Birchwood

[BirchwoodPete]

So the start of my layout thread. I posted up about this project a while ago in the track design area, but I never got round to moving it over here once I started to actually make some progress. 

 

So an overview. I had severa Hornby trainsets as a kid, but never actually got as far as having a layout built up. My dad had put together enough track in the late 70s early 80s to build the 1980 Hornby catalogue layout, which we would build up every Xmas and break down in the new year.  We had a reasonable bit of stock, but over the years we didnt really appreciated the maintenance and servicing required, so slowly everything started failing and running poorly.   Once I hit teenage years and discovered rc models the trains got left behind and the years have rolled by.

 

Now I have my own home and have started my own family the urge had returned to make up for the lost years. I decided to convert the spare room/office, a small space approx 8' x 9'.  Around February this year I downloaded scarm and started trying to cram as much track in a small space! After several failed attempts I 'borrowed' a few ideas from another layout design and I had a plan.

Edited May 15, 2019 by BirchwoodPete

[BirchwoodPete]

This design has changed a little since I started building it. I simplified it slightly by removing 1 inner loop and the siding / shed area is yet to be finalised.  

 

Baseboard construction began, plywood frames with 9mm ply tops and softwood bracing.  The first three boards went together quickly, but it took a few weeks for me to get the final bits of framing assembled. Mostly because 1 board became the work bench, so while all track was modified and had droppers soldered on I didnt have space to continue the track all the way round the room!

 

 

 

 

 

I started to lay down some track and start working how things would fit.  This was my first time using flexi track, so that was fun to get my head around. I mark and cut using a dremmel and the tidy the cut ends with a file. This started off being a slow process but I have got a lot more confident and now I am much quicker at getting things cut and fitted

 

 

Just a quick look at the underside of the baseboard. Each board has a different style of bracing but they all seem to work well

Edited May 15, 2019 by BirchwoodPete

[BirchwoodPete]

So moving forward I acquired some closed cell foam sheeting and stuck this down on the boards and began laying track.

 

 

And for now I can't upload anymore images so I'll have to continue this another time!

[BirchwoodPete]

 

A couple more shots of track laying and the start of fitting dropper wires. 

[BirchwoodPete]

A little more progress shown here. I forgot to take too many pics as I did this, I was having so much fun playing with wires and trying not to melt my fingers

 

 

 

Not going too mad with the pictures of this, everyone's seen wiring before. Not the neatest of installations, but I can easily see where everything is in case of problems down the line.  I made several mix ups with frog polarities on the cobalt, which resulted in some fiddly work underneath the baseboard swapping wires around. I think I had about 50% success rate so a dozen cobalt to swap wires on

 

[BirchwoodPete]

A bit more progress to date. Lines all laid all around the room. I still need to add dropper wires to the last two boards, but they are just plain  track, no pointwork to deal with.  

 

 

 

I have spent a lot of the last few weeks working on resurrecting some of our original late 70s and early 80s locos.  Back in the day we didn't really know much about servicing and maintenance, so ive got 20 odd years of catch up to do. I've managed to resurrect my dad's 1979 coronation Scot Hornby tender drive. The motor is a good runner and lovely on dcc. The coronation non streamlined duchess of sutherland  was a good runner in dc, but on dcc needs over 7v to get the motor going, so on my nce system it's still a bad runner.  I have upgrade the nce power supply from 12v to a 15v 2.4amp supply and the difference is amazing. Everything runs much better and smoother. I have an x04 motored flying scotsman. I was bought this as a birthday present at the age of 11 but it never ran right and now finally, with a replacement neo magnet fitted and new pickups fitted it runs really well. I'll probably got some additional wiper pickups to make thing smoother down the line, but it's nice to run a loco at last after 23 years from being gifted it

 

Edited May 20, 2019 by BirchwoodPete
Awful spelling