martink Posted October 4, 2019 Share Posted October 4, 2019 Well, I have finally settled on the subject of my third linear motor T gauge layout - Dauntsey, a minor junction station on the GWR main line to Bristol. The layout will be 6' x 2' or thereabouts, the equivalent of 38' x 13' in OO, and about the largest size I can manage as a single-board portable layout. Even with all that to play with, some compression and rearrangement will still be necessary! I was looking for a site on a GWR main line, preferably ex-broad gauge for the wider track spacing, with a small goods yard off one line and a refuge siding off the other, plus a road overbridge and a nearby canal with a single lock. Having a junction for the branch to Malmesbury is a nice bonus. The scale will be 1:480, about 6% smaller than the normal T Gauge 1:450, since recent experience shows that the linear motor drive system works best with carriages exactly 24, 36 or 48mm long. Choosing 1:480 means that standard 57' coaches work out to be 36mm across the buffers, and 9' wheelbase goods wagons 12mm (so two wagon bodies on a combined chassis add up to 24mm). 25 wagons per foot! This time around, I am building some sample trains before starting work on the layout, so have 3D printed a few representative locos and wagons. With a quick and dirty coat of paint, they give a good idea of what is possible. They do, however, look a bit out of place and under-sized on an Aussie layout, and the rough running in the video is a known issue with that stretch of track. 2 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
martink Posted October 17, 2019 Author Share Posted October 17, 2019 I now have a small test track up and running, a trial run for the goods yard on the Up side of the station. One working point onto a siding is enough to do quite a bit of shunting - fully automated - in 1:480 scale. The Down side will be similar with a refuge siding, plus a loop around the back to increase the number of trains it can handle. 1 3 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
martink Posted October 28, 2019 Author Share Posted October 28, 2019 The track and control boards for the new layout arrived this afternoon. Just over 24m of track (it needs about 19-20m), and enough daisy-chained modular section/switching boards for the next 2-3 layouts. From top left: point control, storage road control, 3 x stop section control, a mix of straights and curves, a different mix with more straights and joiners for the 6' long layout. And of course, my standard photo size yardstick. Now I have to test them all. Sigh. 2 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
martink Posted November 17, 2019 Author Share Posted November 17, 2019 Finally back to work on the layout after the usual distractions... The track for the down main line (outer loop) has been assembled into roughly 1m sections and fit checked. The next task is to wire, install and test it before doing the same for the up main. The Anyrail track plan shows the full design for the rail side - these are all the functional tracks, and there will be additional non-functional ones to complete the full station plan. The points are shown in almost-finished form, and have been assembled from standard track pieces. 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
martink Posted November 28, 2019 Author Share Posted November 28, 2019 Steady progress - the Down main line is built, wired, and tested with its final electronics. The Up main line and the dummy branch to Malmesbury are built and fit-tested, with wiring and electronics under way. The electronics are my new all-purpose plug-together modules, slightly customized for this location to reduce the number of cables from the layout, with a one-size-fits-all test panel. The picture shows all of the track for the rail side of things, with canal and road still to go. 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
martink Posted January 19, 2020 Author Share Posted January 19, 2020 Back onto things after the usual distractions and delays. The canal loop is now finished and ready to install on the layout. The end of the month should see the track, wiring and electronics complete followed by the start of the scenic work. 3 6 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
martink Posted January 21, 2020 Author Share Posted January 21, 2020 All the track has been assembled and installed. All the electronics modules have been built and tested. There are currently 75 3-wire cables dangling beneath the layout, all of which need to plug in to those modules. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darwinian Posted January 21, 2020 Share Posted January 21, 2020 Fascinating seeing how this comes together, not my thing with all that electrickery but I'll be watching with interest. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
martink Posted March 13, 2020 Author Share Posted March 13, 2020 (edited) Enough pieces of the layout have now come together to make publishing a preliminary work-in-progress video worthwhile. Baseboard, track and electrics are finished, and construction of the scenery has begun. The initial one-section-at-a-time test software has been replaced with something a bit more elaborate. The final version will manage up to a dozen trains on the main line instead of the current four. The trains are test pieces or borrowed from a previous layout. There are still plenty of rough edges here, but it should start to give an idea of what it is all meant to look like. Edited March 13, 2020 by martink Fixed Youtube link 4 5 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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