Dad-1 - Workbench - West Bay Wagon Works

[Dad-1]

Thanks for that info Bigmet,
My problem there is that I've never had the chance to creep around any sidings.
When young & rebellious enough to do things like that I wasn't into railways.

My best recollection of the Birmingham Screwdriver was looking through the fence
between our Dunlop compound and a British Leyland site. There on a wheeled 'dolly'
was an Austin A40 Farina bodyshell where one at least of the doors wouldn't quite fit.
There were two obviously advance auto engineers with a sledgehammer and heavy
round steel shaft thumping the roof to door pillar junction to try and get a 'fit'.
I suppose as good an example of panel bashing that you could ever come across !!
Probably a good idea that my Oxford Diecasts A40 doesn't have opening doors ?

My Father used to work in the Ford factory at Southampton at the time they made
the 100E type vans & Escort & Esquire estate variants. I heard tales of milk bottles
being welded in doors - that must have given an annoying rattle !! In addition he'd
seen an irritated line worker deliberately kick a door panel leaving a large dent.
At the end of the line the vehicle would be rejected and sent for rectification, in
all probability with the same finesse as used by British Leyland.

Geoff T

[Phred]

My uncle and one of his sons worked at the Ford factory at Eagle Farm in Brisbane in the 1970s. They both agreed that you should never buy a Ford that was assembled on a Friday. The approach of Friday afternoon knock off fostered all sorts of creative short cuts.

[Dad-1]

Phred,

Did you hear about the 'workers' cars ?
It seems that as a worker you knew the chassis number of your new car as it went through production.
At the Southampton plant there would be double the amount of spot-welds and it would be rejected
after the first paint dip and get sent around for a second treatment. A workers pre-ordered car was
extremely well built !!

Then they wondered why machines were brought in to replace manual labour. It was a rather quaint
old world back then. Thinking back though, is present day life much better ? With winter coming probably,
as I don't have ice on the inside of the bedroom window any more.

Geoff T

[Phred]

Dad-1wrote:
Did you hear about the 'workers' cars ?

I remember my uncle and cousin talking about that but I can't recall the details. It was well over fifty years ago now! Where did that go?

Dad1 wrote:
With winter coming probably,
as I don't have ice on the inside of the bedroom window any more.

While visiting my Aunty Rosie in Bristol one Christmas when I was little, my mother went crook at me for picking the ice off the inside of the living room window and eating it to see what it tasted like.

[Bigmet]

Early in my career the stints in manufacturing engineering were 'deeply interesting' as opportunities to see some of the realities of mass production. What went with continuous three shift working was the scale of the 'special jobs' that were nothing to do with the business, but able to be performed while the management were in the land of nod. I'll not forget the reaction the first time I showed my face in the wee small hours.

My late FiL whom I first encountered shortly after this experience gave me the lowdown from his forty years in engneering management, with some useful guidelines on securing agreements to keep this 'under control', as in not damaging the plant capability, while also 'not muzzling the ox that treads the corn'; sound advice from the bronze age.

...Then they wondered why machines were brought in to replace manual labour...

The reduction in physical injuries alone is enough justification for this. Looking back, I recall very well how those 60+ years old looked when I was young, even those in relatively less physically demanding work. Life is so much kinder now, and life expectancy has correspondingly greatly improved. There's nowhere near the same 'dread of winter' now, compared to sixty years ago, which I well remember hearing from my grandparent's generation.

















=

[Bufferstop]

My father's occupation on my birth certificate said "cylindrical grinder" He was nothing so mundane. So many jobs that they struggled with ended up on his bench. Once the plant went to shift working there was always a queue of special jobs which along with the assistance of his brother in the tool room went a long way to providing fringe benefits. I asked him if he could turn down some Triang pizza cutter wheels, which ran on the sleepers. They took a little longer than expected, what turned up was some turned nickel silver wheels using the Triang axles, insulators and gears, with a note from my uncle in the tool room, those wheels had turned out to be cast with some horrible alloy and case hardened so he deemed it quicker to turn some replacements from a bit of bar that was in the useful oddments box. The personnel officer from the company was interviewd some years later on a local politics programme, commenting on poor staff relations at local companies he claimed that work study engineers and the "Bean Counters" often failed to take into account the practice of turning a blind eye to "special jobs" or "foreigners" his point was that in the old crafts workshops the craftsmen were permitted to use the facilities and spare materials to produce items for their home use and it helped keep down dissatisfaction with the wages.

[Phred]

Bufferstop wrote;
turning a blind eye to "special jobs" or "foreigners"

'Foreign orders' were widely accepted in the half of the Postmaster General's Department which provided telephone services up to the 1970s in Australia.

Some people could dead set take the weewee though. One day when I was working as the Depot Clerk a bloke strode into the office and loudly demanded (in front of everyone): 'When are you going to order more cement? I've still got half my patio to finish!'

[Peterm]

Bufferstop wrote;
turning a blind eye to "special jobs" or "foreigners"

'Foreign orders' were widely accepted in the half of the Postmaster General's Department which provided telephone services up to the 1970s in Australia.

Some people could dead set take the weewee though. One day when I was working as the Depot Clerk a bloke strode into the office and loudly demanded (in front of everyone): 'When are you going to order more cement? I've still got half my patio to finish!'

Yep, there's always one.

[aleopardstail]

an establishment with any sense also realises these little side projects don't really cost anything but are an excellent way to maintain skills

[Dad-1]

Specials !!
Apart from some odd bicycle tools made at Ford it was the outlet for my 1/2 worn tyres
I worked for Dunlop and when rally driving ran tyres from new until about 1/2 worn. I could
then sell them for as much as they had cost me at staff discount prices. So my 3 sets of wheels
and tyres didn't cost me anything.

My two back-to back gauges in heavy brass were made by Wolverton Works, arranged via one
of our friends. Specials could make the world go round more smoothly.
Gauges 1 x 14.5 mm; 1 x 14.35 mm, the 14.35 better when running on old Peco set-track
pointwork where the wheels need keeping off the point of the common crossing. Easier than
trying to add something inside the respective check rail.

Geoff T.

[Bufferstop]

Coming out of Moor Street on Sundays Shakespeare Express I spotted that there is now a genuine "Birmingham Screwdriver Company." It's name along with an "arm and hammer" graphic emblazoned across the upper brickwork. It will go a long way to educating the younger generation and incomers to the history of old Brumagem.

I've just spotted Dad-1's description of the attempts to "adjust" the fit of a car door. Times don't change, whilst my son was an apprentice in the motor trade, at a company owned by a Mr E....s (one of the gang of five) who ran BL, he was given the job of pre delivery checking an Austin Maxi. He started the task and after about half an hour of struggling he went to tell his foreman that he couldn't get the front N/S door to adjust for fit. "B apprentices" was the retort. But after ten minutes with his Brummy Screwdriver he'd thrown in the towel. Admitting defeat he fetched the measuring rods from the body shop which proved that something was seriously wrong with this car. The problem eventually landed on the desk of Mr E. Once he'd worked his way through the list of expletives he told them to strip out everything inside the car and check all the dimensions that were in the bodyshop's repair manual. There was much just out of spec but the B pillar(between the doors) was 45mm too far back. Way beyond the scope of adjustment even with their favourite tool. They rejected the vehicle, piled it all into the back seat and loaded it onto the flatbed for a trip up to Longbridge.

[aleopardstail]

Coming out of Moor Street on Sundays Shakespeare Express I spotted that there is now a genuine "Birmingham Screwdriver Company." It's name along with an "arm and hammer" graphic emblazoned across the upper brickwork. It will go a long way to educating the younger generation and incomers to the history of old Brumagem.

I've just spotted Dad-1's description of the attempts to "adjust" the fit of a car door. Times don't change, whilst my son was an apprentice in the motor trade, at a company owned by a Mr E....s (one of the gang of five) who ran BL, he was given the job of pre delivery checking an Austin Maxi. He started the task and after about half an hour of struggling he went to tell his foreman that he couldn't get the front N/S door to adjust for fit. "B apprentices" was the retort. But after ten minutes with his Brummy Screwdriver he'd thrown in the towel. Admitting defeat he fetched the measuring rods from the body shop which proved that something was seriously wrong with this car. The problem eventually landed on the desk of Mr E. Once he'd worked his way through the list of expletives he told them to strip out everything inside the car and check all the dimensions that were in the bodyshop's repair manual. There was much just out of spec but the B pillar(between the doors) was 45mm too far back. Way beyond the scope of adjustment even with their favourite tool. They rejected the vehicle, piled it all into the back seat and loaded it onto the flatbed for a trip up to Longbridge.

Worked for Toyota for a while, we were shown an example of why you needed to look a little wider than your own job station

Corolla plant in Turkey made a car, this got through the welding shop, painting shop and about a third of the way through the assembly shop before this was noticed.

three door hatch on one side, five door hatch on the other, computer glitch, no one noticed until it got to the one guy where the job was get in the back one side and get out the other on a five door

[Dad-1]

I suppose it's all still going on ....
Even in our hobby.
At the club's exhibition in July a guy I'm trying to get to join us
bought a brand new factory sealed Hornby sound fitted loco - I wasn't particularly
interested in the actual loco, but said he could run it on the club test track.
Box opened up and one wheel sitting loose in the box. Easy enough to press back on,
but for how long ?? I don't know how much he paid, but it must have been around
£300 !!

Geoff T.

[Peterm]

Them Chinese girls ain't paid enough to care, is probably what the problem is.

[Dad-1]

peterm,

I expect that's what the car workers thought - until all the works closed down !

Anyway back onto subject.
The Dapol 16 Ton steel mineral wagon kit.
My last photo from this build, now with decals on. I still have to weather, but as yet don't know for
what use. Chalk usage means very white, coal black & dirty, steel scrap very rusty particularly where
water runs out of the side doors.



Seriously it's a brilliant kit, and all praise to Airfix for originally tooling it.
I DO have a gripe with Dapol. It's about time they corrected the header picture and revised the decal sheet.
I HATE unnecessary errors.
1) The header picture shows the Tip end door white stripe on the fixed end. I'd offer a decent picture free !!!!
2) The decal white stripes are identical, but should be handed. I cut the shaped ends off !!
3) It should offer more than one running number to encourage use of additional kits.

You can see that by using 2 decal sheets I have added a 7 over the 0 to turn 231709 into 231779. Cutting
individual numbers out of another sheet & lining up is NOT easy. I know Fox do nice sheets, but it would
make sense on a future re-print of decals to add a few spare numbers while correcting the white stripes.

I may do something regarding the LNER Conflat S kit by Parkside. This has probably been my least favourite
of their wagon kits. So many things not quite right !!

Geoff T.