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Burchill Edge Sidings - BR Blue Carriage/NPCCS Sidings, with a nod to Manchester Red Bank & Bristol Malago Vale


9C85
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Thanks a lot.  This is my first layout in over 40 years, and obviously a first dabble with DCC.  I am enjoying it so far but I do not have the dexterity or patience for some of the fiddly stuff I would like to include.  I have opted for Kadee delayed action uncoupling in the yard area, so I can marshal parcels stock, and my passenger trains will be fixed rakes of 5 coaches, although I could probably squeeze a BG on the end if the 08 was moving it. I am trying to give the impression of the viewer looking at the middle portion of a bigger yard. I am going to use girder overbridges as scenic breaks.  

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30 minutes ago, rob D2 said:

Plenty of space for lots of GUVs etc !

Yes I am looking at getting quite a few GUVs.  At the moment, I only have a 5 coach passenger train and five 'loose' parcels vans. I am trying not to buy any more stock until I have at least ballasted the track, but a certain auction site gets visited frequently.  I have one Lima GUV which I have rewheeled and had a go at fitting Kadees under the buffer beam, but I need to revisit it as I used Hornby NEM pockets glued to plasticard, which get knocked off, so I think I need to try the Kadee No 5 boxes  (I have an old Hornby CCT fitted with the latter which seems to behave itself ).

I am weighing up buying old Lima GUVs and upgrading them, against the cost of getting new Bachmann GUVs, which are obviously of a higher standard.  The problem being the Bachmann 'NEM' pocket is not at the right height for Kadee couplings, so I would have to do as much butchery on a brand new expensive Bachmann GUV as I would need to do to a cheap Lima.

I have learned a lot on other threads in this forum about couplings for Bachmann Mk1s and I have fitted Keen Systems drawbars to some Mk1s in the passenger set. They seem to be OK for fixed rake trains but I don't think they are ideal for loose coupled stock, plus they require quite a bit of additional work to fit to BGS and GUVS, which will constitute the majority of my stock. 

I have attached another photo, taken a week or so prior to 'sleeper griming ' this evening, which gives a view of the carriage sidings and the coaching stock 20200413_212209.jpg.a5d8d43f8f1222f85e648bef23ecf913.jpg

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7 hours ago, lezz01 said:

Nice mate. It looks very promising. What are you going to use for ballast?

Regards Lez.

Thanks.  I have got mostly woodland scenics medium blend  but I am going to 'thin it down ' with fine grade also.  I am conscious of not trying to give it a well maintained look and I am going try and leave the sleepers exposed as much as possible in the sidings at least.  The 'main line' in and the reception road  ( nearest to the retaining wall in the photos) will be better maintained.  I have only ever ballasted once before  (about 10 years ago) and that was for a working diorama for work, so the finish was unprototypically pristine.  Thanks for the kind words 

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Good stuff. Looking at photos of the time, the sidings weren’t weedy, just oily it appears.

 

That was the joy of the time - there was a lot of stock about even if it was only one colour !

 

for a cheap low tech uncoupling method for shunting id deffo consider the “ Kirby “ method - paper clips and magnets. I use it with some of my stock and it’s very cheap and fairly reliable 

 

9C7A3242-4355-4E42-BFEE-CA8A190DB2D8.jpeg

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I am considering doing some static grass patches, especially at the end of the siding at the front of the layout  but, as you say, it is mostly oily grime I need to be going for.

I used one and a half aerosols of railmatch sleeper grime getting the track knocked down to its current state. The first aerosol was a bit temperamental - I thought it was operator error, but luckily the second one behaved itself and I just about got away without wrecking the work I have done so far.

I should  probably get an airbrush for the final track weathering, but I have never used one of those either. I will have to seriously pluck up courage to have a go at weathering my stock, but I really should do it for the genuine 80s parcels 'livery'  :-)

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A really interesting layout and looking good already.  Thanks for posting it.

 

For me ballasting is the worst job in building a layout, but when its done its done.  While I’be usually used dilute pva to stick it down, on my last layout I used Deluxe Materials Ballast Bond (Some sort of glue in a bottle), it was more expensive, but made the job far easier.  I also tried Deluxe Materials Ballast Magic (powder you add to the dry ballast mix) and it didn’t work for me (although a friend used it successfully).

 

Looking forward to seeing your progress.

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3 hours ago, 9C85 said:

I am considering doing some static grass patches, especially at the end of the siding at the front of the layout  but, as you say, it is mostly oily grime I need to be going for.

I used one and a half aerosols of railmatch sleeper grime getting the track knocked down to its current state. The first aerosol was a bit temperamental - I thought it was operator error, but luckily the second one behaved itself and I just about got away without wrecking the work I have done so far.

I should  probably get an airbrush for the final track weathering, but I have never used one of those either. I will have to seriously pluck up courage to have a go at weathering my stock, but I really should do it for the genuine 80s parcels 'livery'  :-)

Looking forwad to seeing your BR blue locos and stock on here...:whistle::senile:

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I have a method using BBQ ash for ballast if you're interested. The only drawback with it is it takes a bit of time but you can lay in a supply that will last for, well I've still got a some left from my batch that I made nearly 30 years ago. You will need some bits and pieces of kitchen equipment but only cheap bits and bobs from either a pound shop/secondhand shop. I have a few bits of kitchen stuff that are only used for modeling and live in the workshop, that way I keep wifey happy, although I'm the cook and the kitchen is my domain but happy wife happy life as they say. 

Regards Lez.  

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1 hour ago, saxokid said:

Looking forwad to seeing your BR blue locos and stock on here...:whistle::senile:

Thanks for all the encouragement.  I only have a small amount of stock at the moment - and loco-wise I have the Class 08 and a Bachmann 47. The latter has had its sound chip reblown with Legomanbiffo's v4 sounds and it's a lovely bit of kit. I will need to renumber and weather it at some point, but I may end up getting that done professionally if I don't feel confident enough. I have recently sold the very first loco I bought for the layout.  It was a Hornby Class 31 fitted with TTS sound.  It was a lovely looking thing, ran well and sounded great, but it was in engineer's Dutch livery (don't ask me why I bought it for a BR Blue layout :wacko:).  I tried getting a blue body for it but with no luck.  I didn't fancy repainting it, so it has gone to 'the bay' and I will put the funds to another blue loco. I would like either a 25, 33 or 45/46, preferably with sound, but my 08 doesn't have sound and it's sometimes quite nice to just listen to the sound the coaches' wheels make on the track joints as they are being shunted around the layout. I can always turn sound off if I wanted to, so it's nice to have the option.  

I might make a start on ballasting later. I will post photos of any work I manage to do.

Thanks again for all the encouragement. 

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43 minutes ago, Melangoose said:

Love that picture with the Class 40, so much atmosphere 

 

40060 - one of the Haymarket "few".

Pic at Bolton - I'm not too sure if it was a diverted service via the S&C. If it was, it would have passed by me and I've probably got a photo of it....

 

 

The space on the right is now the back of a retail park (B&Q or similar).

There is no through road in the middle, but another through platform has been re-instated on the far left.

 

Oh - and there's lots of knitting above the tracks,

 

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1 hour ago, 9C85 said:

Thanks for all the encouragement.  I only have a small amount of stock at the moment - and loco-wise I have the Class 08 and a Bachmann 47. The latter has had its sound chip reblown with Legomanbiffo's v4 sounds and it's a lovely bit of kit. I will need to renumber and weather it at some point, but I may end up getting that done professionally if I don't feel confident enough. I have recently sold the very first loco I bought for the layout.  It was a Hornby Class 31 fitted with TTS sound.  It was a lovely looking thing, ran well and sounded great, but it was in engineer's Dutch livery (don't ask me why I bought it for a BR Blue layout :wacko:).  I tried getting a blue body for it but with no luck.  I didn't fancy repainting it, so it has gone to 'the bay' and I will put the funds to another blue loco. I would like either a 25, 33 or 45/46, preferably with sound, but my 08 doesn't have sound and it's sometimes quite nice to just listen to the sound the coaches' wheels make on the track joints as they are being shunted around the layout. I can always turn sound off if I wanted to, so it's nice to have the option.  

I might make a start on ballasting later. I will post photos of any work I manage to do.

Thanks again for all the encouragement. 

 

A Springs Branch allocated 25 or 40 would be a good bet if you base it 'oop north.

Chuck in a couple of Cravens 105 power twins from Newton Heath for good measure.

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Here goes then. I have just found the remnants of the medium grade ballast I used at work all those years ago, so I thought I would use it up on the access track to/from the main line. It's a start, at least 

IMG-20200422-WA0015.jpeg

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OK, so I have put the ballast down for the 'reception road ' alongside the retaining wall on the (nominally) North East end of the layout . I am yet to glue the ballast down . I will be using the traditional method of wetting the ballast with a spraymist of water (plus w/u liquid) then using a syringe to drop 50/50 pva/water (+ w/u l). I have a question of how should I apply the glue in the area of the point blades?

Am I ok to do the job all in one go, or should I mask the area off before spraying the water and use another method to glue the ballast in this area? For additional information, I have made future provision for fitting point motors (there's a 10mm diameter hole beneath each turnout 'pinhole') but at the moment I am using wire in tube point control. I am trying to avoid ballasting  in the immediate vicinity of the pinhole, as it will just end up on the garage floor . Thanks for any advice you can give 

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OK, so I have now glued down the ballast for the access track to the main line, the point it connects to serving the yard reception road, and the reception road itself, including the point which directs trains back to the yard headshunt.  Am I a bit unusual in that, so far, I have found the ballasting process quite enjoyable? I suppose it's all new to me at the moment and I have done one siding. I effectively have another nine times what I have done so far before it's finished.  I will see how I feel about it then :wacko:

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The Lima GUV isn’t a bad model, this one was given 3 links and a quick weather to add to a parcels train on Charwelton, no major work done as it was set in the middle of a rake and passing fairly quickly to avoid too much scrutiny.

305DC1BC-2E4B-4AED-9AA5-B9F15C88AEC0.jpeg

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13 minutes ago, 43110andyb said:

The Lima GUV isn’t a bad model, this one was given 3 links and a quick weather to add to a parcels train on Charwelton, no major work done as it was set in the middle of a rake and passing fairly quickly to avoid too much scrutiny.

305DC1BC-2E4B-4AED-9AA5-B9F15C88AEC0.jpeg

That's exactly the sort of look I am after.  How did you weather it? 

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