The LNER Encyclopedia

Good morning all

I am indulging in my love of articulated carriages, and building a Diag 218N triplet. This was converted from Howlden six-wheeled stock.

I have the Isinglass drawing and only the brake end is drawn. This is good for the outer ends, but what of the four inner ends?

I feel that the inner ends would not have end lights. I also wonder about the beading of plain carriage ends. Did plain carriage ends have the horizontal beading that the brake ends have above and below the end lights?

I have never seen drawings of Howlden six-wheel stock apart from those included in the couple of artic sets that I have from Isinglass.

Any ideas??

Earlswood nob

PS; My membership of this forum has promoted a desire for accuracy, which has improved my modelling and the satisfaction that I get from it.

Beading was not merely decorative but was used to cover joints in the panelling. There is a selection of end views of Howlden stock in Nick Campling's 'Historic Carriage Drawings Volume One LNER and Constituents', none of which show non-brake ends with the end lights nor the equivalent horizontal beading top and bottom of them. They do show the arrangement of footsteps etc. and also the NPCS ends have a horizontal bead just below halfway up - but not at the same height as that on the end with the lights; this could be because the panels were shorter on these vehicles.

Best man to answer is probably Nick himself...

Seconded. Plain ends with vertical beading over the joints.

My only though would be whether you'd have telltales for the passenger alarm on each carriage - presumably there would only be an actuator on one end of the set, so only one set of telltales, on that end.

Intermediate ends on artic stock had no fixtures on them, unless they had through lighting control cables. These are Howlden ends..... Just suppress the steps for the intermediates.

G'day all

WOW...What quick and informative responses. I overlooked the Howlden drawings in HCD vol1. I have just opened the book and there is a plain end drawing, and two brake end drawings, one with alarm gear.

My drawing of Diag 218N shows the brake ends are 3ins narrower that the central carriage. This would only equate to 0.5mm difference on each side, so I'll ignore that difference.

Now to produce a diagram for my production of the required ends.

I've never regretted my misspent youth receiving a classical education, but sometimes I wish we touched on subjects like technical drawing.

Thanks to all

Earlswood nob

Hi Earlswood,

Slightly late on parade but I thought I'd add my tuppence worth having spent some time recently building Howlden carriages including articulated stock.

I looked at the pictures and I looked at the drawings and I looked at the kits to find a lack of consensus. I reckon that the GNR converted 6-wheelers into articulated stock with the minimum of changes and hence cost. From what I've seen I think that the inner ends were stripped of steps etc but each carriage retained individual communication chord tell-tales. If you look at photos you will see that brake ends had gas lamp gear added and steps were superimposed over the end lights. Most had communication chord tell tales moved as well.

My approach has been to use the drawings for the outline but build the detail from photos.

Good luck.

Regards,

Vernon

This discussion has been most interesting as I'm in a program of building Howlden stock for my mid-late 30s layout which is vaguely located near Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire but its not the ECML! Its some form of secondary route over which occasionally ECML trains were diverted and was used by Doncaster for running in turns - otherwise how else could I justify running a P1, P2, not to mention a U1, etc!

So far I have built:
2 x 6-wheel thirds
1 x 6-wheel brake third
1 x 6-wheel brake
1 x 45ft LBC

The next build will be a Dia 218D triplet comprising: third brake, compo, third.

I'll be building them from the 3 individual 6-wheel D&S kits but Danny has sent me the additional etches and some bogies (I already had some D&S Fox bogies from coaches I'll be fitting Gresley bogies to).

I don't have a lot of info on these other than Danny's outline sheet for the various articulated sets that can be made from his coaches. However, I have been studying photos that I have found in my extensive book collection as well as the drawings of the NPCS 6 wheelers in Nick's book mentioned above. I also have the 3 part series from the RM (Jan-March 2007) on building a 7mm D&S triplet.

I'm also awaiting the arrival of a resin Dia 129 compo from Bill Bedford which should be an interesting build. Following that will be a 'Louth Quad' using etches from Nick Easton which were commissioned originally by a mate in Melbourne.

I also have a twin set of ex 6-wheelers comprising a third and 3 compt brake third by a David Gray - these need styrene rod for the beading on the lower sides, I got these from a deceased estate in Melb (along with some of my D&S 6 -wheelers).

Incidentally Earlswood what coaches does your D218N consist of?

Woodcock29

Good morning all

Thanks for even more information.

The Diag 218N consisted of three 34ft10ins carriages. The two ends being four compartment brake thirds (d281). The middle carriage was a five compartment composite (d155); third-first-first-first-third.

According to the isinglass notes; there were four sets and used in the West Riding district. They were scrapped just after WWII.

I did attempt to make a DIag 218O quint from Hornby Clerestorys, but wasn't happy with the result. The panelling and beading were incorrect and I attempted to improve matters by sanding the lower sides smooth and making the beading with strips of plasticard. After hours spent cutting, placing, and glueing strips, the end result wasn't great, and I was suffering from eye-strain. As usual I was trying to run before I could walk.

After I make progress with the methodology of producing the Diag 218N, I will attempt more artics as it should be a lot easier.

Earlswood nob

G'day all

Whilst looking through my few drawings of artic carriage sets, I find that Quint Diag 218O had five compartment brake thirds (D279) at both ends.

These brake thirds were 42ft 11 5/8ins long, which is considerably longer than the 32-34ft length of the ex-6 wheel stock which form the rest of the artics.

Were these carriages eight-wheel rigids before conversion?

I have failed to find any six-wheeled NPCS vehicles longer than 36ft in HCD vol3.

If one averages out the total weight of the quint over its length, then the weight of the end carriages is 17 1/2 tons compared to the 13 I/2 tons of the centre carriages. Would the six Mansell wheels have been happy with the increased axle loading?

Any ideas?

Earlswood nob

Think you will indeed find that they were originally rigid 8 wheelers, but it is also true to say that quite early in GNR days,
there were some 40 foot 6 wheelers, before they settled on the shorter ones. Actually I am pretty sure that John mentioned that
they were converted 8 wheelers.

Interestingly, I can find no evidence that the GNR converted any of their longer 4 wheelers to 6 wheelers, unlike the Midland.

Remember in regard to the earliest question, the artics of 6 wheelers were an economic answer to the problem of not being able
to afford the quite dramatic price differential between rigids and bogie carriages in the earleish years of Gresley as C&W,
and they had inherited a number of quite new carriages from the ECJS which were too good to dismantle. Whilst there were detail drawings
of the articulation there seem to be none that relate to changes of the ends.

Paul

G'day all

Thanks John Coffin for the info.

In the description of the set (12) of drawings it says GNR quint brake compo (ex-6 & 8 wheel stock).

I've also noticed that the articulation bogies are of the heavy duty variation.

Perusing the Isinglass catalogue, I notice that there is a 90ft twin and 123ft triplet listed, which I guess were also ex-8wh rigids.

I don't think any 8 wheel rigid carriages survived intact into the thirties, so I don't intend building any as 8 wheel carriages, it's merely my thirst for information, which is fueled by this forum.

Earlswood Nob