Spare Parts From Barry or elsewhere

People complain about parts being removed from locos at Barry but what about the tenders that were sold to the steel company.

 

there is a large difference between Woodhams Selling tenders and people stealing spares.

 

Yes Woodhams did have a massive problem with parts being stolen. At least 2 so called enthusiasts spent the night in Barry nick for stealing parts . Worst thing is that some of those who now purport to be whiter than white in those days were in fact the worst offenders and were banned from the site. But hey -it's got to be all water under the bridge now. What's taking place currently is the tale end of a huge shakedown process. Even back in 1984 I received a valve connecting link in the post (wasn't popular with the postman!)previously removed by the sender from' Eddystone'. The guy who sent it either had a conscience or he wanted to help-I didn't give a monkey's at the time-just glad to receive it! I certainly could live with this as we had paid as much for our loco as someone else had for an almost complete one! There will always be one or two parts flying around(including the duff ones) and more and more we are having to rely on newly manufactured items-but no problem, our industry is relentlessly re-inventing itself. Currently I am heavily involved in the restoration of 4253 at Rolvenden and the process goes on....

 

Did that with an SR April Fools spoof back in the 90s. Renamed and renumbered 34039 for a morning with a credible back story. That really got some folk all het up.

 

When we were restoring 5029 we only had 3 of the 4 Outside slide bar tie straps of the loco... but we had a spare off 5080...( actually it was a full set), during one of our trips to TYS, I spotted 5029s missing strap being prepared for fitting to 5080.... so shortly after 5029 gained a original set that fitted without modification and 5080 was re united with its original set... everybody happy all round

IanH

 

Or to other groups? 34081 lost her tender to a steel works so we bought the tender from 34028 long before that became a preservation project. All the non ferrous parts on 34081 and many (most?) other locos at Barry had long gone before they were saved so what's the big deal if a few other bits went missing too? Heaven knows where our outside motion ended up. Some say it was stored in the tender when she was moved from Eastleigh to Barry and it ended up in the furnaces at whichever steel works bought the tender. We managed to source a pair of second hand connecting rods but the con rods were made from new. I can't say that the fate of these missing parts concerned us much, we just viewed it as just another problem to be solved and funded and I suspect that was the attitude of most other preservation groups at the time.

 

Thing to remember back then was that no one expected any non reserved engines to survive, so if you could replace missing parts of your loco from another you would, and if you could buy spares you did, the bluebells 9f i have heard got a full set of motion off another 9f as part of the purchase price.

Today there is still a lot of parts out there and in quite a lot of cases the owners are giving them back to the restoring groups , some missing parts off of 4253 have i believed been gifted back to the loco, also you now get a lot of cases where one loco group have spares that they don't need, swopping these for stuff that another group has that they do need, its been in this way through getting to know other loco owners that 4253 has been able to obtain quite a lot of parts, and now with the spares aquired with the 58 there is the chance of even more missing parts becoming availible.
so what might have started off as someone taking a part off an engine awaiting scapping, fully expecting to never see that engine again is now prooving to have been a bit of a god send, saving the making of some very expensive parts.

 

Based on the fact that every single loco went to Barry with a full set of motion, this means that all of the parts are in preservation, but obviously some greedy groups / persons are holding on to more than their fair share , preventing or delaying restorations due to the high cost of replacing these. The chances of damaging a rod are probably minimal & there is little need to be hanging on to multiple sets of spares.

Bob.

 

Hadn't previously heard that. There is a spare set of 9F cylinders, but they came from one of the 9Fs that was cut up in the mid 1980s.

Tom

 

,
Not really true, especially regarding connecting rods. On most locos, these were removed and placed in tenders, bunkers or on running boards, but very few ended up in preservation.

 

I think you'll find that these were acquired by whoever chanced upon them first & subsequently went into their stores.
I remember 30 years ago a railway which had paarts of a 72xx acquired from Barry yet didn't even have an ex-Barry loco.
These parts were later given (free !) to a group which had bought one.

Bob.

 

Given that 24 connecting rods had to be forged for various ex-Barry B.R. Standard locos (and more to make), someone must be sitting on a lot of connecting rods, then.

 

A false assumption there I'm afraid.
Whilst clearly those locos which arrived at Woodhams under their own power (a number did) were complete, a number of WR ones arrived towed with connecting rods cut through with oxy acetylene behind the crosshead & in front of the big end to make them easier to tow.
This is one reason for the shortage of ex GW con rods.
A lot of SR locos arrived with much of the motion taken down & stuffed in the tender, This would make easy pickings for the scrap merchant on arrival as well as getting mislaid when locos & tenders became parted with some tenders ending up cut up or sold on to the steel works.

Comparison of the list of surviving GW locos which were attached to 3500g tenders but now have no tender (or instead have one straight from BR) suggests that a number of these tenders were cut up whilst their locos survived.

 

What about cab fittings and other easily removed parts? Did Woodhams remove and scrap them on arrival, or were they gradually pilfered. I do seem to remember a 70s or 80s magazine interview with Dai Woodham where he said that he had a quantity of removed parts in storage, which he would sell to groups buying a loco if they asked.

 

But did they scrap them or keep them at that time?

 

I have a picture of Leander taken at Barry with part of its motion missing... So even the "complete early survivors" weren't so complete. 48173 still had connecting rods in 1986.. But parts were missing.

 

Deleted.

 

And 1988! I think you mean coupling rods?

48173 Barry 25.8.88 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!