Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

This forum is for the discussion of railway modelling of the LNER and its constituent companies.

Moderators: 52D, Tom F, Rlangham, Atlantic 3279, Blink Bonny, Saint Johnstoun, richard

Post Reply
Graeme Leary
GNR C1 4-4-2
Posts: 751
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2011 9:43 pm

Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Graeme Leary »

I've been offered 2 x 3 wagon packs of Bachmann 35-528 Berry Wiggins tank wagons. I presume that despite what I've been able to find (which suggests to me more LMS) that, like coal wagons, these 3 particular liveries in each pack could have been seen all over the UK during Grouping but would like to have it confirmed, especially that they would have been seen on LNER tracks.

Related query - would tank wagons in National Benzole Mixture livery (as Bachmann 37-659A been a 'grouping' era livery. Again, what I've found suggests this livery would have been post grouping. Again, if in grouping era, would they have been seen on LNER tracks?

If I had been aware of it I would have looked for Tourett's (??) book on tank wagons when in the UK last month which would have no doubt answered these queries.

Graeme
New Zealand
Seagull
GER D14 4-4-0 'Claud Hamilton'
Posts: 301
Joined: Sun Oct 14, 2007 7:15 pm
Location: Between a cheap railway station and a ploughed field

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Seagull »

Hello Graeme

From the very book you mentioned http://www.tourretpublishing.com/Petrol ... Wagons.htm, the Bachmann Berry Wiggins livery with the chevrons is post war and though it's not exactly clear from the book I would guess that the Fetter Lane address is also post war.

One piece of good news, at least some of the prewar tanks were lettered in a similar way to the one without the chevrons and in the same sort of font

BERRY WIGGINS
......& CO LTD
....KINGSNORTH
.....HOO. KENT
(Ignore the full stops in the bottom three lines I had to put them in to get the text to line up)

So you could get away with a little over painting and some smaller white letters to back date them.

Tourets says they started in 1927 and their head office was Tensulam House, Water Lane, Stratford, but Graces Guide has a more accurate history https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Berry_Wiggins_and_Co

Kingsnorth Refinery at Hoo, Kent was one of the largest in the county in the 1930's and would have supplied most products.
I remember it still going in the 1960s....... :shock:

Tourrets says they shipped bitumen from Kent to Gloucester and also Manchester to Gloucester.
Remembering that bitumen is what you have left after you have removed all the lighter products from crude oil then they must have also shipped those lighter products somewhere! Some would have gone in tankers - the floating kind - but the rest must have been in the rail tanks.

Petrol had to be in the buff (sandy yellow) tanks with a red strip, but everything else (Kerosine, gas oil, diesel, and fuel oil) would have come in good old black.


I'm afraid the Bachmann 37-659A 'National' one is post war.

Alan
Playing trains, but trying to get serious
Graeme Leary
GNR C1 4-4-2
Posts: 751
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2011 9:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Graeme Leary »

Many thanks Seagull - good to get that settled (and have a few more items - the National Benzole tanks - to put on trademe (our ebay)..
Graeme
Graeme Leary
GNR C1 4-4-2
Posts: 751
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2011 9:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Graeme Leary »

Seagull - did mean to ask in my last - you quote the colours on tanks as petrol being buff/sandy yellow with the red stripe and everything else in 'good old black'.

Bachmann also do a Pease and Partners 14 ton tank (their 37-662) in a deepish red livery and a google of Pease and Partners shows an (undated) advertisement listing coals, coke, iron castings, road materials, paints and tar products. The only products in this list that I imagine would be 'fluid' enough to carry in tank wagons would be the paints and tar products. Would the red Bachmann depicted have carried either of these or an entirely different 'liquid' altogether? (I'm pretty satisfied with these Bachmann wagons being grouping as there is a HMRS photo dated 30/6/1930 , although in black/white which seems to match exactly the Bachmann wagons. If so I will probably get some more of these to make a 'respectable' number of matching wagons.

Thanks again.

Graeme
Seagull
GER D14 4-4-0 'Claud Hamilton'
Posts: 301
Joined: Sun Oct 14, 2007 7:15 pm
Location: Between a cheap railway station and a ploughed field

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Seagull »

Hello Graeme,

The buff with red strip livery on rail tanks (applied before WW2) was for products with a low flash point.
The ones that give off lots of flammable gas so are easy to set fire to with a flame or spark.
Today that would apply to lots of products, but between the wars pretty much the only low flash point product that was shipped by rail in any quantity was petrol.

Other oil based products were almost always in black tanks, simply because spashes would quickly stain the outside of the tank anyway.
Shiney silver tanks are used today because these days 'stainless' steel is much cheaper to make and now acually is stainless and does not need painting. (It was originally called stainless because it stained (rusted) less than ordinary steel).

Other types of product (not oil based) would come in any colour you like.

I think the Pease & Partners tank is supposed to be for creosote - a bye-product of coking coal as P&P are shown as having several coking plants.
The picture I have seen suggests it was NOT black and the text describes it as red, so red lead (red oxide) would be very likely.

Creosote would be used by the railway company for sleepers and extensively by the timber industy for treated saw timber.
Your fence, wooden coal bunker or shed in the back garden would have used this. I'm sure the odd creosote tanker or two could turn up almost anywhere. Another possibility is coal-tar which would have be used for making soap and cleaning chemicals.

There was a fair trade in vegetable oils in those days (linseed, flax, rape, etc.) but mostly they were used in industrial products, paint and varnish making and rather less in the food industry than now.
Another possibility is molasses which was used in the food industry then as now - both animal and human.

Again it would mostly be one or two tanks. Block trains of anything, even petrol really only appeared as a result of WW2.

Hope that helps.

Alan
Playing trains, but trying to get serious
Graeme Leary
GNR C1 4-4-2
Posts: 751
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2011 9:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Graeme Leary »

Many thanks Alan, sums it up brilliantly and fills a gap in my education. In my youth (in the 40s/50s) we lived in a creosote house, which was not that common out here in the colonies and was I think recognised as a 'trendy' form of exterior decor that architects sometimes used - not for the utilitarian back shed! Just to think, could have been delivered in a Pease and Partners tank wagon if we had lived in Blighty.

Graeme
Graeme Leary
GNR C1 4-4-2
Posts: 751
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2011 9:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Graeme Leary »

Seagull - supplementary question on this tank wagon matter (as you seem to have the answers to hand for which I'm very grateful):-

I have also been offered some more wagons as:-

Bachmann 37-677 'Carburine Motor Spirit - in a 'sort' of buff tone (which you mention) with red stripes under the brand. (Carburine's not a brand name I've ever heard of here in New Zealand).

Bachmann 37-670 Shell (on one side) and BP the other - also Buff with red stripes under the brand names.

Bachmann 37-665 As I understand part of a 3 wagon set but with variations - all basically silver grey but no red stripe.

Same query as previously - would any of these have been grouping era running wagons, especially on LNER?

Many thanks,
Graeme
jwealleans
LNER A4 4-6-2 'Streak'
Posts: 4208
Joined: Wed Oct 25, 2006 8:46 am

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by jwealleans »

Graeme,

Your Pease and Partners wagon is fine for the 1930s - we use one on Grantham, although I'm not sure it would ever have wandered so far south.

Image

As has been stated already, highly inflammable cargoes such as petrol and aviation spirit were carried in buff tankers with a red stripe up to the Second War. Less explosive substances could be in tanks of more or less any colour - even that vile blue 'RonUK' wagon Mainline did is correct.

Image

I made up a short rake of the Carburine tanks and I think they look OK.
mick b
LNER A4 4-6-2 'Streak'
Posts: 3727
Joined: Tue May 30, 2006 4:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by mick b »

I believe the Tank wagons with a footboard/steps are post war only ?


I have used some of these 4mm decals, which are very good.

http://www.robbiesrollingstock.co.uk
Graeme Leary
GNR C1 4-4-2
Posts: 751
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2011 9:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Graeme Leary »

Thanks again Jonathon. Will get the Carburine tanks.

Mick b - I also have 4 old Lima tank wagons, painted in (a quite bright) Yellow with the word Shell and shell symbol, ladder on each side and steps up to a flat 'platform' at one end with a handrail. Would these be the 'footboard/steps' you mention? (They also are 10-15% overall larger than the Hornby/Peco models plus have quite 'bulbous' ends. Would these have been an Italian (Lima?) flight of fancy or do they sound - as they look - not correct? (Sorry can't post a photo - my IT manager is recuperating from on operation).
And re the transfers from Robbie Burns, presume his description of 'stone' is the previous mentioned 'buff'?

Graeme
mick b
LNER A4 4-6-2 'Streak'
Posts: 3727
Joined: Tue May 30, 2006 4:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by mick b »

As far as I am aware JW 's photos above are the only pre war type. No idea re Lima I would think post war, especially if larger ?.



Buff/ stone are very similar colour shades.
DS239
LNER N2 0-6-2T
Posts: 58
Joined: Fri Apr 29, 2011 4:17 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by DS239 »

Graeme Leary wrote: Mon May 28, 2018 5:58 am Mick b - I also have 4 old Lima tank wagons, painted in (a quite bright) Yellow with the word Shell and shell symbol, ladder on each side and steps up to a flat 'platform' at one end with a handrail. Would these be the 'footboard/steps' you mention? (They also are 10-15% overall larger than the Hornby/Peco models plus have quite 'bulbous' ends. Would these have been an Italian (Lima?) flight of fancy or do they sound - as they look - not correct? And re the transfers from Robbie Burns, presume his description of 'stone' is the previous mentioned 'buff'?
The Lima tank wagons that you mention are a continental design, so steer clear of them, and 'stone' is the same as buff...
Seagull
GER D14 4-4-0 'Claud Hamilton'
Posts: 301
Joined: Sun Oct 14, 2007 7:15 pm
Location: Between a cheap railway station and a ploughed field

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Seagull »

Graeme Leary wrote: Sun May 27, 2018 5:56 am Bachmann 37-677 'Carburine Motor Spirit
Bachmann 37-670 Shell (on one side) and BP the other - also Buff with red stripes under the brand names.
Bachmann 37-665 As I understand part of a 3 wagon set but with variations - all basically silver grey but no red stripe.
Hello Graeme

I'm back at work and taking large books like Tourret's with me is not really an option so I cannot look up details for now.

The Carburine Spirit tanker should be fine - I have one and my planned layout is the southern end of the ECML in the late 1930s.

I do not remember the history of the Shell/BP co-operation but the red stripe suggests that it could be pre-war. The red stripe requirement did not last for long after WW2. Maybe someone else can come to your rescue here.

The three wagon set I do remember is strictly post war.

Alan
Playing trains, but trying to get serious
Graeme Leary
GNR C1 4-4-2
Posts: 751
Joined: Fri Oct 28, 2011 9:43 pm

Re: Berry Wiggins 14 ton tank wagons

Post by Graeme Leary »

Thanks all; have bought the 3 Bachmann Carburine plus the buff Bachmann Shell/BP (also with red stripes) as it seems to meet the same criteria.

However, my 4 'bulbous' end Lima Shell tanks will be on trademe (our ebay) along with quite a few other 'dubious' items in the near future (but tempted to get another couple of the Pease and Partners (creosote???) tankers to add to the 2 I already have. (TMC have them in stock).

Graeme
Post Reply