Hi! :)
I bought a pack of water filling posts.. I´m building them now.. So far so good, but…
QUESTIONS:
I´ll have one or two by the loco station, but would it also be a good idea to have one by each station?
Where will the crane typically be placed at a station? After the platform, or just at the stopping Point of the loco next after the platform?

Usually at Platform ends, and between lines in depots

Few pics here

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=railway+water+cranes+images&biw=1272&bih=569&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjY7qjQuaXLAhWEzRQKHfQTD1gQsAQIGw

They were seldom used on platforms on the mainline stations.  On "inter-city" routes, water was scooped up from troughs between the rails with the loco on the move or, in the case of route junctions and terminus stations, they were sited in the yards.  Occasionally, there would be a loco change, particularly in the case of splitting a train so the new loco arrived from the yard already coaled and tanked up.

Branchline stations often had them close to, or actually on the platforms.  They were usually placed at a convenient spot where the loco could fill up whilst the train waited at the platform changing passengers.

Water points, as with coaling stages, had everything to do with distances and loco capacity.  UK is not a big country so yards were never far away (at no point in UK are you ever more than 70 miles away from the coast).  "Local" facilities were expensive so they tended to be sited at each end of the route where locos were stabled overnight.

As the Southern had no water troughs there were water cranes at the end of most of their platforms. exceptions being where there were a number of stations fairly close together in urban areas and at the smaller rural halts.

I would also suggest that on lines with slow unfitted freight traffic there would need to be water cranes, as pick up from troughs was not so good at low speed, the optimum speed for pick up was 45mph, some pick up was possible as low as 15mph but he amount was much less.

Maybe in such cases water cranes might have been sited on goods refuge loops/sidings, I'm less familiar with non SR lines.

Hmm, just a thought Martin, but are you modelling UK, Swedish or an other geographic region?

Bill :)

Nice picture of the water crane at the end of the down platform at Bishops Stortford, on the West Anglia Main Line (London Liverpool Street to Cambridge).

The water tower is in the background next to the station building.

http://www.time-capsules.co.uk/picture/show/1261/Bishops-Stortford-Railway-Station

It could be that the water was only for the Bishops Stortford to Braintree branch line trains by the late steam period, but there were watering facilities at Dunmow and Braintree, so I suspect it was for any loco as necessary.


Ed

[user=6]Petermac[/user] wrote:

They were seldom used on platforms on the mainline stations.  On "inter-city" routes, water was scooped up from troughs between the rails with

Hi Martin,

There is a good reason why water troughs were problematic where winter is a bit more than an overnight frost - ice, which a) buckled the trough, and b) smashed the water scoop…Heating systems (steam, hot water) were required. Not used in deserts either due to evaporation.

There are some nice photo's of the narrow gauge line at Mariefred showing a water crane at the end of the platform being used to fill up what looks like a 2-4-2, and as a bonus a water tower in the background. See http://www.4rail.net/gallery_pictmonth_2015.php for August 2015.

So, yes, the end of the platform would be fine. Steam engines went through water at a tremendous rate, slow freight trains were lucky to make make it between water cranes. 450 imperial gallons per hour for a smallish engine were typical (2000 liters per hour).

Nigel