GWR broad gauge conversion

[lakeview770]

Can anyone please help shed some light on the GWR broad gauge conversion of 1892 and possibly point me in the right direction of good suitable reading material I assume that the one weekend they converted they converted just the mainlines? And then the rest of the system later?

 

Andrew

[Titan]

I think a lot of lines were converted to dual gauge, the extra rail being laid on the non-platform side such that there was not a big gap for the passengers to jump. This must have made for some interesting track formations outside stations where the shared rail had to swap sides, not to mention the pointwork! Then when sufficient standard gauge stock was available to run the services the broad gauge rail would be lifted. So it was not exactly overnight.

[chrisf]

There is an acount, with some background info, of how the job was done on the Moretonhampstead branch in "The Newton Abbot to Moretonhampstead Railway" by Anthony R Kingdom and Mike Lang [ARK Press]. By the famous weekend of 21st/22nd May 1892 there was still 171 miles of broad gauge, all west of Exeter: the total had gone down to about 8 miles by the end of 1875 but the GWR then absorbed the South Devon Railway and pushed the total mileage back up again. Although it was not the whole system that was converted in one weekend it was still a tremendous achievement. Others are far better qualified than I to compare it withthe way that infrastructure projects are carried out today!

 

Chris

[DavidB-AU]

The famous weekend was regauging the 177 miles (including branches and sidings) between Exeter and Penzance which was planned well in advance. There was a lot of preparatory work in the weeks and months leading up to it, including pre-drilling sleepers, prefabricating complex junctions on site and making sure the nuts and bolts on every joint were free to move. New standard gauge stock was distributed throughout the south west on well wagons or temporary broad gauge bogies in the weeks ahead and regauged. All broad gauge stock was worked empty to Swindon on the night of Friday 20th May 1892 and stored in 15 miles of temporary sidings. 4,200 men commenced regauging the entire line and branches at daybreak on Saturday and it was completed at 4.04am on the Monday. Not quite overnight but certainly less than 48 hours.

 

These days they would close the entire line for 6 weeks.

 

Cheers

David

[Guest dilbert]

The removal of broad gauge lines on the GWR was a project that lasted around 20 years, the culmination of this being that weekend in 1892. The logisitics would have been complex. Swindon works constructed miles of sidings in broad guage ro receive loco and rolling stock that would not see service in standard gauge... dilbert

[The Stationmaster]

The Broad Gauge Society sell a facsimile of the operating notice for 'that weekend' and it is very interesting as it includes the train arrangements for bringing in staff (from all over the GWR network including the Northern Division and with through coaches from various branch lines); the arrangements for clearing broad gauge stock; taking and removing the blockade; which will be the last and first trains - tremendous read for a few quid.

 

One of the more amusing aspects which I found in an old works order book was that some of the S&T work was over-spent because it had not been included in the original estimates and had to be given retrospective financial authority - seems there's never anything new in the railway world.

[Joseph_Pestell]

The famous weekend was regauging the 177 miles (including branches and sidings) between Exeter and Penzance which was planned well in advance. There was a lot of preparatory work in the weeks and months leading up to it, including pre-drilling sleepers, prefabricating complex junctions on site and making sure the nuts and bolts on every joint were free to move. New standard gauge stock was distributed throughout the south west on well wagons or temporary broad gauge bogies in the weeks ahead and regauged. All broad gauge stock was worked empty to Swindon on the night of Friday 20th May 1892 and stored in 15 miles of temporary sidings. 4,200 men commenced regauging the entire line and branches at daybreak on Saturday and it was completed at 4.04am on the Monday. Not quite overnight but certainly less than 48 hours.

 

These days they would close the entire line for 6 weeks.

 

Cheers

David

 

6 months more like.

[Coach bogie]

Evidence of the prep work (see DavidB-AU above) here with standard gauge transoms in place. All that was needed was to romeve the broad gauge ones, slew track over and reattach.

 

http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?hl=en&sa=X&biw=1440&bih=728&tbm=isch&prmd=imvns&tbnid=rH-u0Rjkfpll0M:&imgrefurl=http://www.therailwaycentre.com/Sea%2520Wall%2520Guide/SWhistory.html&docid=pbtqA_7DutOKqM&imgurl=http://www.therailwaycentre.com/Sea%252520Wall%252520Guide/Picture%252520file/Teignmouth&w=400&h=266&ei=UMSXUNKbKeyY0QWQqID4DQ&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=3&sig=109919131149284437567&page=1&tbnh=183&tbnw=275&start=0&ndsp=12&ved=1t:429,r:5,s:0,i:84&tx=144&ty=116

 

Mike Wiltshire

[The Stationmaster]

6 months more like.

And that's just for the civil engineers - need another 6 months for S&T testing after that. But to be fair it is a very different railway now and they could hardly go along cutting every other transom or whatever in advance!

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

So, who's going to build the variable gauge layout which gauge converts over the course of the exhibition weekend? 125th anniversary in 2017...

[buffalo]

Evidence of the prep work (see DavidB-AU above) here with standard gauge transoms in place. All that was needed was to romeve the broad gauge ones, slew track over and reattach...

I thought that the preparation had involved cutting every other transom to narrow gauge length, then cutting the remainder and slewing the inner rail outwards during the final weekend. If you look at the shorter transoms in the foreground of that photo it looks like there are depressions in the ballast where the extra has been removed.

 

As others have said, this was only the final stage of a process that had been going on for about 25 years. Apart from a few short sections, the only track that had not already been converted to narrow or dual gauge was between Exeter and Truro (not as some sources claim, everything west of Exeter). This was the main section that was narrowed on the final weekend without ever seeing dual-gauge track. It's interesting to note Holcroft's comment in An Outline of GW Locomotive Practice 1837-1947 that "...as a feat of engineering it did not compare with the New Milford-Swindon conversion twenty years earlier, which had passed almost unnoticed."

 

There's a useful summary of the earlier conversions here, and the same site also has maps showing the extent of broad and dual gauges from 1841-91. Unfortunately, the later maps fail to show the extent of the narrow standard gauge network.

 

Nick

[Coach bogie]

I thought that the preparation had involved cutting every other transom to narrow gauge length, then cutting the remainder and slewing the inner rail outwards during the final weekend. If you look at the shorter transoms in the foreground of that photo it looks like there are depressions in the ballast where the extra has been removed.

 

Nick

 

It is not an area I have really looked at closely in the past but if very second transom had been cut would that not make things somewhat unstable, especially as this was one of the faster stretches? I see your point regarding the depression in th ballast. There are shots at Dawlish that show 'offcuts of wood'. Difficult to judge as other photogaphs of the period do not show such close spacing, I have just dug out the Malan photgraphs and spacing appears to vary across the system The track between Exeter and Newton Abbot was 'different' to elsewhere as it never received dual gauge, there were even sections of 'conventional' style cross sleepered broad gauge, Some remnants from the atmospheric days appear to be much closer spaced. Despite all the work within ten years it had all be replaced with modern cross timbered track.

 

I must read up further on the conversion when I get the time

 

Mike Wiltshire

[Orinoco]

Between Truro and Penzance, the main line was originally standard gauge. It was made dual gauge to accommodate broad gauge trains.

[buffalo]

It is not an area I have really looked at closely in the past but if very second transom had been cut would that not make things somewhat unstable, especially as this was one of the faster stretches? I see your point regarding the depression in th ballast. There are shots at Dawlish that show 'offcuts of wood'. Difficult to judge as other photogaphs of the period do not show such close spacing, I have just dug out the Malan photgraphs and spacing appears to vary across the system The track between Exeter and Newton Abbot was 'different' to elsewhere as it never received dual gauge, there were even sections of 'conventional' style cross sleepered broad gauge, Some remnants from the atmospheric days appear to be much closer spaced. Despite all the work within ten years it had all be replaced with modern cross timbered track.

 

I must read up further on the conversion when I get the time

 

Mike Wiltshire

Mike,

 

Baulk track was very solid stuff. Remember that there were also metal tie bars and/or strap bolts linking the baulks as well as the transoms. I always find it difficult to estimate transom separation from photographs, so much depends on the angle of the photo, though IIRC the spacing on several survivng GWR drawings is arount 11'.

 

Whilst most photos of the final weekend show baulk track conversion, I've often wondered how much cross sleepered broad gauge only track there was between Exeter and Truro. There had been a fair amount elsewhere in earlier years. Presumably, conversion of the sleepered track would have been quite a lengthy process unless holes were drilled and maybe even chairs fitted before the conversion weekend?

 

As to narrow gauge baulk track surviving, yes, it had largely gone from the main lines by the end of the century, but much persisted in sidings. Indeed, I know of a couple of cases where new sidings were laid using it around 1909-10.

 

Nick

[The Stationmaster]

Not being able to lay hands on my facsimile notice I've consulted McDermott who gives the following details -

171 miles of running line to be converted of which 42 were double thus giving 213 track miles and on the mainline almost all of this was broad gauge with just over 4.5 miles of mixed gauge in the immediate Plymouth area

McDermott states that the amount of single line involved was one reason for doing all the work west of Exeter at one go.

Of the 213 miles 36 had previously been relaid on cross sleepers - at various places in Devon and Cornwall.

Some 3,400 men were brought in to reinforce local PWay staff - there was a single broad gauge train (from Swindon) to bring men in and all the others were narrow gauge terminating at Exeter with the men transferred there to broad gauge trains to go forward to their respective work sites. The total of about 4,200 men were distributed in gangs of 20 who had just over 1 mile to deal with; with the remainder in larger gangs at places where there were complex layouts. (as an aside I can but assume that my great grandfather was quite likely one of the 3,400 as I believe he was in the PWay Dept at Uffington at that time - now there's something interesting to delve out!).

McDermott confirms - as do various photos in the book - that every second transom had been shortened in advance while a third rail had already been laid in on all 36 miles of cross sleepered track.

Although work started at daybreak on the Saturday such was the pace that in the evening of that day a trial narrow gauge train was run through from Exeter to Plymouth North Road

[Nick Holliday]

There is an extensive and informative article in a fairly recent Railway Archive (No 33 December 2011) called "Two days in May - The Conversion of hte Broad Gauge in Devon and Cornwall in May 1892 - A New Account" written by Roger Langley, It covers in depth the logistics, including how they managed to get the four thousand odd labourers to the various workplaces, from places as far afield as Chester and South Wales, just for that weekend. Fascinating reading.

[melmerby]

I think a lot of lines were converted to dual gauge, the extra rail being laid on the non-platform side such that there was not a big gap for the passengers to jump. This must have made for some interesting track formations outside stations where the shared rail had to swap sides, not to mention the pointwork! Then when sufficient standard gauge stock was available to run the services the broad gauge rail would be lifted. So it was not exactly overnight.

There were some interesting track layouts to accommodate both gauges.

In "The GWR, 150 Glorious Years" there is a photo of a mixed gauge siding where the standard and broad gauge junctions from the running line are completely separate.

On the next page there is a trailing crossover in double track where the broad rail has to effectively change sides as it crosses over!

Another interesting photo shows one of the "convertible" locos which were effectively a standard gauge loco running on broad gauge wheelsets, it looks most odd.

As a broad gauge it had inside frames, the narrow wheelset fitted inside the frames to make it an outside frame loco.

 

Keith

[BG John]

On the next page there is a trailing crossover in double track where the broad rail has to effectively change sides as it crosses over!

It's a nice feature to model. I haven't done it on a crossover, but did it on plain track. No photos I'm afraid, as it was in my pre digital days when I didn't take enough photos.

[Donw]

The GWR was quite used to the swapping of sides on the dual gauge trackwork. On single track lines the 'Narrow' gauge track had to be moved to the platform side which was not always the same side. The BG society data sheets show some wonderful trackwork. There is loads of the rail used as fence posts in the forest of dean perhaps we should recover it and lay more Broad Gauge.

The changeover was a magnificent achievement. There was a lot of preparation work including clearing ALL the broad gauge stock from the area first.

Don

[Coach bogie]

 

McDermott confirms - as do various photos in the book - that every second transom had been shortened in advance while a third rail had already been laid in on all 36 miles of cross sleepered track.

 

 

That is what I like about this site. You learn something new every day. Thanks to Mike and Nick for correcting me on the shortened transoms. I am impressed with GW engineering that the track did not spread.

 

Mike Wiltshire

[John_Hughes]

In the 1980s there was certainly ex-Broad Gauge bridge rail still in daily use and connected to the main network at Tyseley shed; I wonder if it's still there?

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

... I am impressed with GW engineering that the track did not spread.

Over-engineered! For the vehicle mass and imposed dynamic load the reserve factor of strength or degree of redundancy in the design (or however you care to think of it) was very large indeed. A member of the de Havilland mrc who in real life was an airframe stress man told me that it was well over 90% redundant for the maximum loads imposed, and it was a good job it wasn't expected to fly...

[The Stationmaster]

In the 1980s there was certainly ex-Broad Gauge bridge rail still in daily use and connected to the main network at Tyseley shed; I wonder if it's still there?

Bridge rail was still being rolled - occasionally - well into the 20th century and was used by both the GWR and WR for various places in loco depots. Plus of course redundant bridge rail was used for the straining posts in post & wire fences.

[buffalo]

...Plus of course redundant bridge rail was used for the straining posts in post & wire fences.

As seen here at Camerton. In this case, redundant pieces of BGS bridge rail

 

 

And, back in the real world, there's even the odd bit of Barlow rail and other GWR ironwork:

 

 

This example at Hallatrow station entrance from A39 Wells Rd.

 

Nick

[AMJ]

I have seem many photos of the dual gauge track and various interactions similar to those at Didcot museum.

 

There were also a few interesting items of rolling stock designed to be able to be changed from BG to SG. In the main these look to have been wheels on the outside of the frames for BG and then replaced by wheels on the inside/between the frames for double framed items. Why scrap something that still had some life in it?