Graham Farish have announced a newly tooled range of NER P7 (later LNER D12) Coal Hopper Wagons in N Gauge!

Two hundred years ago in 1825 the Stockton & Darlington Railway (S&DR) opened,heralding the age of the train and kickstarting rail travel as we know it today. Established deep within the rich coal fields of North East England, the S&DR connected collieries and docks, ports and pitheads, to move coal faster than ever before, fuelling the industrial revolution. Later, the North Eastern Railway (NER) would take over the S&DR and would go on to further revolutionise the movement of coal with the introduction of large, 20-Ton Wooden Hopper Wagons.

Fittingly then, in this bicentenary year, Bachmann are delighted to reveal that the NER P7 Coal Hopper Wagon is their next new tooling project for the Graham Farish range, bringing this iconic wagon and its derivatives to N Scale for the first time.

The new Graham Farish models depict both the NER-built P7 and LNER-built Diagram 12 wagons with their wooden end pillars or steel uprights respectively. Several of the variations seen amongst the P7 fleet are also captured accurately, including options for double or single axle guards, wooden end pillars that extend either to buffer beam level or below, and with or without safety chains, plus the cutout for incline ropes and single or double handrails at either end of the hopper.

When the North Eastern Railway took over the Stockton & Darlington Railway in 1863, coal was typically transported in small wooden trucks known commonly as Chaldron Wagons but by the start of the twentieth century, the board of the NER had set upon using larger wagons, allowing for shorter trains and quicker turnaround times when it came to loading and unloading. The result was the distinctive wooden-bodied 20-ton coal hopper, constructed from eight planks and with its sides angled outwards at the top to increase capacity and aid the gravity discharge system, the most numerous of which to be built was the NER Diagram P7.

The first P7s were introduced in 1902 and subsequently more than ten thousand were built. Diagram P8 was a variant of the P7, fitted with anti-friction gear to allow greater payloads and these hoppers were uprated to 23-tons, however by the early-1920s this gear had been removed, the capacity reduced to 20-tons, and the wagons were reclassified as P7. As a result, by the time of Grouping in 1923, more than 17,000 Diagram P7 wagons were handed over to their new owners, the London & North Eastern Railway (LNER).

During their construction several variations appeared across the P7 fleet. Double axle guards were used up until 1917; with eight bottom doors built into the hopper floor the wagons lacked stiffness in their underframes and so the double guards, which attached to both the inside and outside of the solebar and were stylised by the inverted U shape on the solebar above the axle box, provided increased rigidity.

Braking came by way of clasp brakes, with a pair of brakes fitted to both wheels on one side of the wagon only. These could be controlled from either side of the wagon using a traditional side lever, although some wagons were built with an operating lever at either end to aid discharging over coke ovens and blast furnaces. Steps were provided on the solebar and atop the buffers to allow shunters to operate the brakes or discharge doors whilst riding on the wagon in areas where access from rail level was limited. Handrails were also fitted on the sides and ends, with some wagons having a single horizontal rail at each end whilst most sported a pair.

Two large wooden pillars were fitted at either end and on many wagons, these extended below the bufferbeam allowing them to couple to the earlier Chaldron wagons which did not feature buffers nor drawgear of the type that was in use by the 1900s. The bottoms of the pillars were fitted with metal buffing plates to reduce wear, and chains were provided either side of the standard drawgear to allow the new hoppers and old Chaldrons to be joined together. Later, many wagons had the pillar extensions removed, and some were built with the pillars ending at bufferbeam level from new. Some P7s were further modified for incline use by having a slot cut above the bufferbeam through which a rope could be passed.

The LNER continued construction of these 20-ton wagons and maintained the same principal dimensions. The wagon ends however were changed, with the two wooden pillars replaced by twin vertical steel T-section uprights. With this change came the loss of compatibility with Chaldron wagons, however this was immaterial because the NER had already phased such wagons out of stock a decade earlier. The LNER-built examples were allocated Diagram 12 and more than 7,000 were built between 1923 and 1930.

The introduction of steel-bodied wagons signalled the beginning of the end for the 20-ton hoppers and their numbers gradually declined, although many were still in use when the LNER was Nationalised and became part of British Railways in 1948. Their final days were spent with private operators and at National Coal Board collieries and today, several survive in preservation.