Shed Layout - Dauntsey Garden Railway

[FoxUnpopuli]

I'm building my first shed for the house, this will have to be a general workshop and storage shed (for woodworking mostly - building more sheds) but the eventual goal will be for it to be to house the first of the garden railway 'stations'.  At the moment I just would like somewhere to run some locomotives, not quite sure if I have a focus on what's important yet.  This isn't my first layout, as I've helped construct and run exhibition layouts before now, but it will be the first in... well, a good long while!

 

The space available is a U inside a ~3.44m/11'3" square, but the layout will eventually pierce the walls, to access the outdoor loop routes 'North' and 'South' (for want of better terms.)

 

Attached is my starter plan, not particularly scientifically laid, with the approximate pierce points through the walls.

 

What I want in the right-hand side of the shed:

• Town terminus station, with a turntable at the end of the platform used as the pointwork for the runarounds (like Harbourne station.)
• Three passenger platform faces, 8 carriages + loco each minimum each.
• Goods/parcels dock which may, or may not, be attached to these platforms; 3 or 4 bogie carriages.
• Access to up and down directions of the outdoor loop (i.e. exit to top-left or bottom-left.)
• Locomotive shedding area (roundhouse?) with ashpits/coaling stage/watering.
• Carriage storage if possible.

 

What I'd like in the left hand side of the shed:

• Exits to outdoor loop.
• Goods yard / industry area.
• Triangle to the loop if it fits.

 

Technical guidelines:

• Inclines are OK at 1 in 40.
• There will be superelevation.
• Ideally min radius 900mm, 762mm acceptable in pointwork and goods/shunting/slow running areas.  (Discuss?)
• Peco Code 75 Streamline (but not Bullhead yet as I like variety in my points!)
• Switchable DC or DCC (so sectioning ideas appreciated.)
• General construction will be a variant on American-style L-girder - laminated plywood substrates (hence the capability to superelevate, and have inclines.)

 

Period/area:

• LNER/LMS joint - somewhere in the Leicestershire/Lincolnshire area
• 1945-1947, but 1956-1958 as a guest starring period.

The station/layout is fictional - but if someone can come up with a real location that ticks some of the boxes (has to have a loco shed) then I'm up for that.  A simpler through station on the left with shed/industry junctioned off to the right is also feasible.

 

I've come up with the following, but you may be able to tell I forgot the accesses to the 'south' and added them on very hurriedly this morning.  I've included it here and now because I'd like comments before I rebuild it in a slightly more tidy way - hopefully with some improvements for prototypical pointwork at the station throat.

 

The right-hand/station side of layout will be constructed first, and that area will be used as a test-bed for various techniques, as well as locomotive and stock storage for my growing fleet.  When the left-hand side is added, it should all combine to work as a layout (just) without the outdoor loop.    That said, the layout could be two separated 'straight' layouts with no 'U' inside the shed.  A large radius U linking the two could be added outside at the 'south' end later.  There is no access to loop across at the 'north' end of the layout.

 

Any help and comments greatly appreciated.  I'm not sure I want to accomodate a roundy-roundy inside the space, useful as it might be for running in locomotives, etc.  I may have a separate perimeter loop at eye level for doing just this.  Cunning and/or elegant solutions will not be pooh-poohed.

 

Edited June 5, 2020 by FoxUnpopuli
Speeeeling.

[melmoth]

Two quick observations. A prototype for the turntable arrangement at the terminus would be Ramsgate Harbour, which closed in 1926, or on a much smaller scale, both Ventnor and Bembridge on the IOW.

 

Secondly, it looks like you've drawn the plan using Anyrail. I've mentioned this on here before recently, but I would advise you to amend the view of the plan to show the roadbed as this gives a much better idea of clearances. Click on the 'show' tab and then tick the 'roadbed' box option. As it stands the plan literally only shows the width across the rails with no allowance for sleepers, and therefore the distance between parallel tracks is likely to be insufficient, and clearance at platforms etc might also be inadequate.

 

The plan itself looks like good fun.

[FoxUnpopuli]

Good tip - and yes, I bought Anyrail as I liked it  It's not perfect, but it's pretty good.  I have used 45mm centres for parallel tracks, widening to Peco's standard 50mm at pointwork as required.  I just about nailed the platform edges by eyeball, but yes, the roadbed highlights a couple of clashes.  I think the platform size is adequate, I'm sure there are prototypical design minimums... and they can be found here on RMWeb somewhere. 

[Harlequin]

Hi Mark,

 

Very nice flowing curves!

 

How do your doors open? Are they really hinged in the centre or conventionally in the door frames either side of the opening? This may impact on the width of the boards and the trackwork just inside the doorway, if they open inwards.

 

The baseboards are quite deep at 1metre. Lots of people would find that too far to comfortably reach the back but maybe it's OK for you.

 

What is the rail-top to rail-top clearance where the south-bound lines pass under the station approach lines? Are you sure there's enough distance for them to reach the same level at the crossover into the goods yard?

 

Edit: (Standard streamline track spacing is 2inches which rounds to 51mm to the nearest mm.)

 

Edited May 24, 2020 by Harlequin

[FoxUnpopuli]

Hi Phil!  Nice to see you here, many thanks.  To answer your questions:

 

Single 762mm standard door width, hinged in the centre to the left side, opening inwards.  At least, that's the plan at the moment.  It could open outwards, as it would open into a 'garage area' of the same shed (overall size of the building is 3.6x6m.)  If it opens outwards, however, we can't leave anything in the way in the garage area.

 

Yes, the door jamb means the width is 900mm at the north edge, I could have gone 900mm all around but I pushed for 1m.  I'm quite lanky and the layout will be relatively low (for reasons that will become obvious when I post photos of the shed.)  Time will tell if I've made a boo-boo, and things can always change or be rebuilt. 

 

Track elevations are marked on the image if you click on it (it's quite large - actually 1pixel per mm) but at the bridge the runs curving northwards from the station are at 90mm (should be, but I see they're at 80mm - good spot) and the highest part of the southbound lines are about 10mm - so 80mm rail to rail was the design.  The station area is flat at 80mm, and the goods area on the left-hand/west side is flat at ~33mm.   Everything otherwise ramps up and down to suit.  Elevation changes are a challenge I want to model - everyone seems to shy away from them for the most part unless they're deliberately trying to achieve a multilevel layout.  I want to do it to replicate a landscape where someone built a railway!

[FoxUnpopuli]

 

Click pic for 3440x3440pixels.  I can supply the .any file to anyone interested.

[mdvle]

3 hours ago, FoxUnpopuli said:

Elevation changes are a challenge I want to model - everyone seems to shy away from them for the most part unless they're deliberately trying to achieve a multilevel layout.  I want to do it to replicate a landscape where someone built a railway!

 

The reason people avoid them is because they cause operational problems, particularly with steam.  And elevation changes on a curve are even worse.

 

Not saying don't do it, but it might be worth setting up some test track to see what your locos can actually pull before committing to much into building the part of the layout with elevation changes.

 

Also see this thread (if you haven't) which seems to indicate from experience that steam is much happier in the 1:75 to 1:100 range.

 

 

But my other concern would be how much operating of this layout can one realistically do without the outside trackwork - there is no fiddle yard to feed the trains into/from the station.  I assume part of the reasoning behind building part of the layout indoors is to have something to operate in colder / wetter weather, and so that really needs to be a priority in the design if so.

[FoxUnpopuli]

Very good points.

 

Test track: good idea, and entirely doable.

 

One of the models I do want to do is the Lickey incline (at 1-in-37ish)  - and model it faithfully with banking locomotives.  Logically, if I wanted 1-in-40 inside, I'd have to bank that too.   So, sounds like 1-in-100 is more sensible if I want to do them at all.

 

I do want to model Bournville shed* and have started on a decent locomotive roster for it, with some Saltley and Bromsgrove residents and some occasional Bristol and Birmingham visitors.

 

As for basic operation, yes, your points are well made.  But... I would like to shy away from 'fiddle yards'... simply because in theory, I'll have enough room and locations for stock to realistically move from A to B to C and thus have transient homes.   If I need somewhere to store stuff first (not an incorrect assumption) then perhaps what I should be thinking about is modelling a marshalling yard with some carriage sidings on the left-hand side, and a loco shed on the other.

 

Father and I have discussed him modelling a proper hump-shunting yard, and we've done a fair bit of research to this end. It would about as complex to operate as the real things were dangerous, but it's a challenge we'd like to try.  But for this - no.  Just sidings.

 

Maybe this first venture boils down to: 'Functional and self-contained' versus 'a part of a larger layout'.  No reason that the former couldn't develop into the latter later?

 

* and Bournville's Cadbury factory, later.

[mdvle]

1 hour ago, FoxUnpopuli said:

As for basic operation, yes, your points are well made.  But... I would like to shy away from 'fiddle yards'... simply because in theory, I'll have enough room and locations for stock to realistically move from A to B to C and thus have transient homes.   If I need somewhere to store stuff first (not an incorrect assumption) then perhaps what I should be thinking about is modelling a marshalling yard with some carriage sidings on the left-hand side, and a loco shed on the other.

 

and

 

Quote

Maybe this first venture boils down to: 'Functional and self-contained' versus 'a part of a larger layout'.  No reason that the former couldn't develop into the latter later?

 

Fiddle yards, while strictly speaking are for storage, aren't storage in the same way as a yard or carriage sidings - they are a way to wave our hands and pretend there is a larger world outside of the layout.

 

You say the first venture boils down to "functional and self-contained", and that is they way to go - but is your current design really functional and self-contained?

 

So you have 2 carriage sidings, and engine facility, and 3 platforms - great, you can switch arriving trains to make up new departing trains.  But where to those arriving trains come from, and where do they go?

 

If you are happy just switching the passenger station and constantly building and then taking apart the same train then the layout as it stands works sort of fine - but if you want to actually have arriving and then departing trains then all you have is a 2 track mainline to nowhere - no place to store the just departed train and instead grab the next arriving train from.

 

So perhaps try mentally thinking about how you will actually operate trains when restricted to being just inside this shed, and see if this design still fits in to what you want.

 

Same thing with your marshalling yard and engine facility idea - consider how you will actually operate trains for an hour and see if the design actually "works" as opposed to being a faithful reproduction of a portion of the real railway.

 

And in the meantime, if you want some inspiration on how to model a terminal layout consider the following 2 layouts, both by the same person, and see how in the case of Bradfield how things actually operate (there are some YouTube sessions in there somewhere I think), and for Leeds City how the design for a passenger timetable results in fiddle yards.

 

 

 

Edited May 24, 2020 by mdvle

[DCB]

 The turntable at the end concept is fine for a fiddle yard but there is no prototype for a huge 75ft turntable at the end of a UK station.  It looks wrong.  I would leave off the last couple of feet (above A) and push the platforms up over the turntable keeping the length. and sort out the station throat, adding the couple of feet (B) saved by pushing the platforms away because there is a massive pinch point on the junction with light engines, ECS movements and arriving and departing trains all conflicting. 1 in 40 grades are 6 coach max for much current steam RTR so be careful.

[FoxUnpopuli]

@DavidCBroad Turntable: yes, you're right...  but it's certainly a talking point, no?  I saw Harbourn station and liked it, hence its inclusion.  Time will tell if it remains here, but I do take your point it looks odd.  Maybe the three goods sidings would not all connect to it - some pointwork to get a single escape road would probably work better.

 

Your 'B' point is great information.  Yes, now I see that having the carriage sidings alongside the station means that all Empty Coaching Stock movements have to block the mainline.  It looks like there needs to be a large headshunt/escape (i.e. like the 'goods route') accessible from the platforms before the main junction throat of the station.  Similarly if the loco stabling is to the station side, then again, as you imply, some other headhunt & access is required to not block everything up (too much.)

 

Thank you for this useful feedback.

 

Now...  why is the height of the layout a potential issue?

 

 

The chipboarded area is the 3440x3440mm (3.6x3.6m external) planform of the room.  The open area to the right is a 'garage' for large garden equipment.

 

The shed is built on 750mm groundscews (https://www.groundscrewcentre.co.uk/) - visible clearly in the garage area. I've not put in the wood blocks on top of the screws here, you can see I've used upside-down joist hangers to cap the screw and stop the open screw top digging into the wood.  The wood is floor joist material - 195x45mm thick.

 

With the floor being 22mm chip on these 195mm joists, and then there being minimum 100mm-ish clearance to the ground...  you can see that this puts any permanent way exiting the shed through the wall effectively a foot higher than anything inside.  The garden runs for 60 metres or so off to the left of this shot.

 

This gives me an interesting engineering decision - if I make a high-/eye-level layout inside, the PW is above head height outside...  awkward to engineer, but practically quite useful for access around the garden.   Conversely, if I make it a 'sensible' level outside, it becomes a little low to be practical inside.  Of course, I can put gradients in... at 1-in-100 or so!  Estimating a 30 metre run to the next station, that allows me just a 300mm drop.   Traditional garden railways sit lower, on brickwork for stability.  Very sensible.  We shall see if I can engineer a practical solution to my particular elevation problems!

 

I think I'll make something that will sit low and get myself a comfy office chair.  I can make some drop down workbenches which will allow me to stand and do stock maintenance, etc, but be clear of the layout so it can still be run if necessary, but be lifted out of the way for 'formal' running sessions.

 

Other possibly interesting things in the photo: the stud walls are stacking up to the left.  I've built all the walls and some of the roof trusses now, I can probably put the walls in place this week.  Then, just waiting on the steel profile roofing (with skylight sheets) to arrive before I clad the walls and assemble the roof.

[Harlequin]

Thanks for the explanation about the door. Makes more sense now. (I was expecting a quadrant.)

 

I can just about make out the elevation numbers on the large zoomed in image and I'm not sure about them. (Possibly silly of me to question professionally written software but hey I'm a programmer and I know that all sorts of things can go wrong...)

 

It feels like the goods route in particular will be very steep - right on the generally accepted 1:35 limit and possibly worse. And that's not allowing for transitions to and from level around the big double junction. Does AnyRail handle transitions?

 

Just something worth checking because it could be very annoying in the real world.

 

[FoxUnpopuli]

The percentages are the gradients (i.e. 2% = 1 in 50) but I think you're correct about the transitions.  As it happens, I think you've all scared me away from doing steep slopes in the shed, so a substantial redesign is on the cards. 

 

@Harlequin or anyone else - you're welcome to have a crack. I've added the end-to-end comment, which suggests the station would be on one side, and the yard/carriage storage on the other.  The loco shed could be on either side.

 

What I want:

• Town terminus station with three passenger platform faces, 8 carriages + loco each minimum each.
• Goods/parcels dock which may, or may not, be attached to these platforms; 3 or 4 bogie carriages.
• Access to up and down directions of the outdoor loop (i.e. exit to top-left or bottom-left.)
• Locomotive shedding area (roundhouse?) with ashpits/coaling stage/watering.
• Carriage storage if possible.
• Goods yard / industry area.

Technical guidelines:

• Ideally min radius 900mm, 762mm acceptable in pointwork and goods/shunting/slow running areas.  (Discuss?)
• Peco Code 75 Streamline (but not Bullhead yet as I like variety in my points!)
• Switchable DC or DCC (so sectioning ideas appreciated.)
• General construction will be a variant on American-style L-girder - laminated plywood substrates.
• End-to-end running between terminus and carriage storage/goods yard (which will serve as fiddle yard) inside building..

Period/area:

• LNER/LMS joint - somewhere in the Leicestershire/Lincolnshire area
• 1945-1947, but 1956-1958 as a guest starring period.

Edited May 26, 2020 by FoxUnpopuli

[Harlequin]

Well, if gradients are eliminated, at least within most of the shed, then your basic trackplan would still work but just simplified:

 

A double track line would head sinuously (because you are good at sinuous) from North to South on the West side, passing your goods yard, and a double-track triangle in the South West corner would feed the station on the East side.

 

The southernmost junction of the triangle would be outside, as per your current plan (I assume).

 

 

[Zomboid]

Where is Harbourn? Aside from miniature railways the turntable at the end of the platforms is not typical of British railway practise, though there were a few examples. None in Lincolnshire that I know of though. Doesn't make it wrong of course.

[DCB]

The higher the layout above waist height the harder to reach the back. One of mine was 62" above floor level, I could rest my chin on the lift out section. It was narrow, against all 4 walls of the Bedroom, had great viewing angles and I built it and often operated it standing on the lower steps of a step ladder.

Outside layouts can be on stilts or walls, the stilts wobble and the walls crack when the ground heaves with moisture variations.  5ft clearance is quite easy for me at just under 6ft tall,  to duck under.   But if you need to cross the outside tracks then you can also go over them.  Mine run along dry stone retaining walls and cross concrete paths on the level, though currently with on board battery power,  Running just one brick above lawn level fits in nicely with the garden rather than dominating it.  

I was assuming the layout was GWR as its based in Dauntsey.  The GWR didn't go in for platforms much.  They didn't run may trains and those they did all seemed to go to the same places.

Oop north they had workmens trains, and different destinations   so as the workmen were generally illiterate they had to have a platform for each destination, hence a lot of multi platform stations and especially terminus stations.  Down Great Western way workmen were just as illiterate but so badly paid they couldn't afford to travel.   

[Flying Pig]

9 hours ago, Zomboid said:

Where is Harbourn? Aside from miniature railways the turntable at the end of the platforms is not typical of British railway practise, though there were a few examples. None in Lincolnshire that I know of though. Doesn't make it wrong of course.

 

Possibly Harborne? Short branch in Birmingham.

[FoxUnpopuli]

Pig has it.  Apologies for my inconsistent and incorrect spellings.

 

 

This was me marking up a plan of Harborne station to see how it might scale.  The coloured squares are 1metre in 4mm/ft scale.  Chad Valley toy factory and some nice semidetached houses make a fair surrounding.  Also the retaining wall behind the turntable looks interesting.

 

Warwickshire Railways has a lot of info: https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/lms/harborne.htm

 

As for location, I live in Dauntsey, and Dauntsey Lock station and the buildings of the village are interesting, but I'm not confined to one carrier.  I have LMS and LNER stocks, a little GWR and a singular Southern locomotive...  One of the station sheds was going to be a rebuild of Waterloo as if the 1943 Abercrombie plan actually went forward, and the London stations became much more interconnected.  What Abercrombie was suggesting could be extended to make many of the London terminii into joint stations.  Waterloo could have been a starting out point for all four carriers - and a model of the station and planned surrounding buildings to the south bank would be a fun challenge... later. 

Edited May 27, 2020 by FoxUnpopuli
Added Warks link.

[FoxUnpopuli]

More doodling.

 

I'm aware this doesn't fulfil some of the original requirements - the triangle or external links.  This was me trying to make an internal layout with storage in a more conventional way, while still retaining the signature turntable.

 

The initial seed was using Minories point work to create the three platform format.  Next, however, I realised it flipped the whole layout - which is the point all the other requirements went out of the window.

 

I messed around with the throat and surrounding pointwork until I had:

• The ability to remove empty coaching stock/goods to storage from any platform in only one operation to clear the throat
• Stabling (and servicing) for 10 small-medium and 3 large locomotives

And a close up of the throat:

 

 

I think there's some fun maneouvers to be had here.

 

Stock from Platforms 1 & 2 can be moved to storage while a train arrives into or departs from Platform 3 if necessary. 

 

I've no idea if it's prototypical, but the throat itself (as mentioned) is a compacted and expanded Minories layout.  The shed has inlet and outlet crossovers.  The inlet is the engine storage stub on the Minories layout, the crossover at SX is a conventional shed outlet, further up track.  SX provides a long headshunt for movement and marshalling of ash trains or coal empties.  It could go to an industrial or dock area, trains from which would have to move to SE before depatch onto the up line - but goods arriving for that area would have to be backed/shunted onto the up line clear of the (SX) outlet cross over before begin moved into SE - an awkward move.

 

Shed operations could be almost completely independent of the station, turntable movements aside.  This shed could despatch light locos onto the up line very easily, or queue locomotives ready for any stock movements loading the platforms ready for despatch.

 

Open question: if all three platforms were loaded ready for despatch, would the signalbox release three engines together onto the up line, then have them backing onto their consists one by one?

 

[Chimer]

I know the likelihood of a turntable being used for engine release has already been debated, but can't resist suggesting having a conventional buffer-stopped terminus perched on arches a couple of inches or so above the MPD - the gradient up from the depot to the main lines shouldn't be too bad for light engines, and loco coal could be supplied from a siding alongside platform 3 at the upper level ……..