Moxley Heath - 7mm Lt Rly - Carl Arendt Challenge

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello CM and Hello Jack

 

Please send me a PM with your email CM and I'll send one to you.

 

My previous layout had 28" radius points and would only take 9ft wagons and 0-4-0 locos.

 

A small story about the layout I had in the 80's it had 32" radius points and one of the exhibitions I took it to was in Welshpool. Also there were Bill Awdry and John Scott Morgan. JSM asked if he could have a go and would I mind if he shunted stuff at full speed and crashed into the wagons, "just like a real light railway", well I wanted him to sign one of his books so I said yes go ahead and used the opportunity to have a look around the rest of the exhibition. When I came back they were both there crashing about with it, I asked tentatively if it worked OK and they both said yes and can we have a go tomorrow as well. The only time I got a look in was when they went off to give their talks. The layout is still going: http://www.solihullmrc.org/moxley.html

 

That's why I let the kids have a go at exhibitions none of them would even dare to do it like those two did, personally I like 'five miles a fortnight' running.

 

Jim

[Guest Jim Read]

what have you used for the sleepers on the plain track?

 

Apologies Andy I didn't answer this, the sleepers are made from card 6mm wide 56mm long or thereabouts, laid a bit wonky and some of them off centre, when the tie holes got a bit large they'd move the sleeper over a bit and bash 'em in again.

 

Jim

[cornamuse]

YAY, card - now that gets my full attention mounting board, or something else?

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello Andy,

 

The card I used for this was some I'd scrounged years ago to display some photographs.

 

The 00 track that was on the board before though was made using mount board which turned out to be a bit thinner than the copperclad fibreglass strips I got from Marcway to make the points. I had to pack the plain track up a bit with newspaper where it met the points. As I remember the card is 1.5mm and the CC strips 1.6mm so not much packing required.

 

No reason why you can't make points using card though, here's a 3 way I made for my last layout;

 

 

I just find CC strips easier to work with.

 

Jim

[srd]

Coming late to the thread, just wanted to say how much I liked the look of this layout so far. Love looking at O gauge in small spaces, especially ones like this where there is obviously plenty of operating potential but it doesn't appear at all 'forced'.

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello SRD,

 

Thanks for the nice comment I do appreciate it. I'm 'forcing' in some of those KBScale track spikes at the moment, never thought they would be necessary but they do look good :-) I'll take a pic when I've done 'em all.

 

Cheers - Jim

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello all,

 

I've got the track spikes in, had to drill all the holes to start with and push them in the last bit with a pair of bent nose pliers.

 

 

I was wrong about not using them which I hadn't on previous layouts I now think they look better.

 

Jim

[cornamuse]

nice track- agree about the spikes, makes a big difference

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello all,

 

I didn't like the building I'd made to go at the front of the fiddle yard [further back in the thread] so did another one and covered it with Railway Scenics brick paper, still needs some work on the weathering and the windows.

 

 

I wanted it to be removable in case of accidents and so that I could operate the layout from the front so I used a spring and dowel thingy to hold it onto the baseboard.

 

 

Jim

[mog]

I'm loving watching this come together. (Got my shellac and my card btw!) very inspiring stuff.

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello Martin,

 

Thanks nice of you, Andy's [cornamuse] got some great drawings of short wheelbase wagons and undercarriage bits, I'm sure he'd email them to you if you asked him.

 

Jim

[cornamuse]

would love to!

[cornamuse]

have just posted pdfs of a small coach from the NSR and a couple of vans on my Charlies yard thread -

 

http://www.rmweb.co....763#entry654763

 

help yourselves and enjoy

 

Andy

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello Andy,

 

I found a couple more both LNWR I'll email them to you.

 

Jim

[cornamuse]

any further progress, Jim?

[DonB]

Just found this thread, fascinating!

Reely Grate, as suggested earlier, would make a good name for a small foundry casting iron fire grates for all those terraced houses in the Moxley area! My father worked pre-war in just such an outfit at Bilston, but casting bath tubs.

A cupola (like the one at Blists Hill museum) stuck on the end of that building, or even built inside it, gives reason for fire wood, coke, limestone, and pig-iron deliveries, as well as finished product leaving.

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello Andy and Hello Don,

I've been painting the track black area ready for the ballast and the rail rusty colour both sides, it takes awhile to do and doesn't look as though I've done much when finished.



I used to call on Jesse Siddons Ind Est at some of the engrg companies there, JS still uses their cupola, they cast Mr A Gormley's figures that are on Crosby beach now, must go and see them along with the Dream by St Helens, I love public art.

I wouldn't have room for a Cupola Don but it's a good idea to have a foundry, thanks. Interesting about your dad my grandfather worked at Metal Porcelains in Smethwick I wonder if he coated the baths your dad cast?

There's a wagon in the pic with Broadwater's Colliery on it, I got the name from an old map of the area I looked at in Wolverhampton library. In a previous incarnation of the layout a lady came up to me at an exhibition in Wednesbury I think it was and said worriedly, "We live in Broadwater Road, does that mean there's an old colliery under us" I tried to reassure her that it probably closed in about 1910 and any subsidence would have happened before they built her road. She didn't depart that that much happier though, I thought serves me right for delving into the history of the area.

Datts Hole did exist and I have another wagon somewhere with Russian Colliery on it. Someone else came up to me and said, "That solves a mystery for me, do you know Eagle Crossing not far from Gt Bridge" yes I said expecting even more sad news, "Well" he said, "for years there was a sign at the end of a siding there which said Russian wagons only" Phew! I thought well thats ok and replied that the colliery must have been a bit bigger than it looks on the map. He went away happy and I thought well, done a bit of good there for a change.

Jim

[cornamuse]

Very nice - and good to hear a bit of history, too. hadn't thought of private owner wagons yet.

the more I see that loco, Jim the more I like it - thanks for the plans - I like the idea of making it cabless - looks so Victorian like that!

 

cheers

 

Andy

[DonB]

Staying with Cupolas, just to bore you a little more, my first job was in the lab. of a foundry in Wednsfield where the cupolas were inside the building with only the very top section sticking above the roof, no problem with keeping the workers warm in winter! Outside were brick bays with stacked / tipped raw materials for later moving into the works using tipping skips on battery powered platform trucks. These trucks were used on by apprentices on Saturday mornings for ad-hoc races round the works after the boss and the foremen had gone home! The good old days!!

Jobbing foundries were not very large, the "preserved"one at Blists Hill is about 2/3rds the size of the one my Father worked in.

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello Don,

 

Ok you've persuaded me :-) I found this http://encyclopedia2.../Cupola+Furnace I could just have the spark arrestor sticking out through a roof. Though behind that building there is only 1" before the fiddle yard starts. Thinking about it that's what sticks out of Jesse Siddon's factory now.

 

Interesting about Wednesfield I use to park up for my lunch by the old railway line, must have been at the back of Jenks and Cattell [or very near] and behind the fence in a little shed of it's own was a Ruston diesel loco. I met a bloke from the Industrial Railway society and told him, he was very concerned, didn't know about it and was determined to do something. I went there again and it had gone, I never did find out what happened to it. The land is the Wednesfield by-pass now, J&C is still going, bet they import everything.

 

Jim

[DonB]

Wasn't my intention to Rail-road (oops!) you into incorporating a foundry, I just got a bit carried away, venturing down memory lane!

(It's nearly 50 years since I live in the Black Country, came to Derby for a six-month job and still here!)

 

But to add to the potential, the coke would have come from Birmingham Gas Works and I believe they had their own PO wagons, although I can't find a picture.

Other deliveries would be Foundry sands, and fire-resistant / refractory bricks for repairs to that cupola which was the thing which got me started. It's the dog with a bone syndrome!.

I'll shut up now and just admire your ongoing progress, might even get to Shepshed to see it.

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello Don.

 

Don't worry about the rail roading, I'm not very good at making buildings and should make more to improve my skills. For the 00 layout I was going to have I made a couple of the Scalescenes freebies, very good models and I learnt a fair bit from making them.

 

It would be nice to see you at Shepshed you'd be very welcome to have a go:-)

 

Jim

[Guest Jim Read]

Hello all,

 

I like to make my own controllers, ever since I could not get a loco to crawl, it took me a year or so to find and make different circuits, find out about electronic components and how to turn a circuit diagram into something that worked.

 

The controller I make now was designed by Brian Tilbury in 1973 for the 2mm Association, and is a current limited, pulsed/feedback type that will work into a dead short with no harm done to it. It will make a loco go so slowly that it's difficult to see that the wheels are revolving, and the feedback even at this slow speed cuts in and the wheels will continue to revolve when the loco is halted by a finger.

 

 

It only uses three transistors and a few peripheral components.

 

 

I wanted to make one that could be part of the layout, here's a pic of it in position;

 

 

Anyone who knows about electronic is very welcome to the circuit, it can be configured to 0.6 Amp output for 2mm, 1.0 Amp for 00, and 3.0 Amp for old 7mm locos.

 

Jim

[cornamuse]

After searching through my back copies of the Moxley Heath Light Railway Preservation Society Journal (issue 437), I came across this old poster from the 30s or 40s. Maybe it would provide an excuse for that factory, Jim.

 

 

Suprising what you can do with publisher when you are sitting holding a baby and trying not to wake him up

 

ps - like the 2-4-0 loco, Jim

[Guest Jim Read]

It's a Reely Grate program Andy and you're a very good DTP'er.

 

Thanks :-)