conveyed scrap needed to be ckeared of such residue before being used for, say, coal; and wagons which had conveyed coal needed to be cleared of the inevitable residue if they were going to be used for sugar beet.

 

Thus for a  number of years a gentleman and his family carried on a business in the Cardiff Docks area where empty wagons were placed in a siding and they cleaned them out - and made a living on what they got out of the wagons.  But come 1973 the auditors descended in numbers upon the Cardiff Newtown area and discovered that the wagon cleaner didn't pay siding rent, apart from the fact that he didn't pay for what came out of the wagons.  Accordingly the sword of damocles fell and the chap was put out of business overnight.

 

We then faced a problem getting wagons cleaned as they would come back from pits denounced as 'too dirty to load' or 'contaminated' or 'contains scrap'.  A rumour circulated that if they went to D Block at Margam some cleaning was carried out there so I duly sent half a dizen wagons in that direction, a couple of days later not only did those wagons come back (from Severn Tunnel Jcn) but another 4 or 5 had joined them.  So I removed all labels and put some scribbled notes in the labels clips along the lines of 'Margam for cleaning' and off they went again.  The next time we got them back there were about 20 of them and so things continued until after not many weeks we had a trainload of the bl**dy things circulating round every yard in South Wales as everybody got shot of them to somewhere else.  By which time somebody in Marland House at Cardiff decided enough was enough and overruled the auditors and the whole lot went to Newtown to be trickled in to the man who had previously done the cleaning.

 

In the meanwhile the auditors had also discovered that the demurrage and standage rates paid by the steelworks at Cardiff were still on an emergency wartime basis and that - according to them - the railway had lost out on £45,000 in charges for wagon detention over the past 28 years;  that amount was simply written off and correct rates duly applied while a few quid for wagon cleaning were treated as a major item to worry about..

[hmrspaul]

In the picture titled "47643 Wesleys" in the previous post, I thought it interesting that the top line of the data box appears to read MINERAL.

 

Seems unusual to me, have noted the likes of MCO / MCV / COAL 16 (VB) but not MINERAL before.

 

No, I haven't looked at Mr Bartletts archive so please don't shoot me if this happens to be a common marking - in that case I've simply not noticed it before.

No, Mr. Bartlett agrees, also noticed as an unusual feature. COAL 16 was the usual name given to these wagons with the boxed style of lettering.

 

Unfortunately an undated photo, although the Jocko has post 1956 heraldic logo and the lettering is the post 63 boxed style. The mineral is an early one with independent brake, unusually dark and in remarkably good condition (although it looks like the left hand panel has a full replating) - also with top door and bottom door markings. Yes, interesting.

 

Paul

Edited February 8, 2017 by hmrspaul

[The Johnster]

Ah, a man clearly not au fait with the 'Great South Wales Wagon Cleaning Scandal of 1973'.  Cleaning of 16 ton mineral wagons was actually quite a common occurrence although basically it was confined to the interior of them with, I would agree, little attention to the exterior.  The reason was simple - they were used for different sorts of traffic and therefore residual material from a past use had to be cleaned out or problems could occur - one such problem was the tipping of some large bits of scrap metal into the coal transfer system (in part a sort of Archimedes Screw arrangement) at Uskmouth power station completely 'mucking up' the station's ability to unload coal for several days.  So wagons which had conveyed scrap needed to be ckeared of such residue before being used for, say, coal; and wagons which had conveyed coal needed to be cleared of the inevitable residue if they were going to be used for sugar beet.

 

Thus for a  number of years a gentleman and his family carried on a business in the Cardiff Docks area where empty wagons were placed in a siding and they cleaned them out - and made a living on what they got out of the wagons.  But come 1973 the auditors descended in numbers upon the Cardiff Newtown area and discovered that the wagon cleaner didn't pay siding rent, apart from the fact that he didn't pay for what came out of the wagons.  Accordingly the sword of damocles fell and the chap was put out of business overnight.

 

We then faced a problem getting wagons cleaned as they would come back from pits denounced as 'too dirty to load' or 'contaminated' or 'contains scrap'.  A rumour circulated that if they went to D Block at Margam some cleaning was carried out there so I duly sent half a dizen wagons in that direction, a couple of days later not only did those wagons come back (from Severn Tunnel Jcn) but another 4 or 5 had joined them.  So I removed all labels and put some scribbled notes in the labels clips along the lines of 'Margam for cleaning' and off they went again.  The next time we got them back there were about 20 of them and so things continued until after not many weeks we had a trainload of the bl**dy things circulating round every yard in South Wales as everybody got shot of them to somewhere else.  By which time somebody in Marland House at Cardiff decided enough was enough and overruled the auditors and the whole lot went to Newtown to be trickled in to the man who had previously done the cleaning.

 

In the meanwhile the auditors had also discovered that the demurrage and standage rates paid by the steelworks at Cardiff were still on an emergency wartime basis and that - according to them - the railway had lost out on £45,000 in charges for wagon detention over the past 28 years;  that amount was simply written off and correct rates duly applied while a few quid for wagon cleaning were treated as a major item to worry about..

 

You have introduced me to a whole new world that I was unaware of, Mike, and I was a freight guard at Canton in 1973!  

[The Johnster]

From photographic evidence, I have to beg to disagree. Somewhat dirty yes but not filthy. All my minerals get a light wash of grubbiness.

 

P.S. Worseter is set in 1959 not 1961.

Don't know why I had you down as 1961; these 'senior moments' are starting to become continuous...

 

Steel minerals managed to stay merely dirty rather than filthy, not I suspect because they were ever washed (not the outsides anyway), but because they would get a good drenching in the colliery washeries where they were loaded.  The real filth, I would agree, is to be reserved for wooden bodied wagons; the coal dust got into every nook and cranny, and seemed to insert itself into the actual grain and fibres of the wood.  This is very evident in photos of the period where they often simply look matt black; the steels could at least be discerned to be grey, which is why I suggested a dirty rather than rusty approach; it was another decade before the rust really set in, and I was still thinking of 1961 when I wrote it.  A light wash of grubbiness is fine; IMHO it is easy to overdo weathering which for some reason looks 'worse' on models than it did in real life, perhaps because we tended to be closer to the real ones and models are viewed generally from about a scale 200 feet or so away.  I think we are disagreeing about the meaning of dirty as opposed to filthy, or clean as opposed to ex-works, which is hardly a real disagreement!nb

[petethemole]

I didn't have a 00 layout at the time but I built several Airfix railway models for static display and bought the mineral wagon on release in 1961. I painted it with small patches and spots of rust, based on typical wagons I would see on the nearby Midland main line. The older minerals were already rusting, but not as badly as later.

[TheSignalEngineer]

Apologies if any of these have been up before, and the fact that  some are wooden, but they show some nice variations of what coal wagons looked like around 1959. All taken at Water Orton and on John Turner's Flickr site.

 

First a fairly clean 16t welded construction with top and bottom doors. The pressed side door looks as if it may have been acquired from another wagon.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/blue-diesels/23533329305

 

The 7-plank to the left was still in Stephenson Clarke livery. It looks to have had some grey paint on the ironwork but nowhere else. Note one splis-spoke and one plain spoke wheelset. To the left of it is a rivetted 16T with pressed end door.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/blue-diesels/23424858492

 

The two wagons above are also seen in ths photo of a typical local freight at Water Orton in those days. The wagon to right of the 16T in the siding is an ex-Lner 6-plank E93463.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/blue-diesels/23303528639

 

On the other side of the station a rather dirty Cupboard Door version, which looks to have had a couple of recent repairs, next to an LMS 7-plank M270567.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/blue-diesels/23424843172

 

This is probably the same train as above. An ex SR 8-plank with steel underframe, S11006. The ex-PO 21T to the right has split spoke wheels and a very short white stripe, whilst the 7-plank to the left is still in PO livery.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/blue-diesels/23303526959

Edited February 9, 2017 by TheSignalEngineer

[TheSignalEngineer]

Don't use all the same type. Looks like three variations amongst four on this working. I think it could be coke from the look of the load.

http://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrhs1589.htm.

 

Very late for a pannier working as only a few were left at this point, mostly working around the West Midlands, but it still has the early emblem.

[Mark Saunders]

Don't use all the same type. Looks like three variations amongst four on this working. I think it could be coke from the look of the load.

http://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrhs1589.htm.

 

I am not convinced by Coke but it looks more like House Coal, possibly Doubles.

 

It should be remembered that a 16 ton mineral is an uprated 14 ton design without the increase in cubic capacity!

 

Mark Saunders

[The Stationmaster]

You have introduced me to a whole new world that I was unaware of, Mike, and I was a freight guard at Canton in 1973!  

 

Clearly the wrong side of 'the General'   Which for those unfamiliar with Cardiff was Cardiff General station which ls between Canton and Newtown (as was) in railway terms and is west of the Electric Loop (yes, it really was called that).

[Fat Controller]

I am not convinced by Coke but it looks more like House Coal, possibly Doubles.

 

It should be remembered that a 16 ton mineral is an uprated 14 ton design without the increase in cubic capacity!

 

Mark Saunders

That load must have travelled on a very level route, with a driver with a very smooth braking technique- a load like that on the L&MMR would have been in the cess after the second 'All DOWN Goods and mineral trains..' board

[TheSignalEngineer]

I am not convinced by Coke but it looks more like House Coal, possibly Doubles.

 

It should be remembered that a 16 ton mineral is an uprated 14 ton design without the increase in cubic capacity!

 

Mark Saunders

I thought it may be coke from Swan Village Gas Works a couple of stations north of where the picture was taken. This picture was while the local coal yards were still in use, Small Heath depot was mechanised and took over the Birmingham traffic during 1966.

[Metr0Land]

47643 works the Hay Branch. by Phil Waterfield, on Flickr

 

Overseal by Phil Waterfield, on Flickr

 

Heavy Hallage by Phil Waterfield, on Flickr

[The Johnster]

Clearly the wrong side of 'the General'   Which for those unfamiliar with Cardiff was Cardiff General station which ls between Canton and Newtown (as was) in railway terms and is west of the Electric Loop (yes, it really was called that).

 

But familiar enough with Newtown and especially Long Dyke, the point of origin of many of my adventures...  There was, in theroy, a pile of coal left at the west end of Long Dyke sidings for the use of guards provisioning vans on outgoing trains headed upline, for which you borrowed a bucket from the shunter's cabin, but this supply was often 'prematurely diminished' by the locals from the few houses on West Tyndall Street, a lively bunch of whom your wagon cleaner and his familiy sound like fully paid up members...

 

I remember the Electric Loop, which ran from Newtown West to the cattle dock at Splott Road Bridge, being used to store trains from downline on rugby international days; one train used to buffer up behind it's predecessor and couple off from it's stock and on to the stock in front ready for the return workings, so that only the first loco in had to run around.  It was a colour light signalled long loop which IIRC was permissive block.

 

As for the bucket, you chucked it back at the shunters as the van passed the cabin on your way out!

[Porcy Mane]

I think this is a new one. I don't recall seeing that particular arrow of indecision on an 08  in this thread before.

 

08227 Comrie Colliery 19/5/1983 by Pete Wilcox, on Flickr

Edited February 12, 2017 by Porcy Mane

[The Johnster]

Do I remember something about early double arrows in some cases mounted the 'wrong way' around because the works thought they should face forward at the top on both sides?  This looks like an over-reaction to that, as, if the one the other side is mounted correctly, it also faces 'backwards'.  I think.  BR had a history of this sort of thing, getting in to trouble with the lion on the coat of arms on earlier liveries facing to the left (or was it right) so as not to be looking backwards on one side of the loco and upsetting the august authority of the Royal College Of Arms.

 

Or it could be a mistake at a local depot or by the NCB if they'd hired the loco long term.  Anyway, prototype for everything!