7mm Slaters GWR MEX Cattle Wagons (Six of them)

[Rob Pulham]

Those with good memories will recall Graham mentioning some time ago in one of his threads, that I was building some cattle wagons for him. This thread is to outline the builds and the deviations from the Slaters kit as supplied.

This all came about when I picked up a Slaters Cattle wagon kit cheap from eBay. Having next to no knowledge of things GWR I asked Graham if he had any information on the Diagrams represented by the kit to which Graham in his usual helpful way said of course. Graham mentioned at this point that he had 5 in the stash that he had, had for sometime without getting around to them. My plastic kit pile is almost exhausted so I offered to build them alongside mine in return for the information. The plan is that I will do a bit on them when I go up to the cottage (usually every couple of weeks or so).

True to his word Graham has sent me lots of information and just to add variety we are both looking at completely different time frames for our models. Grahams are to be modelled as in the early years on the 20th century and mine is to be in the grouping era pre war. Which as a minimum means that we may have different brakes but other detail yet to be determined.

So a couple of weekends ago I made a start on mine in so much as I removed the sides from the sprues and then cleaned up and using an olfa cutter I cut the representations on the planks on the rear of the sides and the partition. Unlike Parkside kits Slaters only come with planking moulded on one side.





While I was up there earlier in the week (in between going across to Shildon to see the Great Goodbye - photos on my Flickr site for anyone interested) I managed to remove the sides/ends/roofs from the sprues, for three of Graham's kits and clean up all the sprue waste and moulding pips etc.

I brought the side that I have taken the photos of back home to do some experiments with on how to make the head bars. They are made up of a single rod that has been flattened at each end and then drilled and bolted/rivetted on to the body side. Updates to follow as I have a go at the headbars.

 

[Dog Star]

Robin,
Please do not bang you head too hard against the "head" bars...

I was pleased to accept Robin's offer of building some stock for our fledgling GW&GC Jt layout and so we delivered the kits to Robin on Good Friday 2013... you cannot keep a good Shelf Queen down hence the delay in starting. The information sources that I have provided to Robin include:-

* Cattle Wagon section from "GWR Wagons" published by Tourret;
* photographs from various GWR wagon books by Russell;
* "Refining the Exemplary" article from MRJ (pg. 91, issue no.21, 1988);
* "GWR Cattle Wagon Variants" article from MRJ (pg. 184 issue no.24, pg. 235 issue no.25, both 1988);
* photograph from Great Western Railway Journal, pg. 115, issue no.42, Spring 2002).

plus bits and bobs from the GWR Oracle for all things wagonry - Mr. John Lewis (who has appeared on WT in a different thread courtesy Heather).

Even with all of the above sources there are interesting challenges in building models of the "standard" GWR large cattle wagon, such challenges include brake gear variants, fitted/un-fitted, door planking, wheelbase (sorry Rob, forgot to mention this niggle!), livery / lettering... and whether or not to reproduce the use of cast-iron plates for much of the lettering (shown in the photographs of the GWR lettering trials circa 1905).

As a taster, here is an image from the GWR series of photographs which recorded the livery / lettering trials:-



The kits which we supplied to Robin have S7 wheels... could this be a subtle attempt to influence Rob's track making? A membership form was included with the Slater's instructions!

Thank you Rob for doing this for us.

 

[Dog Star]

If anyone has any photos of GWR Mex wagons then feel free to post here, similarly if anyone can point us to other sources not listed above.

thanks, Graham

 

[SteveO]

Nice. I'm intrigued about this cottage that keeps being mentioned - a lot of modelling gets done there so maybe I should make a reservation!

 

[Dog Star]

I'm intrigued about this cottage that keeps being mentioned... ... maybe I should make a reservation!

No gas, no elektrik, no roof... worst of all, no WT!.

 

[Rob Pulham]

No gas, no elektrik, no roof... worst of all, no WT!.

Not quite, but no phone/internet or television which is why lots of modelling gets done

 

[Rob Pulham]

I was pleased to accept Robin's offer of building some stock for our fledgling GW&GC Jt layout and so we delivered the kits to Robin on Good Friday 2013... you cannot keep a good Shelf Queen down hence the delay in starting.

Wow, finishing the other kits took longer than I thought

 

[Rob Pulham]

More progress this weekend past.

All the main parts are now removed from the sprues, cleaned up and placed in takeaway boxes.

The planks have all been scribed on the inside. Thankfully before going too far on this I had a look at photos showing the doors open. It turns out that the planks on the drop down portion of the door didn't really have visible plank lines on the inside. With what I had done and what Graham had done many moons past we have two out of the 6 kits with planks scribed on the inside of the drop down doors and 4 without. We are working on the theory that some of them at least would be visble where the planks had dried and shrunk in service.....

I have also made a start on adding the strips to these doors that were there to prevent the cattle from slipping during loading/unloading. Sadly my plastic strip stock only ran to enough for three of the wagons so I will complete the rest once I stock up once more.



Next up is the head bars. I have had a go with some 0.45mm rod but having discussed it further with Graham I am going to try 0.6 or 0.7mm as being a bit more prototypical (not to mention easier to deal with I hope).

 

[Dog Star]

Why would anyone want a rake of GWR Mex wagons? An interesting question to which there is an interesting answer... an answer which raises more questions of an unexpected nature. The easy bit is the answer to "why?" and that can be found in a GWR official publication - the Service Time Tables for the London, Swindon and Oxford sections (my extract dated October 1910 so just after the opening of the New Line between Ashendon and Aynho Junctions).

I have been "looking" at the Great Western & Great Central Joint Committee line through West Wycombe as a basis for a 7mm layout on which to run Stars and Saints with lake carriages, 2800s with long freights and "retired" Dean period engines / carriages / wagons on local services. A desirable train to model can be found in the WTT, as the 4/30 Thame to Princes Risborough (pg. 223, Mixed, TuO, arrives 4/48) - my understanding of rural Buckinghamshire life is that there was a weekly cattle market at Thame in the Edwardian period and this mixed train looks a candidate for moving cattle from the Thame market.

So the cattle get moved from Thame to Princes Risborough in MEXs attached to a local passenger train. What next?

With the cattle at Princes Risborough the next step is either a down service towards Banbury (another town with a cattle market) or an up service towards High Wycombe and Paddington (or so I thought). There is no obvious down service to forward the cattle without watering at Princes Risborough... there is a tantalising entry for an up service, "Cattle Train" ex-Thame departs Princes Risborough at 5/30 (pg. 214, TuO) and arrives High Wycombe at 5/50. Surprisingly, the destination is not Paddington for the entry is marked as "to Maidenhead" (so via the Wycombe Railway branch rather than the GW&GC Jt New Line). Time to look at a different page of the WTT.

Pg.231 of the WTT covers services over the Wycombe Railway between High Wycombe and Maidenhead and includes an up service shown as "Cattle ex-Thame TuO" dep 6/10 HW arr 7/12 MHD. After a short wait the train departs 07/20 as an up service and arrives Slough at 07/55 where the service appears to terminate (I do not have the relevant WTT page for freight services from Slough).

There we have it, a weekly cattle train from Thame to Slough that wanders across at least three different timetables of the WTT. However, this simple story leaves some unanswered questions.

* the WTT shows a light engine working from Princes Risborough to Thame on Tuesdays only, booked to arrive at Thame with time to shunt the cattle wagons and form the mixed service. Where did the light engine come from?

* the arrive / depart timings at Princes Risborough and at High Wycombe suggest that the MEXs are worked through without change of engine... so are the MEXs coupled next to the engine for the service from Thame? (in which case the MEXs ought to be fitted and diagram W5 whereas I was expecting unfitted wagons to diagram W1).

* what was the destination for the loaded MEXs if not Slough?

* how did the MEXs get to Thame for the once a week working?

regards, Graham

 

[ZiderHead]

… my understanding of rural Buckinghamshire life is that there was a weekly cattle market at Thame in the Edwardian period …

There still is! Although the stock obviously isn't moved by rail these days.

 

[Ian G]

A good book to have a look through is the Risborough, Thame,Oxford Railway, most of the track bed is still there, there are only a few sections of the line impassable - the A40 at Oxford service and a few houses in the way near Cowley BMW, trains from the for mentiond car plant still run, If i remember correctly there is a photo of a cattle train passing through Thame in the book.

Regards

Ian G

 

[Dog Star]

If i remember correctly there is a photo of a cattle train passing through Thame in the book.

Ah, now that is interesting and for a different service!

Buried in the footnotes to the High Wycombe - Maidenhead service is a statement to the effect that the morning Oxford Goods to Taplow (dep. OXF at 11.40) can drop off cattle (only) at Wooburn Green - a rather odd caveat and I am not sure why cattle could be delivered to Wooburn Green and not to any other stations between High Wycombe and Maidenhead. Never mind that puzzle - the thing is, if the photo (ref. above) shows a cattle train passing Thame then that service has to be the Oxford-Taplow Goods rather than the Thame cattle market service (TuO).

Anyone who can show me that picture? or offer the ISBN of the book?

thanks, Graham

 

[Ian G]

I was thinking of the wrong book, the ISBN is 902888417 Princes Risborough - Thame - Oxford Railway, R Lingard, Oxford Publishing Company.
I will have a nose through all my local books as I was born in Monks Risborough.
Now living just down the road from the line

Ian G

 

[Dog Star]

I was thinking of the wrong book, the ISBN is 902888417 Princes Risborough - Thame - Oxford Railway, R Lingard, Oxford Publishing Company.

I have that book and I cannot see a photo which includes cattle wagons - which page is the picture that you have in mind?

 

[Ian G]

I did say in my 1st sentance I was thinking of the wrong book.

Ian G

 

[Dog Star]

A few days after writing about the cattle train workings from Thame, in this post, the seasonal weather left me with a chill etc. so my thoughts wandered off to one of the unanswered questions about the working of the cattle traffic. I had written that my information from the GWR WTT dated October 1910 was limited to workings along the GW&GC Jt "New Line" and that the cattle traffic from Thame "disappeared" from view when the working left High Wycombe for Slough (not covered in the WTT information available to me at that time).

More in desperation than hope I entered GWR WTT London Section into an internet search engine and found a reference which turned out to be the entire WTT from which I had some extracts! If heaven exists on the internet then at the moment that place is where the desired WTT was to be found. So now I had information on UP freight workings from SLO... um, quite a few. A discussion with the Oracle of GWR C&W material brought forth an interesting and highly relevant document for 1912 - Marshalling Instructions for Freight Service across the entire GWR network. Whilst there is no reference to either the mixed working from Thame or the "Cattle Train" from Princes Risborough there is a section for Slough.

There are two UP freight services which depart SLO after the arrival of the Cattle Train from Princes Risborough (via High Wycombe). Whilst either service could have taken the cattle wagons forward the later train is the most likely for the "notes" state that the later service carries traffic for Paddington, Smithfield and Poplar (wake up Adrian... how does this fit into the world of Basilica Fields?).

So now I know the likely destination of the cattle from Thame Market. There is no indication of where or if the cattle were watered on route (maybe there is an official tome on this subject? any ideas anyone). Similarly there is still no information on how the empty MEXs got to Thame.... maybe one of the daily workings between OXF and Taplow which were routed over the Wycombe Railway.... maybe one of the daily workings from SLO to OXF via High Wycombe. Hopefully the Marshalling Instructions shall shed light on the matter.

 

[Buckjumper]

There are two UP freight services which depart SLO after the arrival of the Cattle Train from Princes Risborough (via High Wycombe). Whilst either service could have taken the cattle wagons forward the later train is the most likely for the "notes" state that the later service carries traffic for Paddington, Smithfield and Poplar (wake up Adrian... how does this fit into the world of Basilica Fields?).

Zzzzz...snore...mmmm...WOT? I've got to buy more wagons?

Live cows to Smifffield? Not since 1855 m'lud when the new Metropolitan Cattle Market was opened at Copenhagen Fields.

In the real world any cattle have gone to or from Poplar via the Norf Lundun, but it's conceivable I could divert some through BF. I understand that cattle passing through the Thames Tunnel on the ELR tended to loose their bowels in fright - probably why they went through at night as there was time to clean up the passing spray before the early morning commuter rush.

AFAIK cattle were to watered and inspected at junction stations - any on your route fit the bill?

 

[Buckjumper]

Rob - have you noticed any significant bowing of the sides due to tension release from scribing the interior planks?

 

[Rob Pulham]

Rob - have you noticed any significant bowing of the sides due to tension release from scribing the interior planks?

Hi Adrian,

By good fortune I have one of the kits at home so I can answer that one without delay.

No, there doesn't seem to be any bowing at all thankfully I sloshed a bit of paint on the inside of one of my Midland cattle wagons last night and noticed that I hadn't scribed the inner planks on it (I haven't looked but I bet I didn't do it in the other two either)

 

[Jon Gwinnett]

At one time someone (Richard De Camin?) did replacement resin ends to enable later versions to be built. They built up quite well, although from memory we didn't tackle the wheelbase issues.