Clements on Claytons

Irish Railway Record Society

Clements on Claytons

N.E. GAMBLE

One of the most valuable items in the Society's Library is a set of bound volumes of typescript entitled IRS Bulletin. It is a series of circulated typed notebooks beginning in 1928. They belonged to a small group of enthusiasts who recorded their observations and studies and kept in touch by post. While the group was small, it included members living as far away as India!

Among the prime movers in what was originally known as the Irish Railway Historical & Observation Society was R. N. 'Bob' Clements who would later play such an important role in the IRRS, within a short time the group came to include K. A. Murray, who altered the title to 'Irish Railway Record Society' in August 1930. This name was used until 1932 when the two editors, Messrs Murray and Charles Coghlan, ceased publication due to lack of interest and an unwillingness to pay the subscription needed to keep the notebooks in circulation. When it appeared again in February 1933, it was under the sole editorship of Mr Coghlan and the title was Irish Railway Society!

After 75 or more years, it is right that some of the material should be given a second airing in our JOURNAL, for it is the only source of information for contemporary developments, and we believe that our copy is the only known set in existence. It also contains a number of articles, especially by Messrs Murray and Clements, which formed the basis for subsequent articles in our JOURNAL. We do not intend to reprint them, but to look at some topics not subsequently the subject of published research.

The first article to be reprinted is a short one, which Mr Clements published on the GSR Clayton railcars which arrived in 1928 and which were not among the glories of steam! In June 1929 (Bulletin 3) Mr Clements wrote ‘Six Clayton cars were delivered in 1928 to the GSR by the Clayton Wagon Works, Lincoln’.

‘The following description of this type of car is mostly taken from a paper read by Mr S. R. Devlin, Chief Draughtsman of Claytons before the Institute of Locomotive Engineers at Leeds on 14 Dec 1928.

‘The boiler is of the vertical cylindrical water-tube type with superheater. The working pressure is 330 lbs, and the boiler can evaporate 2,000 lbs per hour at 212 deg F. The boiler is fired from the top, through a stoking tube. The firebox can be dropped from the boiler for cleaning by removing six nuts.

‘The engine is of the non-compound fully enclosed type, with gear transmission. It has two double-acting cylinders, 7" by 10", to which steam is distributed by piston valves beneath the cylinders. The valves are operated by eccentrics mounted on a layshaft driven by spur gearing from the crankshaft. The cut-off is variable in forward and reverse between 80% and 30%. The cars can be driven from either end, but there is only one reverse lever, so that the driver has to take it with him when changing ends: it can only be removed when the gear is in mid position. The body and underframe are built as a unit, with steel framing and exterior panelling.

‘Swing-bolster bogies are fitted, with laminated side-bearing springs and helical bolster springs. The body is mounted on two four-wheeled bogies of which one carries the power unit. The water tank and coal bunker are at the forward end of the engine bogie, clear of the car body, the boiler being carried at the rear of the bogie, with the engine mounted horizontally between the axles.

‘The cars in service on the GSR are numbered 358 to 363. No. 360 has worked between Harcourt St and Foxrock, and Nos. 359 & 361 between Westland Row and Dalkey. The car on the Foxrock service was very unpopular with the men. It could not make steam enough for the severe gradients: the driver said he could not get up the bank without letting the water right out of the gauge-glass, and when pressure fell the car soon got stuck. The tubes are very close together and the canal water at Harcourt St is very bad, so that the boiler needed washing out frequently. The washout plugs are very inaccessible.

‘The men also complain of the firing arrangement through the stoking tube; they say they have no control over the coal. Black coal falls on black coal and the fire never burns up. This trouble is, I think, due to the firemen not having much experience with these cars, and putting on too much coal at a time.

‘The coal consumption of the cars on the Harcourt St line was 19 lbs/mile, and on the Westland Row line it was said to be 25 lbs, though I would not like to guarantee these figures, though they come from Mr Lee, shed foreman at Grand Canal St. They seem impossibly large, the makers claim 11 lbs/mile. I may mention that the complaints that the boilers were too small were brought up with much emphasis, referring to the L&NER cars, in the discussion on the paper at Leeds.

‘The GSR cars cost £1,800 each; they seem to be identical with those on the L&NER except that the English cars are 3rd class only, while the Irish ones have a small first class compartment. A point of interest is that the upholstery of the 3rd class seats is the same as the standard on the LMSR England’.

The following was contributed by Mr K Davison in Bulletin No. 5 (October 1929). ‘Railcars on the Western District’. A Sentinel or Clayton coach leaves Mullingar (on weekdays) at 11.10 am, united with the Cavan train and runs to Inny Junction. There it is uncoupled and leaving at 11.38 am runs to Sligo, stopping at all intermediate stations and arrives at 2.22 pm. A Clayton leaves Sligo for Mullingar at 11.30 am and arrives at 2.48 pm. Another leaves Mullingar for Athenry at 11 am and arrives at 1.10 pm. Leaving again at 1.25 pm, it reaches Mullingar at 3.35 pm. Another leaves Mullingar for Athlone at 3 pm, arriving at 4 pm. Another leaves Athlone at 9.50 am and arrives at Mullingar at 10.48 am.’

In Bulletin No. 5 (October 1929) Mr Clements recorded ‘Clayton car No. 362 is working to Kinsale Jc., Clonakilty and Kenmare; she is doing better than on the D&SE, only burning about 14lbs per mile; but she takes 23 mins for the 6¹/₂ miles up the bank to Waterfall, or 27 mins on a bad day, while an ordinary engine will do it in 13, the schedule being 15 or 16’.

In Bulletin No. 6 (December 1929) Mr Clements noted 'The Clayton cars are not working on the Sligo line at present, for I saw their trains three times, and the engines were 635, 534 and 654, on trains of three six-wheelers. Clayton car No. 358 is in Inchicore. A misprint in Bulletin No. 5 stated that No. 362 was working to Kenmare - this should be to Macroom’. In Bulletin No. 10 (Aug 1930) Mr Clements curtly recorded 'Claytons withdrawn between Mullingar, Athlone and Athenry.'

There was an aftermath. Mr Murray, reporting on the Eucharistic Congress of June 1932 in Bulletin No. 15, reported that 'As every available carriage was pressed into service, some very unusual vehicles were to be seen (on the D&SE section). Among them were the coach portions of the six Clayton cars, withdrawn from service, running in three articulated sets; of the six cars only one is not third class; the central bogie is Inchicore built, the others are the original ones. They are, I believe the first articulated coaches in Ireland, excepting the two Drumm battery-driven trains’. Sean Kennedy points out that the carriage portions were readily adapted to articulation in pairs because of the availability of the pivot bearing support for the power bogie at the original power unit end of each vehicle.

In the revised Bulletin No. 17 (May 1933) came the final note, by 'CL': 'The new Waterford and Tramore Coaches’. The first of these arrived on 9 March. They are the old Clayton cars, with engines removed and running articulated in pairs, weight 36 tons. The old coaches are to be scrapped at Waterford'.

There they remained, forgotten to most except those who used them on that isolated line until they were in their turn supplemented by AEC railcars at the end of 1954.

The remainder of this article appears in IRRS Journal number 163, published June 2007.