west highland Mallaig and the Road To The Isles

[mallaig1983]

1 hour ago, Alcanman said:

Great work with the rocks. You're really getting the delapidated look around Mallaig that I saw on my visit in 1984.

Thanks for the kind words. That’s really encouraging to hear as that’s what I’m trying to achieve. Nothing posh and shiny just run down and oozing atmosphere. 
Thanks for sharing the photo. 
 

Andy

[mallaig1983]

Another weekend on the rocks here on Mallaig. Rather a pain but I have now run out of both plaster of paris and carving plaster so will need to replenish before further progress can take place. One end of this rocky area is now about 90% there but the other end is much further behind. I have added a photo of each end to show where we’re at. White plaster doesn’t show up particularly well in photos but hopefully you can make out the progress.

 

 

[David Bell]

Looking good!

 

[mallaig1983]

The creation of the Atlantic coast continues. Well the part of it that concerns my little slice of Scotland does anyway. This morning there was some final carving of the plaster just to blend everything together. It actually looked quite daunting because the moulded rocks were a little greyer than the carving plaster so before paint it looked a real mish mash. This afternoon has been spent colouring the rocky shoreline and if I’m honest I’m cock-a-hoop with the result. Slowly but surely the layout is developing into something close to the how I imagined and hoped it might look. So I think I’m going to enjoy a couple of beers tonight. There are still grassy areas to be applied to the rocks and seaweed and weathering where the tide has lapped but for now I can be content with where we’re at. Enclosed are a couple of pics but please excuse the line side clutter.

 

 

[David Bell]

That is looking great. Enjoy the beers. 

Cheers

David

[61656]

I’ve just spent a really enjoyable hour (or more) reading from start to finish. Really enjoyed seeing the progress and I appreciated your honesty - nice to know I’m not alone in beginner’s errors!

 

 I’m really looking forward to seeing this develop and learning more about Mallaig in 1983. Even if single class 20’s plays havoc with my OCD!

 

Kadees are on my to consider list (but it’s a long list), so I’m keen to know more about them, especially in NEM pockets. I have to say 3 link couplings on freight are a joy, but I do have one awkward corner I can’t reach!

 

 I bought a platform 5 stock book for 1986 for about £3 on ebay and that’s been invaluable for loco and coach numbers, not least some of the more obscure stuff - like mixing air / vac and ETH / steam. 
 

Looking forward to more!

[mallaig1983]

10 hours ago, 61656 said:

I’ve just spent a really enjoyable hour (or more) reading from start to finish. Really enjoyed seeing the progress and I appreciated your honesty - nice to know I’m not alone in beginner’s errors!

 

 I’m really looking forward to seeing this develop and learning more about Mallaig in 1983. Even if single class 20’s plays havoc with my OCD!

 

Kadees are on my to consider list (but it’s a long list), so I’m keen to know more about them, especially in NEM pockets. I have to say 3 link couplings on freight are a joy, but I do have one awkward corner I can’t reach!

 

 I bought a platform 5 stock book for 1986 for about £3 on ebay and that’s been invaluable for loco and coach numbers, not least some of the more obscure stuff - like mixing air / vac and ETH / steam. 
 

Looking forward to more!

Thanks for popping by and the kind words. I’m trying to document the build as a ‘warts ‘n all’ type of thing. I’ve enjoyed model railways all my life but this is the first attempt at actually modelling a railway. Everyone starts at the beginning and if I can share my mistakes and someone else can learn from them then great. Some great people on here have offered lots of advice and being honest is hopefully putting something back. 
I’m glad you enjoyed the read and I’m enjoying following your build. Don’t worry to much about your OCD. A single class 20 on the Mallaig line averaged around one a year. I don’t intend to overkill it.

 

 

[61656]

51 minutes ago, mallaig1983 said:

Thanks for popping by and the kind words. I’m trying to document the build as a ‘warts ‘n all’ type of thing. I’ve enjoyed model railways all my life but this is the first attempt at actually modelling a railway. Everyone starts at the beginning and if I can share my mistakes and someone else can learn from them then great. Some great people on here have offered lots of advice and being honest is hopefully putting something back. 
I’m glad you enjoyed the read and I’m enjoying following your build. Don’t worry to much about your OCD. A single class 20 on the Mallaig line averaged around one a year. I don’t intend to overkill it.

 

 

I think it’s good to have a few ‘honest’ layouts to share experiences with. It’s nice to be at a similar stage to someone else too (so slow down). 
 

There will shortly be a warts and more warts description of fitting my 87 with sound, but I’ll continue fitting my own locos now I know what I’m doing. 

[6990WitherslackHall]

24 minutes ago, 61656 said:

I think it’s good to have a few ‘honest’ layouts to share experiences with. It’s nice to be at a similar stage to someone else too (so slow down). 

 

Yeah. Both of my layouts are still in the work-in-progress stage (McKellar Yard and the still unnamed one in my bedroom) the latter is virtually complete and just needs a backscene and some bricks on the bridge.

Edited April 4, 2021 by 6990WitherslackHall

[mallaig1983]

43 minutes ago, 61656 said:

I think it’s good to have a few ‘honest’ layouts to share experiences with. It’s nice to be at a similar stage to someone else too (so slow down). 
 

There will shortly be a warts and more warts description of fitting my 87 with sound, but I’ll continue fitting my own locos now I know what I’m doing. 

Now I am thinking that you’re ahead of me with progress, you’ve certainly laid a lot more track. Your standard of modelling is excellent and I’ve taken inspiration. I’ve found that reading about others layouts really does this and also giving others access to our own layouts drives us to aim high. I think telling about mistakes is as important as sharing the joy of triumphs. We’re all human and none of us are born experts. Also I’m really happy to be told if I’m doing something wrong, it’s one way we learn. In my experience this forum is full of decent people who are full of encouragement. There are some jaw droppingly good layouts on RMweb but I haven’t come across any modelling snobbery. Everyone seems willing to share their experience and offer advice so that we might all be able to achieve as good a standard as our current skill set permits. 
This can only be a good thing. I’ve found RMweb to be a really positive experience, especially during this lock down period. It’s like one big club room and some good banter can also be had.

[mallaig1983]

1 hour ago, 61656 said:

I think it’s good to have a few ‘honest’ layouts to share experiences with. It’s nice to be at a similar stage to someone else too (so slow down). 
 

There will shortly be a warts and more warts description of fitting my 87 with sound, but I’ll continue fitting my own locos now I know what I’m doing. 

Good luck with the sound fit

[61656]

1 hour ago, mallaig1983 said:

Good luck with the sound fit

When I write it up it will be a sit down with a cup of tea and cake moment. But I’m not doing that until it works (and I’m awaiting parts at the moment). 

[61656]

1 hour ago, mallaig1983 said:

Now I am thinking that you’re ahead of me with progress, you’ve certainly laid a lot more track. Your standard of modelling is excellent and I’ve taken inspiration.

Quite early in the day to be drinking...

 

I’m just a first timer with no concept of “outside of your ability”. I’ll try anything. Just like doing an old house up, ensure you know where to turn the water off and crack on!

[mallaig1983]

Well today hasn’t been particularly productive. Seems everything I touched turned to rats. It didn’t start well when I burnt my last two hot crossed buns in the toaster at breakfast. A couple of non modelling tasks this morning went pear shaped too. Once in the attic it seemed the bad luck was to continue. Stupid little annoying things constantly being a pain in the proverbial. I did get some concrete laid around the boat yard though. Readymix pollyfilla to be more presice. I then turned my attention to doing the same at the oil depot. A quick vacuum over to get rid of dust and bits of plaster to prepay the surface and the vacuum sucked up the surface. So I reglued the surface and put some weights on it to hold it down while the glue went off and decided to run some trains. Well true to today’s form that didn’t go well either at least not to begin with. Running over the north end of the main line and loop and the section through the point and headshunt was dead. I assumed that as various things are stored under the layout I must of pulled a wire out somewhere. Lying on my back contorted under the layout I couldn’t find anything loose in fact without a track diagram drawn on to the underside of the boards it was difficult at first to work out exactly what wire went where. I then worked it out and those of you with good memories who have been following this thread from the beginning will remember that I started wiring from the buffer stop at the end of the layout. I then started wiring from the middle as this is where the controller is placed. What I hadn’t done was to join the two sections and apparently the layout at this end had been relying on the track connections. I couldn’t work out though why both lines had failed at the same time until I remembered what I described as saucery of the unifrog points. So one track joint could well of failed months ago, probably during painting and ballasting and the other much more recently. A short section of twin wire to join the two sections of wiring later and we were up and running. I have realised however that my powerbus, or my version of a powerbus is not to clever. It’s literally sections of wire between the choc block connectors that sit on the end of the dropper wires. I was advised that this was the way to go when I ordered the wire last spring but since watching YouTube tutorials I have leaned that I should probably get a bit more serious with it. Serious will undoubtedly translate in to more expensive but what price reliability? I’ve learned a lot over the last year and I’m not afraid to admit to myself when something could have been done better. 
I’d be interested to hear what you chaps have used, assuming you have gone down the DCC route. I’ve just watched a Charlie Chadwick video and he has gone way beyond what I’m sure I need. He obviously loves his electrics, me much less so. 
 

Thanks for allowing me to have a winge about my day. We go again on the morrow.

[mallaig1983]

Tomorrow I plan to get the frames set up and mount the boards for the temporary (or perhaps semi permanent) fiddle yard. I’m getting a bit bored of running just one set of coaches on the layout and having to lift the loco off and put back on the front in the off scene section so this is becoming more urgent. I say temporary as the fiddle yard will sit in the area that Glenfinnan will eventually occupy. The eventual fiddle yard will sit underneath the non section between Mallaig on one side of the attic and Glenfinnan on the other. As previously mentioned trains will run through Glenfinnan and do a 180 degree turn and enter Fort William which will run up the center of the room. Trains leaving FW for Glasgow will then run back and behind Glenfinnan losing height and will arrive at the eventual fiddle yard below the MLG - GFN section. This will be a couple of years away tho as I now intend to build Fort William after Mallaig so this temporary fiddle yard will also contain a loop to act as Glenfinnan until I get on to phase 3. 
As the layout plans have grown considerably from the original plan I’ll definitely need a more serious bus wire and probably wireless handsets too. One step at a time though so hence the temporary fiddle yard.

 

See, I’m all motivated again now.

[David Bell]

One step back, three steps forward. All in all it is going pretty well. You should go back and look at your very first post then reflect on how far you have come in what is in reality a very short time. So well done and crack on.

Cheers

David

[61656]

Some days model railways are just sent to try us! Despite doing no modelling all day, I have learnt that pre-mixed polyfilla could be a useful form of concrete on the railway, so quite the opposite of your day!

 

I think no matter how much you plan your wiring, there will always be a possibility that a lose (or worse, an intermittent) connection will waste hours of your time. I had an occasionally dodgy pick up on my 03 combine with a poor soldered connection to my fiddle yard (which is still reliant on fishplates for conductivity). 4 hours of head scratching and about 6 seconds to fix once I’d worked it out. Fortunately I was ahead of the game and modelled a brewery. I’ve gone to a lot of effort to ensure the quality of the beer on these occasions!

[mallaig1983]

Thanks chaps. Some days it just doesn’t fall right does it. Still, what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger :-)

[young37215]

As others have said, some days it goes pear shaped and there is nothing you can do but feel frustrated. I spent several hours yesterday mucking around with wiring and creating power district sections. At the end of the day there was nothing visible to show for a days work, I think I have got it all working but will not be surprised to find a problem or two along the way. 

 

My power BUS comprises 32/02 equipment wire for the main and 16/02 for the droppers connected using Screwfix earth blocks which all fits together very easily and is flexible enough to allow additional wires to be easily added if required. (I have wired each piece of track on scenic sections but only a few in the fiddle yard) It is probably heavier duty wire than necessary but in the 4 years since initial installation the only issues have been down to my stupidity. None of the components were particularly expensive either and given how reliable and robust it has been to cope with my electrical ineptitude, it would have been worth twice the price!

 

One tip, buy wire in bulk from someone like RS Components, not piecemeal like I have. You will use more wire than you anticpate and having a reel in stock avoids waiting for supplies as well as costing a lot less. 

 

 

 

 

[6990WitherslackHall]

When building McKellar Yard and the other oo gauge micro layout, I've come across more problems than I can count. Like David said, it's only one step back, three steps forward (though in my case, it's one step forward, three steps back)

 

The point is, no matter how much problems we face when building layouts, we eventually get round it.

[mallaig1983]

Thanks Rob, 

I appreciate the advice and your wiring looks acceptably tidy. Yesterday’s wiring problem was down to my own stupidity a year ago. I think at the time I was more concerned about my soldering. I was working upside down under the layout and I simply missed a really obvious point. I can chuckle about the error now. I will replace the bus with the suggested 32/02 wire and tidy everything up. Even after I’d wired and tested the layout I knew it was messy and would need a good tidy up but at the time I just thought ‘It works - leave it alone’. 
 

Things I have learned for when I tackle Fort William are to solder the droppers to the underside of the rail before laying the track and to wire the BUS with individual boards turned upside down. I will standardise with the 32/02 wire.

This should be easier as Fort William boards will only be 2ft wide as opposed to the 3 and a half ft of Mallaig.

[61656]

2 hours ago, young37215 said:

My power BUS comprises 32/02 equipment wire for the main and 16/02 for the droppers connected using Screwfix earth blocks which all fits together very easily and is flexible enough to allow additional wires to be easily added if required. 

 

One tip, buy wire in bulk from someone like RS Components, not piecemeal like I have. You will use more wire than you anticpate and having a reel in stock avoids waiting for supplies as well as costing a lot less. 

 

 

 

I use pretty much the same system, but I use 24/0.2 for everything. 
 

I would echo your advice too. Buy wire bigger than you think you need and buy more of it. Christleton is on its 3rd roll of 100m (all wiring is the same black 24/0.2, using labels and sleeves for identification).

 

I have split my layout into one power bus for each board, which can be disconnected for fault finding. I also wired my inner circle separately to everything else, with a DPDT, to allow testing of new locos on DC power. 

[mallaig1983]

I was reading up on your wiring and signalling last night, well into the wee small hours as well. Fascinating but I couldn’t keep up with everything. Obviously the needs of a major junction on the West Coast Main Line are quite different to the needs of a single track in the West Highlands. I’m full of admiration for how you’re doing it ( I’m not all the way through your thread yet) and I see that you were simplifying the signalling power. Am I correct in thinking this is what you do for a living? I’m no electrician believe me but I did wire up my camper van conversion and it all worked, nothing fused or caught fire so I seem to have the ability to follow a wiring diagram and work the rest out based on what I learned from that. 
Now you say you have used a separate power bus for each board. Do these seperate sections link on to the next board or direct back to the power supply? 
Another question, my prodigy base unit currently and for obvious reasons sits underneath Mallaig. The Mallaig section is 16ft in length so all perfectly adequate but will this still be an ok position to be powering Fort William which as the train trundles Will be something like a distance of 45ft away? I suppose eventually if I’m using WiFi handsets it would make more sense to place the power supply around the midpoint.

 

On another point regarding Fort William does anyone know where the signal box was located? Electric point motors and colour light signalling etc I’m wondering if this was controlled from Mallaig Jc box or have I missed it?

 

Right, back to the attic and the fiddle yard boards.

 

Thanks again both.

Edited April 6, 2021 by mallaig1983

[6990WitherslackHall]

1 hour ago, mallaig1983 said:

On another point regarding Fort William does anyone know where the signal box was located?

 

 

 

I looked it up on Google images and one of pics was this. It's the signalbox at Fort William Junction. I'm not entirely sure if it's actually at Fort William or elsewhere. 

 

 

[mallaig1983]

Thanks Witherslack. That is indeed the box at Fort William Jc, formerly known as Mallaig Jc. It controls the junctions of the Mallaig line and Fort William yard and depot. It’s about half a mile east of Fort William station. When Fort William station was re sited in the early 70s (the original station site became the Fort William bypass)  the new station was built to current (for the time) standards with colour light signals and points with electric motors as opposed to the old style of point rodding and cranks etc. I’m wondering if control for the station was transferred to this box or some kind of accommodation was incorporated into the new station building. If you check photos you’ll also notice that it was laid with more modern flat bottom rail. The whole thing was completely new.

Thanks