nabisco shunter Welwyn Garden city.

[Gra]

I guess space is limited Gra but it's a pity you can't include the running lines north of the Hunter's Road overbridge towards the Digswell Rise overbridge (the next bridge down road) because you could then replicate the 'main line shunt' moves of propelling terminating trains from the Down main line back into the Up slow line platform.

Mickey

PS Anychance of a 'play on it' when it's finished it would be like a walk down memory lane for me...

That's exactly what I intend to do, Mickey. I haven't made it clear that the layout will be a tailchaser, running round my loft. I have a straight run of some 28ft for the Twentieth to Hunters section. I will be able to replicate the main line shunt and the train will be out of sight, on a curve, the other side of Hunters when it stops to reverse back.

We will see what we can do re a visit when there is something really worth seeing. I think there is a picture of you in the box on the forum as a long haired lad, am I right? How about making up a model "you" that I can place standing at the top of the steps, outside the box?

Gra

[Hatfield Shed]

I'm currently modelling Welwyn Garden City station, Mickey which will eventually include the Nabisco sidings...

Big isn't it?...

Yes it is! You spot on re the bridges. There is some compression in the pointwork between the platforms and Hunters but the platforms are a true scale 600ft long so I can accommodate trains of prototypical length. There will also be some compression between the platforms and Twentieth Mile but not too much as I want to keep the sidings as long as possible in order to fit the suburban trains that parked up there. There will also be some compression between the Hertford Branch platform and the end of the footbridge by Nabisco. The layout is viewed from the Nabisco side.

When I thought about what to build from ECML subjects in the KX suburban area, having at last a decent space to use; I wondered which side WGC would best be viewed from, and never did make up my mind. Finally settled on Hatfield, viewed from the East side.

So all we have to do now is find a way of joining my 'Hatfield' (once constructed) onto the 20th mile end of your layout, and we will be laughing. Still building the storage at the moment, that has to be complete and tested before the scenic goes atop. Hatfield is surprisingly compact considering what it packs in, and with a little compression and licence at the South end the visual breaks are bridges for me too. (The road underbridge to the South becomes an overbridge bridging a cutting in short.)

[Mickey]

I think the Nabisco's diesel shunter was re-fuelled inside the Nabisco's factory sidings cos i don't believe i ever saw it come out of those sidings?.

Mickey

[Eccentric]

The little Fowler must have been quite shy, because very few pictures of it have surfaced. On the other hand, if what follows about its use is correct, then there would have been little opportunity to see it close-up unless visiting the factory.

Here is a link to one image - taken in August 1974 which I think was at, or just past, the end of rail transport at this site:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/91977133@ ... 57N4-uzwGP

A bit of history as far as I can piece together:

The locomotive was supplied by Fowler in 1934 - the factory was operational by the end of 1926 and the rail link was used during construction, so shunting would have been carried out by other means until 1934.

It worked continuously until the end of the rail-hauled grain era in 1974(?), when it was locked up in its shed.

Originally fitted with a Waukesha 4 cyl gasoline engine, a 2 cyl McClaren diesel was installed by Fowlers engineers in 1952.

Reputedly wagons were pushed into / pulled from the headshunt siding by a BR locomotive, so the Fowler simply trundled to-and-fro along the straight rear connecting line and factory sidings.

The reported use of an 0-6-0 loco would suggest one on hire (to cover repair work maybe) at some stage?

If anyone knows of any other photos of this locomotive, or the Nabisco factory rail system in use, I would be very pleased to hear from you.

Tony

[ajb200]

Firstly, many thanks for the posts in reply to my query. a great help. The 0-6-0 and 0-4-0 shunters referred to are most likely the BR yard pilots, usually a Hitchin 03 class shunter, or an 08 as a stand by.

As for the freight workings. I suspect the consist was worked down as a pick up from Hitchin by a J1 or J6 0-6-0 loco. I remember seeing a mid afternoon southbound pick up at langley Junction many times, that shunted Falder and Willmotts coal siding before heading south. It seems likely that the evening northboud working would be the return of this. The timings fit. The loco would have shunted the WGC yard before returning. i cannot remember if a Hatfield N1/N2/ or N7 ever worked as yard pilot at WGC between branch duties?????. AJB200

[Hatfield Shed]

In the BR period the N1, N2 and N7 were the dominant classes at Hatfield and consequently performed yard work at WGC, the N1s all gone by the mid-fifties, and there were examples of J52, J67, J69 allocated to Hatfield at various times which will have tripped over; and 'exotica' N5 69266 during summer 1959 which definitely shunted WGC yard at least once, because I saw it in the act.

The pick up freight was a J6 then briefly a B1 turn, before the EE thousand horse and Brush type 2 took over. Did an L1 ever get on this job, I don't know?

[Mickey]

I have occasionally thought that Nabisco's sidings would have made a nice little piece of railway to have retained for preservation in the past maybe for either a steam loco (probably a tank loco?) or even a B.R.diesel (a class 31 would be have been nice?) along with a maybe a couple of B.R.Mk1 coaches and and a few box vans and a couple of brake vans as well?. The total length of the Nabisco's sidings which basically ran straight from the buffer stop at the headshunt end (the single siding road broke out roughly at the midway section into 3 roads for the rest of the way passed the rear of the Nabisco factory) to the buffer stops at the Bridge Road end was at a rough guess I would say around 400-500 yards long?.

Mickey

[Hatfield Shed]

Even more, roughly 26 chains or 570 yards was my 'on the ground' estimate, with the help of management bods I knew at Nabisco and Polycell enabling access.

What killed the prospect for any preservation in the area was the combination of the high land values and occupation. The Hatfield Luton and Dunstable would have been a nice route; survived relatively late, attractive countryside and stations, easily reached directly from the London area; but just for a start at WGC the branch roadbed and platform face that once served the branch is still in full time use for the London inner suburban service.

[Mickey]

My own guess of between 400-500 yards wasn't to far off the mark.

As previously posted before by myself a friend of mine mentioned to me back in 1968/69 about possibly buying the railway land around the former Ayot station and doing something with it with railway preservation in mind maybe in a similar way that Quainton Road started in Buckinghamshire (north west of Aylesbury Town) around the sametime 1969/70?. Yes the Welwyn Garden City-Ayot-Wheathampstead-Harpenden East-Luton Hoo-length was quite an attractive route going through some nice open countryside for a lot of the route until approaching Vauxhall sidings on the approach to Luton Town and Luton Bute Street station.

[Hatfield Shed]

Even more, roughly 26 chains or 570 yards was my 'on the ground' estimate, with the help of management bods I knew at Nabisco and Polycell enabling access.

My own guess of between 400-500 yards wasn't to far off the mark.

Mickey

Quite so.

I was surprised at just how long it was, extending well to the South beyond any requirement for moving wagons on and off the Nabisco sidings. Before my time, but from a pre WWII map the South end had at one time at least one parallel siding off it serving factory sites on Broadwater Road, sites which were occupied post war by the Polycell and Roche establishments, and also a siding sharply curved on to an almost due east alignment just North of what were formerly the film studio buildings, later occupied by Polycell. (Last siding on a very similar layout to the many industrial sidings off the first mile of the Hertford branch, once it had diverged from the ECML.)

[Mickey]

An interesting post Hatfield Shed I wasn't aware of any of that?. The Roche building which is still there is located south of Welwyn Garden City station and set back from the railway towards the south end of the Up yard opposite to where the flyover rises over the 4 running lines so a siding that went atleast as far as the Roche building was a fairly long siding running more or less parallel to the Up yard but set back from it. (Broadwater Road runs more or less in a straight line most of it's way from the corner of the Nabisco's/Shredded Wheat factory at the junction with Bridge Road East, Bessemer Road & Broadwater Road southwards towards the Twentieth Mile roundabout near the Twentieth Mile tall brick arched railway bridge).

Funny the time I was at Welwyn Garden City (box) as a 'box lad' between July 1972-March 1974 I never took a walk around to the Nabisco's sidings/Shredded Wheat factory to take a closer look at the headshunt and buffer stops and also taken some photographs as well (although you could see most of the sidings from the top of the footbridge that spanned right across from the station entrance side to the Shredded Wheat factory side) athough I wish I had done so now also I wish I had made an effort and taken some photographs of inside 'Garden City' box and around the station & yard area but at the time you never think it was all going to end?.

[JeremyF]

Hi I am also looking for the Shredded Wheat Shunter. Does anyone know where this is now?

[buddy]

Does anyone know the whereabouts of the Nabisco Shunter Engine now? I understand it was in the Fleggburgh museum Norfolk until 1973 when this museum closed down. I worked at Nabisco in 1960 and am interested in its history.

[Hatfield Shed]

For those that don't know, the later silos have been demolished and much of the factory complex, so that what is supposedly left are the original 1926 silos and buildings, a much more compact site. Some talk of an art gallery/display space in the buildings, amongst a large new housing development for which proposals are being worked up. Hopefully something will be done about the near derelict through heavy corrosion east end of the footbridge before it suffers some structural failure...

[Neal]

Buddy
As of tomorrow the ex shredded wheat Fowler with the maclaren engine will be at our premises to begin a restoration to running order. The location is secret as it is a private address and we don't want hoards of people wanting to come and visit just for a look. However for those people with a genuine interest, visits could be arranged. Unfortunately the shunter has been stored outside for about the last ten years and is in poor condition, including being siezed up, but nothing too serious at the first inspection. This is not destined to be a long term restoration, and should have it working by next year.
Neal