Back in the days when pretty much everything was transported by rail, private owner salt wagons were a major feature of the British railway scene, and a very colourful feature at that. Most salt producers transported their goods in the type of pitched-roof wagons which have become synonymous with the industry, but an exception was Seddon's, based at Middlewich in the heart of the gigantic Cheshire saltfields, who used low arc-roofed vans like our model. The majority of their fleet were wooden-bodied, but in the aftermath of the First World War the railway companies had a surfeit of steel-bodied gunpowder vans which they were keen to lease out to any takers, and they must have made Seddon's an offer they couldn't refuse. However the combination of salt and metal was never a very happy one, and the steel vans weren't widely adopted for this type of traffic. Give your goods trains an unusual but authentic touch with one of our Seddon's vans.

Many thanks to Richard Neale for his assistance with the research into this livery.