Slaters Plastikard O Gauge 7C03 GWR 6 Wheeled Siphon Milk Van Slat Sides Diagram 04
This Slaters kit builds a model of the GWR diagram O4 6 wheel Siphon milk van with slatted sides, the most prolific type of these 6-wheel vans.
These vans were built for milk in churns and fish traffic in the Edwardian era, the slatted sides providing cooling air flow around the load. Through the 1920s and 30s the slat sided vans were steadily replaced by newer bogie designs, but were deployed to other express loads, including fruit and vegetable traffic, beer in barrels as finally as engineering department stores and parts vans. Several lasted into British Railways service.
The kit features moulded plastic body sections with etched parts for the chassis and lost-wax cast brass detail parts. Supplied with wheels and sprung buffers.
The railways were an ideal means to supply fresh milk to Britain's growing cities in in churns, direct from country farms. The milk needed to be kept cool throughout the journey and the initial solution was to provide slat-sided vans to create a flow of air around the churns driven by the movement of the train. As train speeds increased these 6-wheeled vans were built for improved running and stability. Later vans featured louvre vents, making them better suited to service as general parcels vans as well as for milk, with the milk traffic itself being moved to bulk tank wagons in the 1930s.
The older slat-sided vans were also useful for carrying crated fish and beer in barrels in addition to a number being converted for other uses, including as engineers parts and stores vans. The slate-sided vans were slowly withdrawn through the 1930s with a small number, mostly in engineers service marked ENPARTS, lasting until nationalisation.
As the GWR index of diagrams was drawn up the milk vans were allocated a series with the prefix letter O and the telegraphic code word for a milk van was Siphon. A suffix letter was used to describe the general type and load capacity of the van, eg 4 wheels, 6 wheels, bogies, end doors, through gangways, etc. The code word and letter were frequently painted on the outside of the van. Standard livery throughout most of the GWR era. was chocolate brown with straw yellow lettering.
The development of the milk van into the GWRs standard general utility van with the 50ft twin bogie and gangwayed 'Siphon G' design led to GWR non-passenger coaching stock being referred to as 'brown vehicles' and the term Siphon being so commonly used.