7mm Heybridge Basin

[Osgood]

You'll wish you hadn't mentioned it......

Lightening the load

After the trauma of the transfers, (albeit happily resolved in the end) and a further delay on progress with the "little engine" due to a bout of illness, that is also sufficiently settled now, I fancied a brief break and something of a diversion on the workbench. Motivation came from both a...

www.westernthunder.co.uk

 

[Tim Birch]

I have attached an extract from the relevant pages of 'Bradshaw's canals and navigable rivers of England and Wales (1904)' which may help.

 

[Richard Gawler]

Yes Tim it does help.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, Chelmsford ran on coal brought by sea from the North East and barged along the navigation. The coastal vessels moored in the estuary (some sources state, near Osea Island) where their cargos were transferred to old Thames barges for transfer into the navigation. Hence the name Collier's Reach on this part of the Blackwater estuary.

Bradshaw says to me, the sea lock was large enough for coastal vessels but the access was restricted by the tides.

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

Just been looking at a copy of the Imray East Coast Pilot Guide (Lowestoft to Ramsgate) and today the sea lock is only open 1.5 hours before and 0.5 hour after high tides. Of course if you miss high tide then it's around a 12 hour wait for the next one .

I suspect when Heyridge was a commercial port the channel was kept maintained/dredged to allow slightly longer times for the lock to be open at high tides.

 

[simond]

I made my Puffer from ~2mm mounting card, as my late MIL had a substantial stock of it, she used to frame pictures.

I found a suitable drawing on line, prepared cad lines plans, and then printed them full size, stuck to the card with Pritt stick and cut out with a scalpel. I used the cargo hold as a "square box " and the keel of course, and stuck the frames to that. Bit flimsy til you stick the deck on, but after that, plating up was reasonably easy - I used thin card in strips about 3 or 4 scale feet wide and about 16 long from memory.

I imagine a barge would be pretty easy, as it is mostly cargo hold. Of course if you want it open with full internal detail, you'll have to model it like the real thing...

 

[James Spooner]

Just been looking at a copy of the Imray East Coast Pilot Guide (Lowestoft to Ramsgate) and today the sea lock is only open 1.5 hours before and 0.5 hour after high tides. Of course if you miss high tide then it's around a 12 hour wait for the next one .

I suspect when Heyridge was a commercial port the channel was kept maintained/dredged to allow slightly longer times for the lock to be open at high tides.

I remember visiting Heybridge basin quite frequently as a child as my parents enjoyed taking us for a walk along the sea wall, then having a drink at The Old Ship. There was generally a freighter in the basin, which as a small child looked huge, but was probably only a couple of hundred tons, bringing timber in from Scandinavia (I guess bound for Brown’s yard in Chelmsford). I do recall seeing dredgers occasionally in the Blackwater, but suspect that the freighters still had to ride the tide because away from high tide there was an awful lot of mud and not much water in the estuary…

Nigel

 

[cbrailways]

Scalescenes do an 00 scale barge and the print can be scaled up (or down) as required: T030e Steel Barges - Scalescenes

Usual disclaimer, just a satisfied customer.

 

[Richard Gawler]

I have planned some visual balance into the layout using the combination of loco coal with water column, and a shelter for passengers waiting at the platform (post 10). A barge is probably the largest vessel I can put on the waterway without upsetting this balance, but it really does have to be a timber one. Steel barges like the Scalescenes one are sadly 60+ years too modern for the period depicted.

 

[Jordan]

Personally I wouldn't as it would make the baseboard larger and more awkward to store. I'd try and keep within the 1200 x 400mm.



I'll be interested to see your approach to modelling the water.

On a Dutch HO quayside layout I built years ago I filled, smoothed and sealed the plywood surface then installed the quay wall. As I wanted to model a low tide I added a mud bank from stained polyfilla, gouged in rivulets from the quay wall and painted it from light to dark brackish water colour to give the impression of depth. The 'sea' was a thin layer of good quality PVA (as it dries clear) spread over the painted surface avoiding the mud banks. As the PVA dried I stippled it with a brush to provide the impression of movement. Once fully set I went over with a gloss varnish over the sea and mud banks with the latter absorbing sufficient varnish to glisten but not be saturated.

Glimpses of the water can be seen in these four photos.

View attachment 188086

View attachment 188087

View attachment 188088

View attachment 188089

Sorry, posting photos of the real thing doesn't count...

 

[Tim Birch]

Yes Tim it does help.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, Chelmsford ran on coal brought by sea from the North East and barged along the navigation. The coastal vessels moored in the estuary (some sources state, near Osea Island) where their cargos were transferred to old Thames barges for transfer into the navigation. Hence the name Collier's Reach on this part of the Blackwater estuary.

Bradshaw says to me, the sea lock was large enough for coastal vessels but the access was restricted by the tides.

Richard,
I have found a bit more information which may help to build the picture. Both are extracts from books by Edward Paget-Tomlinson (anything by him is a mine of information). The photo is from 'Britain's canal and rivercraft' and the text is from 'Canal and river navigations'. The boat in the photo looks fairly straightforward to build.

 

[Richard Gawler]

The footbridge at Little Baddow is still there, it is quite disitinctive because it is higher than usual.

Returning to John Marriage's book, timber was unloaded by hand at Coates Wharf (Brown's warehouse) in 1959. So while I don't (yet) know how timber was loaded at Heybridge Basin, it would be plausible to suppose this was also done by hand. Which suits the layout.



A timber barge 30 years earlier than the steel one. I doubt these changed much over the previous 30 years, and a scale model would (just) fit into the basin on my baseboard.

 

[PaxtonP4]

Thanks all, interesting. Wasn’t so much the gates themselves, as the self-determination of the horse.

I’ve ridden (not at all seriously) since I was a kid, so am not unfamiliar with horses, they are undoubtedly prey animals with all the baggage that entails, and yet they are capable of becoming habituated to regular behaviour.
I’m intrigued that the horse would apparently keep walking without some ”encouragement”

cheers
Simon

Working Horses do just that. Numerous accounts of milk float horses following the milkman down the street.

 

[Allen M]

Working Horses do just that. Numerous accounts of milk float horses following the milkman down the street.

When I was a kid in Kidderminster our Co-op milkman (Mr Collins to the kids, Alf to the adults) moaned for weeks (months?) after they took his horse & float and gave him an electric float. His complaint, he had to walk twice as far. The horse followed him up the street, he had to go back and fetch this newfangled electric thing!
This was before I left school so I think just into the early 1950s.

Back to boats. I remember the canal boats being pulled through Mill Street lock, Kidderminster (by St Mary's Church) by horses. I later learnt that this stopped about 1948 with nationalization of rail and canal. The LMS operated part of the wharf in GWR rail territory. As a kid I used to help open & close the gates. There is also a slot in the foot bridge so the horse could change sides without un-clipping the rope.

Hope this is of interest.

Regards
Allen

 

[Alan]

I learned to sail at the London Boro' of Newham's Outdoor Centre very close to the Blackwater end of the canal, with the Ship by the lock and the Jolly Sailor less tha a hundred yards away behind the sea(river) wall.

 

[Richard Gawler]

Richard,
I have found a bit more information which may help to build the picture. Both are extracts from books by Edward Paget-Tomlinson (anything by him is a mine of information). The photo is from 'Britain's canal and rivercraft' and the text is from 'Canal and river navigations'. The boat in the photo looks fairly straightforward to build.View attachment 188119View attachment 188120

Tim, I bought myself a copy of "Britain's Canal and Rivercraft" by Paget-Tomlinson and it doesn't have this picture or mention the Chelmer and Blackwater at all!

My copy is the contents of the first edition of 1979, reprinted as a paperback in 1993 and the typesetting uses a serif font. Only a couple of pounds through Abebooks but I wonder which edition you have?

 

[Alan]

If I remember correctly the Passmore Edwards museum in Stratford East London may well have information on the type of barges used on the Blackwater and Chelmer Navigation

 

[Richard Gawler]

I've had a look at the Passmore Edwards museum on Wikipedia, it sounds like it would have been well worth a visit but sadly it closed some years ago.

There is an entry page for the Navigation at Home Page of The Company of Proprietors of the Chelmer & Blackwater Navigation Limited, and I really ought to make some enquiries at the Chelmer Canal Trust.

 

[Alan]

Also look at Chelmer Canal Trust

 

[Richard Gawler]

Also look at Chelmer Canal Trust

I have just started to look. There is a real wealth of information here, although much is naturally for the navigation rather than the boats.

The first thing I have found is a detailed written specification for "the construction of a Canal Barge for Brown & Son, Timber Merchants Chelmsford" dated May 3rd 1907, which begins,

"The said Messrs Brown & Son to supply and deliver timber to yard and the said Howard & Sons to find the necessary Ironwork Labour etc. as set forth below
Dimensions 60 ft long 16 ft Beam and 3 ft 3 in draft
Keel to be laid on block, scaffs to be 2 ft 10 in long jogged, laid with tar hair and fastened with 2 - 5/8" through bolts and clinchers.
Stern & sternpost to be tenoned into Keel & fastened. Floor timbers to be berthed on keel 14' apart fastened with one oak treenail in each floor through keel in alternate edges
. . . "

I have copied this text as a sample from "Coates' Cuttings, The Chelmer Canal Trust's Newsletter", September 2001, Issue 17.
COATE'S CUTTINGS - CHELMER CANAL TRUST NEWSLETTER ISSUE 17, September 2001

If I find a drawing, and make the effort to learn about the terminology involved, I could make a model of a barge. Quite how this will affect the timescale of the "Heybridge Basin diorama project" is anyone's guess, but I will at least have all I need to try a barge.

 

[Tim Birch]

Tim, I bought myself a copy of "Britain's Canal and Rivercraft" by Paget-Tomlinson and it doesn't have this picture or mention the Chelmer and Blackwater at all!

My copy is the contents of the first edition of 1979, reprinted as a paperback in 1993 and the typesetting uses a serif font. Only a couple of pounds through Abebooks but I wonder which edition you have?

Richard,
I'm sorry for the delay. I'm in Mallorca at present and can't confirm any detail until early next month.