Annie's Virtual Pre-Grouping, Grouping and BR Layouts & Workbench

[Northroader]

Very nice piece of writing, but the funny thing is that at the time he was on about, Marylebone station only functioned on four platforms! You’d expect a mainline London terminus to have more, but not so, so there wasn’t a platform five, it’s only in more enlightened times with liberation from the London Midland Region that it’s happened.

[Edwardian]

1 hour ago, Northroader said:

Very nice piece of writing, but the funny thing is that at the time he was on about, Marylebone station only functioned on four platforms! You’d expect a mainline London terminus to have more, but not so, so there wasn’t a platform five, it’s only in more enlightened times with liberation from the London Midland Region that it’s happened.

 

Not as odd as King's Cross Platform 9 3/4s, which not only would not be under the main train shed, as depicted in the filums, but would suggest that the ancient and magnificent seat of learning populated by bizarre and eccentric professors lay on the Cambridge line, which is entirely improbable, of course.   

[Northroader]

If you’re going to Cambridge, you’d hit a brick wall anyway.

[Regularity]

1 hour ago, Northroader said:

If you’re going to Cambridge, you’d hit a brick wall anyway.

I thought a FENce more likely..,

[Annie]

In between sleeping a lot more than usual post-COVID jab I've been continuing to work on the Ashington branch.  This branchline is entirely fictitious and exists in a fold in the map  somewhere between Bath and Bristol.  I've decided that I much prefer working on imaginary lines as there's no stress involved with trying to patchwork fragments of research together and there isn't any having to undo hours and hours of work after finding historic photos that show that I've done it all wrong.

Things still have to be done properly though and in a railway like manner, but all the details are entirely down to me and what I decide my line of railway should have, - or not have.  And horrors, Ashington is set in the latter half of the 1950s, but with me having a growing collection of Swindon built BR Standard classes I needed somewhere to run them.  As you all know I like branchlines, shunting/trip working and tank engines set against a slightly idealised background with a touch of the rosy tints and Ashington certainly ticks those boxes.

 

Ashington signal box.  This a very old digital model with few mesh errors that I've retextured and fudged about with bits that aren't supposed to fit together in order to come up with a more interesting signal box model for the branch's terminus.  I tried to make some new bits for it in Sketchup, but the Force wasn't with me this afternoon and I ended up making a collection of strange objects that weren't what I wanted at all.

 

 

Some railway building models are either hard to find, or completely lacking in Trainz so I was very much delighted to find this old GWR stable block model based on the one at Abingdon.  I've retextured the roof, but otherwise it's as I received it.  An iron pagoda  from the same source can be seen in the background and other delights include a sand drying furnace a platelayer's hut and a couple of corrugated iron lock up sheds.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 4, 2021 by Annie
can't spell for toffee

[Northroader]

The only thing to say is it isn’t flat between Bristol and Bath. The River Avon is in a deep valley with the GWR main line taking short cuts through tunnels. So whether you go North or South from there you’ll have steep climbs in hilly country. Very nice area to be imaginative, though.

[Compound2632]

27 minutes ago, Northroader said:

The only thing to say is it isn’t flat between Bristol and Bath. The River Avon is in a deep valley with the GWR main line taking short cuts through tunnels. So whether you go North or South from there you’ll have steep climbs in hilly country. Very nice area to be imaginative, though.

 

Vide the S&DJR's stiff climb out of Bath!

[Edwardian]

3 hours ago, Annie said:

I tried to make some new bits for it in Sketchup, but the Force wasn't with me this afternoon

 

I know the feeling 

 

 

Lovely stables

 

3 hours ago, Annie said:

 

 

 

 

 

[Compound2632]

Will they pass inspection by our resident Great Western stable boy, @Mikkel?

[Annie]

3 hours ago, Northroader said:

The only thing to say is it isn’t flat between Bristol and Bath. The River Avon is in a deep valley with the GWR main line taking short cuts through tunnels. So whether you go North or South from there you’ll have steep climbs in hilly country. Very nice area to be imaginative, though.

 

2 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

Vide the S&DJR's stiff climb out of Bath!

Ah, I have that aspect covered though gentlemen.  I've only shown the flattish bits on Ashington so far, but there is a rather magnificent tunnel through a range of hills between Allerton and Thornton and the climb up from Ashington to Thornton is a pretty darn steady one that makes my engines have to work a fair bit harder.  (Ashington-> West Hatch-> Stanford-> Marshfield-> Thornton-> Allerton-> Castleton  18 miles)

Possibly the layout could use a few more bumps and dips in it than what it has to be properly representative of my chosen area, but  it's definitely not all flat.

The other good thing about my 'fold in the map' branchline is that according to the Shed Bash Uk website the surrounding sheds and sub sheds have exactly the kinds of engine allocations I want.

 

1 hour ago, Edwardian said:

Lovely stables

Yes indeed James.  In the case of the prototype it remained standing until the 1980's before being knocked down by the usual vandals to put up a supermarket.

[Annie]

Morning Broad Gauge cheer up picture.  'Sultan' 1862.

 

 

And back by popular request, - 'Sultan' 1873.

 

[Hroth]

20 minutes ago, Annie said:

Morning Broad Gauge cheer up picture.  'Sultan' 1862.

 

 

And back by popular request, - 'Sultan' 1873.

 

 

But does it swing?

 

 

....

 

 

But the locomotives are certainly majestic specimens!

 

[Edwardian]

This little one does .... all together ....

 

 

 

 

[Annie]

Presently contemplating GWR corrugated iron buildings; - the pagoda buildings in particular that were introduced in 1907.  An interesting website can be found here:   https://inlanding.wordpress.com/2013/03/26/wrinkled-tin-series-gwr-pagoda-shelters/

 

Not to be missed are Lamp Huts and Lockups here:  https://inlanding.wordpress.com/2013/04/16/wrinkled-tin-series-lamp-huts-lock-ups/

 

And the Fairford Branch page here:   https://inlanding.wordpress.com/2013/04/09/wrinkled-tin-series-along-the-fairford-branch/

 

The Fairford Branch is of particular interest as I'd like to do some kind of representation of it someday.  Kelmscott & Langford station had a kind of super corrugated iron pagoda shed for a station building which has certainly caught my interest.

 

 

 

 

Me Mum owned a coat in the same style as the ones those two ladies are wearing.

 

 

The combined lock up office and shelter conversion at Coryates Halt is of interest too, - even though it's a 1950's conversion and not really proper GWR at all.

 

 

Edited August 6, 2021 by Annie
fumble brain

[Annie]

Morning Afternoon Broad Gauge cheer up picture (sorry I couldn't wake up and slept really late).  'Amphion' Gooch Standard Goods class built 1856.

 

[Annie]

On 05/08/2021 at 04:49, Northroader said:

The only thing to say is it isn’t flat between Bristol and Bath. The River Avon is in a deep valley with the GWR main line taking short cuts through tunnels. So whether you go North or South from there you’ll have steep climbs in hilly country. Very nice area to be imaginative, though.

Just to return to this topic I thought I'd post this snap of Ivatt 2MT 46509 in charge of morning parcels train from Ashington.  The gradient has eased here on the long climb up to Thornton station, but you can certainly see that the landscape is far from being flat.  There is a difference in height of 50 meters between Ashington and Castleton.  (Ashington-> West Hatch-> Stanford-> Marshfield-> Thornton-> Allerton-> Castleton  18 miles)

 

 

With the tunnel at Thornton well behind No. 46509 and having passed through Allerton the branch takes a sweeping curve towards Castleton.  The landscape here looks flat, but the line is running through a wide shallow valley.

 

 

And achievement unlocked, - level up!  Castleton now has a goods yard so it is now possible to send goods trains off the branchline to somewhere else.  This has been my major project in between falling asleep and I'm very pleased to have got it done at last.  The goods shed is an old Trainz model that's mostly based on the one that was at  Buckfastleigh in its basic shape and form.

 

 

 

And a general view of the goods yard and MPD from the road bridge that crosses the line.  Rebuilding the MPD was my previous 'in between falling asleep' project.  Still some WIP bits and bobs to do, but the goods yard is functional.

 

 

This is a snap of the same area before I started working on it.

 

 

Edited August 7, 2021 by Annie
fumble brain

[Hroth]

3 hours ago, Annie said:

Morning Afternoon Broad Gauge cheer up picture (sorry I couldn't wake up and slept really late).  'Amphion' Gooch Standard Goods class built 1856.

 

 

I like the way that the safety valve can be dynamically reconfigured without leaving the cab footplate! There's also at least one nice big chunk of coal at the front of the tender too...

 

2 hours ago, Annie said:

... This is a snap of the same area before I started working on it.

 

 

 

Apart from the woeful colour light signalling, you can tell its "modern times" by the extraction of a PW ganger by aliens, bent on trying to understand BR working practices...

 

[Edwardian]

1 hour ago, Hroth said:

 

Apart from the woeful colour light signalling, you can tell its "modern times" by the extraction of a PW ganger by aliens, bent on trying to understand BR working practices...

 

 

Yes, and here was I thinking that sort of thing only happened in the US

 

The truth, I suppose, is out there ....

 

.... somewhere

[DonB]

Just a VERY small amendment needed to the incoming road (Centre LH side in above pictures) of Castleton goods yard .-- Painted centre white lines were not used in pre-grouping eras. not sure when first introduced but likely to have been mid-1930s. Also, in Broad Gauge era would not have been a smooth tarmac type surface.

Sorry... just been inducted into Nit-Pickers Anonymous.

[Annie]

24 minutes ago, DonB said:

-- Painted centre white lines........

The road model with the white lines is/was a part of the original layout Don.  The white lines apart it's an awful low resolution road model that only gets used because it floats slightly above the ground which makes it really easy to lay in place.  The road model in the picture is the one I prefer to use and once I've finished with trackwork repairs & etc I will be changing out the roads and looking at tidying things up a bit in the towns.  Overall though for an older Trainz layout it was better than most and made for a good base for me to work from.

 

[Annie]

Pickup goods duties on the Ashington branch.  What I'm presently doing is finding out if any of the goods yards on the branch have problems that make them too darn difficult to shunt.  I don't mind a goods yard being a bit of a puzzle that needs solving, but being unworkable altogether is another thing entirely.  Ashington's original builder went a bit mad with shunting signals in the good yards confusing the heck out of the Trainz AI and creating situations where signals would be on and would never clear.  The only signal that's really needed in these smaller goods yards is the one controlling the yard exit to the running lines so I've been deleting most of them.  I'm very much of the common sense on the part of all involved school of thought when it comes to shunting small goods yards; - with occasional guidance from the signalman's flags, - or his tea towel waved out the signal box window in the case of one delightful story I once read. 

 

 

Not quite Kings Cross with the number of diamond crossings, but with the good yard on the other side of the running lines from the branchline this was the only way I could do it.  I really like these Swindon built 2MT Ivatt tender engines.  They are quite old Trainz models now being from TS2004, but with a bit of fettling and a wee polish up on their textures they are doing just fine.  They are very nice to drive and the thing that I like about them is that their brakes work properly like they really are slowing down 160 tons or so.  I really can't stand digital loco models that are instant stoppers.

I am having a lot of fun with rebuilding this old layout by the way.  It's just like my Big Book of Trains I had when I was a wee tot back in the 1950s.  Eventually I'll return to my serious (no smiling allowed!) historical projects, - BUT not yet.

 

[Caley Jim]

3 hours ago, Annie said:

The only signal that's really needed in these smaller goods yards is the one controlling the yard exit to the running lines so I've been deleting most of them. 

Quite correct.  Movements in the yard would come under 'Yard control', under the supervision of the station master/yard foreman.  Only if a move required to go beyond the exit signal would the signalman be involved.

 

Jim

[Annie]

Still playing trains in the 1950s, - still falling asleep too much.  My digital copy of the September RM arriving just after I woke up didn't half give me a fright as well.

 

3MT 82030 approaching Castleton in charge of a local passenger service.

 

 

What colour is Brunswick Green?  No 82030 pausing at platform 1 at Castleton.

 

Edited August 10, 2021 by Annie
More information

[Annie]

Commanded to be built by the Lords of Swindon therefore it is acceptable before mine eyes.  An older model for Trainz, but beautifully made and it runs superbly.  Andy Smith was its creator, - a brilliant digital modeller who died far too young.

 

 

I'm still working on Ashington and today I was replacing older low resolution ground textures for much better ones with normal maps.  Many trees were planted as well as I continue to find older less than best tree models hiding away in odd corners of the layout.  Most of my tasks for this session eventually settled on Allerton and I spent a while doing all kinds of tidying up jobs around the township.  As it stands it's fine, but there are a number of things that haven't been finished off in the way I like to do them.

 

Other jobs have been getting the trackwork at the dairy factory, the fertiliser works and the cement works into a properly useable state, - and once again I had to remove a large number of shunting signals that should not have been there.  The dairy factory didn't need much doing to it, but the fertiliser works and the cement works needed a bit more fettling.

On running a test train away from the cement works I found that No. 46509 was really struggling with the load and perhaps worse still this very capable little engine was struggling to stop.  All a bit odd since 46509 has working brakes both on the loco and the tender.  On investigation I found  that those Presflo powder hoppers are set up for both lime and cement and somehow both had been loaded at the same time so each hopper was carrying what should have been an impossible double load!  I should be able to fix that by editing the magical incantations in the hopper wagons' config files, but it's certainly not a problem that I've struck before.

 

 

Another interesting problem was that my Ivatt 2MT's, - both the 2-6-0's and the 2-6-2T's, - couldn't do a run down the branchline without running out of water and they seemed to be gobbling coal as well.  It's only now that I have Ashington that they've seen much use so I hadn't noticed this before.  On investigation I discovered that the problem was that these older models for Trainz had been originally set up for imperial measure with their coal and water loading and then in the later versions everything became metric.  All of which meant their imperial quantities were being read as metric quantities which meant they were carrying a lot less than they should be.  Once I sorted that out all was fine and my 2MT's are now running very economically which is of course what these engine are known for.

 

 

I'm still struggling with being more sleepy than usual and I have my second COVID jab coming up soon so I'm hoping that's not going to further trash my ability to stay awake for any useful amount of time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Annie]

Book Corner:

 

 

This book published by the Transport Treasury was recommended to me to assist me with my early BR Cornwall project and just from a very quick flick through it this morning I can see that it's going to be very useful.  The all important photographs are large and clearly reproduced which is exactly what I want.  All I can say is thank you very much Mr Riley for your pilgrimages into Cornwall with camera in hand.

Edited August 12, 2021 by Annie
Um.........