Station lamps

[urbophile]

Gargrave station (north of Skipton on the Leeds- Carlisle/Morecambe route) had paraffin lamps for many years. It was a staffed station then but one of the regular staff lived at the next station up the line (Bell Busk, long since closed) and when he was on sole late-turn duty he would extinguish most of the lamps before hopping on the last train home, and ask one of the regular passengers to blow out the rest. I think electricity took over when the station was de-staffed - in the late sixties perhaps?
I was always fascinated, on family visits to London in the 1950s, how many suburban stations were still lit by gas despite being served by 'modern' electric trains. It seemed anachronistic to me.

 

[Taunton]

I was always fascinated, on family visits to London in the 1950s, how many suburban stations were still lit by gas despite being served by 'modern' electric trains. It seemed anachronistic to me.

I believe that some stations were lit by a tap off the 630v DC third rail. This was practical in former times when there was more DC lighting gear on the market, electric tramways used this on streets on their own systems as well, and there were still a few pioneer towns which had installed a DC town supply from their own generators (I think Lynmouth in North Devon was one, powered by a water-driven generator). Apparently changing light bulbs was not for the unqualified!

 

[edwin_m]

I believe that some stations were lit by a tap off the 630v DC third rail. This was practical in former times when there was more DC lighting gear on the market, electric tramways used this on streets on their own systems as well, and there were still a few pioneer towns which had installed a DC town supply from their own generators (I think Lynmouth in North Devon was one, powered by a water-driven generator). Apparently changing light bulbs was not for the unqualified!

In one of the recent "Secrets of the London Underground" it was said that the people at Blake Hall could tell where the train was by the state of the lights. So the same may well have happened there.

 

[Rescars]

David L Smith, in his fascinating books about the G&SWR inn Scotland, wrote that in the 1920s a crew running after dark suddenly recalled a remote station thereabouts they should stop at, found they had run past it, and backed up. Nobody about, passengers or staff. "Just a candle in a window", they reported. This actually describes the difficulty of stopping at a remote station, on a dark and rainy night, when the platform is scarcely lit, the train has no headlights, and there are no other lights around. A distant signal or similar might be appropriate, but they seem not to have been always provided.

Last station gas lights I recall were at Dunstall Park, first stop out of Wolverhampton Low Level. We had just bunked Oxley shed and were now heading to Tyseley. Probably 1966. The station had likely had no renewals of anything since nationalisation.

Last oil-lit one I recall was Yeo Mill Halt, Taunton to Barnstaple line, to the end like this. It had no staff and no services at all - electric, gas or water - so oil lamps were the only way. There were a few oil lamps on the approach path as well. Although the guard of the last train was supposed to put them out I believe they would often delegate this to a responsible alighting passenger known to them; country folk then knew what to do with oil lamps, as their cottages nearby likely still had the same.

IIRC the station with the candle was Palnure. Hardly a major conurbation(!), but the station building is still there and it's just a few yards from the A75 trunk road. So not that remote, just a long way from the nearest gasworks. Failing to stop and backing up at a station was apparently not that remarkable back in the day on the G&SW.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 23 Jul 2022 ==

I was always fascinated, on family visits to London in the 1950s, how many suburban stations were still lit by gas despite being served by 'modern' electric trains. It seemed anachronistic to me.

IIRC when the Southern electrified the trains, it was more cost effective to keep prenegotiated contracts for lighting the stations with gas. Terminating the contracts early would have been an unnecessary expense.

 

[Springs Branch]

Adrian Vaughan's book Signalman's Morning gives a detailed account of the daily set-up required for the pressurised paraffin-powered Tilley lamps used to light the platforms at Challow station on the GW main line.

On starting his railway career around 1960, Vaughan was employed as a Junior Porter at Challow before migrating to the signal boxes, and his description of being trained to light the Tilley Lamps using meths and pressurise each with a bicycle pump runs to about two pages.

The pressurised Tilley Lamps apparently give a more brillant white light than would normally be expected from a simple paraffin lamp, and are known as "Challow Lamps" on account of the GWR first trialling this type of lamp at that station before their widespread introduction.

It sounds like about seven of these lamps were hung on each of Challow's platforms in the hours of darkness - although on winter mornings only the up platform was lit since no trains were timetabled to stop in the down direction in the hours of darkness.

 

[Andy873]

Thanks for all the replies.

When I started this topic, I was mildly curious about the station lamps, but now its turned out to be a fascinating subject.

It also illuminating (pun intended) to hear of gas lamps still in use even into the 1970's, I guess changing to electric lights was a very low priority.

Here's a photo of the 'operating' pipework on one of our station lamps:

John, that's superb work there, but I have to ask the question - why aren't the lamps actually burning gas? too risky etc?

Thanks,
Andy.

 

[John Webb]

.....John, that's superb work there, but I have to ask the question - why aren't the lamps actually burning gas? too risky etc?

Thanks,
Andy.

We've no gas supply on site for a start - it was terminated after BR closed the box in early 1980 after moving the station announcer to the station. The old brick and concrete gas-meter cupboard by our entrance is a useful store for weedkiller, fence 'creosote' (or rather it's modern alternative) and one or two other things we need to keep locked up and away from the box. The installation of even bottled gas and a 100ft or more of distribution pipe was out of the question when we first started so we used electricity from the start. In any case two out of the four lamps we eventually acquired were also incomplete (missing the burner support) and would have been expensive to repair. The four lamps we have are distributed around the site path and are kept lit at night as part of site security - that's a lot easier to achieve with electricity as well!

 

[Andy873]

We've no gas supply on site for a start - it was terminated after BR closed the box in early 1980 after moving the station announcer to the station. The old brick and concrete gas-meter cupboard by our entrance is a useful store for weedkiller, fence 'creosote' (or rather it's modern alternative) and one or two other things we need to keep locked up and away from the box. The installation of even bottled gas and a 100ft or more of distribution pipe was out of the question when we first started so we used electricity from the start. In any case two out of the four lamps we eventually acquired were also incomplete (missing the burner support) and would have been expensive to repair. The four lamps we have are distributed around the site path and are kept lit at night as part of site security - that's a lot easier to achieve with electricity as well!

Thanks John, understood!

 

[Taunton]

Adrian Vaughan's book Signalman's Morning gives a detailed account of the daily set-up required for the pressurised paraffin-powered Tilley lamps used to light the platforms at Challow station on the GW main line.

On starting his railway career around 1960, Vaughan was employed as a Junior Porter at Challow before migrating to the signal boxes, and his description of being trained to light the Tilley Lamps using meths and pressurise each with a bicycle pump runs to about two pages.

These were extensively used by colonial railways, both outdoors and inside, having many locations without electricity or gas, generally known as the "pressure lamp", as there were multiple manufacturers.

 

[Dstock7080]

In one of the recent "Secrets of the London Underground" it was said that the people at Blake Hall could tell where the train was by the state of the lights. So the same may well have happened there.

yes, certainly connected to traction current.
As soon as train started from Ongar the station lights extinguished, gradually getting brighter as the train approached or full illumination if the driver shut-off the controller on the way.

 

[paul1609]

Here's a photo of the 'operating' pipework on one of our station lamps:
View attachment 118070
The smaller pipe on the right comes off the supply below the chain-operated valve and sends a continuous gas supply up the right-hand support pipe where it feeds into the pilot light via a small needle valve etc. to allow for some adjustment.
The larger pipe on the left takes the controlled gas supply to the main burner. We've left the chains off to deter fiddling with the lamp and you can also see an electric cable which provides the 12v electric LED globe bulb with it's power.

We've two lamps arranged like this. The third had no pipework and we had to mock up something; this is it after erection:
View attachment 118071
In this case I was able to route the wires through one of the gas/support pipes to keep them hidden. The LED bulb was chosen as being about the same size as a gas mantle!

William Sugg & Co are still in business in Horsham West Sussex and still make Gas Lights and are able to provide spares for a lot of their elderly models they also make heritage lamps with modern electrical lighting systems LED etc https://www.williamsugg.co.uk/

 

[Rescars]

Thanks for all the replies.

When I started this topic, I was mildly curious about the station lamps, but now its turned out to be a fascinating subject.

It also illuminating (pun intended) to hear of gas lamps still in use even into the 1970's, I guess changing to electric lights was a very low priority.

All these references to gas lighting on stations makes me wonder when the last gas lit carriages ran in the UK. Had they all gone by 1930?

I recall gas lit signal boxes in the 1970s (Oxford for example), but were signals themselves ever lit by gas?

 

[Taunton]

I think there were gas-lits in South Wales colliers' services into the 1950s. Wooden seats as well. Someone here will likely have the details. Weren't the initial Gresley quad-arts in London suburban service gas lit?

 

[Gloster]

All these references to gas lighting on stations makes me wonder when the last gas lit carriages ran in the UK. Had they all gone by 1930?

Didn’t the Hemyock branch have former Barry gas-lit coaches until closure in 1963, or were they replaced by former LNER vehicles late on? Wasn’t this due to the slow speeds meaning that the batteries wouldn’t charge.

 

[Taunton]

Didn’t the Hemyock branch have former Barry gas-lit coaches until closure in 1963, or were they replaced by former LNER vehicles late on? Wasn’t this due to the slow speeds meaning that the batteries wouldn’t charge.

As I understand it, the principal reason for the replacement of the Barry gas-lit coach at Hemyock by the LNER ones at Hemyock was precisely because of their (apparent) ability to be battery-lit on the slow speed line. It didn't quite work out, so when the locos were exchanged with Exeter shed for washing out etc, they took the two coaches to and fro with them, to give the accumulator a run along the main line.

The LNER-design Thomson era coaches (there were two) at Hemyock were not that old, and might actually have been built just into BR times.

 

[Gloster]

As I understand it, the principal reason for the replacement of the Barry gas-lit coach at Hemyock by the LNER ones at Hemyock was precisely because of their (apparent) ability to be battery-lit on the slow speed line. It didn't quite work out, so when the locos were exchanged with Exeter shed for washing out etc, they took the coach to and fro with them, to give the accumulator a run along the main line.

The LNER-design Thomson era coaches (there were two) at Hemyock were not that old, and might actually have been built just into BR times.

A battery-charging unit was apparently installed at Tiverton Junction when the Thompson vehicles arrived around October 1962. As said, even so the spare vehicle was supposed to be taken for a run to charge it up.

 

[John Webb]

William Sugg & Co are still in business in Horsham West Sussex and still make Gas Lights and are able to provide spares for a lot of their elderly models they also make heritage lamps with modern electrical lighting systems LED etc https://www.williamsugg.co.uk/

Thanks for that link, looks interesting. All our four lamps were donated to us at various times in various states of repair and I'm currently working on the fourth and last one.

 

[contrex]

IIRC when the Southern electrified the trains, it was more cost effective to keep prenegotiated contracts for lighting the stations with gas. Terminating the contracts early would have been an unnecessary expense.

North Dulwich was still lit by gas, at least on the platforms, when I was at school nearby from 1964.

 

[Ediswan]

On starting his railway career around 1960, Vaughan was employed as a Junior Porter at Challow before migrating to the signal boxes, and his description of being trained to light the Tilley Lamps using meths and pressurise each with a bicycle pump runs to about two pages.

The pressurised Tilley Lamps apparently give a more brillant white light than would normally be expected from a simple paraffin lamp, and are known as "Challow Lamps" on account of the GWR first trialling this type of lamp at that station before their widespread introduction.

I have used both when camping. Tilley lamps are far brighter than Hurricane/paraffin lamps. The only thing we used a paraffin lamp for was to mark the location of the latrine at night.

However, as alluded to in the first paragraph quoted, Tilley lamps are considerably more fiddly in operation. And pose a greater risk of burning your tent down if mishandled. (Image found using Google.)

 

[Rescars]

A battery-charging unit was apparently installed at Tiverton Junction when the Thompson vehicles arrived around October 1962. As said, even so the spare vehicle was supposed to be taken for a run to charge it up.

Thanks for your answers. Into the 1960s. My goodness! I think I have seen somewhere that the ex Barry coaches were converted from electric to gas lighting because of the problem with charging accumulators on the Culm Valley line. This must have been a unique modification.

 

[WesternLancer]

Not sure if you live in the Park Estate in Nottingham (referred to somewhere upthread) but that was certainly the situation when I lived there a couple of decades back. At the time the person who wound and adjusted the clocks was on a bicycle with a ladder over his shoulder, but he must have retried by know and it's not exactly a large pool of labour to recruit from so I don't know what they do now. One downside was the tendency of drivers to use full beam headlights, completely unnecessary at the official 20mph limit and encouraging them to drive too fast as well as dazzle others.

Yes, that's the spot - indeed chap you mentioned retired about 10+ years ago IIRC. He was a real enthusiast for the gas lamps and gradually restored all of them from a run down and poorly maintained condition from the mind 1980s onwards until they were all in tip top condition. He trained up a successor, but I think that person subsequently left and the firm that maintains other part of the streetscape have a couple of employees trained to keep them in decent working order. I think some help has been sourced by the residents in Grate Malvern who miantain the gas lamps there.

Gas lamps – Transition Malvern Hills

transitionmalvernhills.org.uk

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 25 Jul 2022 ==

Many of the station gas lamps were made by Sugg and my local station (Pallion) had a full set of them. When my parents moved there in 1968 the station had been closed for 4 years and the lamps had been removed from the posts but the gas was still connected so we could pull the little chains to let the gas out - I can't remember if we set light to it. As far as I remember the lamps had a small pilot light rather than needing to be lit by hand.

This is a great short video on gas lamps

Great film clip!

 

[Pigeon]

there were still a few pioneer towns which had installed a DC town supply from their own generators (I think Lynmouth in North Devon was one, powered by a water-driven generator).

Completely the wrong end of the scale! That was AC at 100Hz, which was right at the upper end of the range of strange local AC frequencies that were around before the 50Hz grid standard took over.

 

[4069]

Selsdon station was still lit by gas until closure in 1983:

 

[Pinza-C55]

When I visited Chathill station on the ECML in 1978 it was still lit by ancient NER oil lamps which made a startling contrast to the then new HSTs. I think they may have lasted till 1982 but not sure on this one.