Keeping The Balance - 1974 Articles by D. Rowland

borderreiver

Active member
I have managed to buy five out of six articles from 1974 by D. Rowland contained in "Model Railways" Magazine. While they are now almost 45 years old they were compiled at a time when the period he talked about was within living memory of the adults who worked the railway. He started research because he wanted to know how he could produce a balanced layout representing the L.M.S.R. in 1938. How many locomotives, how many carriages and how many wagons. I will read them through and put some information in this thread because I think that his research is still valid for representing a time that has now been largely gone from this world for fifty years.

Rowland's findings were startling for what they revealed about the railway modellers wanted to reproduce. While the physical size and number of vehicles required was daunting for a railway modeller in 1974 the average Trainzer has nothing like the same constraints in 2018 (buying hardware and having money for assets are still their own constraints though!).

Some basic findings by Rowland:

1. 10 locomotives, 23 coaches, 8 non-passenger carrying vehicles, 19 service wagons and 714 merchandise wagons required for his notional 1938 L.M.S.R. model railway layout!
2. Of the wagons almost half were Private Owner wagons and the vast majority of private owner wagons were coal wagons, equally divided between 10 Ton and 12 Ton capacities
3. Of the railway owned wagons over half of them were in the common user pool.
4. Half of all railway owned wagons were open merchandise wagons, with two-thirds of those being of 12 ton capacity.
5. Only one in six railway owned wagons were covered vans, with two-thirds being of 12 Ton capacity. Only 1 in 10 of the total wagon population.
6. There were more loco coal wagons than there were locomotives, other service wagons being ash, coke and sand wagons.
7. Brake vans, special wagons, tank wagons, salt wagons and cattle trucks were present in much lower numbers than open wagons.
 
Don Rowland's article on Keeping the Balance" on Locomotives - L.M.S.R. 1938

7,644 locos in L.M.S.R. stock in 1938, around 5,176 tender locomotives and 2,404 tank locomotives with 33 Garratts and 31 diesels.

4-6-2 = 28 Express Passenger
4-6-0 = 314 Express Passenger
4-6-0 = 688
4-4-2 = nil
4-4-0 = 741
2-8-0 = 109
2-6-0 = 289
2-4-0 = 15
0-10-0 = 1
0-8-0 = 727
0-6-0 = 2364

4-6-4T = 8
4-6-2T = 15
4-4-2T = 73
2-6-4T = 347
2-6-2T = 209
2-4-2T = 291
2-4-0T = 1
0-8-4T = 30
0-8-2T = 18
0-8-0T = 1
0-6-2T = 171
0-6-0T = 938
0-4-4T = 232
0-4-2T = 4
0-4-0T = 66

Don looked at 24 smaller L.M.S.R. sheds (such as Watford (1C), Bolton Plodder Lane (10D), Penrith (12C), Aviemore (32B), Stranraer (12H), Swansea Upper Bank (4C) and Holyhead (7C)). He mentioned that Central Division had few smaller sheds. His suggested "recommendations" are listed below but your own shed allocations depend on how much you have researched the allocation and traffic for the time period you select. Each recommendation is based around a ten loco allocation average.

Western Division: - 10 locos: - 3 x 0-6-0, 2 x 0-6-0T, 1 x 0-6-2T, 1 x 2-6-2T, 1 x 2-6-4T, 1 x 4-6-0 and 1 x 0-8-0
Midland Division: - 10 locos: - 1 x 0-4-4T, 1 x 4-4-2T, 2 x 4-4-0, 3 x 0-6-0, 1 x 0-6-0T, 1 x 2-6-2T and 1 x 2-6-4T
Central Division: - 10 locos: - 3 x 2-4-2T, 3 x 0-6-0, 1 x 0-6-0T, 1 x 2-6-0, 1 x 2-6-2T, and 1 x 4-6-0
Northern Division: - 10 locos: - 2 x 0-4-4T, 3 x 4-4-0, 3 x 0-6-0 and 2 x 0-6-0T

Express passenger engines in red livery account for just one in ten locos.
0-6-0 tender engines are almost half the total of tender engines.
0-6-0 tank engines are the largest class of tank engine.

Some allocations (Don used 1945):

Warwick Shed (2E): - 17 Locos Western Division: 4 x 2-4-2T, 4 x 0-6-0, 4 x 2-6-2T and 5 x 0-8-0.
Trafford Park Shed (19G): - 19 Locos Midland Division: 6 x 4-4-0, 1 x 0-6-0, 4 x 2-6-2T, 1 x 4-6-0, 4 x 4-6-0 (5XP & 6P), and 2 x 2-8-0
Fleetwood Shed (24F): - 25 Locos Central Division: 5 x 2-4-2T, 5 x 0-6-0, 8 x 0-6-0T, 5 x 2-6-0, and 2 4-6-0.
Stranraer Shed (12H): - 15 Locos Northern Division: 5 x 4-4-0, 8 x 0-6-0 and 2 x 0-6-0T
 
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Don Rowland's article on "Keeping the Balance" regarding Passenger Coaches - L.M.S.R. 1938.

Generally speaking L.M.S.R. passenger coaches were confined to regular workings and did not wander off the L.M.S.R. system. There were several through workings (Liverpool Lime St - Newcastle) which also brought some foreign carriages to the L.M.S.R. but they were relatively infrequent. By and large the L.M.S.R. passenger train was composed entirely of L.M.S.R. coaches.

This was very different from the freight situation. Even before the pooling and common user agreements through workings of freight wagons was extensive. The late-19th Century Gauge Commissioners were persuaded that retaining the broad gauge would perpetuate the worst feature associated with it, that of the requirement for transhipment! So, even in pre-grouping days, boxes of Mr. Carr's celebrated biscuits baked and loaded in Carlisle would travel all the way to Eastbourne, taking a L.N.W.R. covered van on to the L.B. & S.C.R. At first, the L.N.W.R. van had to be sent back immediately but over the years pooling and common user agreements allowed that virtually all railway-owned wagons to be loaded for any station in Great Britain if need be and this was the position in 1938.

( Not in Don's article, but please note that in the case of the N.E.R./L.N.E.R. would provide a wagon where the consignor had a load of at least 2 Tons to despatch to a single consignee. For consignments below 2 Tons the load would be sent via their Road Wagon network where there WAS transhipment of loads at company assigned transhipment stations (what we today would call "hubs"). ("Road Wagon" being the British Railway company term for a railway owned wagon or covered van travelling on the railway network, not a motor vehicle travelling on the public highway. Other British Railway Companies had rules similar to those of the N.E.R./L.N.E.R. ).

The implication is that for Don's L.M.S.R. layout of 1938 he needs L.M.S.R. locomotives and L.M.S.R. passenger coaches but he needs everybody's wagons for freight workings. After September 1939 the situation changed further with the government's requisitioning of almost all Private Owner wagons and placing them in a single pool. Before WWII it would be very unusual for a Wilson's & Clyde Coal Company's wagon to turn up on the Watford & St Alban's branch but during (and after) WWII anything was possible because in the common user pool situation ANY suitable wagon which was available to take the offered traffic could load that traffic for ANY destination. Upon discharge at the destination it was then available to be loaded with any suitable load for any further destination. ( I know that during WWII to maximise utilisation/limit empty running some coal wagons after discharging the Railway Management Organisation would send the train of empties on to a Royal Ordnance factory or depot to load ammunition for an intermediate destination, particularly so if that intermediate destination was on the way towards a colliery (Coal Mine) allocated to load the train of empty coal wagons. )

Returning to the L.M.S.R. passenger coaches. in 1938 the company had 7,644 locomotives in total and 17,478 passenger coaches. This is 23 coaches for the ten locomotives on Don's notional layout. Of course not all ten were allocated to passenger work and not all had the automatic train brake equipment required for passenger train operation. In 1938 the long distance intercity traveller was a "rare bird" in terms of total passenger numbers! The average 3rd Class passenger spent 12½d (pence) (5p in modern UK decimal currency) on their ticket. Even in 1938 that did not buy many miles of travel. The average 1st Class passenger spent 2s (shillings) and 4½d (pence) (2s 4d) (14p in modern UK decimal currency). this means that for every First Class passenger presenting themselves at Euston station and asking for a single 1st Class ticket to Glasgow Central, Oban, Inverness or Aberdeen there were many lesser mortals whose ambitions stretched no further than Pinner and in 3rd Class at that! For every long distance express there will be a goodly number of stopping trains.

The L.M.S.R. tended to demote older main line corridor coaches to cross country and longer distance stopping trains rather than build new non-corridor lavatory stock, which certainly differentiates it from the policy of the L.N.E.R. at that time. This led to some very mixed trains for the passenger, especially the 1st Class passenger. Overall the older demoted corridor coaches were more comfortable than non-corridor coaches. As late as 1946 one third of all L.M.S.R. coaches were of pre-grouping origin. Don asserted that the proportion in 1938 was between 35 to 40%.

Don's summarisation of passenger coaches for his notional L.M.S.R. 1938 layout breaks down in to six passenger sets:

1. Auto Train - Stanier Composite & "Lemon" Driving Brake 3rd. ( a "Lemon" vehicle - Period II coach low waisted single window design ).
2. Fowler Brake 3rd, Fowler 3rd, Stanier Composite, Stanier Brake 3rd.
3. Pre-grouping set - Brake 3rd, 3rd, Composite, Brake 3rd.
4. Fowler Corridor Brake 3rd, Fowler Vestibule 3rd, Fowler Corridor Composite, Pre-Grouping Corridor Brake 3rd.
5. Stanier Corridor Brake 3rd, Stanier Vestibule 3rd, Stanier Corridor Composite x 2, "Lemon" Vestibule 3rd, Stanier Corridor Brake 3rd.
6. Spare set - Pre-Grouping 3rd, pre-grouping 1st, pre-grouping corridor Brake 3rd.

Set 6 would probably be "venerable" and gas lit in to the bargain. Even this breakdown is perhaps too orderly. Alternatively two new Stanier Corridor Composites could go in to set 2 and the elderly pre-grouping 1st could find itself in set 5 for a quick outing to Birmingham New Street!

Don excluded electric multiple units from his figures.

The L.M.S.R. figures Don had access to concerned seating numbers and did not readily refer to brake vehicles. Don was not overly concerned about that, as the number of brake vehicles were largely governed by the numbers of sets being made up. Don reported that strictly speaking the passenger train should have a brake compartment at each end though the L.M.S.R. were not as fastidious as other companies could be in that regard. He recommended allowing two brake vehicles per train with one or two spare for strengthening at times of heavy traffic.

In 1938 locomotive hauled coaches were split more or less 50-50 between corridor and non-corridor stock. Don wrote (in 1974) that people of the time had forgotten just how widespread the use of non-corridor stock was and that "the younger generation" ( who are not so young now 44 years on! ) could be forgiven for thinking their leg was being pulled when (in 1974) an older person spoke about a vehicle built to carry 108 passengers sat six a side in nine compartments without toilets or corridors.

N.B. - Because of the pooling and common user agreements by 1938 there is no guarantee that Mr Carr's celebrated biscuits actually departed Carlisle in a L.M.S.R. covered van! It appears from Don's article that around 43% of railway owned wagon stock in use on the L.M.S.R. was "home system vehicles" (owned by the L.M.S.R.). Some of that stock would be specialist vehicles that were not in a common user agreement but some would be ordinary wagon stock in use on the system in the course of their travels. Therefore, the van at Carlisle destined to head to Eastbourne had a 57-43 chance of NOT being a L.M.S.R. covered van! If the factory despatched one van a day for five days a week then over two weeks, on average roughly six out of ten of them would be from one of the other big four. I presume from the example Don chose that Mr Carr's biscuit company did not own any covered vans of its own (or lease some from the L.M.S.R. and apply Carr's branding).
 
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Don Rowland's article on "Keeping the Balance" regarding Non-Passenger Carrying Vehicles - L.M.S.R. 1938.

Non Passenger Carrying Coaching Stock ( NPCCS) was initially going to be part of Don's article on Passenger Coaches but he ended up producing it as a separate article, part four in his series. He did this because he found them so interesting and he felt that they deserved "a wee chapter" to themselves. in Don's notional L.M.S.R. 1938 layout for ten locomotives he determined that to be properly representative he would need 23 passenger coaches and 8 non-passenger carrying vehicles.

First, Don described which vehicles were involved. It is sometimes difficult to see the distinction between one type and another. Brake Vans differ from Luggage Vans (in L.M.S.R. terminology) because they have guard's accomodation and internal hand brake, but the dividing line between Luggage vans and parcels vans as well as between parcels vans and milk and parcels vans are harder to imagine ( FYI the N.E.R. happily officially titled some vehicles with guard's accomodation and internal hand brake as "Luggage Vans"! ). This can make it difficult to make a reasoned suggestion for the layout stock.

In 1938 the L.M.S.R. had 6,342 NPCCS compared to 17, 478 coaches so they were an important class of revenue earning vehicle. Out of the passenger coaches in 1938 only 153 were four or six wheelers whereas the NPCCS were split 2,052 bogie to 4,290 four or six wheeled, roughly two to one.

1. Brake Vans: - 1,471 bogie & 319 4/6 Wheel - Suggested Layout stock 2 bogie and 1 4/6 Wheel.
2. CCT: - 1 bogie & 197 4/6 Wheel - ( Covered Carriage Truck )
3. OCT: - 406 4/6 Wheel - ( Open Carriage Truck )
4. CT: - 846 4/6 Wheel - Suggested layout Stock 1 4/6 Wheel Combination Truck.
5. Fish Trucks: - 31 4/6 Wheel - ( All pre-grouping )
6. Fish Vans: - 771 4/6 Wheel - Suggested Layout stock 1 4/6 Wheel Van.
7. Fruit & Milk van: - 213 4/6 Wheel - Suggested Layout stock 1 4/6 Wheel Van.
8. Horse Boxes: - 943 4/6 Wheel - Suggested Layout stock 1 4/6 Wheel Van. ( Incl Special (Prize) Cattle Vans )
9. Kitchen Cars: - 109 bogie & nil 4/6 Wheel
10. Luggage Vans: - 258 bogie & 11 4/6 Wheel - Suggested Layout stock 1 bogie van.
11. Meat Vans: - 6 bogie & 61 4/6 Wheel - ( Bogie vans are probably the Palethorpes Sausage vans )
12. Milk Vans: - 2 bogie & 101 4/6 Wheel - ( Bogie vans are the Insulated Cream vans )
13. Milk & Parcels: - 12 4/6 Wheel -
14. Milk Tanks: - 158 4/6 Wheel -
15. Motor Car Vans: - 195 4/6 Wheel -
16. Newspaper Vans: - 8 bogie & nil 4/6 Wheel -
17. Parcels Vans: - 4 bogie & 12 4/6 Wheel -
18. PO Vans: - 73 bogie & 9 4/6 Wheel - ( Post Office )
19. Scenery Truck: - 11 bogie & 4 4/6 Wheel -
20. Scenery Van: - 79 bogie & nil 4/6 Wheel -
21. Misc Vans: - 20 bogie & 1 4/6 Wheel - ( Bullion Vans, Corpse Vans etc )

Suggested Layout stock - three bogie and five 4/6 Wheel NPCC vehicles

Don acknowledged that strictly speaking he should have included an Open Carriage Truck but it would have been at the loss of the Milk van (in the form of the losing the Fruit & Milk Van). He also acknowledged that he probably would have both an Open carriage Truck and Milk van but then he would be upsetting the very balance he was seeking to represent (at least on a ten locomotive layout - he never mentioned stretching it to a 20 locomotive layout!).

Don mentioned that the only NPCC vehicles on BR in the mid-1970s were the parcels vans of one sort or another (BG, GUV, etc ( Don didn't mention the Royal Mail Trains or BR parcels DMUs )). The modeller of the mid-70s could be forgiven for thinking that in 1938 Parcels Trains were the norm but that really wasn't the case (Just as Steve Banks makes it clear that it wasn't the case on the L.N.E.R.'s East Coast Main Line in the 1920s or 1930s either ). Instead, passenger trains, especially stopping passenger trains, often had one or more NPCCS vehicles added to their formation. Sometimes such vehicles outnumbered the passenger coaches. Even in the mid-1950s during BR days out of London suburban trains out of Kings Cross would regularly stop at Crews Hill to set down or pick up Horse Boxes. Just imagine that today!

Don mentioned that the decison the modeller makes about the stock they run is down to them. However, if they want to be accurate in the representation of the L.M.S.R. in 1938 he said that they should consider what were the proportions of vehicles that existed.
 
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Further to Don Rowland's article on NPCCS, a couple of points:

I was rather surprised that on the L.M.S.R. in 1938 with the size of it that it had only 771 Fish Vans and 31 Fish Trucks ( All the fish trucks being of pre-grouping origin and I wonder how many were still being used for fish traffic in 1938? ). I think of busy fishing ports like Aberdeen and Fleetwood and places such as Kyle of Lochalsh which landed fish from the Hebrides fleet. London Billingsgate was the country's largest market but Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow on the L.M.S.R. system were not markets with a demand to be ignored. I can't help but be a little amazed that the L.M.S.R. fish traffic relied on just 771 vans, of which some must have been out of action due to the normal requirements of repair and maintenance. This must put "the fish train" in Rowland's "rare bird category, though the suggested stock for his notional layout does run to one van. A small fishing port or a small market receiving a fish delivery. It seems it would be the main line modeller who runs a fish train on the W.C.M.L. or E.C.M.L.

I am assuming that with Parcels vans amounting to just 4 bogie and 12 4/6 Wheel vans while "Milk & Parcels" vans adds just 12 more 4/6 wheel vans across the whole of the L.M.S.R. system, that to reach a situation where vehicles carrying parcels could outnumber passenger coaches in a stopping train that the L.M.S.R. was using vehicles for parcels that were not titled "Parcels Vans"/"Milk & Parcels Vans" I naturally reach for the 1,792 Brake Vans to fill the role but the photograph Don used to illustrate an NPCCS vehicle on a passenger train appears to be a four wheel covered goods van in 1948. It was marshalled behind a 2P 4-4-0 loco number 427 still lettered LMS (repainting was a process not an event - it took time to get every loco and piece of rolling stock repainted) so a fitted van and it is not easy to determine if it is a L.M.S.R. van or not. I assume that it is one, since Don's statistics say it is 43% possible! it might not be one of the 24 4/6 Wheel Parcel or Milk & Parcel vans. A decade later the BR NE Region was certainly pressing 4 wheel fitted 12 Ton covered vans in to service in passenger trains for parcels traffic. A creative "accountancy trick" Don could have applied would be to have his Open Carriage truck and draw on one of the 714 goods wagons ( a fitted 12 ton covered goods wagon ) to replace the suggested 4/6 Wheel Brake Van in his suggested layout stock NPCCS! He has provided his own justification in the photo in his article.
 
Don Rowland's article on "Keeping the Balance" regarding Goods Wagons - L.M.S.R. 1938.

Don started with reiterating that while the locomotives, passenger coaches and NPCCS on his notional L.M.S.R. 1938 layout for ten locomotives will entirely be L.M.S.R. vehicles it is very different when it comes to goods wagons. Even in pre-grouping days there was inter-working of wagons between one company and another. The 1917 Common User Agreement allowed companies to use as their own stock certain wagons belonging to other companies. This agreement was extended from time to time so that by 1938 the great majority of railway owned wagons were in the pool. ( I have Tatlow's "LNER Wagons Vol 2" which shows a N.E.R. 10 ton Diagram C9 5 Plank Open Wagon at Barmouth in 1924 - well within the territory of the G.W.R. )

Twice weekly balances ensured that a company did not lose wagons, but that any losses were made up with wagons, anybody's wagons, of a similar type. So, although the L.M.S.R. had a stock of so many common user variants the agreement only ensured that that number would be on the L.M.S.R. system; they could and did belong to all four companies. Therefore, although Don knew that the L.M.S.R. had a certain wagon stock and round about that number would always be on the L.M.S.R. system just what the mix would be he could not say.

The Private Owner wagon was another issue. After initial registration by a railway company that it was built to a standard a wagon could run virtually anywhere in Great Britain that its owners wished. The only figures Don had access to were for total PO wagons registered and how many of them would be on the L.M.S.R. at any given time he was unable to say. Don also believed neither could the L.M.S.R.! therefore, when it comes to determining how many wagons he should have for hauling by the ten locomotives he had to make some assumptions. Don suspected that by the time he'd finished that the reader would come to the decision that it would really make little difference.

In 1938 the L.M.S.R. had 285,811 wagons. Don assumed that at any given time some 285,611 railway owned wagons were on the L.M.S.R. give or take a couple of hundred ( a mere 0.1% error in accounting returns or reporting would be 285 wagons! ) That works out at 374 wagons for the ten locomotives. Those are just for capital stock. Don analysed that another 19 wagons should be assigned to represent the 14,488 service vehicles. ( 393 wagons on an OO gauge layout! Luckily for us in Trainz our wagons do not take up space anywhere but on disk space and RAM. ) the PO wagons now must be accomodated. In Great Britain as a whole there were 605,099 PO wagons compared with 663,589 railway owned vehicles. Obviously not all of them would be on the L.M.S.R. but as mentioned above, it is not known just how many of them would be. Don had to make an estimate. Of the 663,589 railway wagons the L.M.S.R. accounted for 285,611 (43%) of them. Assuming that 43% of all PO wagons, some 260,193, were on the L.M.S.R. this adds a further 340 wagons to the layout. that makes a grand total of 733! ( While Don believed the 43% of PO wagons was a reasonable assumption, I believe that if anything it was a little low. The L.M.S.R. would have had a higher than the "average" British density of PO wagons because the N.E.R. ( later the NE Area of the L.N.E.R. ) had historically a very high level of railway owned coal wagon provision and successfully pursued it through the near monopoly enjoyed by the N.E.R. across North and East Yorkshire, County Durham and Northumberland. )

How was the wagon stock made up?
Don recapped that for a layout designed to represent the L.M.S.R. in 1938 around a shed allocated ten locomotives that the modeller would require 23 passenger coaches, 8 NPCCS and 733 wagons. Don then asserted that this was probably not what the reader expected. From entries in the contemporary Model Railway press of the day (1974). Don wrote that this is why he wrote the articles "Keeping the Balance" because of the articles he saw in the Model Railway press of the day which the modeller appeared to have proportions reversed to more like 733 locos, 23 coaches and 10 wagons!

Don's article then listed wagons in several tables. he did list a couple of caveats:

1. Table 2 tabulated railway owned vehicles, but Don had already reported that not all the railway owned wagons on the L.M.S.R. would be L.M.S.R. wagons, not by some degree, far from it.
2. In Table 1 the railway owned wagons are listed by type. While in theory if all railway owned wagons were common user then 43% should be L.M.S.R. not all railway owned wagons were actually common user., just the great majority of them. In addition non-common user wagons owned by the L.M.S.R. could, and did load for travel outside the L.M.S.R. system. They would have had to be handled like the L.N.W.R. wagon hauling Mr Carr's celebrated biscuits to the L.B. & S.C.R. before the 1917 Common User Agreement - sent back immediately. It was the return journey that mattered. This upsets the balance to a degree but is hard to quantify with any reliability.
3. Don had been told that despite the Common User Agreement, some railwaymen liked to use their own wagons. Back in 1974 Don had not been able to unearth evidence verifying that. Even if that was so Don's notional layout would have a goodly mix of wagons. Even on G.W.R. branches the same Common User Agreement would apply and the typical bucolic G.W.R. branch would not, as some enthusiasts believe, be served purely by G.W.R. wagons.
4. The PO Wagons. the only official figure Don had for 1938 was 583,789 ( source British Railways Facts and Figues 1952 and 1958 Editions ) This stated that 583,789 wagons were requisitioned in 1939 at the start of WWII and a further 21,310 were not requisitioned. There is a discrepancy and Table 3 is the result.

The Tables in the next forum post: -
 
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Don Rowland's article on "Keeping the Balance" regarding Goods Wagons - L.M.S.R. 1938. - the Tables

Table 1: - Railway Owned Wagon Stock 1938

G.W.R. - 82,453 = 12.4%
L.N.E.R. - 258,236 = 39.0%
L.M.S.R. - 285,611 = 43.0%
S.R. - 33,709 = 5.1%
Misc - 3,580 = 0.5%
Total 663,589

Table 2: - L.M.S.R. Wagon Stock 1938

Open Goods Wagons = 147, 811 ( 193 ) ( Figures in brackets are the suggested number for the layout )

Under 8 Tons - 81 - ( nil )
8 - 9.9 Tons - 12,224 - ( 16 )
10 - 11.9 Tons - 39,068 - ( 51 )
12 Tons - 91,574 - ( 120 )
12.1 - 19.9 Tons - 1,198 - ( 1 )
20 Tons + - 3,664 - ( 5 )
20 Tons + Bogie - 2 - ( nil )

Covered Goods Wagons = 51,220 ( 68 )

Under 7 Tons - 393 - ( nil )
7 - 9.9 Tons - 6,318 - ( 8 )
10 - 11.9 Tons - 13,593 - ( 18 )
12 Tons - 30,873 - ( 42 )
12.1 - 19.9 Tons - 43 - ( nil )

Mineral Wagons = 62,509 ( 82 )

Under 8 Tons - 1 - ( nil )
8 - 9.9 Tons - 1,576 - ( 2 )
10 - 11.9 Tons - 4,159 - ( 5 )
12 Tons - 50,002 - ( 66 )
12.1 - 19.9 Tons - 3,586 - ( 5 )
20 Tons + - 3,139 - ( 4 )
20 Tons + Bogie - 46 - ( nil ) Fitted

Special Wagons = 3,450 ( 4 )

Ordinary - 3,179 - ( 4 )
Bogie - 271 - ( nil ) Fitted

Cattle Trucks = 7,272 ( 9 )

Rail and Timber Trucks = 7,732 ( 10 )

Ordinary - 6,196 - ( 8 )
Bogie - 1,536 - ( nil ) Fitted

Brake Vans = 5,617 ( 8 )

10 - 15 tons - 202 - ( nil )
Over 15 Tons - 5,415 - ( 8 )

Total Operating Stock = 285,611 ( 374 )

Service Vehicles = 14,488 (19)Ballast Wagons = 3,361 - ( 4 )
Breakdown Cranes = 60 - ( nil ) incl ballast Brakes
Loco Wagons = 8,903 - ( 13 ) Loco Coal, Coke, Ash and Sand Wagons
Gas Holder trucks = 117 - ( nil )
Mess/Tool Vans = 546 - ( 1 )
Rail & Sleeper = 658 - ( 1 ) Timber, Rail & Sleeper Trucks
Travelling Cranes = 274 - ( nil )
Miscellaneous = 569 - ( nil )

Table 3: - Private Owner Wagon Stock 1939

Mineral Wagons = 583,789 ( 328 )

8 Tons - 28,114 - ( 16 )
10 Tons - 272,901 - ( 153 )
12 & 13 Tons - 269,782 - ( 152 )
15 Tons - 3,899 - ( 2 )
20 Tons + - 9,093 - ( 5 )

Special Wagons = 21,310 ( 12 )

Special Traffic - 21,310 - ( 12 ) Salt, Tar, Lime, Petroleum, Acid etc

Tables 2 and 3 reveal some facts, Don expanded on them;

1. Almost exactly half the railway owned wagons are open merchandise wagons ( 198 out of 393) and 2/3rds of those 198 are 12 Tons.
2. 2/3rds of Covered Vans are also 12 Tons.
3. Even so, vans are relatively rare, only 1 in 6 of railway owned vehicles and 1 in 10 of all goods vehicles.
4. Most L.M.S.R. owned Mineral Wagons were 12 Tons. While 1 in 5 L.M.S.R. owned goods vehicles were mineral ones PO Mineral wagons dwarfed them.
5. Special types (Cattle Wagons & Brake vans) were statistically "lost" in the noise ( yet the L.M.S.R. & G.W.R. were the majority Cattle Wagon owners!)
6. Loco Coal, Coke, Ash & Sand wagons were the largest group of service wagons - the layout should have more loco coal wagons than locos.
7. The vast majority of PO wagons were coal wagons. 10 Ton and 12 Ton types were almost a 50-50 split.
8. The Special traffic PO wagons (including oil tank wagons) were, like the railway-owned cattle wagons, statistically "drowned out" by coal wagon numbers.
 
Further to Don Rowland's article on Goods Wagons, a couple of points:

I have read that a frequent complaint made throughout the 1920s and 1930s was that British Companies were laggardly when it came to investing in their infrastructure, be it Private Owner wagon capacity or the facilities to handle the wagons. This was obviously not helped by the economic difficulties experienced across the two decades in question. If Railway Owned 40 Ton / 50 Ton bogie Steel Body Coal Hoppers had been adopted on a wider scale how much benefit might have been gained? Probably not as much as we think unless the "elephant in the room" was also addressed ( the sheer numbers of 10 and 12 Ton PO Wagons.) The investment in loading facilities at collieries and discharge facilities at factories, gas works, ports and power stations would have necessarily have been large and money was tight. Certainly the L.N.E.R. was short of cash throughout the 1920s and 1930s, almost ruinously so between 1929 and 1933. The fact of government aid given to the railways to encourage employment is not prominently reported but it did make some difference.

Don does not explicitly mention one revolution that was taking place on the railways during the 1930s, that of containerisation. I have to presume that the 3,179 ordinary "Special Wagons" must surely have contained some conflats. It is only the 271 bogie special wagons that get an annotation as being fitted, and I do not have access to any books on L.M.S.R. container flats to verify how many (if any) were fitted with AVB during 1938. However, if the 7,272 Cattle Wagons are statistically drowned out by the sheer numbers of mineral and open wagons the presence of the conflats are even more obscured by the ubiquity of "coal dust". Even if all 3,127 ordinary "Special Wagons" were conflats they were still just six percent compared to the numbers of L.M.S.R. owned covered wagon stock, which itself was a mere 34% compared to the numbers or L.M.S.R. owned open merchandise wagons. 6% of 34% is a tiny 2.1% compared to the L.M.S.R. owned open merchandise wagon. For every Conflat there would have been roughly six Covered Vans and fifty open merchandise wagons! All of which were dwarfed by coal traffic, particularly coal traffic in PO wagons.

Like the Fish trains in the NPCCS section, trains comprising a couple of dozen conflats would seem to be a privilige of the main line modeller representing the W.C.M.L. and E.C.M.L. With 4 special traffic wagons suggested for Don's notional layout there could at least be a nod to one loaded conflat coming or going from the layout's goods yard on a pickup goods working while others pass by on other trip workings from the area's marshalling yard. The station yard will need a high capacity crane to load or unload them!

Finally, were conflats in the common user agreement pool in 1938? If the railway companies were to maximise efficiency and minimise "the great evil" of transhipment en-route then presumably they needed to be. September 1939 would have resolved the issue if they had not been before. Did Mr. Carr's celebrated biscuits leave Carlisle in a container in 1938? possibly not if conflats were around in small proportions.
 
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Don Rowland's article on "Keeping the Balance" on the implications - L.M.S.R. 1938.

This was the sixth and concluding article in Don's series, found in December 1974's issue of "Railway Modeller" magazine. Don began the articles with the supposition that a modeller had decided to model an accurate layout modelled on the L.M.S.R. as it was in 1938. He selected the number of ten locomotives allocated to the layout's shed. In pursuit of their passion for accuracy the modeller had now discovered that they needed 23 passenger coaches, 8 non-passenger carrying vehicles, 19 service vehicles and 714 goods wagons. Don's research had implications for a modeller deciding to implement his approach.

Space was the first implication. This was a physical implication for an OO Gauge modeller in 1974, and still would be today. However, the Trainz modeller of 2018 is not constrained in the same way. The physical space taken up by a 2018 Trainz modeller is the footprint of their PC and the physical space taken up by Trainz on their hard drive. A loco shed with ten locomotives was not a large one but in OO Gauge 23 passenger coaches would require 25 feet of sidings (1905 feet in the full size real world (635 yards/580.6 metres)). The wagons would need 200 feet of OO Gauge sidings (15,000 feet in the full size real world (5,000 yards/3 miles/4572 metres)). Twenty sidings, each 10 feet in length would fit the bill.
If that is a shock, then realise that the L.M.S.R. had the same problem in the real world of 1938. While the company had 6,845 route miles it required 5,978 miles of sidings. Put another way 7/8 mile of sidings for every route mile! ( If your L.M.S.R. 1938 Trainz route is 32 miles long then provision is required for 28 miles of sidings. I realise that is a bit simplistic because 32 miles somewhere on the Settle & Carlisle certainly did not have 28 miles of sidings laid out alongside it. However, should you decide to model 32 miles of route somewhere around Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool or Glasgow then you would have to probably lay rather MORE than 32 miles of sidings! The 7/8ths figure is an average across the system. )
In these days, when acres of sidings have gone in repeated spells of rationalisation it can be difficult to appreciate the fact that the steam railway had such a provision for sidings. Don believed that a general lack of sidings on many layouts contributed to some falling short in capturing the atmosphere of the prototype. ( While I can see why Don made that comment I can also see why many OO Gauge modellers have to build smaller layouts. I attended a Model Railway exhibition in last year which included a very good, (and very large) layout representing an area south of Leicester with no station in sight. There were a lot of sidings. Perhaps not an exact realisation of the prototype but still something in excess of a hundred feet of OO Gauge sidings. Not many individuals would have the space, time or money to lavish on a similar model layout. As I have already said, Trainzers are not constrained in the same way. )
For the 714 goods wagons on Don’s notional L.M.S.R. layout he suggested 8 brake vans. He explicitly ignored service wagons at this point. The traditional British goods train consisted of engine (or engines if Midland Railway), n wagons and brake van. 714-8/8 gives a figure of 88.25, so 88 wagons plus brake van for the average freight train. Don asked that before people write to him about how marvellous the 4Fs were they never hauled 89 wagons that they let him point out that officially the average L.M.S.R. freight in 1938 comprised 33.68 wagons (say 34, 23 loaded plus 11 empty) and brake van. Assume all brake vans are in work, which would be most unlikely then one would have got only 8 x 34 = 252 wagons actually on the move. You still need a lot of siding space. The twenty OO gauge sidings each ten feet in length would not be far out.
Accomodation issues are not yet resolved however. In 1938 the average L.M.S.R. goods train covered 8.88 miles each hour it was in traffic. The actual speed when under way was more than that, around 25 mph and sometimes higher. From the disparity in speeds Don inferred that the average L.M.S.R. goods train spent a lot of its time in reception roads, loops, sidings and lie-byes being examined or just waiting for the road. The layout is going to need loops and lie-byes to put the goods trains ‘inside’ whilst the 23 coaches go thundering past.
( Inspection and examination are little heard terms these days. Back in the 1970s there was a TV entertainment show called “The Wheeltappers and Shunters Club” based around the concept of a northern working men’s club ( For U.S. readers - a private club with principally male blue collar workers as members (nominally from the railway/railroad) where liquor was served and entertainment laid on regularly (singers, comedians, magicians, bingo etc.) A wheeltapper was a man employed to walk along trains while halted in yards (and sometimes stations) inspecting the train by tapping the wheels with a mallet. The sound would indicate a good wheel or a cracked wheel. Other workers would check axle boxes, topping up with oil or grease if necessary or telling the shunter to remove wagons from the train if they had defects such as hot axle boxes. Wagons requiring sheeting ( Tarpaulin covers) could be checked for tightness and trapped water pooling on flat tarps swept off). Coal trains which comprised hoppers would be checked for bottom doors being closed securely. )
Locomotive, 34 wagons and brake van does not seem like much but in OO Gauge it amounted to a length of ten feet. In 1938 with many, many more goods trains around than found today and with frequent stops for wagon examination the railways were liberal with their loops and lie-byes (generally the latter on the L.M.S.R. as a loop involved facing points and complex interlocked signalling. Setting back in to a lie-bye from a trailing turnout was simpler).
Don claimed that modellers might not over-indulge themselves with carriage sidings but would lay down as many platform faces to cope with the most abundant passenger service imaginable.

Don summed up with the following:

1. To model accurately, really accurately, a railway involves more than just excellent models, you should keep the balance.
2. Get fact, not (Don said) fiction.
3. Not too many big engines; don’t forget the 0-6-0s.
4. Not too many coaches, and plenty of non-corridors.
5. Don’t forget NPCCS.
6. Most, if not all passenger stock will be L.M.S.R. ( on the 1938 L.M.S.R. layout )
7. Lots of wagons will be needed and everybody’s wagons, especially Private Owner.
8. Plenty of open wagons and cut down on “the specials”.
9. Lots of sidings and lie-byes but the fewest passenger platform faces that can be justified.

To finish off, Don re-iterated that it was down to the modeller to decide what to run, even modelling non-L.M.S.R. railways if they want to! However, modellers presumably would find a legitimate reason to run what they wanted to run and that was fine, just so long as they knew the reason why they wanted to run it that way and being aware then that their layout was therefore not “the average” L.M.S.R. layout. That way they would be "Keeping the Balance"
 
Further to Don Rowland's article on the implications, a couple of points:

I found myself in "Barter Books" at Alnwick today, which occupies most of the eastern half of the former N.E.R. station building. I found a copy of Bill Hudson's 1988 book "Along LMS Lines Volume One Central & Western Divisions". There are plenty of photographs and I have started looking at them with Don Rowlands' articles in mind.

Plate 53 on page 39 shows the reception sidings at GOOLE during 1911 but which became part of the L.M.S.R. Central Division in 1923. Private Owner open wagons loaded with coal almost completely fill the shot. An 0-6-0 tender engine stands about eight lines back from the wagons in the foreground. The Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway promoted the port of Goole as the most inland port on the east coast (On the north bank of the River Humber The North Eastern Railway's presence at Kingston Upon Hull was only slightly irritated by the arrival of the Hull & Barnsley Railway. (The N.E.R. would take over the H.&B.R. in 1922). On the south bank of the River Humber the Great Central Railway had the great port complex at Immingham. Both would become part of the L.N.E.R. in 1923). Goole was an L.M.S.R. toehold in L.N.E.R. territory.

The caption mentions that Goole Reception sidings held 2,250 wagons and despite being taken on April 24 1911 the scene would be virtually unchanged when it became part of the L.M.S.R. 12 years later. if the average length was 20ft then there were 45,000 feet of siding space (8.5 miles/13,716 metres/13.7 km). The visible wagons are primarily from Glass Houghton Collieries Ltd, Crigglestone Colliery, and J & J Charlesworth's West Riding Collieries. All were served, to a greater or lesser degree by the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway. Some have side, bottom and end doors.

Plate 131 on page 81 shows a 4F 0-6-0, number 4350 hauling a coal train near Kenilworth in 1938. The loaded coal train appears to be almost all Private Owner wagons according to the caption. Weedon brothers, Goring; James Lush, Salisbury and Stevco, Oxford are the first three. The train appears to be at least as long as twenty wagons before the curve beneath a bridge takes the tail of it out of sight.

Plate 125 on page 78 is captioned an L.N.W.R. 0-8-0 is heading south near Northampton with a long mineral train just prior to the grouping. I can count 53 visible wagons. Several more are hidden behind the signal box and a lineside building and the caption confirms that the train had sixty or so vehicles. Visible wagons include colliery company wagons from the South Staffordshire Cannock Chase and Warwickshire coalfields, plus coal merchants from London, Brighton, Eastbourne and Winchester. Only six railway-owned vehicles were identified by the author out of the sixty in the train.
 
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Further to Don Rowland's article on Goods Wagons, more information about conflats and container traffic in 1938:

Container traffic seems to have been accomodated on low side open goods wagons as well as conflats, so some of this traffic which went unmentioned by Don Rowland in his articles could and did travel on the 39,068 10 Ton/11 Ton open merchandise wagons. They appear to have been fitted vehicles if relying on just the two examples below but more research required before saying they never travelled on loose-coupled open top merchandise wagons.

Paul Bartlett's Photography site has for sale a photograph of seven pristine LMS F4, F6, F9, F10 & F11 LMS Insulated Meat Containers with side and end doors (LMS Diag 200 lot built by Metro C&W 1929) on 204238, 210031, 218846, 212093 ex-LNWR 10 Ton open goods wagons with 9 inch sides (Diag 103) rebuilt with drop sides and vacuum brake.

Plate 254 on page 140 of Bill Hudson's 1988 book "Along LMS lines Volume One" has a Black Five 4-6-0, number 5230 travelling north in 1938. The caption describes the short train as follows; "Readers will be familiar by now that much of the Western Division goods traffic ran in the form of fitted freight trains, which could be slotted in between the passenger services with relative ease. These trains often carried specialised goods, and one particularly important source of revenue was the daily meat train between Scotland and Broad Street goods depot, which was conveniently sited for the main London meat market at Smithfield. The train picked up at various slaughterhouses in southern Scotland and Carlisle and the main empty working is seen here storming Shap in 1938 behind 'Black Five' 4-6-0, No. 5230, from Upperby shed. The train is composed of an insulated van and twelve type FM and FR containers." At least two, maybe four of those containers are travelling on low side open merchandise wagons. The wagon behind the insulated van (which was marshalled at the head of the train behind the locomotive) seems to be a 3-plank open wagon with side door. The other identifiable one eighth in the formation appears to be a one plank dropside wagon. The photograph focus implies there might be two more further back but it is not clear. I see that the train is rather short, so presumably the L.M.S.R. charged a sufficiently high premium rate to make running such a short goods train profitable.

I have to try and reconcile Bill Hudson's use of the phrase "much of the Western Division's goods traffic ran in the form of fitted freight trains" against Don Rowland's assertions. Don did not provide much information about how many of the L.M.S.R. open or covered goods wagons were fitted, or how many of the special wagons were fitted. With photographs of L.M.S.R. containers mounted on rebuilt 10 Ton LNWR open merchandise wagons these would be in the 39,068 figures Don shows for that range of vehicles. Perhaps the conflats were in there too rather than the special vehicles. How many of the 39,068 were fitted is not revealed in Don's articles. In any event, the Scotland to Broad Street meat train was a service which would have run nearly all of its journey on the W.C.M.L. so it remains one of Don's "rare birds".
 
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Further to Don Rowland's article on Goods Wagons, information about non common user wagons in 1938:

Information from the LMS Society.

The LMS freight train consisted of everyone's wagons. Almost all general service wagons were common user.

By 1933 the list of NON COMMON USER wagons had been whittled down to:-


  1. Wagons exceeding 12 tons capacity, except end door mineral and pig iron.
  2. All wagons belonging to Bishop's Castle Railway Felixstowe Dock and Railway Manchester Ship Canal Shropshire and Montgomeryshire Railway
  3. All vacuum and Westinghouse piped and fitted wagons.
  4. Cask wagons, Deal wagons, Hopper wagons, Twin wagons not fitted with bolsters, Plate, Long Low and tube wagons,
  5. Coke wagons.
  6. Specially constructed vehicles.
  7. Service vehicles.
  8. Double Bolster wagons (except SR) and 6 or 8 wheeled bolster wagons.
  9. GWR China Clay, Cattle and 20-ton end door mineral wagons.
  10. Gunpowder Vans, Meat Vans, Refrigeration Vans, Insulated Vans, Banana Vans.

The list is formidable but in practice the numbers involved were not great* especially since the LMS and LNER had a private arrangement making their fitted covered vans common user between themselves.

As from 1st March, 1941, virtually all wagons other than special vehicles became common user.

Apart from this non-common user wagons could still be back loaded to: -


  1. Stations on the owning line;
  2. Stations beyond (but via) the owning line;
  3. Stations on an intermediate company's route on a direct route home.

For all these reasons there was a good mixture of wagons on almost any LMS freight train.

* Some information on the numbers of vacuum fitted wagons below.

Further to Don Rowland's article on Goods Wagons, information about vacuum fitted wagons in 1938: -

Information from the LMS Society.

Vacuum fitted wagons were comparatively rare beasts by today's Standards. At nationalisation the relevant figures were:

Company. No. of fitted Wagons. Total = 129,691

LMS 39,039
LNE 59,964
GWR 23,776
SR 6,912

This was out of a total of 1,223,634 wagons or just about 1 in 10.
 
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I have been able to buy the missing link, July 1974's Railway Modeller Magazine with Part One of Don Rowlands' series titled "Keeping the Balance".

Don started off with a comparison between optimists and pessimists. He considered himself among the former and despite Don's evident disappointment at the appearance of "Lord Westwood", and wondering if Margate had learned any lessons from "the Triang Debacle", he considered the hobby was "sound in wind and limb". Don considered that the hobby was ready to take a step forwards. His purpose behind the KtB articles was to contribute to the direction he believed it should take, presenting some facts and figures on which his conclusions are based.

In the 1970s the ongoing refinement in standards had meant that scale modelling was possible and was accompanied by a quest for accurate prototype information. Don believed that the combination meant that any sufficiently keen modeller could produce a faithful replic of virtually any railway they wished. There were, it was true, difficulties of space, especially in the larger scales, but nevertheless the hobby had progressed to the point where such a layout could be contemplated without too much trepidation. ( Of course Trainz modellers do not need to have the same trepidation about the size of a route. There can remain some trepidation about having the skill to actually produce a large route of sufficient quality to confidently share it on the DLS! )

While the combination of scale standards and prototype information would produce exquisite models those by themselves would not produce an accurate model railway. What Don believed was required was a correct mixture of prototypes for the location to be modelled. In other words Don asserted that to create a truly life-like model the modeller should "keep the balance", hence the title of the articles. This fact of railway modelling had been relatively neglected in the past ( pre-1974 ) and in Don's opinion merited a lot more attention. The series of articles by Don was to lay out facts and figures and lay down some ground rules in the hope that modellers will know how to derive the particular balance for their next layout should they wish to do so.

Don made two points: -

1. Most of the facts and figures were averages. The skill lies in the intelligent use of averages and not in their blind acceptance.
2. Don was laying out a framework and NOT telling modellers what sort of layout they should have. That was the modeller's decision. He was merely presenting facts in a form that may have been new to the modellers of the day. Whether or not to use them is up to the modeller.

Don mentioned sources:

1. Martin Waters' articles in Model Railways for July 1973.
2. Journal of the Historical Model Railway Society articles on traffic at various locations.
3. BR official reports.
4. L.M.S.R. L.N.E.R. G.W.R. and S.R. official reports.

Which company ran the fastest passenger trains in 1938? Would it be the L.N.E.R. with its record breaking Mallard, the Flying Scotsman train and high powered pacifics? The G.W.R. with its Castles, Kings and the Cheltenham Flyer, or the L.M.S.R. with its Coronation Scot? It surely could not be the poor old S.R. with its superannuated 4-4-0s struggling up Sole Street bank! To anyone fed on a diet of stop watch readings and boiler pressures from "certain well-known pens" ( Don's phrase ) that is the sort of picture that emerges.

The official figures produced by The Railway Clearing House present an entirely different picture. Far and Away the top of their league was the much-maligned Southern Railway with an average of 18.19 miles per hour. The L.M.S.R. came a poor second with 14.45 mph, closely followed by the L.N.E.R. at 14.44 mph. The G.W.R. trailed in with 14.19 mph.

Passenger train Speeds - Train miles per train hour: -

1938: - S.R. 18.12
L.M.S.R. 14.45
L.N.E.R. 14.44
G.W.R. 14.19

1939: - S.R. 18.08
L.M.S.R. 14.09
L.N.E.R. 13.98
G.W.R. 13.68

Don had experience of working with official statistics and while he considered the RCH as far from being perfect he did think that they were superior to individual impressions. ( If the 1939 figures were for the whole year, January through December, then the blanket deceleration of passenger train speeds from the start of WWII in September 1939 obviously had an effect. )
 
Interesting facts about average speed comparisons between the big 4 in your last post. Could it have been the SR's extensive network of electric trains with their fast accelerating EMU's that gave the SR the edge ?

Rob.
 
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Hi Robd - I don't doubt that the electrification program on the Southern Railway had an effect on the figures. While there were electrified services on both the L.M.S. and L.N.E. they obviously weren't as large a percentage of train miles as the Southern. While the big four all had (relatively) fast long distance principal express services they were a small number of train miles compared to local and medium distance stopping trains. I was reading the preface to Peter Tatlow's "Wagons of the LNER Volume 1" and I see that he acknowledges D.P. Rowland's 1974 articles as an inspiration to him producing the books. He wanted to examine what L.N.E. wagons were running on his beloved L.M.S. in the 1930s (his own childhood recollections of the railways were during WWII). He had wondered why around half the wagons he saw on L.M.S. goods trains appeared to be L.N.E. wagons.
 
I am going to give this thread a bump since I have seen a few posts elsewhere on about vans and the rarity of vans fitted with continuous brakes. As can be seen from earlier posts on Don Rowland's articles, vehicles fitted with continuous brakes amounted to only around 10% of all goods vehicles at nationalisation in 1948. During 1939 covered vans amounted to only 1 in 6 of railway owned vehicles and 1 in 10 of all goods vehicles.
 
An absolutely fascinating group of articles and thank you for your very precise summary of them borderreiver. I can see myself coming back and making a more in depth study of them. On my own Middlevales Border section though I can see that I should really trade in a couple of my beloved 0-8-0-s for 0-6-0s and while I run a very good local stopping train passenger service with about the right number of non-corridor coaches in hand, my collection of Fowler 2P's and 4P's is a bit too generous for the traffic, especially since a pair of Webb 2-4-2 tank engines actually seem to be able to handle most of the local passenger services. A rake of Stanier corridor coaches hauled by a 4P compound (sometimes double headed with a 2P) handles the boat train to Avavoyle and that's the only 'posh' passenger service on the line.

When it comes to goods wagons on the line I have about 200 open wagons and with running 50-60 wagon coal trains on the power station supply run as well as supplying all the industries on the line as well as domestic goods yard deliveries they are barely enough. I have a sensible number of goods vans on the line with a very small handful of 'specials' and most goods traffic is handled by sheeted opens.
The big choke point is siding space with some stations that should have more siding space not having it. I particularly noted what Don Rowland said about the ratio of siding miles to running line miles and I could see at once why I have so much trouble trying to run prototypical length trains on Middlevales and then handle them at their destinations so they can be shunted and dispersed by trip workings to local industry & etc. I think some layouts, - and the original Middlevales is no exception, - were made more for blatting express trains through rather than for actually attempting to run anything like a proper goods service in a prototypical fashion. I'm no great expert when it comes to railway operation, but as a railway family brat I do try my best to get it right if for no other reason than to stop my grandad and uncles turning over in their graves.
 
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Starbeck and Neville Hill

I have been doing some research in to the July 1926 locomotive allocation to LNER sheds in Yorkshire in connection with passenger train duties listed in the North Eastern Railway Association's publication "LNER - Carriage Roster from 19th July 1926 until further notice." The results give some idea of "keeping the balance" in mid-rank L.N.E.R. sheds during the mid-1920s, before big post-grouping changes were really under way. Those changes came in the form of the arrival of L.N.E.R. Gresley designed D49s and Steam railcars. Top-link sheds were already receiving Gresley's A1 pacifics by 1926, so the big changes were already under way at the likes of Kings Cross, Grantham, York and Gateshead.

Starbeck (code SBK) was the shed for the nearby town of Harrogate in North Yorkshire. Neville Hill (code NEV) was the former N.E.R. shed in the city of Leeds. Fifty-five locos were allocated to Starbeck and seventy-nine were allocated to Neville Hill.

Starbeck

Tender Engines (25)

4-6-0 B13 - 2 - #2006, #2008
4-4-0 D17/2 - 1 - #1922
4-4-0 D20 - 1 - #2020
4-4-0 D21 - 3 - #1238, #1241, #1242
4-4-0 D22 - 3 - #1533, #1541, #1545
4-4-0 D23 - 1 - #274, (recently down from 2 as of Oct 1925)
0-6-0 J21 - 6 - #22, #470, #510, #556, #1549 (5 Saturated+Westinghouse) #579, (1 Superheated+Westinghouse)
0-6-0 J26 - 4 - #1674, #1773, #517, #831,
0-6-0 J27 - 2 - #1025, #1044,
0-8-0 Q5 - 2 - #1708, #1717

Tank Engines (29)

4-6-2T A7 - 4 - #1114, #1170, #1182, #1193
0-4-4T G5 - 9 - #149, #439, #529, #1775, #1912, #1915, #2090, #2091, #2092
0-4-4T G6 - 3 - #108, #334, #1020
4-4-4T H1 - 5 - #1500, #1520, #1528, #1530, #2161
0-6-0T J77 - 2 - #276, #166
0-6-2T N8 - 6 - #218, #267, #345*, #348, #861 ( 3/26-6/26 ), #1165* 2 locos marked *steam brake goods locos, other 4 Westinghouse brake.

Of the tender engines, 0-6-0 types amount to twelve, almost half. There are only two 4-6-0s, which are the older B13s, whilst 4-4-0s amount to nine covering pretty much the whole range of 4-4-0 power. Four are the most powerful former N.E.R. 4-4-0s (D20 and D21). The heaviest goods/mineral trains are catered for by two 0-8-0 Q5s, which indicates that there is not a lot of that traffic on hand. The six 0-6-0 goods tender engines of J26 and J27 were capable of hauling most long unfitted goods trains.

The tank engines are dominated by 0-4-4Ts. No less than nine G5, with three G6, the latter being found employed in former N.E.R. Steam Autocars. The Harrogate to Knaresborough shuttle being the main Steam Autocar deployment in 1926. Raven's H1 4-4-4T were the heaviest passenger tanks available with five on hand. Four 0-6-2T N8s are allocated, though in N.E.R. and early L.N.E.R. days these were more likely to be found on empty carriage work duties than hauling passenger services. Two unfitted goods N8 0-6-2T and two A7 4-6-2T are on hand to cover local trip working, with the A7s being capable of hauling heavy train loads. Goods shunting is in the hands of J77s, which are rebuilt versions of the G6 0-4-4Ts.

Neville Hill

Tender Engines (54)

4-6-0 B13 - 5 - #750, #753, #762, #2006, #2008,
4-6-0 B15 - 1 - #819,
4-6-0 B16 - 4 - #924, #929, #931, #1380
4-4-2 C7 - 4 - #2201, #2203, #2207, #2210,
4-4-0 D17/2 - 1 - #1877, #1905, #1908, #1923
4-4-0 D18 - 2 - #1869, #1870
4-4-0 D20 - 6 - #725, #1026, #2011, #2026, #2103, #2108, #2109,
4-4-0 D21 - 3 - #1237, #1243, #1244,
4-4-0 D23 - 1 - #472
0-6-0 J21 - 10 - #806, #1567, #1596, #1805, #1806 (5 Saturated+Westingh) #619, #300, #1569, #1808, #1814 (5 Superheated+Westingh)
0-6-0 J25 - 5 - #1723, #1970, #1977, #2034, #2067,
0-6-0 J26 - 1 - #543,
0-6-0 J27 - 2 - #1213, #2357
0-8-0 Q6 - 5 - #1257, #1261, #2280, #2282, #2298

Tank Engines (25)

4-6-2T A7 - 2 - #1180, #1183, #1185
2-4-2T F8 - 4 - #72, #674, #801, #1602,
0-4-4T G5 - 1 - #1884,
4-4-4T H1 - 5 - #1326, #1518, #1531, #2143, #2147
0-6-0T J71 - 1 - #278
0-6-0T J72 - 2 - #512, #516
0-6-0T J76 - 2 - #197, #198
0-6-0T J77 - 1 - #71, #1313, #1462
0-6-2T N8 - 1 - #213 Westinghouse fitted – used as carriage pilot?
0-6-2T N10 - 3 - #429, #1132, #1317 All Westinghouse fitted – used as carriage pilots?

Tender engines at Neville Hill amount to 69% of the allocation at the shed. Of the those, 0-6-0 types amount to eighteen engines, over a third. Present are four 4-4-2 3-cylinder Raven Atlantics of C7 Class. The 4-6-0 types are more represented here than at Starbeck, with ten engines, of which four are the newest Raven 3-cylinder B16s.
The probable duties for the C7s are the Liverpool to Newcastle express passenger trains, taking over from L.M.S. locomotives for the journey onwards to Newcastle. A further duty would have been the Leeds to Glasgow express via York, which a Neville Hill C7 could take as far as Newcastle.

The 4-6-0s and 4-4-2s, together are slightly outnumbered by 4-4-0s, with seventeen on shed to a combined fourteen between 4-6-0s and 4-4-2s. Six D20s and three D21s represent the higher powered former N.E.R. types and secondary passenger trains are their most likely duties. The ten J21s are all fitted examples, with half also being superheated. To me this points to there being several daily duty rosters for them on local passenger trains. Eight powerful goods 0-6-0s (J25/26/27) and five powerful 0-8-0s (Q6) are at Neville Hill for unfitted goods/mineral trains.

Tank engines are a relatively small group and the 0-4-4T type has a single example on shed. the F8 2-4-2T has four for lighter local passenger trains with the 4-4-4T H1 again having five locos. There are four 0-6-2T types but I believe they were on empty carriage work or station pilot duties. Goods shunting appears to be in the hands of eight 0-6-0T types, split between four classes (J71/72/76/77). Heavy local trip work can be covered by three 4-6-2T goods tank engines of class A7.
 
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York Shed

The research I carried out for Starbeck and Neville Hill I also repeated for York.

The listing of the allocations at York shed for July 1926.

York Shed @ July 1926, code YRK: - 148 locomotives

L.N.E.R. Classes


Tender Engines (117)

4-6-0 B13 - 5 - #744, #761, #766, #775, #2005,
4-6-0 B14 - 1 - #2115,
4-6-0 B15 - 9 - #787, #788, #797, #799, #813, #817, #821, #822, #823,
4-6-0 B16 - 27 - #844, #845, #847, #848, #849, #908, #911, #921, #923, #927, #933, #936, #942, #1371, #1374, #1377, #2364, #2366,
#2368, #2370, #2372, #2373, #2374, #2376, #2378, #2380, #2382,
4-4-2 C1 - 2 - #4424, #4447,
4-4-2 C2 - 1 - #3986, - this loco is described a allocated to "York", not allocated to "York G.N.R." as applies to two other former G.N.R C2 Atlantics.
4-4-2 C6 - 6 - #532, #698, #699, #702, #1680, #1792,

4-4-2 C7 - 23 - #706, #716, #717, #721, #727, #729, #2163, #2164, #2165, #2166, #2167, #2168, #2169, #2170, #2171, #2172, #2195, #2198, #2199,
#2202, #2204, #2206, #2208

4-4-0 D2 - 4 - #4372, #4387, #4396, #4180,
4-4-0 D3 - 1 - #4348,
4-4-0 D20 - 13 - #707, #711, #712, #713, #1232, #1260, #1665, #1672, #2018, #2021, #2022, #2027, #2101,
0-6-0 J21 - 8 - #34, #534, #1596, #1803, #1804 – Saturated+W #807, #1516, #1807 – Superheat+W
0-6-0 J24 - 1 - #1844,
0-6-0 J25 - 4 - #1973, #1989, #1991, #2068,
0-6-0 J26 - 7 - #412, #442, #525, #554, #818, #1130, #1200,
0-6-0 J27 - 2 - #2342, #2383,
2-6-0
K3 - 3 - #39, #52, #53,

Tank Engines (31)

4-6-2T A7 - 2 - #1113, #1195

0-4-4T G6 - 2 - #63, #255,
0-6-0T J71 - 8 - #237, #347, #399, #1085, #1134, #1140, #1167, #1758,
0-6-0T J72 - 11 - #500, #1720, #1746, #2307, #2309, #2313, #2328, #2331, #2332, #2333, #2334,
0-6-0T J77 - 7 - #138, #324, #999, #1000, #1346, #1348, #1431,
4-8-0T T1 - 1 - #1656

The allocation includes eight former G.N.R. tender engines (three Atlantic 4-4-2 and five 4-4-0) for passenger services to the south towards London.
two further former G.N.R. C2 Atlantics, not shown here, are in Yeadon's allocated to "York G.N.R."
Shunters dominate the tank engines.
 
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