West End Workbench

[rob]

Great recycling Jon,those CCT's look great...as ever overawed by your plasticard skills too!

[jwealleans]

Cheers, Rob, I'm quite pleased with the way they've scrubbed up. Very remiss of me not to comment on how helpful Matt Chivers was with the castings I was missing from the bogies. I now have enough to complete the low roof one which is skulking at the back of the test track.

Now, my little puzzler from last week. As I mentioned back upthread I had a few days in May where I kept being given part-finished items. At Middlesbrough show, Scottiedog of this parish handed me a plastic bag containing two etched coaches. These, I found, were Arthur's (ArthurK otp) prototypes for some North Eastern bow ended vestibuled stock. They do appear on Arthur's workshop thread on RMWeb but the images appear to have gone for the moment. They were part built; one was on bogies and the other a basically complete bodyshell.



D 152 all first in nickel-silver.



D 156 all third in brass.

I believe these were built from 1908 for services between Newcastle, Liverpool, Leeds and Glasgow. They lasted until after the war, in the main. Some were fitted with Gresley bogies in later life.

I contacted Arthur a few weeks ago and he was kind enough to send through the remaining parts from the etches and another pair of bogies. I've been working on them slowly for about a fortnight but I didn't want to post them until there was discernible progress. With the acquisition of springing wire at Wakefield I've got them both onto bogies and so here they are. Parts for roofs and interiors are on the way and I'm hoping to receive the castings in the near-ish future so as to be able to complete them.









These are prototypes and as I'm sure Arthur will elaborate there will be changes to the final design. The principal one as I understand it will be a separation of coach body and floor so the interior can attach to the floorpan and the body lift off. That is my preferred means of assembling coaches. I can vouch for the presence of the compartment walls making it very fiddly to attach droplights and door hinges.

The design of the inset end doors is neat, they being part of the end etch which is shaped and then attached to the sides at the inner end of the door. Bogies are sprung and very smooth and free running.

[Atlantic 3279]

So you've recovered from model railway overload?

I do like those NE bow-ended coaches, both prototype and your brass models . The "Gresley, but not quite" appearance does a good job of fooling self-appointed expert observers at times. As Model Railway Constructor mentioned many years ago too, the fact that they are short makes them ideal for running on layouts whose curves are a bit on the tight side. More people ought to model them.....
Even though I knew that NE carriage livery was for some time "Crimson Lake" I was still surprised, as a result of many years of being mentally conditoned to expect teak finish on bow/dome ended stock, to see a set of these coaches in crimson on Keighley club's 7mm Ravensbeck layout

[jwealleans]

So you've recovered from model railway overload?

Just about. It may be a few more days before I can approach a 7mm layout.

They do look good in Crimson. These will have to be brown - some NE stock was scumbled (like those 49' examples we had on Marske this weekend) but I don't think these ever were.

There's a really good picture of one of these in a book somewhere, but can I like h*ll find it now I want it.

[IAK]

Oooooo, very tasty!
Now one or two of those would be nice to play with.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

[ArthurK]

Nice to see the work that Jonathan has put into these. I started the build of these and passed them over to a third party for comment. Now that Jonathan has got his hands on them I can look forward to seeing them completed. I also did test builds of four compartment corridor brake first (D153) and the two compartment brake first (D154). These are written up on RMWEB under 'Arthur's Workshop'

There are some design features that I would like to change and given time I will modify the artwork In particular there is a necessary change to the bogie design also Jonathan and others would like the body shell and underframe, with compartments, as separate bolt together items. I am looking into that as well.

At the moment I have been busy pushing on with the Q5/2 and the B15, both of which should appear in the new year. Hopefully the Q5/2 wil be available in middle/late January. Having said all that the coaches are certainly not forgatten. It is my intention to produce trhe range of these coaches D152 through to the Bogie Brake D159. If my memory is correcy there were only four of the latter.

ArthurK

[scottiedog]

Jonathan,

Re the ex NER 49' Low Arc Roofed Coaches. There is a comprehensive article on this stock in the British Railway Journal, NER Special Edition. The article includes photographs of a Dia 53 4 Compartment Brake 3rd in LNER simulated teak livery. There are also photographs of other Dias of this stock, in this livery, at the Ken Hoole Study Centre. I do not know how long they ran in this guise.

A detailed history of the NER Bow Ended NER Gangwayed Coaches can be found in British Railway Journal, No 34, Christmas 1990. There are drawings of these coaches in the Isinglass range. These cover the LNER alterations e,g, Whestinghose Brake removal dates, and in some cases withdrawl dates. Further info on request!

[JASd17]

Hi all,

Jonathan nice to meet you 'shunting' at the weekend.

The NER corridor stock certainly looks very fine. But there were very few examples, compared with the Gresley stock, less than 70 I believe. They were still used on Newcastle-York-Hull services in the early 1930s. Some on the Hull-Liverpool services too.

Some of the NER stock was converted into Buffet cars too. Most lasted into early BR days - longer than the B15s etc. Arthur!

Although I think some of the ex-GCR Liverpool-Hull route stock in 1932 was the Parker stock for the GC London extension, see inter area working 583/4 in the 'NERA edition' May 1932 roster.

John

[Atlantic 3279]

Any known transfers of the NE bow-ended stock to the Southern area of the LNER before 1939?

[JASd17]

There's a really good picture of one of these in a book somewhere, but can I like h*ll find it now I want it.

Are you thinking of the one in Mr Campling's Pendragon edition of LNER Carriage drawings? An Open Third I believe, wrongly described as a Corridor Third.

John

[jwealleans]

Hello, John. Yes, it's always nice to put a face to a name. I hope you enjoyed the layout and the show.

Are you thinking of the one in Mr Campling's Pendragon edition of LNER Carriage drawings?

I was. In fact it was right under my nose on the end of the workbench - I'd convinced myself it was in a Michael Harris book and had looked all over the place for it.

A detailed history of the NER Bow Ended NER Gangwayed Coaches can be found in British Railway Journal, No 34, Christmas 1990

It can. At the risk of making myself look even dimmer than I just have, I got that out when you gave me the coaches, David, and put it just above my desk where I promptly forgot about it. I did remember that I have the BRJ NER special, though - because when I first saw those coaches of Martin's I thought the livery was wrong, but clearly the builder had done his research.

In the interest of balance I should observe that Bill lists these coaches in his made to order range. I have a D 159 body in the cupboard.

No note in the article of transfers to the Southern area, sadly, Graeme - most of the ones which went anywhere seem to have gone to Scotland. There were some later builds based on these which went to the GE section but they were different. Bill lists one of those.

Soldering on these is now all but complete - just the whitemetal bits to stick on. I'm away for a few days now, though, so please don't hold your collective breaths.

[scottiedog]

Any known transfers of the NE bow-ended stock to the Southern area of the LNER before 1939?

[scottiedog]

Any known transfers of the NE bow-ended stock to the Southern area of the LNER before 1939?

As Jonathan says, there were no transfers to the Southern Area of the LNER. However, I do recall seeing at least one photograph (at the Ken Hoole Study Centre) of some of these coaches on a train working into Kings Cross in the 1930s. I think that they were an excursion - possibly a football special. Now there's a thought!

[jwealleans]

According to that article, weren't they the regular stock for a Scarborough/Whitby - KX service?

[JASd17]

According to that article, weren't they the regular stock for a Scarborough/Whitby - KX service?

I think that may have been a Southern Area working, so most likely GN stock. Although things may have been more complicated over the summer.

John