BR rolling stock rebranding

[Entertexthere]

Does anyone know whether wagons owned by the big 4 companies and branded with company names were rebranded in any way (be a BR emblem, renumbering, Ect.)

 

[ChiefPlanner]

A prefix like "E" or "W" were added to the existing numbers. I believer

Austerity Britain had a paint shortage, -ex PO wagons had a "P" letter added. The BTC bought the fleet , for a ridiculous sum , most of which was fit for firewood.

 

[Taunton]

As I understand it, for wagons, the numbers were left as is, just a prefix edded (W, S, M or E), while new build were prefixed B. Departmental stock had a further D added in front. As with other stock, there was a runout of old company designs which were numbered in the company series. There was no branding of ownership, just as required they were repainted, grey for unfitted and brown for vacuum fitted. A large number of private wagons (principally for coal, from collieries and merchants) were also taken in, some prefixed P, others renumbered into the "host" of their area company series.

This describes it better than I can

https://www.ltsv.com/w_ref_numbers.php

 

[Entertexthere]

Thanks a lot for helping!

 

[Taunton]

-ex PO wagons had a "P" letter added. The BTC bought the fleet , for a ridiculous sum , most of which was fit for firewood.

The railway nationalisation act included the nationalisation of all the private owner fleet. These were commonly not owned by whoever's name was painted on the side, but by specialist wagon hire companies, of which there were a number, mostly characterised by names including "Wagon" and "Finance". These had a certain value to these businesses depending on how much future revenue they would get from continuing to hire them out as before, so while they indeed were often dilapadated, especially the coal wagons with wooden bodies which were smashed during loading, there was a revenue stream to be compensated. A further finance source by these companies was provision of wagons on hire purchase, and at nationalisation they were entitled to the remaining revenue from the HP period.

The hirer/owner of the wagon, in turn, made good money from charging demurrage on their wagons at the receiving end. This is a charge, per day, for the wagon just being kept standing. Many local coal merchants used the wagons as storage, and instead of unloading it the day it was received would just keep it on a siding until they wanted to bag up the coal. It was cheaper than building their own storage facilities, and avoided double handling as the coal went straight from wagon to coal sack. This charging passed to the railway with the wagons, so whille the wagon itself may not have been worth much, the charges for it were worth having.

Although many wagons may have appeared ramshackle, it was common to rebody them periodically. This was cheap, most of the value was in the running gear, and a carpenter working on their own could rebody a wagon quite straightforwardly and quickly. The war had greatly disrupted this, both during and after the war timber was in very short supply, given that it was typically seasoned for several years before use. It was one of the principal reasons for the rapid change to steel bodies.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

The railway nationalisation act included the nationalisation of all the private owner fleet. These were commonly not owned by whoever's name was painted on the side, but by specialist wagon hire companies, of which there were a number, mostly characterised by names including "Wagon" and "Finance". These had a certain value to these businesses depending on how much future revenue they would get from continuing to hire them out as before, so while they indeed were often dilapadated, especially the coal wagons with wooden bodies which were smashed during loading, there was a revenue stream to be compensated. A further finance source by these companies was provision of wagons on hire purchase, and at nationalisation they were entitled to the remaining revenue from the HP period.

The hirer/owner of the wagon, in turn, made good money from charging demurrage on their wagons at the receiving end. This is a charge, per day, for the wagon just being kept standing. Many local coal merchants used the wagons as storage, and instead of unloading it the day it was received would just keep it on a siding until they wanted to bag up the coal. It was cheaper than building their own storage facilities, and avoided double handling as the coal went straight from wagon to coal sack. This charging passed to the railway with the wagons, so whille the wagon itself may not have been worth much, the charges for it were worth having.

Although many wagons may have appeared ramshackle, it was common to rebody them periodically. This was cheap, most of the value was in the running gear, and a carpenter working on their own could rebody a wagon quite straightforwardly and quickly. The war had greatly disrupted this, both during and after the war timber was in very short supply, given that it was typically seasoned for several years before use. It was one of the principal reasons for the rapid change to steel bodies.

An excellent reply ..the condition of PO wagons clearly deteriorated through the war years , for obvious reasons it was all about keeping traffic moving - regardless of cosmetics (pre-war - PO wagons made useful advertising for the product carried , albeit more restrained than in the Edwardian era say when Welsh coal wagons often went into great detail about "best hopping coal" etc).

The material shortages of Austerity Britain were very real - so a wagon running around with softwood planking (maybe destroying the faded lettering of other days) was of little concern - when steel for the urgent rail replacement and locomotive building programme was in very short supply. To be fair - the main line companies , especially the GWR had attempted to convert collieries etc to higher capacity steel wagons as far back as the 1920's , with mixed results. Some of these vintage ex GWR wagons had long lives and were around until the mid 1970's. TOPS saw them off basically.

 

[Taunton]

The company that really made the running with steel coal wagons was the LNER in the 1930s, who introduced the characteristic 21 ton Hopper in their North East (Newcastle) area, which design later became a BR standard and lasted to the end of non-air braked freight. This was larger than the general square shape 16 ton mineral wagon standard elsewhere. The LNER built thousands of them before nationalisation. The old North Eastern railway had standardised on hoppers, initially tapered-sided wooden ones, with bottom discharge betwen the axles, whioch needed quite different unloading facilities to the rest, discharged through side doors.

In a reversal of the enforced purchase of all the private wagons at nationalisation, the National Coal Board later standardised on the hoppers on their own internal systems such as that at South Shields, bought secondhand from BR.

The timber shortage postwar was even worse than steel, for multile reasons. Much was traditionally imported from Scandinavia, completely cut off in the war, and subsequently having foreign exchange in short supply. The timber then needed seasoning for years before use, and the seasoning sheds had traditionally been next to the import docks (the Isle of Dogs, now Canary Wharf, right where I am writing this, had the largest concentration), and these had been at the centre of wartime bombing destruction. many of the wartime photographs of conflagrations are of the timber sheds going up, Quite a lot of the timber going into wagon bodies (and passenger carriage framing) in the late 1940s was "green", not seasoned enough, and this deteriorated and warped in just a couple of years and needed replacing again. But it was all they had.

 

[randyrippley]

Its probably difficult now to understand the post-war timber shortage, but during the war a massive amount of woodland and forestry was cleared, mainly for building work (especially concrete shuttering) and pit props. Some went into military production (aircraft, ships) but much of that seems to have been imported. Whole woods were requisitioned and clear-felled, with no thought of conservation. So not only were the felled stocks depleted, but the growing forestry reserve was depleted as well. During the war the shortage even led to the adoption of concrete sleepers on a commercial scale.
Post war, what little wood that was available was required for building, while we had an excess of steel production capacity (even if the iron ore had to be imported). Steel may not have been cheaper than timber, but at least it was available. There were even attempts at steel houses: for instance there were a few in Yeovil which basically looked like they were oversize steel barrels cut in half.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Its probably difficult now to understand the post-war timber shortage, but during the war a massive amount of woodland and forestry was cleared, mainly for building work (especially concrete shuttering) and pit props. Some went into military production (aircraft, ships) but much of that seems to have been imported. Whole woods were requisitioned and clear-felled, with no thought of conservation. So not only were the felled stocks depleted, but the growing forestry reserve was depleted as well. During the war the shortage even led to the adoption of concrete sleepers on a commercial scale.
Post war, what little wood that was available was required for building, while we had an excess of steel production capacity (even if the iron ore had to be imported). Steel may not have been cheaper than timber, but at least it was available. There were even attempts at steel houses: for instance there were a few in Yeovil which basically looked like they were oversize steel barrels cut in half.

Some of those "temporary" steel houses are still in occupation , ditto post war prefabs. To be fair there was a huge shortage of housing after both war damage and the cessation of the pre-war housing boom. Imports from the USA had to be paid for in dollars after the end of the war.

London Transport certainly stockpiled good quantities of quality sleepers and crossing timbers , as no doubt did the big 4 in preparation. Much was no doubt used in those war years for urgent repairs and bomb damage need. (as well as new siding connections - we have a 1942 made Westinghouse shunt signal preserved locally , recovered from Petersfield , but probably used as a "new" connection sometime in WW2)

Post WW1 tree planting must have paid dividends - (the birth of the Forestry Commission) - in peaceful times a back load of the many Welsh based tramp steamers taking coal to France and Scandinavia was (of course) pit wood. A sight one saw in the Welsh Valleys up until the 1960's , when the decline of low headroom coal faces and increased mechanisation saw hydraulic face props and ring arches used for head drive tunnels.

 

[Taunton]

... made iof steel.

There was some iron ore produced domestically. It lay in a band from Northampton across to Lincolnshire, and formed a considerable load by rail for a while. Low iron content but better than nothing. There was a concentration yard on the ECML at High Dyke, the high point between Peterborough and Grantham at the north end of Stoke tunnel, which when I pass nowadays, at speed, and provided I've managed to get a Mk 4 seat with a window view, I try to imagine where all the weeds are now full of iron ore wagons and O2 2-8-0s ready to haul it off to Scunthorpe. There was a substantial private system to the west with WD-type tank locos bringing in wagonloads from the opencast extraction points.