Old Goods Wagons with Center Roof Canvas?

[Auto-Train Original]

Can anyone tell me more about these wagons I see in a lot of photos from before WW2 all over Ireland? Who made them? When did they last get used and has anyone modelled them? Thanks in advance.

[leslie10646]

They are "convertible wagons which were to be found on GSWR, MGWR, LMSNCC, BCDR (?), SLNCR(?) and DSER to sorta with.

@jhb171achill will write you an essay when he has time off from sucking up to Americans!

[Flying Snail]

Take a look here to see the late KCME's model of a DSER convertible wagon

https://irishrailwaymodeller.com/topic/10867-dwwr-dser-convertible-wagon/

They are the definitive pre-CIE Irish wagon. So named as they could be converted between being a cattle wagon and a covered wagon. The soft top could be rolled back to provide ventilation when needed. As Leslie said, all Irish railway companies had them - the transportation of cattle from fairs to the ports was one of the major goods traffic types on Irish railways.

 

[murrayec]

https://www.studio-scale-models.com

[Mol_PMB]

The roof opening also allowed heavy items to be craned into them and then covered over. 
Similar vans were used on the big island too, but they lasted longer in service in Ireland. 

[Mayner]

The 'soft topped" or convertible wagons were gradually phased out on CIE during the 1950s most likely gone by 1960. Although the majority of Convertible Wagons were built in the 19th Century and were 14' long, the MGWR had some (approx 100)longer 17'6 Irish Railway Clearing House (IRCH) 'Standard Covered Wagons" of the Post WW1 era built as convertible wagons. The MGWR IRCH 'convertibles" had the same rood profile as a standard H Van but fitted with a removable canvas centre.

CIE replaced its remaining soft topped wagons and GSR & pre-amalgamation 14' calltle Wagons (K) with longer KN wagons during the 1950s, but ended up with a surpluse of KNs as the traffic declined during the 1960s

[Northroader]

You can get them as a card kit from Alphagraphix (this one’s 7mm scale) and do your own chassis.

[jhb171achill]

On 11/4/2025 at 3:59 PM, Auto-Train Original said:

Can anyone tell me more about these wagons I see in a lot of photos from before WW2 all over Ireland? Who made them? When did they last get used and has anyone modelled them? Thanks in advance.

Only seeing this now! 

If you mean the open-topped cattle wagons, these were built in huge numbers within the period of around 1880-1900. Regulations introduced which required cattle wagons to have roofs resulted in them being (mostly!) converted as such in the early years of the 20th century. Most survived into the 1950s, gradually being replaced by standard CIE types, as per Provincial Wagons' excellent cattle wagon kit.

If you mean the "soft-tops" (officially "convertible goods vans") the origin of these is in the 1870s, with few constructed probably much after 1880-5-ish. Some of these were later converted to fully roofed vans for goods only, but while "convertible" were used for dry goods with the tarpaulin on, and cattle with it off. They were still to be seen - just about - into the 1950s. When CIE's standard goods and (separately) cattle vans started being built in large numbers, "soft-tops" were the first to go.

Who made them - in most cases the railway companies themselves. In some cases, especially with smaller companies, british export companies like Pickerings or the Birmingham Railway Carriage & Wagon Company, thought the output of these latter was more to be found on narrow gauge lines.

[murrayec]

In the workshop for repair;-

SSM kit with extra detailing built by KMCE

Eoin

[Mol_PMB]

On 11/4/2025 at 10:42 PM, Mayner said:

The 'soft topped" or convertible wagons were gradually phased out on CIE during the 1950s most likely gone by 1960. Although the majority of Convertible Wagons were built in the 19th Century and were 14' long, the MGWR had some (approx 100)longer 17'6 Irish Railway Clearing House (IRCH) 'Standard Covered Wagons" of the Post WW1 era built as convertible wagons. The MGWR IRCH 'convertibles" had the same rood profile as a standard H Van but fitted with a removable canvas centre.

CIE replaced its remaining soft topped wagons and GSR & pre-amalgamation 14' calltle Wagons (K) with longer KN wagons during the 1950s, but ended up with a surpluse of KNs as the traffic declined during the 1960s

This snippet intrigued me, and I have been looking out for them whilst trawling through photos online and in books. I've finally found one - in 'Irish Railways in Colour - a second glance. On page 38, credited to the Midland Publishing Colection, and dated 1958, here is 3318M, an IRCH 'convertible' van:

It's in early CIE dark grey livery with eau-de-nil snail and numbering. The ropes are tied to special eyes on the uprights, which are absent on the equivalent vans with full roofs.

For comparison, here's another similar MGWR van 3259M with a full roof:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53511621949

This normal full-roofed variant of the IRCH wooden-framed goods van was used by the GNR, GSR and MGWR. The GSWR preferred the steel-frame version, which was also adopted by CIE prior to the H vans, but I've found no evidence of other railways adopting the IRCH van designs.

 

[jhb171achill]

A lot - if not most - of the “soft-tops” were the older, lower-sided, round-roofed body types as shown in the models above.

A handful made it to the late 50s.

[Mol_PMB]

Indeed. It was particularly the IRCH design with the flatter roof that I had been searching for. There can't have been many of them - they're much harder to find than green H vans or GSR grain hoppers for example (though perhaps slightly less obvious in photos too).

I fancy modelling several of these IRCH wooden-framed vans with detail differences - a GNR vac fitted variant, an MGWR convertible, a normal GSR van, and a double-skinned GSR van.