Accurascale announce a new range of Chaldrons; The Waggons That Fuelled The Industrial Revolution!

Contributed by: Graham Muspratt

26 Oct 2021 00:00am

Accurascale have announced a new range of Chaldron waggons, With a career on the rails spanning over 150 years, the Chaldrons can find a place on any colliery based layout from the 1820s right up to the 1970s!

There has been a surge in interest in the birth of the railways, along with intrigue in pre-grouping and the Victorian era with recent locomotive releases, not to mention the interest in industrial heritage and its railways. Perfect for small layouts, shunting planks and larger operations with collieries modelled as part of a larger layout.
Accurascale are producing five main variants of the type, including three main body profile types. Within these five variants, there are different arrangements of ‘bang plates’, handbrakes and wheel styles, all of which have included within the tooling suite.

The specification of the models include:
- Die-cast metal chassis with plastic body.
- Weight 9g.
- Run over minimum radius curves of 371mm (1st radius set-track).
- Five different body designs, with additional removable ‘greedy boards’ (horizontal board extensions to the body) fitted to the Shildon Works Chaldron to give a sixth body option.
- Three styles of brake and brake handles. Two block types and the more complicated Londonderry clasp type brake.
- Three styles of wheel design; split spoke, star spoke and wave spoke, to a blackened 00 Gauge RP25-110 profile.
- Three arrangements of ‘bang-boards’, reflecting types seen in service on the waggons.
Scale width wire handrails, metal pin jaw couplings and metal etch handbrake levers on Londonderry variants.
- Eroded metal/plastic detail parts, including grab handles, door securing pins and chassis chain points.
- Metal fine link chains fitted to body where appropriate.
- Waggons connected via all new fine link chains, with Neodymium NdFeB magnetic heads, connected at the waggon via prototypical cotter pin coupling.
- Two extra NEM fitted coupling chains supplied with the waggons for fitting to locomotive/additional rolling stock.
- Each pack produced has been themed by colliery, and each waggon depicted is based on photographic evidence and reference to colliery records to confirm lettering styles. Some packs contain just one style of waggon, while others contain mixed styles where research has shown that they operated in conjunction with each other:

Pack A: North Eastern Railway - Three P1 style Chaldrons, circa 1890.
Pack B: Hetton Colliery Railway - Three ex-NER P1 style Chaldrons in pre-1911 lettering. Built by George Stephenson, Hetton Colliery Railway celebrates its 200th anniversary in 2022, being the world’s first complete railway system that only utilised steam locomotives.
Pack C: Seaton Burn Coal Co. - Two ex-NER P1 style Chaldrons and an S&DR style Chaldron, circa 1902.
Pack D: Pontop & Jarrow Railway - Two ex-NER P1 style Chaldrons and an S&DR style Chaldron in pre-1932 lettering, circa 1910.
Pack E: Wearmouth Coal Co. - Three ex-NER P1 style Chaldrons, dating from the period 1900 to late 1920s/early 1930s.
Pack F: Lambton Collieries (Earl of Durham’s Collieries) - Three ex-NER P1 style Chaldrons in pre-1896 livery.
Pack G: Stella Coal Co. - A perfect example of how Chaldrons were kept in service, being repaired as necessary, until they were fit only for firewood. Three S&DR style Chaldrons, circa 1950.
Pack H: Londonderry Collieries - Three 4T ‘Black Waggons’, in two body styles, circa 1960s.
Pack I: Seaham Dock Co. - Three 4T ‘Black Waggons’, in three body styles, circa 1950s.
Pack J: Vane-Londonderry Collieries - Three 4T ‘Black Waggons’, in two body styles, circa 1960s.
You can pre-order the Accurascale Chaldron Waggons packs for £45.00 each here>>>

Tooling of these distinctive waggons is now complete with pre-production samples signed off and a number of decorated samples already received. Each pack will consist of three wagons and are due in stock in Q2 2022.

Subject to alteration.

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