BR Diesels - North Cornwall

[EtchedPixels]

Etched Pixels, are there any photos of your Wadebridge layout that I could see, please.

It's looking a bit sad - it got very wet the card buildings all died and the platforms shrank. This discussion is however motivating me to finally get off my backside and consider getting on with building some new ones.

What I modelled is based on the final layout but with different sidings kept (so it fits on a 30 cm wide board) - so goods shed (but not the two lines behind it), main platform, island platform, two sidings off island plaform.

I'll take a couple of pictures when I get a bit of time.

Alan

[Chris in Prague]

Many thanks, Alan, for such a quick and informative response. I understand that the rebuilt West Countries / Battle of Britain's had a higher RA (being heavier than the unrebuilt examples) so were banned from many lines, e.g. Ilfracombe. So, if I want to run Hymeks, Warships, Castles (on specials) and rebuilt WCs / BBs I will have to assume that the local councils paid for a thorough upgrade of the Bodmin General-Wadebridge route to RA7, so I can use some concrete-sleepered CWR outside the station and have the station area reballasted.

I will have to find a prototype small diesel servicing area for my model based on Padstow but I still want to keep the turntable by the sea as it is such a beautiful location. (As I'm adding a small locoshed based on Bude's (for the limited steam services) I can add a diesel servicing area, too! The goods shed will be based on Wadebridge as all sidings will be on one side of the (modified) station only. (Do you have any scale plans for Wadebridge goods shed? I have a lot of pictures of it but no plans.)

I have added an island platform to my station plan for operational reasons. (I'm assuming the SR added it in the 1930s.)

I do hope that you will be able to refurbish your layout as I'm looking forward to seeing some photos of it as well as of the railbus.

[EtchedPixels]

Many thanks, Alan, for such a quick and informative response. I understand that the rebuilt West Countries / Battle of Britain's had a higher RA (being heavier than the unrebuilt examples) so were banned from many lines

In part because they were too heavy to cross the Meldon viaduct.

I will have to find a prototype small diesel servicing area for my model based on Padstow but I still want to keep the turntable by the sea as it is such a beautiful location. (As I'm adding a small locoshed based on Bude's (for the limited steam services) I can add a diesel servicing area, too! The goods shed will be based on Wadebridge as all sidings will be on one side of the (modified) station only. (Do you have any scale plans for Wadebridge goods shed? I have a lot of pictures of it but no plans.)

You don't fancy converting the Padstow fish shed into a depot

I do have drawings of Wadebridge goods shed and station but not of the island platform building. They were published in Modellers Backtrack Feb/March 1994 (I think) 1mm/ft of

- station building
- goods shed
- east signal box
- water tank
- hoist
- engine shed

The island platform is tricker as no drawings and few photos cover all of it. There is however an article in the 1980 MRC annual on it and some basic info/arrangement plan.

The shed is also covered in more detail with drawings in An Historical Survey of Southern Sheds

The biggest problem I had with the buildings is the brickwork. There simply isn't any stone paper that is like the pattern found at Wadebridge (and interestingly in parts of Swansea).

I do hope that you will be able to refurbish your layout as I'm looking forward to seeing some photos of it as well as of the railbus.

The Wadebridge buildings are unusual. The rest of the line follows standard LSWR pattern goods sheds, so you might want to consider an LSWR no.1 or no.2 goods shed if you are trying to keep the style of Padstow.


http://www.northcornwallrailway.co.uk/

has sketches for both types and the North Cornwall Railway book better quality drawings.

[Chris in Prague]

Thanks again, Alan. With space at a premium I have had to omit both the quay branch and the (pretty big) fish shed. However, the standard LSWR No. 1 and No. 2 goods sheds are too small and, besides, I really like the look of the Wadebridge goods shed so that's what I'm going to use. The main platform and station buildings will be as accurate as possible models of Padstow including the signal box and signal. However. much else will be changed. (I have presumed that a branch from Wadebridge was built across the river from Padstow to Penmayn (Rock, as it is better known), Britain's St. Tropez! Hence the line's survival along with through trains to Paddington and Waterloo, in the summer, and the continued use of a SR green horsebox on selected trains from London for those ladies who like ride their horses on holiday!)

Alas, that particular Modellers Backtrack is out of print and Google could not find any secondhand copies for sale either. 8-(

Yes, I have been thinking of how I will represent the stonework: probably handscored on card using pencil drawn stone shapes? (Being short-sighted such closeup work is not a problem for me. I have studied the Pendon Museum methods for constructing buildings.) I think Wadebridge goods shed would be a good building to start with, maybe without the concrete sections extension?

Was Meldon Viaduct strengthened for the BR diesels hauling ballast trains from the quarry? After the Class 33s were withdrawn what was there with a low enough RA? (If not, I suppose I could state that, as part of the hypothetical BR - Local Government investment program to save the majority of the Withered Arm, Meldon Viaduct was upgraded too? Or as a diversionary route for when the ex-GWR coastal route was closed by high seas? Warships definitely got to Ilfracombe on through trains from Paddington. So, I can use modeller's licence to say that the surviving lines of the Withered Arm were upgraded to a higher RA. 8-)

[Chris in Prague]

I have just read this on SEmG:

"Bulleid diesels being fuelled at Waterloo.
[There was a temporary arrangement in the North Sidings  from September 1951 until August 1955. Fuel was pumped from a 4000 gallon tank wagon with portable pumps...lube oil was kept in 45 gallon drums, nearby.]
As well as the Bulleids the other mainline diesels could be serviced eg 10001/2."

So, that could have been what was done at Wadebridge to fuel and service diesels? However, I think I will add some small concrete canopies like Ipswich SP has, today. Hmm, did Exmouth Jn concrete works produce anything similar? 8-)

[EtchedPixels]

79977/79978 were the railbusses assigned to run the Bodmin North shuttle.

I like the idea of doing Rock. I did think about 'Splat International Airport' instead of Wadebridge at one point when they were talking about a Cornwall airport but it would have meant being modern image only.

Meldon was not strengthened, but was singled allowing more weight. The quarry trains did not need to cross the bridge (and they still don't - they quarry branch remains). Bridge rules are also frequently more complicated - its often 'these locomotives except by authority of' or 'may pass on authority if fuel tank no more than half full' or 'at 15mph or lower' or nowdays things like 'no more than ten trips a year'.

For lightly loaded routes Laira had a small number of class 25s in later days which were RA5 or RA4 without steam heating boilers if I remember rightly. They worked things like the daily Wadebridge van train. In turn these were substituted for class 37s.

These days Network Rail seem to be using pairs of class 73s on the low RA southern routes along with some 37s. The 37s in mainline use probably don't have long left though - the engines on most of them are now beyond their rated hours.

No idea on the fuelling arrangements - but you can fuel and oil shunters with a jerrycan and an oilcan.

Alan

[port perran]

I very much like your idea of a line to Rock.  I like fictional representations of "what might have been" and I do like that North Cornwall area. It is interesting to have a look and see what still remains of the railway up there.
Keep us informed of progress.
Incidentally, I have a photo  (in Images of Cornish Railways - Maurice Dart) of the weedkilling train (of all things) visiting Bodmin General in May '71 (with a class 22)
Incidentally, on this topic, I'll be at the the Wadebridge model rail show on 6/7 October with Port Perran . There will be several other Cornish layouts there (not all N though I'm afraid) that might give some inspiration.

[port perran]

Just as an afterthought re Hymeks.
According to the Bradford-Barton volume Bodmin & Wadebridge(1834-1978), a single Hymek (D7032) visited  Wadebridge on a North Cornwall line trial in Jan '65 (somewhat unsuccessfully I guess) so you could include one on your railway quite justifiably.

[Chris in Prague]

Dear all,

It was, rightly, pointed out to me that I should have started a new thread on this fascinating subject. Briefly, this is a discussion as to what BR diesels (shunters, loco's, and railcars and units) did run on the ex-LSWR and WR lines in North Cornwall around 1960-1969 (and to a lesser degree, Cornwall) that made up the ex-LSWR Withered Arm network. Also, what could have run if circumstances were different, e.g. most of the network had not abruptly been closed following the WR takeover in January 1963 of all ex-SR lines west of Exeter and, instead, investment had been made to upgrade the Route Availability (RA) of at least some lines. (The scenario I'm planning for my N Gauge layout based on Padstow but moved across the river to what, today, is known as Rock.)

With my 'academic hat' on, from now on, I will cite sources for all the information and politely ask others to do the same so that we can build up a really useful resource for others modelling this period and area.

(As an aside, I'm also interested in the steam locos which ran on the lines in this period, too, but had better leave THAT for another thread! 8-)

[Chris in Prague]

Thank you, Port Perran. I will respond fuller, later. Alas, it's a long way from Prague to Wadebridge, otherwise I'd be delighted to meet you and watch your excellent model of Port Perran in action. (I hope someone makes and posts a video.)

The info. about the Hymek D7032 is very useful as it does prove that there is a prototype for (almost) everything if you look hard enough! So, my future Hymek will be D7032! I guess in green with small yellow warning panel (SWP) in 1965?

The photo (in Images of Cornish Railways - Maurice Dart) of the weedkilling train (of all things) visiting Bodmin General in May '71 (with a class 22) sounds very interesting. Whilst I know scanned images of copyrighted pictures cannot be posted here, one sent by private message would be gratefully accepted! (And I could do the same from my limited library.) Does the book tell you which Class 22 it was, must have been very shortly before the last ones were withdrawn? A model of a weedkilling train would make a nice addition of my planned model which assumes that most of the Withered Arm was NOT abruptly closed down but was given limited investment to keep it open with local government support.

Best wishes,
Chris

[Chris in Prague]

So, Port Perran, I could also add Class 03 D2177 to my planned roster; however, 1968 is a bit late. 8-) (D2177 (Class 03) was used on the lifting train on the final days at Padstow in March 68. (It was based at Laira).)

Currently, my plan is to buy a model of D2388 in late BR green livery and renumber it as D2398 as that was, at least, an SR (Weymouth) allocated loco. in my target time period. (As 03 398 it was 'mysteriously' -- I believe after an accident, withdrawn quite early despite having been overhauled, repainted in BR blue and dual-braked, so it has always interested me as the 'one that got away'!)

[Chris in Prague]

Many thanks Alan, for researching that 79977/79978 were the railbusses assigned to run the Bodmin North shuttle, and the further info. about RA and Meldon Viaduct. I got confused as I believe that the viaduct was used as a headshunt for the quarry so thought ballast trains still traversed it.

Re: fuel arrangements, I've reposted a post about how the Bulleid diesels were refuelled in the 1950s which proves your point! 8-)

[Chris in Prague]

Alan and Port Perran, I'm delighted you like my idea of basing my planned station on Rock (in Cornish, Pennmeyn, I believe, but I'm guessing the LSWR would have called it Panmayn). I apologise for this digression from the topic of BR Diesels in North Cornwall but I promise that it WILL be relevant! (To at least my planned layout.) From reading "A Regional History of the Railways of Great Britain: The West Country v. 1" (Regional railway history series) by David St.John Thomas (26 Feb 1988), "It was not from want of scheming that the steam age invaded the area [North Devon and North Cornwall] late." I believe, back in the 1860s, the Launceston, Bodmin & Wadebridge Junction railway, incorporated in 1864, which became the Cornwall Central and extended its powers to include a line to Truro, proposed (I believe, I need to find the source) a line to Rock.

"The Launceston, Bodmin & Wadebridge Junction Railway Act of 1864 authorized a 21-mile 4' 8½" gauge line from Launceston to a junction with the Bodmin & Wadebridge Railway's line at Wenford Bridge. The proposed line went westward and then from near Otterham turned south toward Bodmin, skirting Bodmin Moor. As part of the scheme the South Devon Railway would have been forced to lay down mixed gauge between Lydford and Launceston.The Central Cornwall Railway Act of 1867 added a second line from a junction with the Bodmin & Wadebridge Railway's Ruthern Bridge branch to a junction with the West Cornwall Railway at Truro. This would also have included an interchange with the broad gauge Newquay and Cornwall Junction Railway somewhere around Bugle. The Central Cornwall scheme would have given the London & South Western Railway a 4' 8½" connection from Waterloo, all the way to Bodmin and Truro and thence over the existing mixed gauge to Penzance. Such a line would probably have proved more profitable than the L&SWR line that was eventually built, and would certainly have been a lot cheaper. It might even have helped the long-term viability of the broad gauge Great Western main line by getting rid of a lot of the transshipment problems. Alas, the scheme was not to be — there was simply not enough money around in the late 1860s to bring it to fruition. Under the Abandonment of Railways Act of 1850, a Warrant of the Board of Trade authorized the abandonment of the Central Cornwall Railway on 16 March 1870."

SOURCE: http://spellerweb.net/rhindex/UKRH/LSWR/CentCorn.html

In any case, I am proposing that, in the 1860s, a standard gauge line was built by the Central Cornwall Railway from Wadebridge to Rock.

[Chris in Prague]

Regarding the Exeter - Barnstaple line, Thomas states that "Nor did the single track merely slow the journey: trains remained infrequent and because of the expense of staffing the signal boxes at all the crossing stations, the service stopped early in the evening." (pp104-105)

The "Southern Region did promise to lengthen loops and introduce centralized traffic control [as was begun on the Central Wales Line but never finished]. But that had not happened before the Western Region took over in 1963, and thereafter the question was not what development would be undertaken but how much of the withered arm would be spared the axe." (p105).

"Bad rail services meant that in the 1950s and 1960s Ilfracombe received far more passengers by motor coach than did other resorts of similar size . . . Even so, it was often block-to-block working with double-headed and banked trains over the gradients between Barnstaple and Ilfracombe, until the route was first singled in December 1967 [despite concrete sleepered track being laid near Ilfracombe -- "Withered Arm" video] and then closed, from 5 October 1970. though rail traffic had been dwindling -- nayt positively discouraged -- the final withdrawal hurt many hotels and boarding houses and led to unsuccessful attempts to get the line reopened on a private basis. Goods traffic . . . ceased from 7 September 1964 . . . " (pp109-110)

" . . . the withdrawal of an area manager and the decision by the local council not after all to proceed with a scheme to finance reopening to Bideford (an active group chartered regular trains to that town in 1980) were disappointments, the lack of local senior management perhaps especially hurting freight and excursion prospects.) (p110)

"Bude is isolated, but would surely be twice its present size had the railway arrived earlier and given a better -- particularly a quicker -- service. . . . Apart from the slow gradient climbing, long delays occurred at Exeter, Okehampton and Halwill while the various sections of trains such as the Atlantic Coast Express were divided . . ." (p118)

"The 1864 powers for the Launceston, Bodmin & Wadebridge Junction had lapsed many years before the LSWR at last felt ready to bridge the gap between its main system and the Bodmin & Wadebridge. [Wadebridge not, finally, being reached until 1st June 1895.] (p119)

So, we have the scenario for a line which COULD have been built in the 1860s which generated more traffic and led to an increase in the size of the towns it served much greater than actually happened because it happened 30 years earlier. We have a Southern Region that COULD have introduced centralized traffic control and a WR which COULD have organised promoted a much better service (after it took over in 1963) than it did and local councils that COULD have subsidised local rail passenger services . . .

[Chris in Prague]

But to return to the subject of BR Diesels in North Cornwall and what did run and, under the above scenario, COULD have run, in North Cornwall in BR days. 8-)