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The Long Drag to Garsdale – The Bug


Southern Fabricator

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DSCF9634.JPG.d1d034cfdff8d596fddc843b0161fdc7.JPGDSCF9634.JPG.d1d034cfdff8d596fddc843b0161fdc7.JPGDSCF9636.JPG.0f9d4833ac68beb23247fa8b50079012.JPGDSCF9639.JPG.18c4d9540439c2b3d92283b589bbce04.JPGDSCF9648.JPG.0c25500515be6a890bf73c7568a46756.JPGDSCF9649.JPG.b88cd9632d3b3d19a4a94c74e9709b29.JPGMark Knoflers song The Bug played in my mind as I finally got to grips with the back scene come storage support arrangement that will keep all the modules together for transport purposes.

Basically they just slide top of each other, then become four 1.2m high x 1.0m wide x 1.8m long stacks.

The side panels are ply on one side with clear panels on the other. I eventually decided that this arrangement would be more practicable for both viewing and transporting the layout. As a result however the western background scenery overlooking Clough and the A684 towards Garsdale Head is now not possible. The other view from Edwin’s Fell to Wether Hill and beyond will now be possible.

 

My Long Drag to Garsdale Project has taken a back seat as I’ve been involved with our GWRM club preparations to our exhibition layout. After being invited over to Tauranga for a January Expo to support their modellers club our members had a ‘debrief’ of our own main line operational challenges with using rakes of passenger and freight trains on tight radius loops.

 

Consequently new baseboards have been built and existing ones modified to suit.

Basically we opted for super elevated loops with a minimum radius of 505 mm on which we test ran up to 16 carriage passenger rakes with comparable length freight rakes during a club running day last month.

In reality we would only be running up to 9 passenger rakes due to existing platform and storage yard lengths and longer freight rakes.

Our next expo will happen over Easter weekend in support of the Hamilton Model Railway Engineers club and our core club members will be busy building electrical circuits and diorama ready for it.

 

In the meantime I’ve tried my hand at making a two aspect S & C type signal using materials such as a bread bag plastic tie clip and tubing from an old spray cleaner bottle. The tube was used for the 3 mm LED hoods and stanchion pole for the signal while the tie clip made up the face plate for the head assembly and maintenance platform. All I need is a ladder and safety cage and it’s done! Seriously one of my future projects will need to be working semaphore signals.

 

Also my first module track work has been laid... after some shuffling to help accommodate the double slip. The angle difference between the prototype and the Peco one make it difficult to keep the station railway track layout prototypical. However in essence it achieves the same effect. My experiment for using a servo controlled point has so far proven workable and I have worked out a method for using an acrylic mounting plate firstly to use it as a point position index marker for the underside of the baseboard and then to mount the servo and all its components onto it. I’ve got some photos here to share.

 

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  • Like 1
  • Craftsmanship/clever 1

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