West Somerset Railway General Discussion

A skilled trades person can make anything look professional. A station nameplate does just that as you ride by, you don't go & inspect it to ascertain it's manufacture. It's far more important to have rolling stock, without it, no railway.

DJB.

 

Indeed, but you mentioned wagons, which is slightly different. Wooden replicas will look fine to begin with, but when it all starts to fall apart in a few years you might begin to wish you'd gone for metal after all.

 

A heritage railway is an holistic whole. Formation, track, structures, signalling, stations, rolling stock, staff, knowledge and more. No one part works without the others.

Robin

 

Well you paint them from time to time.

PH

 

My own view is 180 degrees different - and in case you hadn't noticed significant work is already in progress on the wagons. Previous repro signs have been made on the "cheap & cheerful" basis & the latest running in board to have appeared at Dunster (illustrated in the latest WSR mag) is reason enough to both fund proper repro signs & give some teeth to a WSR heritage committee from whom all alterations & additions should receive prior approval. Authenticity does not stop at wheeled items.

 

This is my 39th year year as a volunteer and the WSR’s 42nd. It is high time we raised our eyes beyond ‘cheap and cheerful’ in all areas of our endeavour and aimed for something better.

Robin

 

I have seen GWR style lettering, made from waxed paper or similar, that is considered as a template for making new station name signs and have seen signs made using them.
A lot of what the GWR used was made by them* - not always out shopped - and whilst there must have been some firm patterns/templates for guidance I think a little latitude must have existed. After all it believe it unlikely that an item with slight inaccuracies, as far as signs, benches and that type of infrastructure was concerned, they would not be discarded or consigned to a furnace. I know there is often debates about the correct colours used but it the days spoken of here paint was frequently mixed on site and the colour reference cards were interpreted by the vision of guy in charge or him who did the painting.
* I am not making reference to engineering or metal fabrications here.

 

Ive heard this said before.The men who made the signs , as the men who mixed the paint , in those days on the railway it was a way of life. Having read so much about railway life & indeed talked to old railwaymen , im sure they would have done as good a job as they were capable of, you cant compere their attitudes then to now. and dont you think a man who might have been a painter for 30 or 40 years knew what shade he was looking at!

 

A long established painter may well do so, but they also had to usually do as they were instructed. Peoples vision interpretations do vary.
However my viewpoint here would be, given the various demands on scarce financial resources, would be maintain a sense of proportion.

 

Just read on the wsr.org.uk website that Bishop Lydeard's station cat has a poorly back leg, hope it's nothing too serious.

 

GWS Didcot have Aldermaston and Thame.

 

Perhaps the vet will do a cat scan.

Bob.

 

IMHO getting some painting done on the carriages, particularly the roofs, would impress the vast majority of passengers much more.

 

Funding for Brunellian Station Sign patterns raised in 24 hours

Further to my post yesterday, pledges of funding from WSR supporters has raised the funding for the patterns for casting missing Brunellian station signs in only a day. We now need to push on and raise the estimated £2,000 cost of casting the reproduction signs, which will faithfully reproduce the station signs supplied new to the Railway in 1862 / 1874 where they are now missing and have not been replaced by original but later GWR signs. A short explanatory paper, updated from that circulated yesterday, is attached.

Robin Moira White

 

Maybe but folk are free to support whichever cause they feel to be most worthy. Will you be posting a link to your carriage roof painting fund soon?

 

They shouldn’t be seen as an either/or choice. Painting carriage roofs is simply part of the routine operation of the railway, and has to be done regardless. Putting heritage (rather than simply functional) signage in place is an enhancement, because it is going beyond the minimum needed to run a service into the realm of an enhanced experience.

Tom

 

There was a picture of a WSR train on the BBC news website recently.

The appearance - largely as a result of paint having come away from large areas of the carriage roofs was very tatty

 

West Somerset before the Railway.

A Hinkley ‘C’ Community Fund Panel meeting at Clarke Willmott’s offices near M5 Jn25 this morning. Corridor wall graced with this splendid map from 1820 / 21. Looking forward to getting home and comparing it with the modern day.

Robin

 

The way the map is drawn makes you realise why the WSR took the route it did

Could a copy be made for display on the WSR or the Internet?

Thank you for that