The Cardiff Locomotive Workshops were situated between Cockle Creek and Cardiff railway stations on the main Sydney to Newcastle railway line.
Contents |
The Hunter River Railway Company established meagre maintenance facilities adjacent to its line at its eastern terminus, near the current day Civic station. These formed the basis of the Honeysuckle Point Workshops the old buildings of which now lie within the area redeveloped by the Honeysuckle Development Corporation.
The workshops grew in size as the isolated Northern system developed. Even when the first Hawkesbury River Bridge linked it with the Sydney system in 1889, a bright future for the workshops was assured. However, by 1925 the decision had been taken to abandon Honeysuckle Point as a locomotive centre and to build a new shop, with modern facilities, on a site where greater expansion could take place.[1]
The railways purchased 172 acres (69.6ha) of land from the Newcastle, Wallsend Coal Company and design of the new workshops was begun. The design was completed in time for work to start in the middle of 1926. The first sidings were connected to the main line in April, a platform for workers was in place by June and all sidings were completed by September of that year. Construction of the foundations for the buildings was well advanced by this time and erection of the steelwork started early the following year. By year's end, the building work was virtually complete.
Machinery and tooling had been ordered early in 1927 and supplies began arriving throughout the year. Two 75-ton cranes were installed in the Erecting Shops. By early, 1928, the first locomotives entered the facility and were under repair. The first locomotive to leave the workshops was 3364. The Annual Report of the NSWGR to 30 June 1928, shows that by that date Cardiff Workshops had already overhauled 14 locomotives and repaired 15 boilers.[1]
The official opening took place on 1 March 1928. By this time the facilities were fully functional. Honeysuckle Point was now a garage for Departmental motor vehicles and a permanent way workshop.
As built, the Cardiff Workshops were a show-piece and were visited by engineers to see the form of construction and layout used. The building covered 150,725 square feet (14,000 m2). Central to the shop was a traverser. The traverser lined up with five inwards roads from which locomotives could be drawn and conveyed to any of 22 pits in the two erecting shops inside. Similarly, tenders and bogies for the tender shop made their way to the two roads provided via the traverser.
Other areas within the complex included blacksmith's and spring shop; machine, fitting and wheel shops; boiler shop and copper shop.
The works manager's office, which included accommodation for his assistant and other clerical staff, was situated near the main line.[1]
The hostilities of World War 2 imposed a heavy load on the industrial resources of Australia and most railway workshops were asked to play a part in the war effort. Cardiff was no exception. A large ammunition factory was built at Rutherford and many dies, tools and jigs were required for that facility. As a consequence, a Tool Room was built as an extension of the Smith and Machine Shops. At this time, the total staff employed at Cardiff was approximately 1200.[1]
In 1952, the 60-class locomotives entered service and facilities for their overhaul became a problem. Cardiff was selected to handle the overhauls, but the length of the locomotives at 109 feet (33.22 m) posed a problem as they were not going to fit on the traverser. The solution was found in partially filling in the traverser and lifting the locomotives into position with the overhead cranes.[1]
For several years, both diesel and steam locomotives were handled at Cardiff, but as initial numbers were not excessive, they were handled without too many problems. When steam had finally gone, a reorganisation was able to proceed.
An electrical fitting shop replaced the copper shop. The diesel engines were maintained where once boilers stood. Bogies were serviced and traction motors assembled on to wheels where the traverser once operated. The erecting shops retained that identity, but with additional platforms to enable work to be carried out at levels above the floor of the shops.[1]
Initially, Cardiff Workshops took in locomotives used in the Newcastle district which included such classes as 30 class passenger tanks and 19, 24 and 26 classes used in coal haulage. Subsequently, the overhaul of the steam fleet was placed on a more formal basis and each of the three large workshops, Eveleigh, Chullora and Cardiff, each assumed a number of locomotive classes for each to overhaul. To Cardiff came the 34 and 35 passenger classes and the 53 and 55 goods classes.
The first five 38-class Pacific express locomotives were built by Clyde Engineering at Granville. The remaining 25 were built by the NSWGR workshops and 13 of these were given to Cardiff.
The order for the 58-class freight locomotives was also undertaken by NSWGR workshops. Cardiff built two, whilst the remaining eleven were built at Eveleigh. 5813, built at Cardiff, was the last steam locomotive to be built in a NSWGR workshop.[1]
Two changes brought about the decline of the Cardiff Maintenance Centre, the name it adopted in March 1987. The first was the decision to maintain all wagons at a One Spot facility, a centre where freight rolling stock could receive all its necessary maintenance at one location. From April 1993, the wagon work was transferred to Port Waratah One Spot facility.
Locomotive work continued, but the second change soon followed. This was to hire locomotives under a Power by the Hour or ReadyPower agreement. Clyde Engineering was awarded the contract. Many older locomotives were retired and Cardiff Workshops had virtually come to an end by the end of 1993. The final day had been set for 7 January 1994. Disposal of benches, lockers, tools and other items were held up until September 1994. However, from 1994 to 1998, Cardiff was used as a worksite for the fitting of radios to all locomotives.
In 1998, EDI Group was successful in tendering to build a fleet of suburban electric trains, the Millenium Trains. Immediately the tender was awarded, the Group moved to prepare the old buildings for their new role.[2]
Most recent locomotive that have been built were assembled at the Cardiff Worksops with the Underframes built at there Port Augusta workshops they being
1 V class for Freight Australia: V544
4 90 class locomotives for Pacific National: 9032-9035
15 SCT class for SCT: SCT001-SCT015
9 LDP class for EDI Rail's Locomotive Demand Power: LDP001-LDP009
12 TT class for Pacific National: TT01-TT06, TT101-TT106
3 WH class for Whitehaven Coal: WH001-WH003