MGWR 1920 WTT (& cattle trains)

[jhb171achill]

With cattle trucks now available (thanks to Leslie!), a few background details relating to the working of cattle trains, once the STAPLE of MANY, if not most, rural lines, might be of interest.

The attached is from the 1920 MGW WTT, but is typical of all cattle workings 1880-1970.
 

(PS: Recess platform thing included by mistake but may be of interest anyway).

[Edo]

an average of over 33 wagons per  cattle train ..........................flipping hell.........I best start saving pronto!

 

 

[jhb171achill]

41 minutes ago, Edo said:

an average of over 33 wagons per  cattle train ..........................flipping hell.........I best start saving pronto!

 

 

A former GSWR driver I interviewed in his very late nineties over 25 years ago told me that his most hated turn was Ennis cattle fair, when (possibly unofficially) he was given what he described as a “worn out” J15 to lift up to 45 loaded cattle trucks out of Ennis for destinations north....

[leslie10646]

1 hour ago, Edo said:

an average of over 33 wagons per  cattle train ..........................flipping hell.........I best start saving pronto!

Ed, lots of fairs specials would have been a lot shorter. I think for a model railway ten looks pretty convincing.

That  said, I have twenty GNR cattle wagons for the Enniskillen Shipper and and sure the loops were big enough to take an 0-6-0, a brake and the lot of them!

If you're an IRRS member and ever in Dublin on Library Nights, take a trip into the wee room at the back of the library which contains the bound weekly notices for GSWR, GSR, CIE for nearly a century - the cattle traffic notices went on for pages and pages most weeks. Fascinating stuff. The said notices (for the GNR, in my case) provided the reason for my house name, as the Fair was on in Pettigo on the day my wife was born. My Dad, who was a constable in Garrison could even have been there!

An entertaining account of the great fair at Ballinasloe is to be found in Tatlow's Fifty Years of Railway Life - not everybody's cup of tea, but an amusing chapter.

Thanks, JHB, for the Midland extracts!

 

 

 

 

[jhb171achill]

Jhb171Senior-recalled counting FIFTY ONE cattle trucks leaving Ballinasloe (I think; possibly Gort or Loughrea) about 1936......  plus van with fry, in which he travelled.

Smell of coal and oil??!???? NOOO!

Cow poo.............

[DiveController]

What would have been the motive power on those? MGWR cattle engine? Did they ever need an udder loco, i.e. double headed cattle?

[jhb171achill]

De udder locos..... yes, not just on the Midland but other lines too, the heaviest 0.6.0s were the norm. Today it would probably be 071s! (Now there’s a thought!)

J15s were commonplace, even in the DSER. I believe DSER 15 & 16 (461/2) also made appearances, though you’d need to dip a Murphy 2.6.0 in grey paint to make it authentic! (They were never lined green, a la RPSI!)

Edited October 18, 2019 by jhb171achill

[Mayner]

The loads for Stock Specials quoted in the 1920 MGWR WTT are based on the short (14') pre-Amalgamation wagons rather than the longer 17'6" KN cattle wagons introduced by CIE in the 1940s, the overall number of cattle wagons allowed in a train presumably would have decreased from a maximum of 45 to 36 as the 14' wagons were withdrawn from service. 

The MGWR 1897 WTT specifies a maximum load of forty wagons "under favorable circumstances in relation to weather and gradients".  "A Special Cattle Train running through to catch a Boat at North Wall and which is being signaled as a Train requiring unusual dispatch" may be made up to 25 Vehicles".

The majority of MGWR Goods and Cattle trains were worked by the "Standard Goods" (Approx 60) up to the introduction of the "Cattle Engines" (22 Total) during the early-mid 1920s, following the Amalgamation the Standard Goods and passenger locos including large Celtic & Connemara Class regularly hauled cattle trains. 

Both the Midland Standard Goods and J15s would have been necessary for working cattle trains through from lines with restricted axle loading to the ports, to take JHBs example the J15 was the heaviest loco allowed to run north of Ennis to Sligo, similar restrictions applied on the majority of Midland Branche lines in Galway, Mayo and Roscommon.

[jhb171achill]

The late Billy Lohan was often rostered for Ennis specials. He never had anything other than a J15 except for a single occasion when he had a Midland 0.6.0 of some sort. I think he said a J18 or J19.

This engine had dodgy brakes, according to Billy, and was being worked to Inchicore to be fixed. On account of this, he ran through a set of crossing gates somewhere north of Ennis and smashed them to pieces!

Edited October 18, 2019 by jhb171achill

[Mayner]

The Midland Standard Goods appear to have had a reputation of weak brakes after the breaking system was modified following the Amalgamation. Originally the Midland goods locos had a steam breaking system that was considered (by Midland men) to be extremely effective, but was considered to have been "ruined" when converted to vacuum by the "Southern".

There is an interesting account of a derailment of J18 593 at Colloney Junction with the Down-Sligo Goods in December 1943 http://www.irrs.ie/Journal172/172 Collooney.htm. the train was unable to stop to unload sundries traffic and detach wagons at Colloney Station ran through the trap points at Colloney Junction the loco turning on its side. Interestingly the crew of the approaching 12:30 Tuam-Sligo Goods with J15 192 and 30 wagons were running at reduced speed having had found it difficult to control their train stopped at Colloney Southern.