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Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Mon Dec 21, 2009 12:47 am
by 52D
The LNER and its predecessors had turntables at locations where there was no shed so all i can suggest is keep looking but look/think outside the box.

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Fri Dec 25, 2009 1:57 am
by hhodgetts
Hi guys, this is my first post. I am doing research about the railways around Blyth and came across this forum and thread whilst Goggling the WWW.

I wonder if the Blyth ploughs are indeed at Blyth. Just behind Renwick Road (then Morpeth Rd) level crossing and signal box was where the South Blyth turntable was. From the angle of the photo one would not be able to see the 6 road engine shed. The ramshackle buildings could well have been associated with the foundry adjacent and just visible over the roof of the shed. The fence looks very similar too, to the one by the roadside at the crossing just beyond the lamp-post. The only way for me to try and help out is to attach a couple of images, one a map circa 1920. Hopefully it will help you decide. I think the tracks by the turntable and hidden by the ploughs might well have altered by the time the photo was taken. Also by the time the signal box image was taken that I have (just prior to demolition of the whole station and surrounding infrastructure in 1972) the foundry was gone, so reference points have changed. Hope it helps anyway.

Here goes, I hope I manage to upload the pictures correctly and without difficulty.

Regards :D

Philip

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Fri Dec 25, 2009 2:28 pm
by Bryan
Seems feasible to me.
So the tracks the ploughs are stood on are the ones that feed the sidings to the left edge of the map?

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Fri Dec 25, 2009 11:00 pm
by hhodgetts
The ploughs I think are stood on the track immediately on the top side of the turntable as marked in red, as the TT pit is visible on the left of the ploughs in the original picture. I think, judging by the fence beyond the ploughs that the sidings beyond the Morpeth Rd (into Cowpen Colliery A pit, now long gone under Bolam Ave housing estate) were severed and out of use by the time the photo was taken, resulting in a useful little siding for the ploughs to be stored on.
The tracks which crossed the road to the left of the TT went back to Newsham Junction past the site of todays Blyth Sports and Leisure Center. The trackbed is still used as a footpath.

Philip

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Sat Dec 26, 2009 4:56 pm
by Bryan
Thanks for the replies. It looks as if we just need the location of the other photo now.
Is it Kirby Stephen or not?

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Sat Jan 16, 2010 5:40 pm
by Bryan
3 Plough photos I am trying to tie a location to.
I think they are of Darlington and Gateshead, but can anyone confirm?
Also in the 2 that I think are Darlington one of the ploughs appears to be a hybrid Timber / Steel.
It must be a repair job but has anyone got any more detail about it?

Thanks in advance.

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Sat Jan 16, 2010 5:48 pm
by 52D
Bryan i wonder if the crane behind the plough in the second picture was used in conjunction with the ploughs on lines such as Stainmore to ease the burden on the poor shovellers.

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Sat Jan 16, 2010 6:21 pm
by 52A
The first photo appears to be at the bottom of Chaytors Bank at Gateshead almost opposite Greensfield box. You can see the begining of the sloped retaining wall that ran along to where the new IECC is now.

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Sat Jan 16, 2010 6:29 pm
by redtoon1892
Yes, Gateshead (Greenesfield)

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Sat Jan 16, 2010 7:07 pm
by 52A
Another interesting aside...what is the correct spelling of Greensfield? I have seen it spelt both with and without the e in the middle, railway publications all show without the e.

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Sat Jan 16, 2010 7:23 pm
by redtoon1892
Greenesfield is the correct spelling.

http://newcastlephotos.blogspot.com/200 ... yards.html

In the photographs it shows one of the original buildings still left standing, in the first photo taken from Rabbit Banks Road you will notice that it has a lower story which was acessed from the aforementioned road,. when steam days ended at Gateshead this was leased off to private business and in the mid 60s to Potter Cowan Ltd, which is now part of the Crossling group to store metal tubes, cast valves etc all big stuff. When we first surveyed it for this possible use it was still full of redundant railway sundries from the steam age like oil cans of various shapes and sizes, oil pouring containers, wire brushes of various sizes, the type for cleaning out loco tubes, paraffin containers, tender coal shovels and irons,drums of various greases, triple aspect oil signal lamps, one of which I still have,its stamped B.R. not L.N.E.R. and a cornucopia of other items, large nuts & bolts, large cottar pins, and various steam fittings, also a used 52A cast shed plate which I also still have, it must have been the stores in steam days as most of the stuff was brand new but of no further use,It all ended up at the tip. I wonder what that lot would have been worth to a preserved railway ?
After Potter Cowans left it was occupied by Ziebart vehicle rust protection and various motor repairers after that, it is now empty and the access road is a bus only link.

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Thu Jul 15, 2010 5:56 pm
by hhodgetts
Interestingly the ploughs at Blyth have turned up on ebay;

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/B-W-photo-NER-Sno ... 2c55cdc9dc

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Thu Jul 15, 2010 9:40 pm
by Rambler
In the (original) second photo, the loco looks like one of the small-wheeled 0-6-0s and the number looks to me to be 1966, making it a J25. As Yeadons book on the J25's isn't out yet, I can't check where it was shedded. Judging by the locomotive livery (and general tidyness) this would be sometime in the 1930's.

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Wed Sep 01, 2010 5:45 pm
by axlebox
The Kirkby Stephen ploughs look like they're in the shed yard at Tebay (NE shed that is).

Re: Unidentified Locations

Posted: Wed Sep 01, 2010 8:37 pm
by Bryan
Thanks for that suggestion.