Church Norton

[2ManySpams]

Hi Martyn, excellent looking woodwork. I'm assuming that those evil looking orange handled choppers are for the copperclad?

 

Out of interest, for the more woodworking challenged, could you post a photo of the underside of board two? I'm interested to see how you've braced it.

[3 link]

Hi Martyn, excellent looking woodwork. I'm assuming that those evil looking orange handled choppers are for the copperclad?

 

Out of interest, for the more woodworking challenged, could you post a photo of the underside of board two? I'm interested to see how you've braced it.

 

Hi Chris,

 

Many moons ago I used to be in the double glazing business, and the main use of these cutters was to trim the thin UPVC strips that surround the window and door openings. The cutters have come in very handy over the years and if you have ever tried cutting copper clad it is not the easiest of materials to cut, the cutting blade is just a standard Stanley blade which can be changed by removing just one screw.

 

 

As for the second baseboard I have used just the one cross member, I intended to put in two diagonal braces but as there was no sign of any flexing I did not bother. This board is 5' 6" across at the longest points and all the boards have additional end strengthening by just doubling up on the ply.

 

 

 

The layout will not be an exhibition layout, so hopefully once the boards are up, it will stay that way. But I am building it to be portable just in case my lottery numbers come up , all the boards are built using 9mm ply and I am surprised at how light they are. The main scenic boards will be open plan so will probably need some additional bracing.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

[3 link]

Hi Guys,

 

Just a quick update as I have not posted for a while, as you can see I have built one set of the turnouts to feed the fiddle yard. These were built using the old method of just copper paxolin sleepers soldered directly to the rail, I chose this method because for one they are quicker to build, two they are out of the way and not in the scenic area ( where I will be using plywood sleepers and C & L chairs and accessories ) and three was the cost, although I was quite shocked at how much the c/paxolin sleepers had gone up since I last used some, mind you that was back in the early 80's .

 

 

 

The other bit of news I have is that to be honest I was not sure that the name Selborne sounded right for the layout ( if that makes any sense ), so what with rule number one and modellers licence being brought into play, I now name this layout " Church Norton " to me it sounds a bit more GWRish and rule number one applies. Funnily enough Church Norton is situated just about 4 miles along the coast from where I live and is no more than a hamlet in size. 

 

Well that's all for now, and as soon as I know how I will alter the title of the heading.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

[daifly]

...

 

Well that's all for now, and as soon as I know how I will alter the title of the heading.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

Go to the first post of this thread. Click on 'Edit' and then click on 'Use Full Editor'. That allows you to change the thread title amongst other things such as description and tags.

 

Dave

[steve fay]

Go to post one and edit it will bring up extra editing options you can do it there.

Enjoying this mate as it might be a bit longer before I get going on mine!! Still if I can use my powers of persuasion you will be able to have a 15 , 94 pannier and a standard 3 tank running on church norton.

Don't for get that 3 car bullied set behind a spam can or mogul. The southern guys need to keep up there route knowledge just in case of diversions.

I can see the standard 3 on the divisional inspectors saloon ( Orion rail kits )

 

Edited , track is looking great

Edited May 7, 2014 by steve fay

[3 link]

Thanks Guys,

 

It's so easy when you know how, and yes the southern option is very tempting Steve all I need now is the time and maybe a lottery win would be handy .

 

" 3 car bullied set behind a spam can or mogul "  , hope you feel better soon Steve.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

Edited May 7, 2014 by 3 link

[3 link]

Hi Guys,

 

Just a quick update, the 3 boards for the fiddle yard are now finished but I have not laid any track on them just yet.

 

So now I have had to decide as to what style of baseboards to go with for the scenic section, although the layout will not be an exhibition layout I still need to keep it fairly easy to take apart in case I have need to. As some of the boards are quite long I need them to be as rigid as possible and hopefully without too much flex, so I have decided to go for the " a la Barry Norman " method which is an open frame design using the " beam method ".

 

This comprises of basically two lengths of ply with blocks of pine sandwiched between the ply at between 12" to 18" apart, I have only put together the one beam so far just to see how practical this method is and see if there are any pitfalls to be aware of.

 

Apart from the cost, ie :- a length of 4" x 1" is a lot cheaper , it does appear to be very rigid and without any twist.

 

If there is a downside it is the weight, but saying that the frame will be open plan so without any baseboard top fitted this should not be a problem.

 

The pictures below are just to give you an idea as to what I am waffling on about .

 

 

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

 

 

[steve fay]

Looking good mate, yes the name Church Norton does have a GWR ring to it.

Watching with interest. Did you manage to edit your videos after?

[3 link]

Looking good mate, yes the name Church Norton does have a GWR ring to it.

Watching with interest. Did you manage to edit your videos after?

 

 Hi Steve,

 

Well yes and no, I uploaded the videos to my ipad and like you said they came out the right way up, tried the same onto my laptop and they were upside down and even using the editing options it did not offer the " rotate " option, Grrrr.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

[2ManySpams]

Snap!:

 

[3 link]

Hi Chris,

 

I completely forgot that you have already covered this form of construction, dohhh !

 

Although saying that I will probably go for the cheaper version, you know the one with less holes .

 

Your frames certainly look the business and I like the way you have over lapped the corner joints by continuing just one strip of the straight beam, very neat.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

[3 link]

I thought I had better put an update as to what has been happening of late on the layout ( fiddle yard ) and to be honest, not a lot !

 

Being a lone modeller as there is not a local club with 7mm interests in my area, I have to be a bit of a jack of all trades and one of my weaker areas in the hobby is the black art of electrics. So to this end I am trying to keep everything as simple as possible, the layout will be DCC and the turnouts operated by tortoise motors and the signals by servos and these will be eventually controlled by a lever frame.

 

As you can see I have started to put some " droppers " in place but no " bus bar " at present, but yet again the gremlins have reared their ugly heads.  I have just spent the best part of the morning trying to understand why I cannot sort out the polarity on one particular turnout, I tried swaping the three wires in different sequences ( I mean how hard can it be ! ) until finally out of the side of my eye I caught sight of a barely perceptible spark ! Yes all it turned out to be was a dry joint on the pcb board on the tortoise motor, Grrrr....

 

Apart from that it all seems to work OK.

 

 

Yes it will be tidied up once I finish.

 

 

My trusty 57xx being used as a guinea pig.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

 

 

[bobster]

Very nice work there Martyn - Lovely 57xx.

 

Cheers, Bob.

[DanielB]

That is such a beautiful loco, and some really, really nice woodwork and tracklaying!

[3 link]

Thanks Guy's,

 

The 57xx is from JLTRT and is a great little runner and very heavy for it's size being that it has a resin boiler.

 

As to the trackwork, what you can see is just the fiddle yard and the points are built using copper paxolin sleepers and soldered on rail, the rest of the track is just C&L flexi track.

 

On the scenic part of the layout all the track will have timber sleepers and plastic chairs fitted to the rail, it just looks so much better than the R-T-R turnouts in my opinion. It's not that hard and I think more modellers should give it a go.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

[DanielB]

I absolutely intend to build my own track for my layout, in fact I have a load of hand built track I picked up off of ebay that's seen better days, that just needs re-soldering and cleaning up before it can be re-used. Easy work that!

[ffayolle]

Nice baseboard...

[steve fay]

Great stuff Mate, good to see it progressing well

Edited August 12, 2014 by steve fay

[3 link]

Hi Steve,

 

Great to hear from you, hope your back is not playing up to much?

 

Will I be seeing you at Telford ? I am hoping that I will be able to pick up the 2251 kit from Laurie fingers crossed.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

[81A Oldoak]

I thought I had better put an update as to what has been happening of late on the layout ( fiddle yard ) and to be honest, not a lot !

 

Being a lone modeller as there is not a local club with 7mm interests in my area, I have to be a bit of a jack of all trades and one of my weaker areas in the hobby is the black art of electrics. So to this end I am trying to keep everything as simple as possible, the layout will be DCC and the turnouts operated by tortoise motors and the signals by servos and these will be eventually controlled by a lever frame.

 

As you can see I have started to put some " droppers " in place but no " bus bar " at present, but yet again the gremlins have reared their ugly heads.  I have just spent the best part of the morning trying to understand why I cannot sort out the polarity on one particular turnout, I tried swaping the three wires in different sequences ( I mean how hard can it be ! ) until finally out of the side of my eye I caught sight of a barely perceptible spark ! Yes all it turned out to be was a dry joint on the pcb board on the tortoise motor, Grrrr....

 

Apart from that it all seems to work OK.

 

P1070440-1.JPG

 

Yes it will be tidied up once I finish.

 

P1070441-1.JPG

 

My trusty 57xx being used as a guinea pig.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.

Martyn,

What is your opinion of the JLTRT 57XX? Is it a straightforward build? I am considering trading in my Bachmann/Tower Brass version, which can be seen on my Cwm Bach forum.

 

Regards,

 

Chris

[3 link]

Martyn,

What is your opinion of the JLTRT 57XX? Is it a straightforward build? I am considering trading in my Bachmann/Tower Brass version, which can be seen on my Cwm Bach forum.

 

Regards,

 

Chris

 

Hi Chris,

 

To be honest no it is not a straight forward build, but given time it does turn into a nice model.

 

I built my one about 7 years ago and at the time I felt the kit had been put on the market before any niggles had been fully ironed out, it also lacked good instructions, which have now been updated I think ?

 

The most difficult part for me was to form the bunker, especially when trying to blend in the corner pieces which are castings, not a good fit.

 

Although I have since built their 42xx which also had the same type of bunker, but I found this one a bit easier probably because I knew what to expect.

 

The hornblocks that were supplied with the kit were too thick and I had to mill them all down 1.5mm if I remember correctly, no choice of motor/gearbox is offered and when I phoned them they said they couldn't remember what they used ! Hence why I think I had one of their first kits.

 

Apart from that the rest of the kit is OK and the castings and resin boiler/tanks are of good quality.

 

Heather Kay has done a very in depth build thread on one quite recently over on the Western Thunder forum, and turned out a stunning loco so it can be done given time.

 

I am still happy to build JLTRT kits because I have got to know how most of their kits go together, and the detailing and castings are some of the best on the market.

 

I have built a lot worse it my time, so maybe I am being a bit to critical and was expecting to much to start with. Their new 54xx has the complete body built out of resin including the dreaded bunker, but if your after a 57xx then it's time to get the soldering iron out.

 

Hope this is of some help.

 

Martyn.

[steve fay]

I think the 8750 pannier also has a cast bunker if that helps

[cromptonnut]

Being a lone modeller as there is not a local club with 7mm interests in my area

 

Sorry to butt in but you may be surprised.  I'm not sure where in sunny West Sussex you are but you are more than welcome to join in with our area group - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/forum/245-south-east-coastal-area-group/

 

We have a members directory, you may find that there are people nearby who are willing to join in.  There's also an O gauge group that meet in Worthing (http://www.southcoasto.co.uk/p/welcome-to-south-coast-o.html) that may be worth getting in touch with.

 

I shall follow this one, I know the 'real' Church Norton near Selsey

[81A Oldoak]

Hi Chris,

 

To be honest no it is not a straight forward build, but given time it does turn into a nice model.

 

I built my one about 7 years ago and at the time I felt the kit had been put on the market before any niggles had been fully ironed out, it also lacked good instructions, which have now been updated I think ?

 

The most difficult part for me was to form the bunker, especially when trying to blend in the corner pieces which are castings, not a good fit.

 

Although I have since built their 42xx which also had the same type of bunker, but I found this one a bit easier probably because I knew what to expect.

 

The hornblocks that were supplied with the kit were too thick and I had to mill them all down 1.5mm if I remember correctly, no choice of motor/gearbox is offered and when I phoned them they said they couldn't remember what they used ! Hence why I think I had one of their first kits.

 

Apart from that the rest of the kit is OK and the castings and resin boiler/tanks are of good quality.

 

Heather Kay has done a very in depth build thread on one quite recently over on the Western Thunder forum, and turned out a stunning loco so it can be done given time.

 

I am still happy to build JLTRT kits because I have got to know how most of their kits go together, and the detailing and castings are some of the best on the market.

 

I have built a lot worse it my time, so maybe I am being a bit to critical and was expecting to much to start with. Their new 54xx has the complete body built out of resin including the dreaded bunker, but if your after a 57xx then it's time to get the soldering iron out.

 

Hope this is of some help.

 

Martyn.

Martyn,

I have looked at the recommended thread and it is a very nice model indeed, but does seem like a lot of effort for what should be a rather straightforward engine.  Perhaps someone can be persuaded to mass-produce a RTR 57XX/8750?

 

I know Heather Kay's work well because she built three JLTRT Collett coaches for me last year and very good they are.

 

Regards,

 

Chris. 

[3 link]

  Perhaps someone can be persuaded to mass-produce a RTR 57XX/8750?

 

 

 

Regards,

 

Chris. 

 

Hi Chris,

 

Now's there's a thought for you, nudge nudge, wink wink .

 

Unless you have set you heart on a 57xx, how about a 74xx from Lionheart ? I have the 64xx with the accompanying auto trailer, I just couldn't help myself and life's to short.

 

ATB,

 

Martyn.