Demountable Debatable 1 (mini blog)

But Firstly ...

Well, it seemed so at the time. fbb has tried to restructure his blog thinking to retain quality (?) but to reduce quantity. Over the last few weeks, the planned structure has repeatedly collapsed, largely due to fbb's lack of self-imposed discipline.

Hmmm?

So here is "the plan" again.

There will be full blogs on Monday, Wednesday and Friday each week.

e.g. Sheffield's Little Nippers

Wednesday 30th April

First's Kernow  Stupidity

Friday 2nd May

On Tuesday and Thursday mini blogs will appear.

29th April Demountable Debatable 1

1st May Demountable Debatable 2

On Saturday and Sunday Variety blogs will appear.

fbb will aim to provide a rough guide to content from time to time, as above.

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Not Such A Big Revolution

It was the infamous Dr Richard Beeching, loved by all railway enthusiasts, that kicked off the so-called "Container Revolution". His plan was that goods would be conveyed long distance by "Liner Train" ...

... with the last leg from depot to customer transferred by the container on the back of a lorry.

Whilst the idea of dedicated trains with huge containers (then 20ft, now 40ft) was the apple of Dr Richard's eye, putting "containers" on trains then lorries is almost as old as the railways themselves.

Indeed, they might well have been road-hauled by a one horsepower tractor unit!

Pre-Beeching, containers came in very varied forms. Like the above, some were half a flat wagon in length ...

... and sometimes used by well known "names" like Captain Birdseye.

Occasionally, they would be plonked in an open wagon rather than on a flat wagon. 

And there were some different designs ...

... made of pressed steel sheet, available in miniature, of course, from specialist railway model retailers.

There were demountable containers for specialist loads ...

... as illustrated by some scale models. A model specialist wagon might be for nuclear waste.

The OO gauge model is pictured above; reality below.

In later years you could unload the old containers by fork lift truck ...

... a system still used today at smaller depots!

The unloading vehicles are now a bit nore sophisticated and they are able to lift much bigger forks!

fbb's fave container wagon, admired for its top-sophistication, was that produced by Hornby Dublo. The wagon was a very basic printed tinplate body on a standard Hornby chassis.

The container was a shaped block of wood with printed paper detail "affixed". But you did get an eye for your crane hook to hook into. 

Oh the fun we had back then!

Of course, these older containers were very different from the big boxes that are used today - but we do all depend of them for a huge proportion of what we wish to buy and consume.

But what about liquids?

Have tank demountables been demonstrated in the past?

To be concluded on  Thursday .

Everybody's At It

Hornby have now joined in with the fake model game. The idea is that you produce wagons that have never existed and flog them. They are either bought by collectors, by modellers who don't  know they are fake, or by modellers who like to consume the branded contents displayed.

The breweries are real - but they do not have any tank wagons, neither are they ever likely to rent any!

 Next Sheffield Nipper blog : Weds 30 April 

Monday Variety

Farewell First's Failure 1

Readers may remember that fbb revealed First's decision to cut and run from its hugely speculative 95a and 95b to Swallownest, Beighton and Crystal Peaks. The service ended on Saturday and Sheffield correspondent David sent fbb pictures of the last three journeys as they arrived at the outer terminus.

In some ways these shots are symptomatic of First's very disappointing attitude to its business generally. Here is the antepenulimate single decker ...

... in First's new, very boring, one-size fits all livery.

The penultimate journey was in the previous corporate standard ...

... looking as uninspiring as it always did. 

The final visitor from Walkley was this.

This was the superb "Sheffield" livery adopted as standard for the City until "the management" changed its corporate mind - yet again - and banished route branding and local liveries to the waste bin of history.

Farewell First's Failure 2
In 1959, the Woodseats to Wadsley Bridge tram route was converted to motorbus and a fleet of Atlanteans was acquired for the job. These were the first such in the city and are seen below lined up at Herries (?) depot all dressed for the 53.

Here are a couple of 42s on the steep Derbyshire Lane on the routes to the south of the city.

In the north, the routes were extended beyond the Wadsley Bridge tram terminus with the 53 serving the edge of the massive Parson Cros estate whilst the 42 ran to a new development at Fox Hill.

For whatever reason, the estate terminus progressively lost a twenty minute route 42 until, in recent times it enjoyed a service 86 every forty minutes ...

... (awful! - it used to be half hourly).

Small buses often sufficed.

There were three infrequent oddities that also served the area.

Then, back in September 2024 came another First Bus rush of blood to the service development head.

A very long standing loop serving Shiregreen (centre right) was un-looped and one half maeandered off to pastures new. The 75 went indirectly to Chapeltown whilst the new 75a ran indirectly to Fox Hill.

Quite who would want to travel from Fox Hill a very long way round to Firth Park is unclear. The route also served Buchanan Road on the Parson Cross estate ...

... a long road never ever served by bus since Sheffield Corporation's very first bus route in 1913!

Needless to say, this loopy development ended last Saturday as well.

It was really good to use a Leeds City livery on the new route, just to confuse the passengers!

But for both developments  (75a, 95a, 95b) there was :-

NO printed publicity

NO printed route map

NO timetable clarity from First

NO house-to-house leaflet delivery in the new area

NO clear posters at major interchanges

But it was ALL ON LINE.

The trouble with "on line" is that it is not a timetable book or leaflet in the hand. Mrs Miggins of Buchanan Road would not be thinking "I wonder if First have started an exciting new bus past my front door?" "Does it go to Firth Park?"

To discover it on line, she would have to know it was there first. Presumably very few people did know, and even fewer cared.

Crackpot management is not helped by a total lack of bus branding and multiple and mysterious liveries - just very poor all round.

So low passenger numbers led to withdrawal after only eight months.

It is worth noting that, even when the 75a ran, the 86 was the ONLY sensible bus to and from Sheffield city centre.

The Skill Of Journalists - Again!

Sounds really impressive; but where in the Transport for Wales area will such a stupedous service operate?

Of course it's drivel. The hack has read "Cardiff Metro" and jumped to conclusions.

The hack has read that the new network will be 105 miles in total by combining all the existing local routes in the city.

The hack has picked up that trains will run every five minutes between Queen Street and Central stations.

The hack has then, out of total ignorance, invented the headline.

The Skill Of Journalists - Again!

When the early railway engineers decided to conquer Chat Moss bog between Manchester and Liverpool, they dumped tons and tons of branches and bracken into the goo which offered a base for running the relatively low weight trains of the day. You could say that the track floated on a bed of straw on top of the squidge.

So where is this floating trains line?

The article is about Ryde Pier and the fact that, after some extensive engineering work, the pier tracks have been re-opened.

Sometimes at a very high tide, part of the track can be inundated, but fbb can assure all readers of this particular article that Ryde Pier has never floated!

Have you noticed that a huge number of these on-line articles report on the incredible? Certainly if Ryde Pier were to float that would be incredible as it is made of a whole heap of cast iron.

Unless the laws of physics have changed recently, iron does not float.

They Used To Be Two Bob

When fbb was nobbut a lad, Airfix aircraft kits were pocket money toys. They were cheap enough to allow a kid to assemble a significant collection and not have to wait for Aunt Flo's annual Birthday offering. 

But like so many former kid's toys, they have now become the prerogative of well-off old men.

fbb spotted this one recently.

It is to a scale of 1:35 - which would be "1" gauge in railway modelling terms, so quite big. It is the HQ "caravan" for Bernard Law, Lord Montogomery ...

... from his North Africa Campaign.

The kit will cost you £58 ...

... but you will need another £13 for Monty and his staff. Then there's the full set of paints ...

... at £11 plus unspecified glue and "sundries" - like brushes, paint thinners and dry cleaning when you spill it all down your best clobber.

Well, fbb would,  for sure!

The model is accurate and exquisite if assembled well (so another fbb failure, then) with a total spend of £92.

And maybe you will want a diorama in which to display it ...

Perhaps railway modelling is not so expensive after all.

National Express Not Excelling

Even fbb's weak knowledge of business finance can see that the line on the graph is going down the pan. Apparently investors don't think much of the sell-off of the group's North American School Bus business.

Selling the business cheaply smacks of financial desperation and undermines business confidence.

So maybe fbb will not add the Group to his non-extensive (non-existent!) investment portfolio.

And there is the ever expanding FlixBus to worry about!

The demountable tank item is postponed until tomorrow.

P.S. Ribble Bus - yesterday fbb wrote about a Bristol VR rebuilt for Carters as an odd looking single deck. He had not found a picture of the Ribble original, registered CBV 9S.

But correspondent David has!

Thanks muchly.

 Next Freight Technology blog : Tues 29 April