Its not big,its not clever but it is Welsh!Now Milford Dock

 

by slow8dirty

 

original page on Old RMweb

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Comment posted by nebnoswal on Sun Feb 08, 2009 10:48 am

 

Just found this, look forward to watching the progress

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??? posted on Sun Feb 08, 2009 10:50 pm

 

Hi all,

For once a productive weekend(possibly a first on this project )I'm off to sea shortly so thought I'd crack on and get the ballasting up to a logical step to pause at before i'm away. So at last the bulk of the ballasting is complete and just patch up work to be done when i return.Even with just unpainted rails and bare ballast down though I can really start to see how the layouts going to take shape now, very encouraging after bare boards for nearly 2 years.

Also thanks to some phots of the wagon repair shed at Warrington passed to me by a friend the original peco trainshed has now been scrapped, the plan is to replace this with a kitbashed pikestuff shed I've got lying around and make this little corner a lot more prototypical. I've never been very happy with the peco effort, to my mind its just screamed "model".

A more frustrating note; I bit the bullet and got round to doing some work on my Etched Pixels conversion kit for a turbostar into a Hippo(175). Being a Welsh layout a Hippo was a must have, but being a complete beginner as far as any form of brass work Ive taken my time and only done a few minutes here and there on it, mainly through being a bit scared to tackle it. So after about 6 months finally got round to fixing the roof etches on. And put them on the wrong way round check and check again those reference pictures! It is recoverable just, and i'm carrying on with it, but i do feel a bit stupid

The layout now has a name-Milford Dock, to be fair Aberdaugleddaw 2 is what it is but as time and has gone on my fictional history and what/why runs on it has diverged enough from the original to need a new name so Milford Haven/Pembroke Dock=Milford Dock

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Comment posted by sithlord75 on Mon Feb 09, 2009 10:08 am

 

Always interested in N gauge modelling. Will keep an eye on this. The overbridge looks pretty good.

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??? posted on Tue Apr 21, 2009 12:02 am

 

Finally returned from sea.

Mrs Smudge bought me 08921 for me birthday while I was away so Milford Dock has an 08 in residence. Before this version came out the story was the last Milford shunter got scrapped in the 90s, cos no way would the old offering standup against more recent traction.

Once it was politically acceptable to sneak away from the family I returned to the layout room. To greet me was Thomas the Tank engine residing on Milfords stabling sidings Mini-me has now been rebriefed

Before patching up the first round of ballasting from before I went away I found that 6 of the point motors needed to be coaxed back in to life and at least one of the PL13 switches has gone dud.I suspect i should have followed the advice on here about them, but they were already in when i found the discussion on them.

Anyway, ballasting is now complete, track awaiting painting and weathering plus some more details(cable troughs and a clamplock representation, orange "tamper targets" are already in.). Have had great fun putting plaster bandage down(another first attempt) tonight, seems to have gone okay.

Some pics taken after tonights session, sorry main cameras duff so i used the mobile.

Some shots of the station throat.

 

 

 

 

 

Looking towards Clarbeston Rd from the platform.

 

Being just a BLT a minimal amount of locos will be required

 

A couple evenings work stretched out to 13 months so far!

 

 

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??? posted on Mon Apr 27, 2009 4:53 pm

 

ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS listen to advice

Unable to get across to the SWAG do on sunday(well done all) due to the car not returning from the stored unservicable pool in time I decided to console myself with a period of "Intensive testing" for the afternoon. Okay playing with my toys.

All worked surprisingly well given the ballasting and painting going on recently, so I was very happy, bar yet another Peco switch going frrrp.

When it came to setting a rake of universal track defect detectors(otherwise known as Dapol spine wagons) back under the scenic break along the docks line I realised all is not well. They constantly derailed at this point and my 57 even did it a couple of times light engine. the only stock affected it seems.

What I originally did many moons ago when building my board joints was to forego such scary options as copperclad sleepers(didn't have the confidence, embarrasingly) and just pin and glue the track really really heavily at these points.Now this method has worked for the last 2 years of the layouts life without any movement at all on 2 out of 3 tracks.

The docks branch line, however, has a reverse curve on the fiddle board to move it apart from the main line to allow space for the cassettes and alignment methods. Now up until now this has held(yes i was surprised), but the reverse curve has pushed the rail ends out by a tiny fraction of a millimetre. For a lot of stock this is ok but a significant few are derailed.

The way forward;

Listen to advice in future, I'm getting better at this.

Redo the fiddle board to get rid of the reverse curve and use a different cassette design.

So all in all

frustrated Matt

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Comment posted by Nevermakeit on Tue Apr 28, 2009 12:03 pm

 

Matt - sorry to hear about your set-back. Hopefully others will be able to benefit from your experience though!

 

This layout looks great and I look forward to seeing more photos.

 

Best wishes

 

Nev

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Comment posted by sithlord75 on Tue Apr 28, 2009 12:28 pm

 

Bet the worst part is it worked for so long. Much sympathy but silver lining time - do you get more space for the scene?

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??? posted on Tue Apr 28, 2009 7:26 pm

 

Thats a good point, I dont get any more space but by eliminating the reverse curve, that will improve the look of trains leaving on that line, as although off scene you could still see longer stock kick out as they negotiated the sharp curve. So not frustration, in service improvements!

 

Hi Nev! thanks for your comments, and welcome to the the best club round here

I don't expect my fumblings to inspire but if i someone learns from my boobs then happy days

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??? posted on Sun Aug 23, 2009 11:15 pm

 

an update!

Ballasting complete and all track weathered.

Pretty happy with my efforts to be honest, probably not up to most standards on here but the difference between the before and after is most satisfying.

A significant start has been made on the scenics and its possible to get a feel for the look of the "finished" article now.

Qiuetly satisfied in Somerset.

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Comment posted by sithlord75 on Mon Aug 24, 2009 1:12 am

 

Hi Matt,

 

Good to hear that there has been progress. Any chance of some pictures?

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Comment posted by Will Vale on Mon Aug 24, 2009 1:35 am

 

It's hard to tell some of these pictures are N-gauge - very impressive. I like the picture with the row of electrical cabinets particularly, and I was wondering if there's a good place to get information about permanent way details like the cabinets and tamper targets - you seem to have a good handle on this!

 

Thanks,

 

Will

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Comment posted by EddScott on Mon Aug 24, 2009 7:47 pm

 

Looks very good. I live in Haverfordwest and quite close to the railway line.

 

I was going to model the refinery but its been dropped from my final layout design. I am going to model the train though.

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??? posted on Tue Aug 25, 2009 12:35 pm

 

Hi Kevin, some issues with the camera at the moment, the diagnostician in me feels its broke However will post some up before the end of this fortnights leave period.

Will, you flatter me, There is a good place to get details of permanent way, Its here , i know absolutely nothing but have gone out and looked at the most benign bits of track wherever i am and anything I dont understand I've asked about on here. I realise where you are,the going out and looking is a bit impractical, but any of the prototype mags are useful for looking at things past the rolling stock.Railway herald is on line and free so probably an easy option for you. Also several of the rolling stock sites, Martyn Reads site and wagons on the web, all useful for the stuff behind the wagons. HTH

As regards THE train(the murco tanks), Id love to have the space to fit in the tanks but Milford dock's nowhere near big enough! however modellers license allows me to have a trip working of 6 tanks. at the moment for operational purposes the gap is filled with some grafar TEA's but Im keeping a close look at ewsjo's workbench. The other signature items for this area and period I feel are 'Hippos' and the loco hauled Arriva mkII rakes. All under build or on their way.

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??? posted on Sat Sep 05, 2009 1:32 pm

 

Aargh Just run out of rail joiners Could of sworn I had more than that in me bits boxes. Oh well new fiddleyard delayed till i next get back from work. On a plus new camera fired up ok today so I'll have a bash at getting some update pics on tomorrow.

Cheers Matt

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??? posted on Sun Sep 06, 2009 11:38 am

 

Ok as threatened, some update shots,

Please bear in mind nothing is actually finished yet, and most of it is a first attempt, so any advice/constructive criticism gratefully received.

Also apologies for the bad quality shots, first rushed effforts with new camera, will read the manual one day

 

The local gronk ticks over in the siding that lead to MOD Gashpipes

 

 

A view down the length of the layout from under the main line road bridge.

 

 

Station throat overview

 

 

and a bit to the left.

 

 

A LOT more to do at this end.

 

 

Well a refreshing change to post something other than bare plywood and streamline Nothing is finished in any of the pics btw

 

Cheers, Matt

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??? posted on Sat Sep 19, 2009 12:51 pm

 

Hooray, New fiddle yard built.

Kids driving me mad

Going up to tidy the layout room(and poosibly test out me working timetable

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Comment posted by Nevermakeit on Sun Oct 04, 2009 3:23 pm

 

I really like the shot of the length of the layout. Any chance of you posting the working time-table when it is ready? One of the big problems I have with getting started on a layout is knowing what to do with the trains! I could just run them up and down and drop wagons off etc, but would like to have some idea if the movements were prototypical or not.

 

Thanks.

 

Nev

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??? posted on Thu Oct 08, 2009 6:13 pm

 

Hi, the timetable has been drawn up for the passenger workings form the Arriva Trains Wales timetable for Milford Haven, thus providing an hourly to two hourly DMU service. The only deviation from the prototype is due to the "accidental" purchase of a Virgin Voyager. This is covered by moving the actual Virgin Cross Country to Newcastle from Cardiff/swansea(cant remember exactly ), as a replacement for the HST that used to run from Milford Haven in BR days.

As far as the freight goes, this was done by browsing the Freightmaster timetables for 2005/7, specifically the Margam, Port Talbot Parkway, Cardiff Central and Newport listings. Suitable workings were chosen and their pathing changed ever so slightly . The result is a selection of actual trains from the area be modelled only slightly misplaced to a branch that in reality only sees DMUs and the Murco tanks train. Weaved inbetween the timetabled workings are the short trips from the dockyard siding to the wagon workshop, MOD Gashpipes branch and occasionly fuel for the fuel point by the resident 08, and light engine movements from the docks and Robeston refinery.

The minus points are that the single track main line is probably about 10 times busier than it has any right to be, but I suspect that I'm not the first modeller to suffer from this little "problem". This is acceptable to me as everything moves sequentially and with a purpose. Also as there is rarely more than one train moving over the layout at any one time its not that noticeable to the viewer.

The plus point is everything has a purpose and the timetable gives me a list of stock to build and aquire as the project progresses. For greater fidelity I could probably trim down some of the workings and draw up a train graph to get accurate times between workingsbut to be honest I think thats probaly a step too far for me.

Hth, Matt

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Comment posted by nebnoswal on Thu Oct 08, 2009 8:47 pm

 

Its good to see that my layout is not the only one to have a giant can hair spray on it

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