Hadley Wood

[manna]

G'Day Folks

 

Glad to hear that a least one survives. I do remember one particular day, I was in the booking hall at Hornsey, keeping out of the wind and rain, lots of glass to see the trains, and an Express (Down train) went under the booking hall then loads of smoke came up through the floor, just something that sticks in your mind, as a 10/12 year old, it was quite surreal.

 

manna

[Atso]

11 minutes ago, manna said:

G'Day Folks

 

Glad to hear that a least one survives. I do remember one particular day, I was in the booking hall at Hornsey, keeping out of the wind and rain, lots of glass to see the trains, and an Express (Down train) went under the booking hall then loads of smoke came up through the floor, just something that sticks in your mind, as a 10/12 year old, it was quite surreal.

 

manna

 

Lovely stuff Manna, thanks for sharing. I visited Hornsey around 2009 but there wasn't much left of the station. However, the shed was still standing and I managed to blag a tour of the facilities off the site manager (I wasn't allowed in the shed though).

[manna]

G'Day Folks

 

That's a shame, the last time I was there (45 + years ago), still used for stabling and fueling diesel loco's, even booked on engine movements there a couple of times (1971/2).

 

manna

[Atso]

2 minutes ago, manna said:

G'Day Folks

 

That's a shame, the last time I was there (45 + years ago), still used for stabling and fueling diesel loco's, even booked on engine movements there a couple of times (1971/2).

 

manna

 

When I was there, it was mainly being used as workshops and storage. The tracks immediately leading to the shed had been lifted, although most of the approach lines seemed to still be in place.

Edited July 6, 2020 by Atso

[manna]

G'Day Folks

 

Engine movements a Hornsey wasn't that demanding, be lucky if you moved 10 loco's a shift, so it gave me plenty of time to wander around and poke about. The sand drying building was still there as was the old GNR coal stage, bit I think the coal wagon ramp had been demolished

 

manna

[St Enodoc]

4 hours ago, manna said:

G'Day Folks

 

Remember those GN booking halls very well, big hollow buildings, the smell of coal smoke, the feel of worn Oregon pine floorboards under your feet, the smoky dull glass windows, but the ticket office light and comforting in the gloom, with clean glass and brass, and green and cream paint.

 

Are there any left, Harringay, Hornsey and New Southgate, were my old stamping grounds as a kid, are there any left (Hadley Wood ) !!!! or has that been replaced with a 'Bus shelter'

 

manna

Some on the Tube - Finchley Central and North thereof.

[5944]

15 hours ago, Atso said:

 

When I was there, it was mainly being used as workshops and storage. The tracks immediately leading to the shed had been lifted, although most of the approach lines seemed to still be in place.

It's still in use as stores, and there is one track still inside - it's got a battery tug stabled there for shunting bogies for overhauled 387s.

[Atso]

Work continues on track laying with the entrance to the goods sidings now being in place and a 40cm length being all that is required to complete the Down main line.

My thoughts are now turning to some of the structures that will inhabit the layout. Given that many these will have to be produced before I can create the ground contours, it seemed logical to begin with the tunnel mouths - thankfully near enough identical at each end.



This drawing was created by importing a photo that was as near square on as possible into Gimp and scaling it, using the track gauge as my reference point, and using the measuring tool. Additional information was worked out from a second photo, my 1935 OS map and Google Maps (thankfully the tunnel mouths and one wing wall on each are original). I've still got some work to do before I'm happy with it, but it is a start.

[Atso]

That's it! Other than having to sort out the final board joint (excitement took over and I forgot about it!) Hadley Wood's scenic track is down!



Now I need to add droppers through the brass sleepers but drill a 0.65mm hole through the sleepers and baseboard and soldering some 0.6mm brass wire into place.

The front hidden loops will be finished next as we have just enough finetrax left to do it before tackling the remainder of the rear fiddle yard - 14 turnouts and around 30 feet of copper clad track left to build and lay!

[manna]

G'Day Folks

 

All ways a sense of satisfaction when you join it all up. 

 

manna

[St Enodoc]

2 hours ago, Atso said:

Don't want to be too much of a party-pooper, Steve, but isn't there a bit of a sharp kink at the entrance to the yard - or is that a trick of the camera?

[Atso]

8 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

Don't want to be too much of a party-pooper, Steve, but isn't there a bit of a sharp kink at the entrance to the yard - or is that a trick of the camera?

 

I think it is a trick of the camera but I'll have a close look at it when I get over to the layout later today.

[Atso]

Ok, so there was a kink in the goods yard track! This has now been attended to.

 

Feeling more motivated now that around 80% of all the trackwork is in place, I've been working on a few scenic items.

 

First are a couple of buffer stops assembled from 2mm Association etches and regauged to fit N gauge's 9mm between the rails.

 

 

Next is something a bit more substantial, one of the tunnel mouths - minus the wing walls, which still need to be built.

 

 

 

Naturally, having gotten this far, I couldn't resist sloshing some paint on it!

 

 

Usually I would pick out random bricks, but as the tunnel mouths appeared to have become near black, I'll be using weathering from this point onward.

[manna]

G'Day Steve

 

It wasn't all black, as I said on Facebook, but it was very dirty,  Kings Cross Gasworks Tunnels were only a little worse.

 

manna

[gordon s]

Always a pleasure to come here and relive trips to Hadley Wood 60 years ago.....

 

Where did the time go?.....

 

I seemed to have missed some magic along the way. Saturday there was talk of tunnel mouth drawings and this morning a beautiful product turned up. Can you tell me how it was produced as the shape is outstanding. Was it moulded/3D printed/laser cut, or did it just appear once the magic words were spoken.....

[richard i]

Looks great, the shape of the entrance must have been difficult to get right.

richard

[Atso]

4 hours ago, manna said:

G'Day Steve

 

It wasn't all black, as I said on Facebook, but it was very dirty,  Kings Cross Gasworks Tunnels were only a little worse.

 

manna

 

Hiya Manna,

 

Don't worry, I read your comment. I'm thinking a dark grey wash and a dusting of weathering powders will be just the ticket once the paint has finally dried.

[Atso]

4 hours ago, gordon s said:

Always a pleasure to come here and relive trips to Hadley Wood 60 years ago.....

 

Where did the time go?.....

 

I wasn't about to see Hadley Wood back when the station building was still in place, but I am beginning to work out that time is a cruel mistress...

 

4 hours ago, gordon s said:

I seemed to have missed some magic along the way. Saturday there was talk of tunnel mouth drawings and this morning a beautiful product turned up. Can you tell me how it was produced as the shape is outstanding. Was it moulded/3D printed/laser cut, or did it just appear once the magic words were spoken.....

 

3 hours ago, richard i said:

Looks great, the shape of the entrance must have been difficult to get right.

richard

 

Thanks for the kind words gents.

 

The tunnel was scratch built using the drawings I produced from the photos I found. Mainly 30 thou plastic card with some 20 thou strip and slaters embossed brick sheet. My only concession to more modern methods was to many to breathe some life into my ancient Craftrobo cutter to cut the tunnel mouth and stonework - the later was then treated to a panel line knife to give a bit more relief to the detail.

 

Three hours this morning saw the first of the wing walls produced.

 

 

Below is a view from behind showing the support structure I made to get the curve.

 

 

A final view showing the blended brickwork on the corners using the technique described in Geoff Taylor's book on making buildings.

 

 

The untreated area at the bottom will be below the scenic level (once some ground contours are eventually made).

[Atso]

The current tunnel assemblies went over to the layout today for clearance testing. As I suspected, the wing badly interfered with the front hidden loops. After some work with the Dremel, a clearance hole sufficient to allow my tallest loco was created = I'm really glad I made the upper wall as a three ply sandwich.

 

 

None of this butchery will be visible once the layout has been completed as the side of the cutting will cover the hole. I only knew about the capping stone on the end of the wing due to Google Maps, it isn't visible in any photo I've seen.

[richard i]

Have you seen the tunnel photos on Wright writes? They seem to show a drainage channel around the top which might be great feature to model, unless I misses its fitting already. 
richard

[gordon s]

16 hours ago, Atso said:

The current tunnel assemblies went over to the layout today for clearance testing. As I suspected, the wing badly interfered with the front hidden loops. After some work with the Dremel, a clearance hole sufficient to allow my tallest loco was created = I'm really glad I made the upper wall as a three ply sandwich.

 

 

None of this butchery will be visible once the layout has been completed as the side of the cutting will cover the hole. I only knew about the capping stone on the end of the wing due to Google Maps, it isn't visible in any photo I've seen.

 

Am I imaging it, or is the tunnel mouth on a slope? The earlier pic showed it to be square and parallel whereas this pic shows the right side much lower than the left. 

 

Optical illusion?

[Atso]

1 hour ago, gordon s said:

 

Am I imaging it, or is the tunnel mouth on a slope? The earlier pic showed it to be square and parallel whereas this pic shows the right side much lower than the left. 

 

Optical illusion?

 

I've just gone back and checked, the tunnel mouth is square! 

[Atso]

3 hours ago, richard i said:

Have you seen the tunnel photos on Wright writes? They seem to show a drainage channel around the top which might be great feature to model, unless I misses its fitting already. 
richard

 

I've seen that Richard. I'm very tempted to have a go at modelling it.

[Atso]

The other wing has now been constructed. Unfortunately, I seem to have suffered from the curse of the non-drying Humbrol paint so have stripped the other bits back and re-primed them. This allowed me to add the small brick panel above the tunnel mouth that I'd missed before.

 

[Atso]

Painting of the first tunnel mouth is well underway now and I've turned my attention to the next structure. I didn't fancy making the second tunnel mouth right now and working out the station dimensions was driving me scatty. Therefore, I've turned my attention to the signal box. This was a glorified ground frame in reality and by 1932, was locked out with the exception of when the goods sidings were being shunted. The two signals were controlled at Greenwood box. The signal box was at platform level but on the ramp, so I decided to model the structure to track level and will cut a hole in the platform (once built) to accommodate it.

Progress over a few hours today:



The glazing is not attached and is masked up so that I can spray the window frames using my airbrush sometime in the next few days.