UK Screenshots for Pre BR Blue. High resolution warning.

#3441. I was particularly taken by the screenshot of the coal drops at Blackhill Frank, though your other screenshots are looking good too.

#3440. Yay! SECR. Another excellent screenshot Ken. My liking for the SECR no doubt arises from my liking for the K&ESR.

#3438. Definitely something different from you with an NER line in early BR days Tanker.
 
Love your Blackhill shots, Frank. I remember measuring it all up for a P4 model many years ago, but it proved impractical due to the many levels. I also recollect the very large goods shed with the crane inside. Great stuff.
Best wishes
Ian
 
Blackhill Station, County Durham

Hello Ian, Thanks! Blackhill station was built as part of the N.E.R.'s extension of the Lanchester Valley branch by the construction of the Derwent Valley branch in 1867. The railway politics of the late 1850s was the genesis for the branch, though the N.E.R. was lukewarm in its enthusiasm.

The L.N.W.R. planned to reach Newcastle from the south-west from Tebay via Kirkby Stephen, Barnard Castle, Bishop Auckland, Crook, Tow Law, Blackhill, Rowlands Gill and Scotswood. The scheme involved both the Lancashire & South Durham Union Railway (using the Stockton & Darlington Railway running powers) and the Newcastle & Carlisle Railway, since their tracks would be required. In the case of the L&SDUR/S&DR from Tebay to Hownes Gill near Consett and in the case of the N&CR their tracks from the south bank of the Tyne in to the N&CR section at the west end of Newcastle Central. However, a new line would be required between the S&DR at Hownes Gill and the N&CR at Derwenthaugh. The L.N.W.R. also wanted to siphon off traffic from Consett Iron Company as well as any colliery and quarry it passed by. This was going on at the same time as the North British Railway was using the Border Counties Railway and N&CR to reach Newcastle from Riccarton junction on the Waverley route. Just how the N.E.R. overcame all of this, while in the process gaining the rights to haul East Coast passenger trains to Edinburgh, access to Carlisle Citadel joint station, control of the S&DR and taking over the N&CR is worthy of a book in its own right!!

Just how practical the L.N.W.R. scheme would have been will never be answered. In the late 1850s while Hownes Gill viaduct had been opened Crook to Tow Law was still operated by an incline. Gradients would have been heavy and the population density sparse. The scheme required a response from the N.E.R. though since it was intent on keeping other companies out of its territory.

Both the Lanchester valley and Derwent valley branches were the price for thwarting the L.N.W.R. plans and the N.E.R. at least progressed them. The Lanchester valley was delayed due to a banking crisis in 1857 but by 1860 that had been resolved, with the line opening in 1862. The Blaydon & Conside branch (the Derwent Valley line) opened in 1867.

At the time of opening, Blackhill station was named Benfieldside after the parish in which it was built. The original terminus of the Lanchester Valley branch, the 1862 Consett station was sited just north of what became, in 1893, Consett North junction between the Lanchester Valley branch and the former Stanhope & Tyne line (by then the Pontop and South Shields branch), The 1893 double track East to North chord between Consett East and Consett North junctions crossed above both the 1868 Hownes Gill to Consett South junction chord and the 1862 Lanchester Valley branch as it climbed at 1 in 49. What public goods facilites were available at the 1862 Consett station are unknown to me, but with even Knitsley station having a run round loop, a coal drop spur and two sidings I can't imagine the 1862 Consett station having less provision than that. The facilites probably disappeared beneath the post-1867 expansion of the yard in the area as Consett iron Company's traffic requirements grew.




In any event, Benfieldside appears to have been built with a view to service both the Blackhill and Consett areas and a small turntable was provided to turn the tender engines which were running only as far as the station before returning to either Durham or Newcastle. From 1868 this would also include Darlington with the Hownes Gill to Consett South chord. As you said, the site was challenging. Built on the side of the valley, which is rather steep at this point, with a falling gradient for the railway, pretty much for all the way from Consett North to Derwenthaugh I can see the problems when trying to reproduce it in P4 scale.

The Consett station most people know did not exist prior to 1896.


 
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Ed's lovely GWR De Glehn compound 'La France' at Truro even though the 'Atlantics' never worked in Cornwall, - but on this occasion I don't care. (TANE version Cornish Mainline, Tinware SP1 TS2019)

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Paulz Trainz De Glehn compound from TS2006 days sneaks into the picture. The shade of green Paul used on this model is very close to GWR pre-1900's era green. There is of course no comparison with Ed's beautifully made and well researched TRS19 De Glehn model with several errors on the older TS2006 model being all too plain to see, BUT having put many miles under the wheels of this old veteran I will be giving it an honorable retirement.

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Highland Railway Train on the Cùil an Droighinn Viaduct

It is some time since I have been working on my Ullapool route. A misty morning in the far north west of Scotland as a Skye Bogie 0-4-4 ascends the grade between Inverbroom and Gleann Mòr at Cùil an Droighinn viaduct on the Ullapool line. The 1 in 36 is a relentless climb to get the line above the Corrieshalloch gorge and the falls within it, so there is a banking tank 0-6-4T on the rear.







The line was never built, since the Highland decided to extend its line from Strome Ferry to Kyle of Lochalsh instead. The government preferred, if the Ullapool line was to go forward, that it did not terminate at Ullapool, but at Ardmair, close by Isle Martin, around seven miles further north. In my alternate universe I have the Admiralty taking an interest in the project in the late 1890s, with the objective of using the bay at Ardmair for Royal Navy vessels. After much lobbying and a threat to have the Great North of Scotland granted permission to build the line, with running powers between Inverness and Garve, the Highland finally came on board, with most of the money coming from the government.

Construction was difficult and completion came as late as 1905. Like the Kyle line, the traffic was light. It settled down to two daily passenger trains from Ardmair to Inverness each day except Sunday, with two in the opposite direction. A third train ran between Dingwall and Ullapool. The Ardmair trains met the ferries to Stornoway. There was a daily freight train, with timber, stone, cattle and fish featuring as the main traffic outwards and coal as the main traffic inwards. During the summer months the Falls of Measach in the Gorrieshalloch Gorge were a tourist attraction, with a charabanc meeting the train from Dingwall to Ullapool at Abhainn Droma Lodge in order to take tourists to the viewing point for the falls.

During WWI and WWII naval traffic on the line was considerable, bound for the Naval quay at Ardmair.



 
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Hello Ed, Hello Annie. I appreciate the feedback, many thanks. Your locos and rolling stock look great Ed. Annie, as to the retirement of your veteran compound by Paul it only took fifteen years to be superseded, so an honourable retirement there.


 
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I couldn't agree more. The fact that you have had Paul's De Glehn in Trainz for that long is incredible! It looks ready to head on to the NRM or a Heritage Railway!

Ed's new model will be a fine addition to your route. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have! :)

Excellent screenshots Frank! My favorite part is your use of a mixed formation train! The LBSCR did quite a few of those during Pre-Grouping days and the LSWR even did a few on occasion!

I remember seeing a magazine article of a Greyhound on the MSWJR in the 50s hauling a mixed formation train. They were extremely rare by that point but they did happen! :hehe:
 
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Hello Tanker, thanks. On the subject of a mixed formation, it is not "technically" a mixed goods-passenger train, but it does have a significant number of Non-Passenger-Carrying Stock (NPCS) vehicles designed specifically to be hauled in passenger trains at "passenger train speeds". However, the train here won't be getting past 40 mph anywhere on its route. The key criteria during the post-grouping era were a wheelbase of 10ft or greater, fitted with (or piped for) train brake and fitted with through steam heating pipes. The consist from Ardmair includes a Horse Box (loaded if running at the head of the passenger train) an open carriage truck, three fish wagons and a Highland Railway four-wheel baggage van.

The Highland Railway had a lavish supply of open carriage trucks. This was partly in consequence to the Highland getting involved from the early 1900s in ferrying cars by train between Kyle of Lochalsh and Strathcarron. David McConnell wrote that an article by Hamilton Ellis in January 1935's Railway magazine mentioned this. It was due to the precarious state of the water ferry at Strome Ferry, required to cross Strath Carron in order to reach the ferry for Kyleakin, as well as avoiding the steep and winding road above Strome Ferry. On stormy days there could be between a dozen and twenty loaded carriage trucks for the trip to Strathcarron.

Given the wild state of the old coach road between Garve and Ullapool and its steep grades I thought it no great stretch to have had someone ferry their car to Ullapool or Ardmair. Now, the empty truck is required back at Dingwall where it may be sent out to Kyle of Lochalsh.
 
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re post #3448 borderreiver
One can almost hear the thrash, an excellent route and history. Look forward to more please.

LBSCR (WIP) TANE

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Cheers, evilcrow
 
Hello Evilcrow, glad that you like the shot and can almost feel the work being done. Laying out the route is a challenge since, while McConnell gives some information it feels as though yet more is needed and sadly that would likely need access to the original work done by surveyor C.R. Manners for Murdoch Paterson, who I believe was associated with the Ullapool and Garve railway company. The DEM information for NW Scotland is not that brilliant either, so there are some issues there. I have already decided to have the junction at Garve immediately to the north of the station rather than immediately to the south of it. I can recognise that someone in the U&GR may have asked why they had to have a separate station at Garve when it was supposed to be the Highland operating the line anyway (It seems as though the HR & U&GR had agreed for the HR to operate it but the U&GR had to build it). Surprisingly, the U&GR actually got an authorising Act through parliament in August 1890, just before the Highland Commissioners decided against proceeding with the line, preferring to go with the extension to Kyle by the HR, which had not then actually got an authorising act for it!!

This generated some ill-will in the faction promoting the U&GR. It appeared as if one arm of the government had encouraged them while another decided against them. So, my premise for the build starts at what if yet another arm of government (The Admiralty) approached the U&GR in the aftermath of the Highland Commissioners decision? I justify the changes on the grounds that Manners did the initial survey but further work and changing circumstances imposed some alterations, not least the insistence on the extension to Ardmair/Isle Martin. It is uncertain if the HR would have been as likely to agree to operate the U&GR in 1900 as it allegedly was in 1890 (if indeed their assurances then were genuine) so I decided to resurrect an alternative idea floated in the late 1880s that if the HR was unwilling then the GNoSR might be agreeable and that their price would be the government forcing running powers on the HR, anathema to Inverness that such a development would be!
 
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1939 - Strath Garve and a Clan 4-6-0

High summer 1939 and the fellow attending to his dog at the side of the old coach road between Garve and Ullapool is probably oblivious of the significance of oil tank empties returning from Ardmair Naval Depot to Dingwall. The weight outbound called for a Clan 4-6-0, in this case Clan Fraser. Here, in Strath Garve the fireman is able to rest, with the grades downhill all the way from here to the junction at Garve. The tree line marks the banks of the Black Water.


 
Excellent screenshots Frank and Ken and nice to see one from you too tailight. I'm still doing nothing with Trainz, but I like to look in here from time to time.
 
1921 - Torr an Eas Quarry

Thanks Annie. In the Ullapool river valley to the north of the town there are several quarries. An old six-inch map of 1902 shows an old lime kiln at Torr An Eas. The quarry line is steeply graded, around 1 in 40 from the loch side, through a level crossing at Moss of Ullapool by Ullapool bridge and up to the loading sidings, which are below the quarry. This quarry is a significant souce of stone and crushed traffic for the line and usually merits a daily trip working during the morning by a tank engine from Ullapool shed. Empties are deposited for the day's loadings and yesterday's load is taken down to Ullapool, for attachment to the daily goods train bound for Dingwall and Inverness.




With the quarry sidings still in shadow, the morning loaded trip gets under way for Ullapool. For the descent wagon brakes are pinned down and a descending speed limit of 10 mph applies as far as the junction at the loch side. The quarry plant is also a coal consumer, so there is a spur with several coal cells, usually filled by a wagon load, delivered three times a week.


 
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1939 - Starth Garve II

Strath Garve and the Ardmair bound loaded oil tanks form the first train out of Inverness bound for the navy depot. It is a special working, and will wait to cross the Inverness-bound morning passenger train from Ardmair at Abhainn Droma Lodge.




Normal traffic usually amounts to two passenger trains between Ardmair and Inverness, a passenger train between Ullapool and Dingwall and a daily goods train from Inverness.

 
The Desolation of Strathgarve

Snow has arrived in Strathgarve. Dingwall shed has turned out a six-coupled "Wee Ben", No. 17 "Ben Alligan" because its adhesion is useful in adverse conditions.








On inspecting the Bradshaw's for April 1910 it would appear that the initial service for Kyle was two Dingwall to Kyle trains, where passengers changed out of Inverness trains bound for Wick and Thurso. I have to consider that the two fictional services for Ardmair might well have been combined at Dingwall and ran double-headed to Garve, where the train divided. The alternative is to have the Ardmair train depart around twenty-five minutes ahead of the Kyle train to clear the section to Achterneed and to be able to cover the distance to Garve before the following Kyle service needs to depart Achterneed.
 
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