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Right them, finally time for a progress report on the rodding. 
 

unfortunately point rodding is one of the items I deal with in my profession, that means there really is no get outs or excuses! I enjoy the thought of doing much more that actually doing it as it’s so small.

 

So progress. 
 

the lead off bench which is outside the box is now in place with all the cranks and pulleys in place and all the rods. I had to move the box in the end as it was just too close, luckily that’s not an issue 

 

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the point on the departure line has been connected up with all of the FPL parts, for the first section of rodding run it’s 5 rods wide and the modelu rodding rollers really do look good. The closest thing to scale I’ve come across. If it was Wills it would be at least twice as wide

 

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The 3 compensators on the run down the hill are also now connected up

 

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finally the easy bit of straight rodding down the hill to the other points is now in, I had previously done the bottom end so that means we now have a completed roddding run

 

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The only section now left to do is on the other side of the track going from the box up to the incoming point. I just stuck down the stools and marked the positions of the cranks, hopefully will complete that next week

 

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Most impressive and instructive, I was thinking about getting the ballast down on my layout, but I can see that will result in a one way ticket to that favourite station of all railway modellers, Effing & Blinding Halt.

 

Plans duly revised, thanks!

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2 hours ago, Johndc120 said:

unfortunately point rodding is one of the items I deal with in my profession, that means there really is no get outs or excuses! I enjoy the thought of doing much more that actually doing it as it’s so small.

Just be glad you don’t have to make it work!

As others have said, absolutely beautiful.

Is it round rodding?  (Looks like it from a distance.)

Paul.

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2 hours ago, MrWolf said:

Most impressive and instructive, I was thinking about getting the ballast down on my layout, but I can see that will result in a one way ticket to that favourite station of all railway modellers, Effing & Blinding Halt.

 

Plans duly revised, thanks!

 

Thank you, there's a few different ways, some ballast and then dig out which I never understand.

 

another way is just to put in the concretes, then ballast before adding the rodding, rollers and cranks. I'm not convinced on this as I like to airbrush the rodding, I think you'll end up with with a hairy stick nightmare trying to hand paint it all by hand. So I do it all and then when I prime and paint the track I also do the point rodding. it's the same shade of dirty brown!

 

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1 hour ago, 5BarVT said:

Just be glad you don’t have to make it work!

As others have said, absolutely beautiful.

Is it round rodding?  (Looks like it from a distance.)

Paul.

 

Thanks again Paul

 

indeed. it's bad enough on the full size stuff, it's one of those things that's fascinating and I understand it well, just it's always hard work and you know somewhere along the lines someone has bodged something up to make it work.

 

so yes We've gone for the round rodding being ex-GWR and in 1955 I doubt any would have been replaced. even now there's sections of it at Park Junction!

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52 minutes ago, dj_crisp said:

Fantastic stuff!

I'm just about to start planning my point rodding adventure - its certainly interesting!

Will


The advise I would give to anyone is to put in your drive and lock cranks where they need to go because they are fixed positions.
 

Then starting at the signal box end put your first roller 18mm from the lead off bench and then have a roller every 36mm. Where you have cranks in the way of where the rollers should go just shift that roller to one side and then continue the pattern of 36mm.

 

once all the rollers are in then put your compensators in half way between the points and the box just in between a set of rollers, don’t move the rollers for a comp as you have 5 yards of tolerance either way of it’s correct position.

 

hope that makes sense 

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Not a great deal to show on the layout at the moment, however we have been asked to be part of the EMGS EM expo virtual show on May 22nd. This puts a bit of emphasis on ensuring the layout can run and get some more stock converted. 
 

here’s the highlights of the testing so far

 

One of my favourites is the Pway train with the ballast plough brake on the station end


we’ve always wanted to try a bit of banking seen as we have a 1:50 coming out of Elmore so there’s a couple of attempts at it as well.

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Hi all, sorry for the last of progress over the couple of months, just seen now the last progress post was the back end of February! 
 

the big news is that Elmore was featured as part of this years EM gauge expo, we did quite a bit of filming while the layout was up in full and this served as quite a good workout for the layout. A few gremlins had to be sorted but otherwise it ran very well.

 

Since the show has now passed we can post the video publicly so if you would like to see it, please follow this link

 

 

 

 

the video firstly describes the building of the layout and then runs through a few sequences to demonstrate how it will be run, hopefully we’ll be able to keep it as busy as this at an exhibition.

 

finally we’ve also pushed on and got some work done on the layout. Firstly the station platform shell is slowly being constructed, this shell is from slaters plasticard and will than be clad with brick finish on the sides but also various different top finishes.

 

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On the main platform face we are looking at having paving slabs edges with 1 or 2 rows of paving slabs laid lengthways along the platform, infront of the building we will changed to fully paved laid widthways. For the bay we are looking at producing bull nose blocks which have the diamonds cut into the top surface, the gap then between the blocks on the bay and the paving on the main will then be a gravel infill.

this is one of our trials with the bull nose blocks, ignore the brick platform that is likely to be the finish for the cattle dock

 

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also completed over the last week has been the station ground frame and the associated point rodding, this is the last bit of rodding to go in, hooray!!!! I am very proud how the rodding has come out but it’s never easy to do!

 

the frame is parts taken from an old springside signal box interior kit, I have then built the base up using plasticard and a Ground frame cupboard which I have printed myself. The inspiration for this was Aberthaw GF, I just now need a set over over the top steps (see last photo by Adrian Vaughan)

 

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Good to have you back - video is luuvverley!  I hadn’t realised that there is no signalled route for a main line arrival to the bay.  Adds to the operating ‘fun’.

Very nice G.F. Based on a sample of 1 renewal (Reading yard late ‘75) I was going to say that it will look good in blue brick . . . then I got to the Aberthaw photo.  Collapse of stout party!

Paul.

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44 minutes ago, 5BarVT said:

Good to have you back - video is luuvverley!  I hadn’t realised that there is no signalled route for a main line arrival to the bay.  Adds to the operating ‘fun’.

Very nice G.F. Based on a sample of 1 renewal (Reading yard late ‘75) I was going to say that it will look good in blue brick . . . then I got to the Aberthaw photo.  Collapse of stout party!

Paul.

Indeed, that was one of 2 routes we decided to drop out to make life more interesting, the other being to run wrong road from the main platform to the mainline. We didn’t want to crowd it with signals and we felt it would add extra interest not including these. also the wrong direction move felt unprototypical.
 

The bay line is more or less only used by branchline autos although there is enough length to shunt in a B-set for starting from the bay. Starting from the bay you can of course go either way anyway

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This week we have continued our efforts on the platform, we have now added the section around the end of the platform tracks and built the section for the cattle dock to go on. finally we can start to see how the catch pit will look, previously I've felt it doesn't really make sense. 

 

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We have also put the first piece of the ramp coming down to the yard level, this is a bit of trial and we're not quite sure if the angle is right yet. We do however like how it confines the coal yard area.

 

on the bay platform we have now added the first layer of brick, this is now ready for the bull nose stones and 2 more layers of brick to build out the overhang.

 

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At the end of the cattle dock line we are having an end loading dock, I've been doing some research for it and came across this lovely shot by Mike Black, it shows 2 metal ramps fitted to the wall above the buffers, I really like this feature so with a bit of 3D design we are now planning to do the same!

 

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3 hours ago, Johndc120 said:

on the bay platform we have now added the first layer of brick, this is now ready for the bull nose stones and 2 more layers of brick to build out the overhang.

Based on memory (always dodgy) and a sample of one (Tilehurst): did bull nose / gravel platforms have an overhang or did they tend to predate such requirements?

Paul.

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6 hours ago, 5BarVT said:

Based on memory (always dodgy) and a sample of one (Tilehurst): did bull nose / gravel platforms have an overhang or did they tend to predate such requirements?

Paul.


memory seems to be serving you pretty well!!


certainly it was in use before the requirement for the overhang, however I seen several examples where modest overhangs are present and then there’s this platform 

 

https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrha1419b.htm

 

which is really ornate and had quite a bit of overhang so I would guess they were still using bull nose when they introduced overhangs

 

john

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More work on the platforms and station area today. We are starting to add the bull nose edging on the sections which don’t have the platform overhang, bits like the end of the bay and the cattle dock. 
 

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After a successful print of the end loading dock ramps we have now constructed the dock, this is a raised brick section with a concrete beam on the loading section and bull nose bricks on the sides

 

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The cattle dock, as well as having it’s edging has also had the brick frontage which ties in with the catch pit

 

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Continuing progress with the station today, we’ve now added the bull nose edging stones to the bay platform, underneath these we have added the 3 layers of brick to build up the overhang.

 

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On the other end we have sketched out a plan for the cattle dock, we think it might end a touch bigger as there’s no need for the gap at the back. Happy that we can get a full van on the end dock before the cattle dock starts, perfect for a Mogo or a horse box

 

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Hi @Johndc120 This is looking really good. A positive contribution I would like to make is that I believe the trackside gates open towards the wagon. This is to avoid the cattle/ sheep escaping down the edge of the dock.  Currently you have them drawn opening away from the wagon.

 

Leastways, that is the way I modelled them on my Mk1 layout cattle dock which can be seen on the first post on Page 1 of the link below.

 

FYI ~ I noticed after posting that picture that the gate nearest the camera had been hung with the hinge side on the opening end,  :banghead:

 

Look forward to following progress 

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So this week, time has mainly been taken up with chopping a couple of sheets of 40thou plasticard into tiny little pieces, these will make up paving slabs.

 

This was done using a proxxon mini table saw to produce strips and then a proxxon cut off saw to then chop the strips into individual slabs

 

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GWR paving had a lot of variation across the periods but we are going for the edge slabs using 3’ x 2 1/2’ laid lengthways along the platform. For the uncovered section of the platform it was common to see extra rows of 2’ x 2’ laid lengthways behind the edging slabs, we have gone for 2 extra rows before then having a gravel infill. In front of the station building it was common to have a fully paved surface, usually of 3’ x 2’ slabs but this time laid widthways across the platform, this is what we will model.

 

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The edge slabs were also thicker being sometimes up to 6” in depth, to give the impression of this depth we have stuck a second layer under the slab where it overhangs the edge of the platform

 

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At 12mm long we have made 115 to cover the 4’ long platform and have a few spares

 

To fix them to the platform we first stuck a few temporary slabs in at the correct distance to the rail, the edge slabs can then be stuck onto the platform using a steel rule as a guide.

 

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once all of the edging slabs are in the front edge is lightly filed to neaten the edge, the paving slabs can then be added behind, this is the first bit of the uncovered platform going in

 

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at the moment we still haven’t quite finished the 2 additional rows, hopefully next week we’ll. finish this and get some of the fully paved section done as well.

 

Some shots of the platform back on the layout

 

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A nice bit of progress once again on the platforms, all of the 2’ x 2’ slabs are now stuck down, We have now started on the fully paved surface infront of the station building, it does appear a bit strange swapping the orientation but we’ve got plenty of photos where it’s like this.

 

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On the main platform face we have added the brick face and the 3 extra layers to build up the over hang. The face of the end of the platform has now been added which now ties in the end loading dock into the platform. We are considering a set of metal steps down between the buffers for access.

 

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Lastly work on the edging of the cattle dock and the brick floor has gone in, we need to now add some of the raised bricks in the floor to help cattle stay on their feet

 

9B281033-0A0A-4027-99DF-B5D36DD78518.jpeg.5093a1a1b87e355b1fc2957675ea1f3d.jpeg

 

Note the correction to the gates on the trackside, thanks to @Fishplate for pointing out the error in my ways!!

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43 minutes ago, Johndc120 said:

thanks to @Fishplate for pointing out the error in my ways!!

 

Happy to help. I 've had lots of inspiration and positive contributions from so many people on RMWeb. So just a little bit of giving back / passing on info. 

 

Latest developments looking really good.

 

John

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