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Mallaig and the Road To The Isles


mallaig1983
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Just now, thegreenhowards said:

Will do. My o gauge is on the garden so it will probably be on the rolling road unless the weather is exceptionally good!

 

I like your MacRats. I have a 27 on order for when they’re released next year. I’d love a 26 as well but I don’t think I can justify one at Gelnfinnan! What’s your excuse?!

 

Andy

I bought a couple a few years ago when things were more affordable. I harbour an ambition to build Georgemass Jc one day. I just bought them at the time thinking that they might be unavailable if I ever get round to building it. I could justify it at the time as the price was good and they did see very very occasional use on the West Highland. I think they’re handsome little locos and I could have a play with them on Mallaig when no one was looking.

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4 minutes ago, mallaig1983 said:

I bought a couple a few years ago when things were more affordable. I harbour an ambition to build Georgemass Jc one day. I just bought them at the time thinking that they might be unavailable if I ever get round to building it. I could justify it at the time as the price was good and they did see very very occasional use on the West Highland. I think they’re handsome little locos and I could have a play with them on Mallaig when no one was looking.

They were indeed very good value for a while. I bought three green ones at £69 each (I think) for my OO layout which is GN based set in the late fifties. At that time they worked out of Hornsey on KX suburban trains.

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1 minute ago, thegreenhowards said:

They were indeed very good value for a while. I bought three green ones at £69 each (I think) for my OO layout which is GN based set in the late fifties. At that time they worked out of Hornsey on KX suburban trains.


Im sure that’s what I paid too. The idea was to add a 24/1 to go with them when one was released. Now one has been released I can’t justify it. I’ve already got a shopping list as long as my arm for this layout that I need to find funds for. 
 

I really must set aside some time to indulge in your GN layout thread and have a proper read through it.

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On 24/10/2021 at 23:58, mallaig1983 said:

 

E9D26A5E-56F4-4F66-96CE-912FE3C6881D.jpeg

 


 

You may have covered this already, but how did you apply that tidy white line to the platform edges? The intermittent line is particularly pleasing. 

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24 minutes ago, 61656 said:

You may have covered this already, but how did you apply that tidy white line to the platform edges? The intermittent line is particularly pleasing. 


The coping stones were from a Plastruct sheet cut into strips. I then cut between the stone about 2/3 of the way in to make them flexible enough to bend to shape before painting them. They were masked up and the white line painted while still on the workbench and most importantly straight. The intermittent one was masked up along the straight and a steady hand painted alternate stones. This didn’t quite work out so that was then painted all white and then the grey was added back. It was easier to cover the white with grey rather than the other way round.

 

I should add that as the strip bends it opens up ever so slightly so a little bit of touching up between the newly opened up gaps was required and also occasionally a small amount of paint seeped under the masking tape into the crack. I actually liked this as it looks authentic. If you get to much of it seeping along the gap just get the grey out again.

Edited by mallaig1983
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On 23/10/2021 at 13:40, mallaig1983 said:

https://youtube.com/shorts/gW1TsQY5t9k?feature=share


I had to replace a section of bullhead flexi on the off scene curve with a section of old code 75 flexi as I thought this would better mate with the code 100 I’m using for the temporary fiddle yard mk2. The join was on a curve so I thought I better test it. It was fine so I thought I’d turn the sound on and just run a train. This led to just a quick video of the train. I sent the video to my mate who’s ill and needed cheering up. Next thing I knew he’s put it on YouTube and sent me the link. So here Mallaig makes its screen debut. This wasn’t intended and was filmed on my phone, without lighting or ceremony. I feel that this will lead to more video when we have a little operating session one day soon. I can’t imagine Richard of Everard Junction will be worrying about competition for his viewing figures but it was just a bit of fun that grew legs. Hope you like the clip.


Well I’m chuckling away here as the video has been watched 1.4K times. This in my world counts as ‘gone viral’ lol. Not quite sure how that happened but you can pretty much garuante that a feature length polished professional version would probably only get a fraction of the views. The weirdness of tinterweb.

 

There has been progress this weekend but nothing worthy of photographing. A bit more on the scenics leading away from Coull’s Castle, some baseboards attacked by Cedric the circular saw that will become the fiddle yard to the big scheme and a few hours on the workbench with wills sheets, glue, a drill and some files. 
 

I may be quiet but I’m not dormant. 
I hope everyone has had a productive weekend and layouts have progressed.

Edited by mallaig1983
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A little bit of progress this past couple of mornings. Nothing particularly exciting for you followers I’m afraid but I still had the boards from the original attempted layout’s fiddle yard and plenty of 2x1 timber I thought I’d make a start on phase 2. I’d cut the boards for the fiddle yard over the weekend and yesterday and today I built frames and bracing and got the two boards mounted to the wall, screwed together and fitted supporting legs to the front. The new fiddle yard sits 18cm lower than the layout and will need to rise those 18cm over a distance of 370cm on a gradient that will run behind where the Glenfinnan section will be. This assuming that my Kadee fitted trains will negotiate the 2nd radius set track curves that I have in stock and plan to use. If I need to use larger then the gradient will increase accordingly. Also the placement of the first set of points in the fiddle yard will need adjustment. If needs be I can extend the length of the fiddle yard but that will make it a bit tighter to access the storage area under the eaves.

 

Here are a couple of photos showing the fiddle yards current and future.

 

 

729B2113-A6A7-44A7-90D8-97DA81E4DA52.jpeg

F246A00F-EB62-4911-BCB5-29FA2BC69DFE.jpeg

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I doubt it Keith. The ‘West Highlander’ started running in 1984 and I believe it was Sunday’s only that season. The area where the turntable was sited would have by that time been earmarked for the new road. The cost I imagine would also of been prohibitive bearing in mind they would of required one at Fort William too.

 

It was a little thought I had when the Cambrian Coast had stream trains again for a few seasons, I joked that Minehead was a long way to go and turn the loco. Minehead has the old Pwllheli table.

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Correct me if I’m wrong but as far as I can see most/all locos on these turns run forward facing to Mallaig - much to the disappointment of those wanting to photograph the loco working hard over the viaduct pulling away from Genfinnan Station.

 

My point though - does this  mean that the locos have come all the way up from Glasgow tender first.  Or are they dragged up.  Not a lot to do with your layout but the last couple of posts got me wondering.

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On 09/12/2020 at 21:36, young37215 said:

Hi Andy

 

The point, facing point lock and the catch point on the run round appear mechanically controlled from a ground frame dating back well before 1983. The picture below shows the signal box diagram which notes the existence of the ground frame. I am not sure what the electrically controlled No 17 was or could have been, maybe others more knowledgeable on signalling matters may be able to answer this.

 

Mallaig.

 

The 1984 picture below shows point rodding continued to mechanically control the point following closure of the signal box. I suspect a locking mechanisim will have been added to the ground frame that I am guessing the Mallaig section token would unlock. Otherwise it looks like the ground frame was unaffected by the signal box closure. 

 

37014 takes on water at at Mallaig with the 1222 to Fort William on 24th February 1984

 

 

Rather a large number of pages since the question was asked and I haven’t read them all, but a search on “ground frame” looks like no answer yet.  So here goes.

Electric Control No.17 means that lever 17 in the signalbox is what releases the ground frame.  I would expect (but don’t know for certain) that it operated an electric lock on the FPL lever.

When the signalbox was closed and replaced by a GF, the electric lock would have been replaced by a (mechanical) token release on the FPL.  When RETB came along all the ground frames were 3 lever (key release, FPL and points).  Whether the station release GF was converted from 2 lever to 3 lever I don’t know as I only got as far as the main GF for a sample FPL test.

Paul.

 

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51 minutes ago, BoD said:

Correct me if I’m wrong but as far as I can see most/all locos on these turns run forward facing to Mallaig - much to the disappointment of those wanting to photograph the loco working hard over the viaduct pulling away from Genfinnan Station.

 

My point though - does this  mean that the locos have come all the way up from Glasgow tender first.  Or are they dragged up.  Not a lot to do with your layout but the last couple of posts got me wondering.


There appears to be a turntable at Fort William - hidden in the woods between the Glasgow and Mallaig lines, just after the junction!

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/doffcocker/6801949971


 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/doffcocker/6801954313/in/photolist-bn4Mfa-bn4N3n-bn4MCk-bn4LKv-bn4NvR-ER5m5w-6LrK7g-aa3h7c-2kYxZCk-242ZsK5-2kNzEZU-f2GP3U-247YMun-LW2Rp8-2mfM9bx-LkF2nC-LvbLZ8-2kTgHGS-JQB5iK-7dRDBZ-p1ZUoJ-FcLJiQ-YEo8RX-h1JKfR-KJqT5K-LogJC2-XGL7Bc-VCpkU8-VnN5CY-VnN6aj-UkLx4E-VnN5YY-VvDfdY-VR1AcS-VR1ApW-W3iCmA-VvDeAW-KJg1Tm-LvKU6y-CRLHdE-LogEhD-LkF1sw-LvbDgn-LvbHPa-LvbJeP-KybgNS-L4JY75-KybjNQ-LkEXxo-L4JWU5

 

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18 minutes ago, pH said:

There appears to be a turntable at Fort William - hidden in the woods between the Glasgow and Mallaig lines, just after the junction!


It shows up quite well on google maps satellite view too.  

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3 minutes ago, BoD said:


It shows up quite well on google maps satellite view too.  


That’s how I found it - I wondered if they had created a triangle at the junction and was looking at Google Maps to check.

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I think the Fort William one came from Marylebone about 20 years ago. I think there was an intention at the time to also put one in at Mallaig, but that fell by the wayside.

 

I am not sure if the Fort William one has ever been used., but if so, it would remove the requirement to run tender first across Rannoch Moor at the start of the season.

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35 minutes ago, clachnaharry said:

I think the Fort William one came from Marylebone about 20 years ago. I think there was an intention at the time to also put one in at Mallaig, but that fell by the wayside.

 

The turntable installation at Fort William was funded in 1999, including a large donation £165k from the Lottery fund.

 

Prior to this all locos from 1984 were brought up from Glasgow tender first so that they could run chimney first to Mallaig which was the preferred direction on the route (operational reason ?) with the exception of Black 5 5407 which ran briefly for a few weeks in the Summer of 1985 the other way around.

 

This new turntable confused the hell out of me one year as I wasn't aware of it's installation and I had taken a photo of a Black 5 on Tom-na-faire depot one evening and then found it facing the other way around the next morning :unknw_mini: . I thought surely they haven't taken it all the way back to Glasgow overnight ...have they ? It was a good while later that I learnt from a magazine about the turntable's installation and all suddenly made sense ! :blush_mini:

 

Regards,

Ian.

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12 hours ago, BoD said:

Correct me if I’m wrong but as far as I can see most/all locos on these turns run forward facing to Mallaig - much to the disappointment of those wanting to photograph the loco working hard over the viaduct pulling away from Genfinnan Station.

 

My point though - does this  mean that the locos have come all the way up from Glasgow tender first.  Or are they dragged up.  Not a lot to do with your layout but the last couple of posts got me wondering.

 

They left Glasgow this year tender first, I cant remember 100% but I think they used the Springburn area to 'turn' them.

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14 hours ago, 5BarVT said:

Rather a large number of pages since the question was asked and I haven’t read them all, but a search on “ground frame” looks like no answer yet.  So here goes.

Electric Control No.17 means that lever 17 in the signalbox is what releases the ground frame.  I would expect (but don’t know for certain) that it operated an electric lock on the FPL lever.

When the signalbox was closed and replaced by a GF, the electric lock would have been replaced by a (mechanical) token release on the FPL.  When RETB came along all the ground frames were 3 lever (key release, FPL and points).  Whether the station release GF was converted from 2 lever to 3 lever I don’t know as I only got as far as the main GF for a sample FPL test.

Paul.

 


Paul,

Thank you very much for your explanation. This is a subject that I have no knowledge on  . Rob had earlier pointed me in the right direction and you’ve now given me further information to make sense of it.

Watching a YouTube video of a loco running round using this turnout in 1986 using the pause button and squinting I can just make out that the ground frame was still a two lever one but there appears to be a recently installed relay box placed close by which I think backs up what you were saying about what might have changed with RETB. So I now need to remove my relay box from that position on my layout. 
Thanks again for your input and sharing your knowledge.


A bit of a grainy image taken of a slightly grainy video playing on my TV

 

F7249860-AABA-4B9B-B908-7C018B871D53.jpeg.8c487c15d2fedc567350103a88f21b5c.jpeg

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That looks more like a Plant box (E&P) rather than S&T, so my guess would be electric point heating rather than signalling.  The smaller ‘box’ to the right looks like it could be a point heating transformer too.

Paul.

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