Recreations of Narrow Gauge Passenger Vehicles

The long term plan for the GVLR after finished Ashover Coach No.4 is to look into building a Ashover replica to give our Ashover coach something of similar period and style to run with. It would have to comply with modern new build regulations by having a steel fabricated underframe instead of the original wood though. Would also have to have thicker window frames to fit modern thicker safety glass. Ashover No/4 is currently having its window frames modified to fit toughened glass.

 

Hi Richard - yes first attempt to collect the bogie frames went a little pear shaped! Hopefully something will get sorted soon.

Watch out for a Lazarus like passenger carriage re-build appearing at the Moseley Railway Trust later this year - almost certainly, subject to approvals etc, at or by our Annual September Gala (& potentially Official Grand Opening of the passenger railway).

We re-created a WW1 Class H watertank wagon recently, from little more than a collection of parts. There are plans for various other phoenix like recreations/restorations over time...
What other historic bits & wrecks of wagons/carriages are lying around waiting to be rebuilt & restored, or wanting for new owners?

Gareth

 

The frame and bogies of the surviving Rye & Camber carriage were moved from Amberley to the Col.Stephens Museum at Tenterden recently after I initiated a discussion between the two groups. I doubt whether they could be restored to a working carriage as there is too much wastage in the metal, but if anyone wanted to build a replica, at least they exist to copy from.

Richard

 

Talking of WW1 wagon how is the WW1 ambulance wagon going that was from the south tyndale

 

There's not a huge amount of visible progress - main frames are still waiting transport south, but all surviving small parts (that we have been able to track down to date) are safely stored away now. However numerous parts are being made for the bogies (which were a bit abscent, to put it mildly!), body & chassis etc as opportunities arise. Not planning to do the main body re-construction until there is somewhere to put it! The first D class open wagon should be completed this year.

I think that carriage restorations/rebuilds/replicas are a higher priority for the Trust, with the passenger railway potentially opening within the next 6 months!

 

Well it will be good to see a full WW1 train including working loco(petrol and steam) in the uk help people imagine what WW1 was like

 

Wait for 2014! There is a major WW1 themed event/get together being planned at Apedale - commemorating 100 years from the start of the war. WW1 was the catalyst for many of the post war 60cm industrial railways in the UK & Europe (even as far away as Argentina!) & many associated technological advances, so it is seen by many as a pivotal moment in NG history.

There are several other WW1 related projects lurking in the wings – watch this space (or come to Apedale & help out!).

Cheers,
Gareth

 

Would anyone know where I could get 7mm plans for Leek and Manifold coaches???

 

I'm pretty sure that the 7mm NG association have published drawings to that scale - there are several sets around to other scales - one in the Keith and Susan Turner book and one in in the Bob Gratton magnum opus (I think).

 

Doing some research into the Stanton coach, did the original bogies get to Apedale to form part of a replica? I remember finding a picture of it, stripped to the chassis, standing at what I think was Tywyn Wharf, but with the remains of the original balcony handrails still attached, although can't find this now. Does anyone know the history of it pre TR, or if any pictures exist?

 

Might be worth contacting the Industrial Railway Society (http://www.irsociety.co.uk)

If anyone else has researched this beastie for their own nefarious ends, it's a good bet they'd at least be known to someone in either the 16mm Scale mob (https://www.16mm.org.uk) or the Merioneth Railway Scociety (http://www.merionethrailwaysociety.com/#). Both groups attract members with a track record for some really out of the way NG research ... some of whom have had work published along the way.

 

Hello all,

Stone and Steam in the Black Mountains by the late Rev. David Tipper (Blorenge Books, 1985) includes pictures of the Stanton Coach in its original 3' guise on the Grywne Fawr Reservoir Railway in South Wales, together with a brief history up to its rebuild as TR No.16.

According to Dr. Tipper the coach was bought second-hand for the Grywne - around 1916, I think - and was sold in 1927 on the completion of the project, going to Stanton-in-the-Peak. IIRC its whereabouts before this are not covered.

By a curious coincidence, while on the Grwyne Fawr railway the coach would have passed Lower Stanton Farm, Llanfihangel, regularly...

The GFRR is worth a look in its own right: beginning life as a road for traction engines, the line was notorious locally for its undulating gradients - 1 in 7 at one point - and terminating at +1800ft, was one of the highest adhesion railways in Britain. Much of its course is now again a road, open to the public.

Hope this helps!

 

I never knew there had been a narrow gauge railway at Grwyne Fawr. Makes me wonder what other narrow gauge railways in South Wales existed that I don't know about...

 

IIRC it was built only to enable the construction of the reservoir. Came across the "stone and steam" book quite by chance whilst working on a renovation in the area.

 

The GFRR never had an Act of Parliament of its own and only ran to a timetable once, on the opening day. The Stanton was known as the 'Glass coach' at Grwyne, which says it all about the line's passenger accommodation! The only other closed vehicle was an Ambulance coach built at the site's own workshops.

The contractor, a Mr. Underwood of Dukinfield, also built short 3'-gauge railways for waterworks projects in Mountain Ash and Penderyn. The stock later transferred to Grwyne Fawr resulting in a total of 7 locomotives.

 

The late Ted Wade's research into the history of the Plynlimon & Hafan Tramway threw up two odd NG vans, still extant 45 years ago in a field near Borth. Neither could conclusively be shown to have anything to do with any known railway in the area. Drawings of both were published in Ted's book on the P&H, which I still have ...... somewhere.

What ultimately happened to this pair, or whether anyone ever solved this particular conundrum, I don't know.

 

Bala Lake Railway now have two Penrhyn Quarry Railway (PQR) carriages built at Felin Fawr, ‘numbered S and T’. These were built by the team at Felin Fawr and were the latest in the carriages built by PQR and it’s successors, so are not technically reproductions but a continuation in carriages built by the PQR.

 

Thankyou for those sources, they do help. Tracking down said book.

 

All sounds a bit WIBN to me...

;-)


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Indeed so but this was posted many years ago before realism about WIBN set in!

PH