Hills of the North - The Last Great Project

[figworthy]

12 hours ago, Barry O said:

this would cover most things including tea breaks, loo stops and bacon butty stops plus any illicit cake chomping moments..

 

 

Are there licit cake chomping moments ?

 

Adrian

[bbishop]

We use blocking back on Southwark Bridge.  If anyone has seen our videos, you will realise it is a big train set with about 30 feet between the fiddle yard and 'A' box so bells are a necessity.  We sort of have one and a half section, because 'A' box arrivals has to 'plunge' the Crows Nest Bow who controls the platform inbound signals.

 

We use the LSWR bells codes, which don't have a call attention.  We go straight into "Warning for".  On the real railway, the codes were officially changed in Southern Railway days so there was a "call attention".  We were told this wasn't adopted on the approaches to Waterloo, when box 'B' sent "Train out of section", box 'A' didn't acknowledge but simply sent the "Warning for" the next train.   Remember these were mechanical boxes with trains on a 150 second headway.  Bill

[2750Papyrus]

Interesting.  Did similar same short cuts apply on the Liverpool Street Jazz service?

[Clive Mortimore]

2 hours ago, figworthy said:

 

Are there licit cake chomping moments ?

 

Adrian

Only if you bring some for the tea boy.

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, 2750Papyrus said:

Interesting.  Did similar same short cuts apply on the Liverpool Street Jazz service?

The Jazz service? No they just improvised.

 

[LNER4479]

Well, thanks for all your thoughts re the bells. Plenty to think about there.

 

Meanwhile, construction continues ...

 

To complete the current woodworking of the lines to / from Carlisle North (Caldew) Junction, the next stage was to complete the gap to link up the 'Caley' lines to the current railhead at 'Grand Junction'. Consideration of gradients, in terms of trying to keep these lines as gradual as possible (sleeper trains of up to 12 vehicles will come this way) meant that I've ended up building back onto the existing boards to start the gradient as early as possible. It needed redoing anyway, as the realignment of the lower slopes of Shap bank meant that the tracks previously laid had to be taken up. Here I'm adding 6mm then 3mm trackbed pieces, aiming for 1-in-150.

 

Done, and tracks being put back down in their new alignment. There's a preliminary rise of 12mm here at the point at which it joins on to the lowest trackbed piece underneath Shap Fell.

 

Meanwhile, up the other end, here I'm adding in the onwards piece of baseboard, taking the lines onwards to Citadel station (left hand) and Dentonholme goods yard (right hand). As it's limited clearance above the S&C lines, then this is a piece of 6mm ply.

 

The supports beneath all this, fitted into place.

 

With the top board now screwed into place (but removeable for now), this shows how the two sets of running lines will start to diverge once clear of the S&C lines. The Citadel ones broadly stay level but the Dentonholme ones need to start dropping.

 

This might give a better idea. That's my 3 foot radius double track template piece, plonked into place to check all is well for the approach to the north end junctions at Citadel. Although the top of Shap is only temporary at the moment, the alignment is pretty much as it will be, at least as far as that gap it goes through. The Dentonholme lines also head for the gap, but underneath the Shap route. Meanwhile the S&C lines will emerge at the lowest level, also on a minimum 3 foot radius curve. It's a busy bit of railway!

 

Back down the other end, with the 'Caley' route in place, we can now turn attention to the supports for the trackbed piece that forms the start of the Canal area.

 

This has been cut from a piece of 6 x 2 9mm ply and its shape reflects the previous fine tuning of the trackplan in this area.

 

Bu there's a problem! This always was a 'pinch point' in the plan. I hitherto tried to get round it by snaking the Shap alignment but that was crippling the trains. Now, I've delayed this 'foul' point as much I can by the profile of the board above and the infringement is about 3mm, as you can see. The solution is to cut away the board above over the tracks and draft in a thinner piece instead, probably a 3mm piece. It'll only be for a short length, as the Shap incline is dropping at 1-in-75 so it'll be clear again within a foot or so.

(there's a trade off going on here - if I were to raise the board above then that steepens the climb of the NBR lines from Carlisle North to Canal and it's already at 1-in-75-ish as it is)

 

With this board placed in position (not fixed down in any way), I could make the final removeable gradient piece for the NBR route. Quite pleased with how this has turned out, looks quite elegant. From this angle, it shows well the shape of the Canal board mentioned above in relation to the Shap route below.

 

Looks even better from this angle! That's a run of getting on for nearly 30 feet of virgin baseboard just crying out for track to be laid! The grade separation can also be seen here, with the 'Caley' lines dropping away underneath the fell.

 

Here's some track plonked in place to give an idea. The two sets of opposing double junctions that is Caldew junction are at the top end board. They need to be here to minimise the gradients but a useful by-product is that the Carlisle North operator and Garsdale operator, who otherwise share this operating space, will be offset from each other so the backs of their comfy chairs shouldn't be continually clattering into each other.

 

And looking the other way, here is what's going on at the approach to Canal, which should be a fascinating quarter of the layout. Bottom right, we have the double track formation that is the start of the Waverley route; on the right-hand side of these is the headshunt of Canal goods yard, which will of course be level. As they get to the top of the climb, there will then be a series of junctions, both to access the loco depot on the left and the goods yard proper on the right. Exact  configuration of these yet to be determined but, irrespective, the goods headshunt becomes the goods yard reception road, with 4 other roads alongside it.

On the right-hand side, there's a very gradually fan out as the entrance the loco depot, for which its headshunt is shown by the plonked length of track. Further away, not massively apparent but take my word for it, is the road that leads to the shed's outside, 70ft turntable.

The space to the left of all this is where the Edinburgh 'fiddle yard' will be, at a level higher again. No idea how that'll turn out in practice but that's where it goes!

 

And that might be it for developments on Hills of the North just yet a while. At the end of the month, the plan is for a partial dismantlement to allow Grantham to be brought out of mothballs to prepare it for the 2021-22 show season. But I wanted to get to the position illustrated above as I might be able to tinker around the edges of the layout even whilst Grantham is set up.

 

 

Edited May 9, 2021 by LNER4479

[robmcg]

Amazing, incredible earthmoving and constructional machination going on,   3mm ply being the magic touch.

 

It fused my brain trying to work out the subtleties so I will be content to observe the creation of these great examples of the steam age.

 

In the meantime I tidied the recent pic of 6220 and the Coronation Scot on Shap, well a generic approximation of that great train with your engine and carriages Graham, this time without the extra  colour light signal feed insulators on the scenic telephone pole...

 

 

 

Having photographed several of the blue engines both the 2004 model and 2018 one, I think the body of the early version is nicer in some ways, thicker handrail notwithstanding.

 

But of course they were at their very best in the war...  Hornby's black versions are among my favourite models.

 

 

 

 

 

Not that these last two have anything to do with Hills of the North....   it's just that I have reputation for thread drift which I have to uphold.

 

 It has nothing to do with bells, morse code, or telepathic transference either. Single line tablet exchange I can understand.

Edited May 10, 2021 by robmcg
foolishness

[Michael Edge]

I had the same clearance problem with the bridges over the goods lines at the south end of our Carlisle, baseboards already built with 12mm ply across the gaps. I had to make the bridge decks out of .025" steel plate to get enough clearance under them, you can now clearly hear the difference when a train runs over them which doesn't sound unrealistic.

[LNER4479]

Thanks Mike. I have that up my sleeve as a last resort as I'd prefer as much clearance as possible (just in case a DJH GNR Atlantic turns up - although I can't imagine who'd bring one of those along?)

 

As I habitually use 3mm cork as the bed for laying track, I could easily graft in a 3mm ply 'bridge' for the first 6 inches, which would be triangular shaped anyway - it's only a goods yard siding on the board above.

[Chamby]

4 hours ago, LNER4479 said:

Thanks Mike. I have that up my sleeve as a last resort as I'd prefer as much clearance as possible (just in case a DJH GNR Atlantic turns up - although I can't imagine who'd bring one of those along?)

 

How about a micro switch set at an appropriate height above the approach track... microswitch trips out a relay... the relay isolates a section of track ahead of the height restriction, bringing the offending stock to a halt.  

 

Woopi-doo.

[LNER4479]

You can go off people, you know ...

[Michael Edge]

Out of gauge locos aren't allowed on our Carlisle - but more particularly in terms of width after we built the platforms at scale clearance from the tracks. At that point I realised just how few locos are actually built to scale widths, we had checked the platform clearances with the two locos which have the greatest throwover on curves - a Princess and a Fowler 2-6-4T - forgetting that I had built both of them.

[jwealleans]

5 hours ago, LNER4479 said:

... a DJH GNR Atlantic turns up - although I can't imagine who'd bring one of those along?

 

Someone modelling the Edwardian LNWR?

[Barry O]

1 hour ago, jwealleans said:

 

Someone modelling the Edwardian LNWR?

and who might that be.. not me.. I am more concerned by the propeller on the Battle Space Turbo car being too large....

[t-b-g]

2 hours ago, Michael Edge said:

Out of gauge locos aren't allowed on our Carlisle - but more particularly in terms of width after we built the platforms at scale clearance from the tracks. At that point I realised just how few locos are actually built to scale widths, we had checked the platform clearances with the two locos which have the greatest throwover on curves - a Princess and a Fowler 2-6-4T - forgetting that I had built both of them.

 

I had similar problems a few times and couldn't work out where I was going wrong for ages. Then the penny dropped. I was measuring from the rail to the platform and allowing prototype dimensions. When your rails are too close together and tucked under a loco, you get extra overhang on footplates and cylinders etc.

 

It was one of those "Doh" moments when I worked it out. It should have been obvious that the extra sideplay in models plus the narrow gauge would require a bigger than scale gap from the rail to the platform but I really missed a trick more than once.

[Compound2632]

14 minutes ago, t-b-g said:

 

I had similar problems a few times and couldn't work out where I was going wrong for ages. Then the penny dropped. I was measuring from the rail to the platform and allowing prototype dimensions. When your rails are too close together and tucked under a loco, you get extra overhang on footplates and cylinders etc.

 

It was one of those "Doh" moments when I worked it out. It should have been obvious that the extra sideplay in models plus the narrow gauge would require a bigger than scale gap from the rail to the platform but I really missed a trick more than once.

 

Moral - always measure from track centres! Or move to P4...

[Michael Edge]

3 hours ago, t-b-g said:

 

I had similar problems a few times and couldn't work out where I was going wrong for ages. Then the penny dropped. I was measuring from the rail to the platform and allowing prototype dimensions. When your rails are too close together and tucked under a loco, you get extra overhang on footplates and cylinders etc.

 

It was one of those "Doh" moments when I worked it out. It should have been obvious that the extra sideplay in models plus the narrow gauge would require a bigger than scale gap from the rail to the platform but I really missed a trick more than once.

It wasn't anything to do with the track gauge (it's EM anyway) - just that modellers normally leave a huge gap between the trains and the platforms, Carlisle has hardly any. Almost all the DJH built 4-6-2s fouled the platform with the trailing axleboxes and steps, many others just with the steps.

[t-b-g]

1 hour ago, Michael Edge said:

It wasn't anything to do with the track gauge (it's EM anyway) - just that modellers normally leave a huge gap between the trains and the platforms, Carlisle has hardly any. Almost all the DJH built 4-6-2s fouled the platform with the trailing axleboxes and steps, many others just with the steps.

 

I knew that but I was just sympathising that you are not the first to have clearance problems with platforms, even if it was for different reasons.

 

There is so much sideplay in most models compared to the real thing that a bit of "spare" clearance at platforms is pretty much essential anyway.

 

Even in P4, I bet models have more sideplay that the real thing just because you cannot scale clearances and they often need to go round tighter than scale curves.

 

Nowadays I don't measure from the track any more. I get my longest carriage or loco and hold a pencil to the biggest overhang to draw out a platform edge. Either the end or the middle of the vehicle depending on which way a curve goes. That marks out the maximum plus half a pencil thickness spare. An old trick but a good one.

 

 

[St Enodoc]

9 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Moral - always measure from track centres! Or move to P4...

For the avoidance of doubt, my "agree" was with the first part only of your comment.

[St Enodoc]

4 hours ago, t-b-g said:

 

I knew that but I was just sympathising that you are not the first to have clearance problems with platforms, even if it was for different reasons.

 

There is so much sideplay in most models compared to the real thing that a bit of "spare" clearance at platforms is pretty much essential anyway.

 

Even in P4, I bet models have more sideplay that the real thing just because you cannot scale clearances and they often need to go round tighter than scale curves.

 

Nowadays I don't measure from the track any more. I get my longest carriage or loco and hold a pencil to the biggest overhang to draw out a platform edge. Either the end or the middle of the vehicle depending on which way a curve goes. That marks out the maximum plus half a pencil thickness spare. An old trick but a good one.

 

 

Me too but I start from the premise that on straight track the platform edge is 20mm from the track centre line.

 

Beware of excess overhang at loco front (or rear, if it's a 2-6-4T) ends, though. Don't ask how I know this.

[Northroader]

A Cornish line (the “Saints”) really needs a “Bulldog” with outside cranks to try out the platform clearances.

Edited May 11, 2021 by Northroader

[Clive Mortimore]

23 minutes ago, Northroader said:

A Cornish line (the “Saints”) really needs a “Bulldog” with outside cranks to try out the platform clearances.

When I built Hanging Hill's loco shed I made the high level platforms found in ER diesel sheds. They are higher than passenger platforms and very close to the locos. Thankfully they were straight. A Heljan Tubby Duff would tend to push its way in and out. The only locos which would get stuck were both Hornby and Bachmann 350hp shunters. The oil boxes on the top of the cranks would catch on the underside of the platforms.

 

[St Enodoc]

1 hour ago, Northroader said:

A Cornish line (the “Saints”) really needs a “Bulldog” with outside cranks to try out the platform clearances.

Too early for me but I do have City of Truro (it ran to Penzance at least once during the 1950s).

[Michael Edge]

If you put the coupling rods where they should be on GW 4-4-0s they'll be no problem, the vast majority of outside crank locos, rtr and kit built, are far too wide. We tried an rtr 08 with just the wheels re-gauged - it nearly demolished the platforms. I rebuilt it as narrow as I could, it just misses now but it's still way over gauge down there.

[St Enodoc]

14 hours ago, Michael Edge said:

If you put the coupling rods where they should be on GW 4-4-0s they'll be no problem, the vast majority of outside crank locos, rtr and kit built, are far too wide. We tried an rtr 08 with just the wheels re-gauged - it nearly demolished the platforms. I rebuilt it as narrow as I could, it just misses now but it's still way over gauge down there.

Thanks for that tip Mike. I've also got a Hornby EE 350hp shunter so I'll check that too.