One for the railway enthusiasts.

[Drains]

Out walking the dog last week in the disused, mostly trackless and overgrown sidings of what was Monktonhall Colliery south of Edinburgh. Found a few interesting things - bits of point controllers, the hump, odds and sods, and this (below). A wooden fishplate. Anyone ever seen one before? Any idea why wood instead of steel?

 

[rtbcomp]

Electrical insulation where the lines conduct signalling current, to isolate different sections.

Or perhaps to signal the presence of a train when its wheels bridged the gap in the rai?

 

[Stereophoney]

Cos it was cheap !

Still see loads of those knocking about aswell as the wooden rail keys

Sometimes my job is very boring But if you were an enthusiast it would be amazing

 

[Drains]

Cos it was cheap !

Still see loads of those knocking about aswell as the wooden rail keys

Sometimes my job is very boring But if you were an enthusiast it would be amazing

Yes! Lots of wooden rail keys too. I guess on slow sidings the material standards can be relaxed a little. RTB's isolation suggestion is sensible though, right or no.

In India (Old Delhi Station in particular) I noticed the track was held down direct to the sleepers - no chairs, just spikes. Those trains moved slowly too.

 

[Stereophoney]

Thinking along the right lines but thinking of more modern installations, when those fishplates were used they probably wouldn't have used track circuits, but i could be wrong, you wouldn't believe how different the railways are just from county to county

 

[Pete.]

I was thinking that - no track circuits back in those days.

 

[jugs]

It's an insulated fish-plate to isolate block sections of track for track circuiting.

track circuiting. Invented by American William Robinson 1872 first used 1876.

Britain didn't use it much (because of cost) until the 1920s, by 1939 most mainline track was fitted.
the reason it was finally introduced was a series of crashes all of which would have been prevented by track circuiting.

See-
Norton Fitzwarren rail crash (1890)
Thirsk rail crash (1892)
Hawes Junction rail crash (1910)
Quintinshill rail crash (1915)
Winwick rail crash (1934)

 

[the snooper]

to stop the pikeys weighing the plates in

 

[Stereophoney]

to stop the pikeys weighing the plates in

Trust me if it was the plates they were nicking we wouldn't have half the trouble they cause from what they are actually stealing !

 

[Drains]

Re the track circuiting -

1) Calm down, calm down.
2) I'll put money on that timber fishplates are not used on mainlines to isolate track sections.
3) This was from a colliery shunting yard. There will either have been a signalman in a box watching what was going on, or the shunters will have been manually throwing the points.
4) The one I found is not an insulated fishplate. It's a block of wood with holes in it.

Now these are insulated fishplates.


Regardless of when track circuiting was invented, adopted or by whom, I think it is unlikely to apply here.

 

[Pete.]

Yeah I guess that it wouldn't insulate very well if it was raining?

If my father was alive he would be able to answer it precisely (and at very great length , bless his soul)

 

[Rudi McAnichal]

In India (Old Delhi Station in particular) I noticed the track was held down direct to the sleepers - no chairs, just spikes. Those trains moved slowly too.

...you wouldn't believe how different the railways are just from county to county.

Track construction in Rangpur, Bangladesh was certainly rather different from UK methods when I took this photo (around 1998). Not a grown-up Hornby Dublo three rail layout, just a place where they had both “standard gauge” and “metre gauge” trains.