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SLITHEROE - A 'LANKY' BRANCHLINE IN THE 1950's


Mythocentric
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Hello everyone After many false starts and delays this is the proposed track plan for my new layout which is based on the Rishworth branch of the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway in BR days. The branch was built to main line standards with the original intention of linking it via a tunnel through Blackstone Edge and into Lancashire. This prodigious feat of engineering never came to pass and the branch terminated at Rishworth on the other side of the river valley from the village. Traffic was quite heavy with a reasonably frequent passenger service and a good amount of freight traffic. The layout will be 14 feet long (10 foot scenic area) by 2 foot 6 inches wide. Because of the restricted space available I have had to make some alterations to the track layout. The track plan has been flipped horizontally to place the fiddle yard at the right-hand end to avoid blocking a fire exit. The fiddle yard board will be hinged to the wall with shelves behind to hold cassettes. The double slip at A replaces a single slip which meant that trains could only access the bay platform (which in the original was a double siding) by crossing over to the down line and reversing into it. For the same reason departing trains could only access the up line by reversing the manoeuvre. The yard access turnout at B was in advance of the crossover and has been moved to give more room for shunting without having to run right back into the fiddle yard. The bridge with the approach road originally passed the head of the station behind the buffers; by leaving it in situ it now happily forms a convenient scenic break. Trackwork will be SMP with 48 inch and 54 inch turnouts. Because of the changes I have decided to use the name Slitheroe which was the name shown on the original contractor’s drawings. As always building a layout is never a one-man job and I would welcome any comments and suggestions before I start work. With thanks Bill

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Very nice, simple design Bill, and nice to see that you are going down the SMP/Marcway route. As you have based it on a prototypical location / plan, then it's quite obviously a prototypical design, but I wonder if any of the experts on here can think of a good reason why there was a single slip instead of a double? If you did go down the single slip route, it would most definitely add to the operational interest so may be worth considering.

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Which way was the single slip?  Remembering that the plan has been flipped, the 'handedness' of the station may have changed, so facing / trailing crossings have changed too? 

 

I can see why it might be a single slip creating a crossing - rather than being used as a bay, it could have been further siding space, and therefore didn't need direct access to the running line?  If there were two sidings there originally, it makes slightly more sense, as they would be accessible from the downline when shunting the yard.

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I think that comment about the layout being "handed" is right. Turn it round and you have something very similar to another L&Y branch terminus - Holmfirth. In that context the slip (single) makes sense.

 

This way round, I think that there should be a facing lead over ordinary turnouts into the main platform with a shunt move to get trains into the bay before departure. The goods yard should probably have a headshunt as well.

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Hi guys

 

Now this is exactly why I decided to start this thread. You eagle-eyed gentlemen have immediately spotted the area which has given me the most problems. My intention was to enable the siding to be used as a bay platform for push-pull (steam) or DMU’s with direct access to the up line, but on reflection I do like the idea of another siding so a single slip it will be as per the prototype.

I chose Rishworth from a shortlist of four: Rishworth, Holmfirth, Middleton and Bacup. (I’m a L & Y fanatic, can you tell?) Middleton proved undoable in the space I have. Same for Bacup which had already been claimed by a person who shall remain anonymous (Jason, a.k.a Sandside! If you haven’t seen his thread yet, go and feast your eyes!) so it was either Rishworth or Holmfirth (including Compo and Clegg!). In fact, at one point I was going to combine the two trackplans to include the superb goods shed from Holmfirth with its split level road below rail access. I settled on Rishworth, or Slitheroe (Love that name! Brings to mind the League of Extrordinary Gentlemen!) because it gave me more chance to present the railway as part of the landscape with its viewpoint across the river valley. The viewer stands approximately where the town stands. It also means I’ll need fewer buildings definitely not being in Jason’s league in that respect! Happily the Branchlines booklet from the LYRS plus information supplied by Andy G (uax6) contains photo’s and drawings of all the major structures including the rather complicated timber viaduct which carries the station access road across the river. Interestingly the yard never had an independent headshunt. Although built as a double track line it was never used as such beyond Ripponden where trains for Triangle and Rishworth crossed over and proceeded single line in each direction. The other line between Triangle and Watson’s Crossing was used for carriage sidings and storage.

I’ve uploaded plans from AnyRail showing the layout in LMS days (circa) 1930 and my modified track plan for your perusal.

 

Jason: I have more than enough Peco track and turnouts to build it but SMP/Marcway is the only way to do it justice (I’m still in tears about the Peco buying spree!). At least I’ve finally made it over the Great Divide into West Yorkshire! :)

 

This is the track layout as built. The red lines show the cross-overs removed by the LMS. The one on the station road had a single slip to the run round and the lower one gave access to the back of the goods shed:

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This is the layout I'll be using. Basically the LMS rationalised plan flipped horizontally and reduced by one siding behind the station:

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Finally a close-up of the revised (corrected?) station throat with the single slip in place:

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It comes to mind that, given the L & Y's penchant for allowing for every possible move, the signalling is going to be fun. Help will definitely be needed in that aspect methinks.

 

Bill

Edited by Mythocentric
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Bill, Do you know which of the two lines were used as the single-line to the station?  I think you may need to consider that in your reversed track plan to ensure you still get the same sort of operations that the original had.  One thing that worries me is the facing crossover your plan introduces - I'm not sure about the L&Y, but a lot of railway companies would avoid facing points as much as possible.  Looking at the original plan, that is the case - both crossovers are trailing, yet all the needed moves are possible.  Would it be possible to rearrange the station throat to give you a trailing crossover at that end?  

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Hi Michael

 

The running line is the one on the station platform side, hence the trailing single slip. I've kept the same orientation because that's how it was laid out in the prototype and in the station limits speeds would be very low. To keep the same aspect as the prototype I would have had to also flip the track plan vertically (have a look at the prototype plan upside-down!) That would have placed the yard and the main scenic feature, the river valley, on the back of the layout which would have defeated any shunting operations which will be a major aspect! It also allows me to use the same propelling moves. The only time the facing point comes into play would be when locomotives were running round their trains, access for shunting wagons across to the siding behind the station or for carriages being propelled into the carriage siding (i.e. the former down line). The only other time it came into play was for goods trains which departed via the down line crossing over to the running line on the other side of the bridge (in my version). That's one of the reasons I chose it. The operational aspects are fascinating! My only regret is that I can't model the next section because Rishworth was reached by a superb viaduct which I'd love to have a crack at! Perhaps given time to get it to exhibition standards I'll consider it as an extention to Slitheroe.

 

Regards

 

Bill

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Barely started and I appear to have hit a snag already. It appears that plywood is hard to come by in Morecambe. Now call me tight if you will but when I'm quoted more for delivery per sheet than the actual cost of the material (from the people who put their name on it) I tend to break out in a cold sweat! And thats before they add cutting charges! The search goes on!

 

 Meanwhile these are photographs of some of the scenes and structure I'll be including:

 

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post-14791-0-37300000-1362109534.jpg

 

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The last photograph is sadly the former location of the railway station in it's current form, An excellent reason for being a member of a line society!

 

All photographs are courtesy of Geograph and are provided under creative commons license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/            

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  • 4 months later...

Barely started and I appear to have hit a snag already. It appears that plywood is hard to come by in Morecambe. Now call me tight if you will but when I'm quoted more for delivery per sheet than the actual cost of the material (from the people who put their name on it) I tend to break out in a cold sweat! And thats before they add cutting charges! The search goes on!

 

 Meanwhile these are photographs of some of the scenes and structure I'll be including:

 

attachicon.gifpike-law-pike-end-rishworth-51590.jpg

 

attachicon.gifriver-ryburn-1174488.jpg

 

attachicon.gifshaw-lane-rishworth-1122063.jpg

 

attachicon.gifthe-besom-oldham-road-a672-rishworth-1072881.jpg

 

attachicon.gifbridge-over-stream-godly-lane-rishworth-1122012.jpg

 

attachicon.gifthe-former-rishworth-railway-station-barkisland-1635626.jpg

 

The last photograph is sadly the former location of the railway station in it's current form, An excellent reason for being a member of a line society!

 

All photographs are courtesy of Geograph and are provided under creative commons license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/            

These are going to make lovely models...and I love the old Lanky, looking forward to developments on this!

cheers,

Iain

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Hi Iain

 

Agree thoroughly about the Lanky. I spent the first 20 years of my life literally surrounded by it (the BR version) so I guess you can say that it was bred into me. Not to mention breathing in those nasty, heavy fogs it helped produce at regular intervals!

 

I've had the ply for the baseboards sat in the bedroom for three months now. The excuse is 'acclimatising', but I got distracted by work (that horrible real-life stuff). Anyhow, once I've got them together I should, hopefully get this thread back on track! (OUCH!)

 

Regards

 

Bill

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I lived in Stalybridge in my early teens which kind of gave me a taste for the L&Y, although it was all 8F's and 9F's then. I do remember the fogs, though! Then we moved to Ayrshire and I just saw the last of the Hughes/Fowler Crabs!

cheers,

Iain

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  • 1 year later...

Hi John!

 

Thank you for your interest. Slow progress as far as track laying is concerned because I took the decision to build it myself and started again from scratch. That meant C&L and until recently you could only buy it online via a credit card (which I refuse to have) or by picking it up at the exhibitions they attend. Happily that's now become easier by using Paypal so things should get moving again soon! I've also pulled up some sections to rebuild because I was fortunate enough to contact Martin Wynne via the Templot Club when I requested help with designing a three-way for the yard entrance (The L&Y loved them!), and Martin generously responded by designing the whole trackplan including a three-way which curves on all roads as per the prototype! Brilliant stuff though I must admit I haven't got around to building it yet!

At the moment I'm working on the station buildings which have lots of small, but vital details, typical fussy Victorian architecture, so I'm slowly but surely making progress there. The trouble is work keeps getting in the way so its a matter of achieving a fine balance between that and play! Ridiculous really because I've never been so busy in spite of (officially) retiring two years ago! Still. As long as the people want it I'll keep going because it's that, after all, which is paying for the layout!

 

Regards

 

Bill

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Already engrossed!

 

Thanks Dave! I hope you are patient too because as you've probably noticed my progress can sometimes resemble continental drift! :sorry:

 

Regards

 

Bill

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Thanks Dave! I hope you are patient too because as you've probably noticed my progress can sometimes resemble continental drift! :sorry:

 

Regards

 

Bill

I think that we both have the same problem

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  • 2 years later...

Which way was the single slip?  Remembering that the plan has been flipped, the 'handedness' of the station may have changed, so facing / trailing crossings have changed too? 

 

I can see why it might be a single slip creating a crossing - rather than being used as a bay, it could have been further siding space, and therefore didn't need direct access to the running line?  If there were two sidings there originally, it makes slightly more sense, as they would be accessible from the downline when shunting the yard 

the siding was used as an overflow hence the single slip and the L&Y didnt really like facing points on the main line

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hi ive modelled Ripponden in finescale N using finetrax points and track everything else is scatchbuilt it has had several outings including Halifax in 2017 where i got a lot of questions and a lot of folks from Ripponden i am now in the progress of building Rishworth in N again but having trouble getting information and pics of tressle bridge and goods yard if you have any source leads it would be much appreciated have you tried Britain from above type in RIPPONDEN and in one of the pics is a longshot of RISHWORTH .

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Many years too late for the writer of the original post but to me It makes a lot more sense when flipped back.

That way the run round is a trailing connection and as It looks very much like this must have had double track for some distance beyond the edge of the plan, either to the next station or just a loop the "Outgoing" track provides a headshunt facility even if an incoming train is approaching.

 

There is a tendency to build layouts with the fiddle yard at the right hand end seen by the operator, it sort of feels right, but it does tend to put the sidings at the back and if you flip them the trailing point become facing and the signalling and operation become very difficult.  The thing is most of those on the exhibition circuit are designed for operation FROM the back...

 

At many steam era branch terminus stations all trains whether passenger or goods had to arrive at the main platform.

As regards the plan post #1 I would put a facing point to the "Bay" and a facing crossover beyond B under the bridge and do away with the slip.  The slip providing a facing lead into a bay is an accident waiting to happen full size or model and I'm sure the Railway Inspectorate would not have passed it

 

See Image #1 flipped back, if the approach tracks are up and down  the plan and especially the slip make a lot more sense, If one line is just a headshunt it is one heck of a shunting puzzle.

 

Another rambling off thread point, when shunting "Haddenhoe" father in laws BLT on Thursday the Branch goods was 11 wagons and a Toad the max we can run round. Part way through the shunt I had 20 wagons out on the main line, quite safely as the driver still had the token, as we pulled the empties out with the fulls.  The original layout as per the flip looks like similar shunts would have been feasible/ easy/ fun 

post-21665-0-87701800-1526265817_thumb.jpg

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