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Newton Stewart on the Port Road


Bochi
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5 minutes ago, Bochi said:

I do know about those books and they are on my "to buy" list. I didn't know how relevant they might be to the period. I will redouble my efforts to chase them down.

 

Plenty of copies of 'Legends of the Glasgow and South Western Railway in LMS Days' available cheaply on Abebooks. As I said, I think that's the one that would be of most use to you.

 

Some copies of 'Tales of the Glasgow and South Western Railway' available, getting costly.

 

There are copies of 'The Little Railways of South-West Scotland' available, but they're definitely not cheap.

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OK here's a revised plan incorporating the suggestions made: the long siding on the west side is no longer a loop, and the continuous link has been lengthened to improve the gradient. I've annotated the main areas though I am finding it a pain to draw and colour proper diagrams in AnyRail :(

 

 

Newton Stewart 2.jpg

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Crossover on the Stranraer side of the West box should be the other way round, a train coming from Stranraer should be able access either up platform via that crossover. It's not that clear on Swan's diagram.

 

Also, if you move the left hand siding in the loco shed yard to between the turntable and the shed, it's in the right place for the coaling platform. The long siding between the tuntable and the running line was a later addition, not sure if it was there in your period (my cpy of Swan is not to hand!). You might have to swing the Whithorn branch out to the left a bit to fit it in.

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The big problem with the engine shed area nestling as it does between the main running line and the Whithorn branch is maintaining a 30" ruling radius. I fiddled around a lot last night and came up with this, which squeezes it all in, as well as the extra siding (it was built in 1931 but in my previous plans I sacrificed it. I still think it might be easier on the curves to leave it out). I have substituted a ruler for the turntable symbol to show the full diameter of what is, to scale, an 8 3/8" TT (a 50ft turntable with some extra rail fixed to it, in the prototype). 

 

As you can see, the extra siding is in place but in reality all these sidings, the engine shed road and the turntable and coaling roads stop more or less at the road whereas trying to squeeze them into my plan means some of them are cut short. As it is this plan uses two small points which is not ideal. It's easier if I compromise on the 1931 siding and leave it out - or even use a 3-way point. Another possible compromise would be to reduce the platform length to around six feet instead of seven. Anyway here is the revised plan:

 

 

Newton Stewart Shed 2.jpg

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Great! Thanks Innerhome.

 

Some of the signals were impressively tall. This picture shows the approach to Newton Stewart from the Stranraer end, with the crossover mentioned by Wheatley on the curve which I got the wrong way round at first.

 

Newton_Stewart_8651_WW2_era

 

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According to Andrew Swan, they seem to have come via Girvan. The 8Fs were officially banned from the Port Road because of weight or gauge restrictions but WD 2-8-0s and 2-10-0s were seen during the war, as well as LMS 8Fs, and the restrictions were later withdrawn. More locos for the layout!

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Later than your period but Peter Brock's book "Calling Carlisle Control" has a log of "Interesting firing trips over the border" from when he was a fireman at Kingmoor, it includes 48321 on a trip from Kingmoor to Cairnryan on 8/10/55. I suppose they could have gone via Mauchline but it's a nice thought. What's interesting is that at that date I suspect the payload was munitions destined for the Beaufort Dyke ! :fie:

 

There's also a photo floating around on the internet somewhere of a 9F outside Stranraer shed. Pretty sure that didn't get there via Newton Stewart !

Edited by Wheatley
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Another day spent cutting wood and making up the baseboards for the fiddleyard or at least the lower fiddleyards, Dumfries and Whithorn. This exercise is reminding me all over again of the basic rules - measure twice, cut once, and try not to end up balancing the whole thing on your knee when doing the countersinks. Chastened, I have ordered pattern makers dowels and foot levellers from Station Baseboards.

 

The high yard is about 44" and I am looking for a clearance of about 3" which will give a 1:56 gradient on each side of the layout (1.5" up and down respectively) which gives wiggle  room for tweaking. So supporting legs can be 40". I was going to use trestles until I realised that the trestles occupy most of the space underneath and I want to store books and magazines and other stuff there, so I will have to knock up socket legs. I would rather not have permanent legs if I can help it because it becomes unwieldy if you have to lift a baseboard to work on it.

 

On the 8Fs, the munitions trains - unexploded gas shells and the like - and other BR traffic, I guess the station did not change much in the 1950s. An article about Cairnryan in British Railway Journal 54 details changes made to the line by the LMS for the increased traffic: at Newton Stewart. It consisted of a signalling change to effectively extend the loop to 500 yards so there is no difference to the track and very little change to the buildings: hence you could run the same layout in a number of periods. 

 

I am waiting for a copy of Legends of the GSWR in LMS Days to arrive. 

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I suspect that the loop extension is that crossover I mentioned earlier, lengthening the loop by shortening the siding. It's not shown on the trackplan in "Little Railways of SW Scotland" but I don't know where DL Smith had it redrawn from for the book. 

 

Apart from the signalling going from lower to upper quadrant, different nameboards and the BR Provender store at the east end I think you are right. 

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On 01/04/2020 at 01:04, Wheatley said:

There's also a photo floating around on the internet somewhere of a 9F outside Stranraer shed. Pretty sure that didn't get there via Newton Stewart !

 

I'd love to see that picture! You don't have a link, do you? I have seen a picture of an 8F outside Stranraer shed, and I thought that was rare enough.

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On 27/03/2020 at 02:10, Bochi said:

I'm very new here; had a couple of layouts in previous homes - both small GWR branches. The ceiling fell in on Staines West, and Midgewater suffered from being in a loft with a savagely sloping roof that did my back in every time I went round the far side of the layout. 

So after moving and settling in to a new house I splashed out on a large shed/workshop - 18' x 14' - which is now full of timber and old/new trackage and tools and so on. But what to build? I've fiddled with exciting but impractical Freezer plans and looked at some favourite subjects such as Woofferton on the Hereford-Shrewsbury joint, but what has really sparked me is the Port Road - surely a true secondary mainline, much of it single track, with steep gradients and some quite short trains, as well as the "Paddy". Andrew Swan's book "The Port Road" is probably the nicest railway book I've ever read and it has plans for all the main buildings at the back!

So to Newton Stewart, the junction for the Whithorn branch and an important market town in its own right - lots of cattle and sheep, meat and refrigerated vans. Anyway, I have come up with a plan using AnyRail and would be very grateful for comments from those much more experienced and knowledgeable than I:

 

640793509_NewtonStewart.jpg.247151d4ed332a06f4c5bd0c1c36da60.jpg

 

Hello from me building Stranraer BR 1959-1965 :)

 

I’ll send some trains down the line :)

 

Best

 

Dan 

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On 31/03/2020 at 18:30, Bochi said:

Great! Thanks Innerhome.

 

Some of the signals were impressively tall. This picture shows the approach to Newton Stewart from the Stranraer end, with the crossover mentioned by Wheatley on the curve which I got the wrong way round at first.

 

Newton_Stewart_8651_WW2_era

 

 

Just noticed the cow turning away from the sight of the cattle train.  Priceless.

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8 hours ago, pH said:

 

I'd love to see that picture! You don't have a link, do you? I have seen a picture of an 8F outside Stranraer shed, and I thought that was rare enough.

You, Danstercivicman and Bochi have mail. Turns out it's a print rather than on the web and It's copyright so I can't post it in thread.

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8 hours ago, danstercivicman said:

 

Hello from me building Stranraer BR 1959-1965 :)

 

I’ll send some trains down the line :)

 

Best

 

Dan 

 

Hi Dan! Will swap cattle for fish and Irishmen.

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Not much to report today. After my rusty carpentry I decided to make a shooting board so I can square off the ends properly and get better joints. Legends of the GSWR in LMS days by David Smith has arrived which makes for entertaining reading: what a great storyteller he was! 

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Yes it’s a very good book. 

 

The main trains from Stranraer were the ‘Northern Irishman’ to Euston Sleeper service at 22:00 hrs and the reverse service from Euston to Stranraer.  This was worked by 6MT Clan, Jubilee or 5MT from Carlisle and Britannia or Class 45 to Carlisle. 

 

The ‘Irishman’ was Glasgow bound and that was Class 126 when they were introduced.  

 

There was a Newcastle service as well and some extra services with through coaches to Newcastle.  This was B1 and 5MT from Carlisle and or 6MT Clan, Jubilee or 5MT from Carlisle along the Port Road. 

 

Cattle services, parcel and freight were the other main trains. 

 

2P, 4P compounds were popular as well but faded out in the late 1950’s from what I can see.

Edited by danstercivicman
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It's a shame that the main Jubilee model is the old split chassis number which I believe is a pain to fit out for DCC. It's a class that's well overdue an updated version. 

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Baseboard construction for the fiddleyards continues slowly. They are 68mm x 18mm frames with 44mm x 44mm legs and levellers from Station Baseboards attached to the feet - they arrived today, thanks SB! I am using very simple techniques for these as the front half will be flat and the whole construction is non-scenic and will likely stay as it is. Fancy L-girders and other such stuff can wait for the station side.

 

 

 

BB legs.jpg

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On 04/04/2020 at 13:56, Bochi said:

It's a shame that the main Jubilee model is the old split chassis number which I believe is a pain to fit out for DCC. It's a class that's well overdue an updated version. 

Bachmann brought out a newly tooled Jubilee a few years back, covers the short firebox locos but may be possible to fit an old long Firefox body on the new dcc friendly chassis?

One thing on your plan that troubles me, if you curved the Dumfries siding round between the main line and the branch, you wouldn't need any gradients, your boards would be simpler, and your locos will pull longer trains.  Just a thought.  

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Somewhere on here, probably shortly after the new Jubillee was released, is a thread where someone grafted a long firebox onto the rest of the short fb body. The old jub was good but the detail on the new one is more refined. 

 

Edit - found it: https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/57173-Bachmann-jubilee/&do=findComment&comment=707477

Edited by Wheatley
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6 hours ago, Stephen 28 said:

Bachmann brought out a newly tooled Jubilee a few years back, covers the short firebox locos but may be possible to fit an old long Firefox body on the new dcc friendly chassis?

One thing on your plan that troubles me, if you curved the Dumfries siding round between the main line and the branch, you wouldn't need any gradients, your boards would be simpler, and your locos will pull longer trains.  Just a thought.  

 

Hi Stephen -

 

I could do that. It has its attractions! It is a good thought. On the other hand the Port Road was a hilly railway and the descent from Newton Stewart towards Palnure was 1 in 90: the railway descended 100ft just to the River Cree. On the Stranraer side it was more or less level at first but soon rose at 1 in 86, while the Whithorn branch descended at a vertiginous 1 in 70 at one point. So I thought the gradients would reflect that, although to strict scale, of course these gradients are negligible that close to the station. If the rise and fall are equalised and there's a 3" clearance, I calculated the gradients at 1 in 56 on the model. But doubtless it will be a bit different in reality.

 

One other factor is that I'm persuaded to put loco turntables at the end of each group of sidings. These will just be centre-pivot sector plates. I'll post the new plan shortly which includes extra sidings so as not to lose staging when the loco runs back from the turntable to head its train again.

 

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Here's the latest version of the plan with extra sidings in the fiddleyard. I've reverted to the earlier idea of losing the 1931 siding from the shed area, but this time the coal siding is on the correct side of the turntable - I think it looks better like this and avoids using small points. I've replaced the Code 100 3-way points with the much prettier Code 75. I have plenty of Code 100 track which I'll use in the fiddleyard area but may use Code 75 throughout in the scenic area.

 

 

Newton Stewart Plan 5.jpg

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10 hours ago, Bochi said:

Here's the latest version of the plan with extra sidings in the fiddleyard. I've reverted to the earlier idea of losing the 1931 siding from the shed area, but this time the coal siding is on the correct side of the turntable - I think it looks better like this and avoids using small points. I've replaced the Code 100 3-way points with the much prettier Code 75. I have plenty of Code 100 track which I'll use in the fiddleyard area but may use Code 75 throughout in the scenic area.

 

 

Newton Stewart Plan 5.jpg

 

Use code 75 if you can. I regret not doing so...

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