Broadhaven - another route to the Continent

[SteveyDee68]

Just to say that I've downloaded the XTrackCad software plus the XQuartz software required to run it, and have installed upon my iMac. However, that is as far as I have got due to the pressing issues of a couple of job applications and a family Halloween Zoom Quiz (first one since August).

 

Will be having a look over the course of the next week and see what I make of it!

 

HOURS OF FUN!

[Pacific231G]

Hi Stevey

I hope the job applications went well.

 

I've only just come upon your thread but finding it very interesting. I too am tempted by the idea of using something not a million miles from Minories as the basis for a "Gare Maritime" as these provide an excellent excuse for rather grander trains than their size would normally warrant. Train ferries are a bit too rare in Europe and especially in Britain (It's a shame Ireland's railways weren't SG as we'd then surely have had several more of them) 

 

Stepen Leigh is quite right about the curve through Peco large radius points. They work well as single points and even the longest coaches glide through them in a very satisfying way but as crossovers the results are disappointing, they're better in that formation than a medium radius crossover but not by as much as one might hope.

 

 

Edited November 14, 2020 by Pacific231G

[SteveyDee68]

Well...

 

Job applications in...

 

Two job interviews attended in the meantime...

 

Three days supply work this week as a TA, two days in a local primary school and the third working 1:1 with a non-verbal autistic child in another primary school.

 

Still plodding away with XTrackCad but also created an alternative melody and chord setting for "With A Little Help From My Friends" on Wednesday evening as a lyric setting challenge! First time I've been musically creative since early April...

 

So no further with my plans but having so far planned exclusively on having the ferry at the front of the station, I started thinking about putting it behind instead ... it was a comment made about blocking the view of the station with the bulk of the ship...

 

I have also been rather reckless with my eBay spending (!) and have assembled a 2+5 Hornby class 43/HST set ( with what turns out to be less than full length coaches) with the intention of repainting into Blue Pullman colours (given recent real life events as a basis) but which might end up in BR green or even BR coach maroon with black power cars (what heresy am I contemplating?), but probably Blue Pullman colours as a "what if"... providing an inter-regional boat train service ... as would the Blue Pullman itself (from the MR)...

 

And then having missed out on the final Bulleid 1co-co1 diesel still in stock at KMRC and two auctions on eBay (one for the Kernow model and another for a Silver Fox version) I got a Hornby class 92 at a bargain price (plus necessary replacement missing bits from Peters Spares) with some mad idea of a "what if" either in BR green or even black and silver (like the Bulleid diesels) for the heavy Pullman boat trains...

 

At which point (having sourced and purchased Pullman Profile No 3) I realised that my seven "improved" Hornby Pullmans (plus additional four for upgrading) are all the all-steel type K vehicles as used on the ECML, and so have started hunting down the newer Hornby Pullmans more suited for the Southern Region...

 

(And as Pullman Profile No 2 only seems to be available at upwards of £120 (for a £30 book!) my resource library has just had funding pulled for any further purchases!)

 

Of course, this begs the question - if I am happy to run a time-travelling class 92 and a reliveried class 43 HST set, why concern myself about whether I am running the right type of Pullmans? (And it is a good question, seeing as I also have a five car rake of Bachmann MK1 Pullmans too - again ECML - but for which a lovely green Hymek and a chocolate and cream BR MK1 BG were acquired to provide (in my ignorance) a WR direct service!!)

 

I mean, how far does rule #1 actually stretch when push comes to shove?! 

 

HOURS OF FUN!

 

[Zomboid]

Rule 1 stretches as far as you want it to. If you'll enjoy running a black and silver 92, then do it (though I think I'd do it in AL1-5 style electric blue if I were going down that road personally).

 

You can completely reinvent BR (or the non-nationalised Southern Railway if you like) in your image, and I personally would enjoy doing that greatly. Or you can stick more closely to things that actually happened.

 

You can buy some HO locos and imagine a world where we bought NOHAB Di3s if you like. They'd look good in a pseudo SR/ BR colour scheme.

[SteveyDee68]

1 hour ago, Zomboid said:

Rule 1 stretches as far as you want it to. If you'll enjoy running a black and silver 92, then do it (though I think I'd do it in AL1-5 style electric blue if I were going down that road personally).

 

 

Oh! Now you've done it! Electric blue class 92 with early syle double arrows and an "E" number (makes me think of the Dapol class 73 in early blue with small yellow panel)...

 

Now there's a thought ... obviously class 92 was developed long after BR used "D" and "E" numbering for their locos; what would be a logically realistic numbering sequence for locos introduced post TOPS?

 

There's another rabbit hole of pseudo research to dive down! 

 

HOURS OF FUN!

Edited November 15, 2020 by SteveyDee68
Premature posting

[Zomboid]

7 hours ago, SteveyDee68 said:

Now there's a thought ... obviously class 92 was developed long after BR used "D" and "E" numbering for their locos; what would be a logically realistic numbering sequence for locos introduced post TOPS?

I would expect them to fill the gaps as a starter. And then reuse the numbers from the pilot scheme disasters, and so on. 56s and 58s can be D8xxx numbers, and anything more recent came after most of the original D series had been vacated.

 

There weren't that many E numbered locos, I imagine that even now there would be plenty of gaps in the sequences for new additions. Since the 81-86s were E3xxx and the 71/3/4 were E5xxx and E6xxx, let's just put class 87s as E40xx numbers, 90s as E41xx, 91s as E42xx and 92s as E70xx. Or anything else that takes your fancy.

 

How the system would have been adapted for the MU-isation of the railway is another question that you didn't ask... Where would HST power cars sit?

[SteveyDee68]

On 15/11/2020 at 19:54, Zomboid said:

I would expect them to fill the gaps as a starter. And then reuse the numbers from the pilot scheme disasters, and so on. 56s and 58s can be D8xxx numbers, and anything more recent came after most of the original D series had been vacated.

 

There weren't that many E numbered locos, I imagine that even now there would be plenty of gaps in the sequences for new additions. Since the 81-86s were E3xxx and the 71/3/4 were E5xxx and E6xxx, let's just put class 87s as E40xx numbers, 90s as E41xx, 91s as E42xx and 92s as E70xx. Or anything else that takes your fancy.

 

How the system would have been adapted for the MU-isation of the railway is another question that you didn't ask... Where would HST power cars sit?

 

Thanks for the response. I spent a little time reading through the wikipedia article about how BR numbered its locos and multiple units before deciding that bathing and grooming a long haired and very messy/smelly lion-head rabbit would be a far easier task than to fathom their numbering systems!

 

I shall follow your example above and number my class 92 in the E70xx series.  Using the equivalent locos with names of British composers would give me:

92009 >> E7009 (Elgar)

92011 >> E7011 (Handel)

92021 >> E7021 (Purcell)

92026 >> E7026 (Britten)

92037 >> E7037 (Sullivan) and

92041 >> E7041 (Vaughan Williams).

 

Of course, in my alternate universe the Channel Tunnel does not get built, the E70xx series of locos being designed to allow electric propulsion from the southern region up the ECML without changing locomotive, for fast freights and boat trains; furthermore, such inter-regional trains are planned to avoid London!

 

My reimagined fleet of (class 92) locos would all be named after British composers, with full names, as follows:

 

reimagined class 92 names jpg

 

 

*  Professional musician and astronomer!

** My conducting tutor and head of course for my music degree!

 

Should I decide to model more than one of these imaginary time travelling class 92/E70xx locos, my order of preference would be E7009 Edward Elgar, E7040 Patric Standford (because he was my Professor of Music), E7019 Gustav Holst and E7032 Malcolm Arnold.

 

Given my non-Chunnel scenario for this loco class, I may change the continental style rectangular buffers on E7009 to oval buffer heads... hmmmm....

 

I can suddenly see where the attraction of a freelance system like the Wardleworth Lines Committee lies!

 

HOURS OF FUN!

 

 

Edited January 30 by SteveyDee68
Missed loco added/table added

[Zomboid]

Go completely steampunk and instead of a sea harbour, the station is serving an airship tower... "Broadchurch Sky Harbour" would be fun, and instead of a train ferry, vehicles are shunted onto some kind of relatively lightweight equivalent which would be slung under the airship for the over sea journey...

 

That's possibly a bit too far fetched, actually.

[Pacific231G]

20 minutes ago, Zomboid said:

Go completely steampunk and instead of a sea harbour, the station is serving an airship tower... "Broadchurch Sky Harbour" would be fun, and instead of a train ferry, vehicles are shunted onto some kind of relatively lightweight equivalent which would be slung under the airship for the over sea journey...

 

That's possibly a bit too far fetched, actually.

It's always worth working even the most far fetched idea.

There was a report on the BBC's Click  programme in 2015 about a giant airship 169m long proposed by the Aeros Corporation  of California that would be capable of carrying 66 tonnes of cargo. The sleeping cars used on the Night Ferry service weighed about 54 tonnes but a BR Mk 3 is about 33 tonnes so it should be able to carry two of them. For the six cars that typically made up the "night ferry" in summer and assuming no baggage car you'd need an airship four times that capacity. So far the company have flown  a smaller proof of concept airship the Dragon Dream but it was damaged when the roof of the hangar it was in collapsed.   

By comparison, the sole six engine Antonov 225 - built to carry the Soviet space shuttle but now back in service as a Ukrainian registered specalist heavy lift aircraft- can carry over 240 tonnes of cargo  so it could probably handle a six car train even with lightweight rails to run them aboard.  It has been used to deliver locomotives as has its little brother the Antonov 124 (several of which are in commercial service) with a cargo capacity of 150 tonnes which could probably handle four mk 3 based sleepers.

Nowadays on most train ferries the passengers are required to leave their carriages for the voyage just as car and coach passengers are on vehicle ferries and I can't imagine that rule being less strict for any kind of aircraft - lighter or heavier than air. So the aircraft would have to have some seating capacity as well as its cargo deck. 

[Zomboid]

The less than successful R101 (according to Wikipedia at least) had a "disposable lift" capacity of 62 tons, but the crew accommodation etc had to come out of that, so one carriage would be about all it could have taken...

 

But then in imaginary steampunk land they could have invented some way to have an airship full of vacuum (I can't think of anything lighter), so who knows. 2 carriages might actually be possible...

[SteveyDee68]

13 hours ago, Zomboid said:

Go completely steampunk and instead of a sea harbour, the station is serving an airship tower... "Broadchurch Sky Harbour" would be fun, and instead of a train ferry, vehicles are shunted onto some kind of relatively lightweight equivalent which would be slung under the airship for the over sea journey...

 

That's possibly a bit too far fetched, actually.

 

And modellers have thought that moving a ship full of rolling stock in a single plane would be too difficult! Imagine trying to make a working model of what you have just described!!

 

HOURS OF MADNESS!!

[Pacific231G]

On 25/10/2020 at 00:01, SteveyDee68 said:

Back in September 2019, I floated the idea (sorry, terrible pun) of adapting the Minories plan with the goods shed in front of the terminus as a train ferry terminal. In that posting, I referred to the Rev Alan Shone's Wardleworth Lines Committee marine terminus, St John's, which featured a train ferry (albeit in N gauge). So as to make my thoughts clearer, I've copied over various posts and illustrations from the Theory of Minories thread.

 

Firstly, the Minories plan with the goods shed in front of the terminus:

 

 

 

 

 

 

My badly butchered version of the Minories plan, showing the position of the train ferry instead of the good shed:

 

 

 

Hi Stevie 

I've just been looking at this again and  think this could be a good answer. The problem with CJF's frankly rather afterthought goods version of Minories* was that you could only access the goods depot via platform three with a rather awkward double reversal. For a train ferry however, not being able to run straight onto the linkspan and thence the ferry or the void when it wasn't berthed could be a positive boon, especially as the ferry would have to be loaded a few vehicles at a time by a shunting loco and not the train loco. As it stands for a Minories totalling two metres long the link span is very short but it could well be longer  with a down gradient to the berthed ferry's deck. Now. the stern half (or third)  of the ferry becomes the view blocker that conceals the fact that the Marine Station is really  only capable of holding a four or five coach train and not the eight coaches (or in Europe umpteen coaches with any number of sections for different destinations ) that boat trains tended to require. 

It's then a matter of choice or location whether our train ferry handles passenger coaches such as Voiture Lits or just wagons. Had Dieppe's Chambre de Commerce succeeded in keeping the WW1 train ferry to Southampton or Portsmouth running as a commercial  operation, as they certainly tried to, it would probably be the latter but if we imagine say Ramsgate harbour terminus becoming a railway ferry port alongside Dover and or Folkestone then the former becomes more likely. 

The other possible alternative reality would be Irish railways built to standard gauge, as they probably should have been. Then almost any of the shorter Irish Sea ferry routes could have included a train ferry.  

 

 

 

 

*(which I suspect may have resulted from a demand by Sydney Pritchard to include wagons that were in the first TT-3 release by Tri-ang but also about to be the subject of Peco Wonderful Wagons) 

[Pacific231G]

On 25/10/2020 at 00:01, SteveyDee68 said:

Back in September 2019, I floated the idea (sorry, terrible pun) of adapting the Minories plan with the goods shed in front of the terminus as a train ferry terminal. In that posting, I referred to the Rev Alan Shone's Wardleworth Lines Committee marine terminus, St John's, which featured a train ferry (albeit in N gauge). So as to make my thoughts clearer, I've copied over various posts and illustrations from the Theory of Minories thread.

 

Firstly, the Minories plan with the goods shed in front of the terminus:

 

 

 

 

 

 

My badly butchered version of the Minories plan, showing the position of the train ferry instead of the good shed:

 

 

 

Hi Stevie 

I've just been looking at this again and  think this could be a good answer. The problem with CJF's frankly rather afterthought goods version of Minories* was that you could only access the goods depot via platform three with a rather awkward double reversal. For a train ferry however, not being able to run straight onto the linkspan and thence the ferry or the void when it wasn't berthed could be a positive boon, especially as the ferry would have to be loaded a few vehicles at a time by a shunting loco and not the train loco. As it stands for a Minories totalling two metres long the link span is very short but it could well be longer  with a down gradient to the berthed ferry's deck. Now. the stern half (or third)  of the ferry becomes the view blocker that conceals the fact that the Marine Station is really  only capable of holding a four or five coach train and not the eight coaches (or in Europe umpteen coaches with any number of sections for different destinations ) that boat trains tended to require. 

It's then a matter of choice or location whether our train ferry handles passenger coaches such as Voiture Lits or just wagons. Had Dieppe's Chambre de Commerce succeeded in keeping the WW1 train ferry to Southampton or Portsmouth running as a commercial  operation, as they certainly tried to, it would probably be the latter but if we imagine say Ramsgate harbour terminus becoming a railway ferry port alongside Dover and or Folkestone then the former becomes more likely. 

The other possible alternative reality would be Ireland's  railways built to standard gauge, as they probably should have been. Then almost any of the shorter Irish Sea ferry routes could have included a train ferry.  

 

*(which I suspect may have resulted from a demand by Sydney Pritchard to include wagons that were in the first TT-3 release by Tri-ang but also about to be the subject of Peco Wonderful Wagons) 

Edited November 17, 2020 by Pacific231G

[SteveyDee68]

7 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Hi Stevie 

I've just been looking at this again and  think this could be a good answer. The problem with CJF's frankly rather afterthought goods version of Minories* was that you could only access the goods depot via platform three with a rather awkward double reversal. For a train ferry however, not being able to run straight onto the linkspan and thence the ferry or the void when it wasn't berthed could be a positive boon, especially as the ferry would have to be loaded a few vehicles at a time by a shunting loco and not the train loco.

I’ve not yet posted my musings upon the train ferry at the other side of the station (to form the background): granted that a model ferry cannot easily move with stock on board, I have sketched two (crazy?) ideas of maybe being able to simulate changes of stock but both (I think) are more workable as an exhibition layout than as something for a sole modeller to operate! 
 

But that did lead me straight back to the original proposal that you also like. The only difference being that I really want a goods in/out loop/siding (or two) that avoids freight trains being assembled in Platform 3!

 

Quote

Now. the stern half (or third)  of the ferry becomes the view blocker that conceals the fact that the Marine Station is really  only capable of holding a four or five coach train and not the eight coaches (or in Europe umpteen coaches with any number of sections for different destinations ) that boat trains tended to require. 

 

Have you looked at Paul Robertson's blog "Seahaven"? This isn't Minories (at all) but does use the rear half of a train ferry to good effect, with the linkspan allowing rolling stock on and off the vessel. This is a freight only situation though, with passenger services via a higher level station. And in N gauge! (To paraphrase the Rev Alan Shone, "There are things you can do in N which are simply not possible in other scales")

 

As this is still my planning thread, I’ll continue to post developing ideas for comment, suggestion or derision (!) - after all, several contributors are better than one overly optimistic pencil!! 

 

HOURS OF DOODLING!

Edited November 17, 2020 by SteveyDee68
Added second quote

[SteveyDee68]

One of the stumbling blocks for me in planning this layout was my desire for the train ferry to not simply be a set of sidings where stock is shunted into and then back out again; putting the ship at the back of the station with warehouses along the backscene was an attempt to be able to exchange stock 'behind the scenes' to further the illusion that the ferry had been somewhere and then returned. That these were all less than successful is evident by my not posting them here!

 

However, the discussions and suggestions on my newer thread Train Ferry Project in 1:76 (link in my signature) mean that the ferry dock can now be at the front once again and I can create the illusion of different vessels/sailing through the use of a traverser within the ship, and so the adapted Minories plan will once again work as the basis for the station.

 

Through re-reading various books and articles regarding the Night Ferry, I will need to plan for a coach stabling siding for the buffet car/walk on passengers section of the train. My planned ferry will easily accommodate six Wagon-Lits Type F sleeper coaches and a couple of fourgon vans (one less sleeper coach than the 1950s formation) but my station was planned for a maximum train length of eight coaches plus loco - the Night Ferry has those extra coaches for "walk on" passengers, but if I fit that longer train into the station I have to be able to store it off stage too!

 

Broadchurch Broadhaven isn't meant to be an exact model of Dover or of the actual train services, but I wish to keep train formations 'proportionate' to each other; a(nother) desire to run two 4-ceps together and then to split them, for example, is dictating track design and platform length for the 'main' platforms, and this may even lead to being able to fit a ten-coach Brighton Belle* (and easily take a six or eight coach Blue Pullman or even a nine coach Blue Pullman HST**) but that all means that the Night Ferry train would need to be proportionately longer!

 

What was the old adage about never having enough room*** for your dream layout?!

 

HOURS OF FUN!

 

* Second mortgage application pending!

** Rule #1 applies! I'm planning for backdated Class 92s too!

*** And time, and money, and skills...

Edited June 7, 2021 by SteveyDee68
Updated name of station

[Chimer]

4 hours ago, SteveyDee68 said:

What was the old adage about never having enough room for your dream layout?!

 

6 inches more will always be enough to make things work perfectly ....

[Satan's Goldfish]

On 01/03/2021 at 15:10, Chimer said:

 

6 inches more will always be enough to make things work perfectly ....

 

 

That's what she said......

 

 

 

 

 

I'll get my coat.

[SteveyDee68]

The wonderful John Wiffen of Scalescenes has tweaked the large station kit for me so that it is in a stucco finish, so I can emulate the likes of London Road Brighton station for Broadchurch Broadhaven. Likewise the footbridge, which allows me to think about passenger access to the ship from the station; luggage? Hmmm. Perhaps I need to think about freight elevators adjoining the footbridge.

 

This project (like the ferry itself) is being juggled with further development of Blackford Wharf, but one decision I have been pondering is the title, and so I am dropping "Marine" as that implies another station for the town. Broadchurch* is already an imaginary location so I guess anything goes (even murder!!)

 

* Referencing the TV series of the same name, so not updated to the new name for the station/layout!

Edited June 7, 2021 by SteveyDee68
Updated station/layout name

[SteveyDee68]

This will seem a very minor consideration, but I believe in the power of names...

 

Broadchurch Marine was the original name for the layout, which I then simplified to Broadchurch (as the Marine part suggested that there was a second station serving the town).

 

In the last 24 hours, I found myself searching Google Maps for Broadhaven ...

 

• There's a district in Cardiff, not too far from the docks...
• There's a settlement of about four dwellings in County Mayo, Ireland...
• And another district to the north of Wick in Scotland...

 

Broadhaven Bay can be found in Ireland, and also north of Eyemouth in Scotland, too!

 

There's a fair few places called  "Broad Haven", too, but they don't count! 

 

So, seeing as I have already decided to dump my idea of Broadchurch on top of the real location of Newhaven, perhaps calling it Broadhaven is more fitting?

 

Then again, maybe it's just me?!

 

HOURS OF FUN!

 

 

[SteveyDee68]

This may, on first read, seem slightly OT, even for me, but bear with me...

 

Over this half term break, I was lent the keys to the Music Centre where I work part time, so I might pop in over the break and do some work on the Music Library. We recently - well, literally just as the first lockdown began - moved into new premises, and as I (voluntarily) look after the Library, it is still in the process of being sorted. It doesn’t help that access has been limited (because of lockdowns) plus also that I work as a supply teacher - I can’t turn down work to go on a weekday when the Centre is open/staffed in order to sort the library! So, having the keys was a bonus...

 

Of course, it has been *glorious* this week, and so I have been pressurised into doing lots of garden and house maintenance jobs, plus I had another job application to complete (blasted things take so bl@@dy long - every school has a different format form, or want you to do it online on some dreadfully designed web based form, drives me nuts!) so only got down once all week...

 

However, today I went down purely to make use of the staffroom, taking with me plenty of point templates, a roll of lining paper, a dummy class 66 loco* and a few Mark 1 coaches for sizing...

 

I’ve had a productive - and very warm - afternoon planning out the terminus full size...

 

What I didn’t do was measure the total length I used  but the short arm of the L is 11 foot long (although the curve from the station only runs half way around before I packed up for the day!)

 

Rather than push coaches around, I created a paper template and photocopied lots of them... I stuck four together to represent a 4-CEP (or a 4-BEP, if I can ever afford one!!), five together as my 5-BEL, and kept the rest loose to create various length formations.

 

Something struck me in the process that surprised me - using the Minories plan as originally designed, the platform serving the headshunt for the ferry would need to be the longest, and yet because of the point work required to reach it, it actually started long after the other two platforms, so ended up shorter! Head scratching ensued...

 

I should have taken a video or photographed the plan whilst it was down on the floor, but forgot in my eagerness to pack up and get home for some tea!!

 

I will attempt to draw it out and scan it in to post up here, but here are the main features (platforms are numbered from furthest away to nearest):

 

• Platform 1 - capable of taking 2 x 5-BEP, there is a release crossover to a central road which allows a 2 x 4-CEP to split and depart separately (something I was keen to incorporate)
• Central release road - a central siding at the buffer stops end allows for a 4-CEP/4-BEP to be parked up within station limits, or 4 x MK1 coaches stored
• Platform 2 - capable of taking loco (steam/electric/diesel) plus 8 x Type F sleeper coaches + 2 Fourgons + 3 x MK1 coaches (eg open 2nd, restaurant, composite brake) to form the night ferry (or NightStar service in my world!); this platform also has a release road to allow a 4-CEP to be released - and yes, it will also take a 4-CEP+4-BEP+4-CEP+MLV combination, should I so wish!! (I think the design is possibly longer than the loft, but the platforms are  all in a straight line at the moment ... a few gentle curves may help with reducing that length!)
• Platform 3 can hold up to 6 x MK1 coaches plus loco within a run-around loop, the engine release road away from the platform allowing 3 x MK1 length vehicles on the siding beyond the loop as a parcels platform. (Why not have a longer platform for passenger services here? Because the overall roof columns make the platform too narrow for passengers!!) The platform beyond the overall roof, between Platforms 2 and 3, is wide enough to enable a Scalescenes Island Platform Building to service the passengers, being a scale 25 feet wide!
• There is a run-around loop to Platform 3; treated as a single road, this also acts as a goods line for receiving/marshalling freight traffic for the ferry.
• Although double track into the station, to enable cuts of up to 4 x MK1/Type F coaches to be shunted to the ferry from Platform 2, a third, central, bi-directional line runs out from the station throat acting as a headshunt, but then merging into the incoming line.
• The ferry is at the front of the station, fed from the same ladder of points feeding into Platform 3.

 

This is where my design departs from being a true “Minories”, but having planned it out full size the advantages are that I have avoided any reverse curves for coaches to negotiate!! (I know, Bastille, I stole without shame from that!!)

 

I think the design still allows a passenger service to be run using Platform 1 whilst coaches are being shunted across the station throat from Platform 2 to load the ferry. And whilst goods trains are being loaded onto/unloaded from the ferry, Platforms 1 and 2 are free to run passenger services (if also making the nearest inbound line bi-directional to also allow it to be used as a headshunt).

 

One issue here in terms of the design is that I am not at all sure whether bi-directional lines were ever permissable in the BR transitional period, although I understand that they are far more common these days. Is this therefore a major no-no, a huge faux pais, an enormous blunder in the design?!

 

Of course, it would be much easier if the train ferry platform was Platform 3 - that would then have a simple headshunt parallel with the incoming line, and no bi-directional lines would be needed! 

 

And having drawn it all out full size, the thought occurs to me - why not have the third platform on the opposite side of the station to the ferry dock? Can it still be reached without 'wrong line' running or awkward reverse curves?

 

Exciting times ... mostly using Peco large radius points (and avoiding the dreaded crossover issue) and medium radius for the few end of platform crossovers/release roads.**

 

HOURS OF PLANNING FUN!!

 

 

* Why a class 66? Because it is longer than any loco I will want to run, so is perfect for gauging room for headshunts, run arounds etc!!

 

** I have used the 12 degree divergence angle of PECO large streamline points - and have just realised that if I “kink” the platform roads forward at the ‘4-BEP’ release points, I could probably use long radius points instead of the medium radius and three way point I've used and avoid any reverse curves entirely! It would make the baseboard a little wider at that point, however, as the track beyond the release point is the length of a 4-BEP! It would also have an impact upon the placement of the train ferry, as that would then need to be angled at 12 degrees also. Hmmmm...

Edited June 7, 2021 by SteveyDee68
Clarity! Replaced some accidentally erased text!

[SteveyDee68]

I was at the Music Centre again today. Sans my roll of paper, of course! But as I had left the box weighting down the end of the roll at the station building end in place, and a piece of sellotape was stuck to the floor where the long arm of the "L" ended, and I had my tape measure with me, I was able to quite accurately measure how much room I had used!

 

Surprisingly, I had used up exactly 17 feet for the long arm of the L, and had simply guestimated 11 feet for the short arm...

 

The loft measures 17.5 feet long by 10.5 feet wide!

 

Serendipitious? I should think so! 

 

I've since unrolled the plan and made a note of the pointwork etc. I also sketched a "kinky platform" version, too! I'll draw them up a bit neater and to approximate scale and scan them onto this page for reference.

 

Yet even as I type this, a mad thought occurs to me - why three platforms? I've modelled everything upon Minories, but why not put a single platform between Minories roads 1 and 2, and road 3 becomes the loop/freight line? Continuing services whilst ferry traffic is shunted simply use road/Platform 1...

 

Of course, that loses a middle release road/carriage siding...

 

But it might just streamline shunting of the ferry, which should be as efficient as possible...

 

Think I need to break out the optimistic pencil once again ... excuse me ... I may be some time ...

 

HOURS DAYS WEEKS OF FUN,!

[Chimer]

17 hours ago, SteveyDee68 said:

Think I need to break out the optimistic pencil once again ... excuse me ... I may be some time ...

 

HOURS DAYS WEEKS OF FUN,!

 

If it would help, I'd be happy to convert an optimistic pencil sketch into an XTrackCad file (using Streamline track), provided you show a few critical dimensions (including desired platform lengths and widths).

 

Don't know how you got on with XTC , you've been a bit quiet on the subject , but I could then e-mail you a file with an initial version that you might be able to play around with.

 

Cheers, Chris

 

 

[phil_sutters]

Just testing for you - somehow 313s don't have the glamour of Wagons-lits and leccy trains on the water don't seem like a good idea.

Edited June 8, 2021 by phil_sutters

[SteveyDee68]

6 hours ago, Chimer said:

 

If it would help, I'd be happy to convert an optimistic pencil sketch into an XTrackCad file (using Streamline track), provided you show a few critical dimensions (including desired platform lengths and widths).

 

Don't know how you got on with XTC , you've been a bit quiet on the subject , but I could then e-mail you a file with an initial version that you might be able to play around with.

 

Cheers, Chris

 

 

 

Hi Chris

 

Very kind of you to offer. I didn't get very far with XTC, mainly due to being side tracked by other projects (have you seen how many things I am apparently tackling at once?! )

 

This weekend's play with paper templates was illuminating - planning full size may be time consuming but it does give you a proper sense of how things might look. I have a fair few points to play with, too, long and medium radius, all insulfrog, so I am happy to mock up point formations and then see how stock looks passing through them.

 

What I want to avoid at all costs is the hideous 'splaying' of coach ends through reverse curves, as nothing looks more toy like (IMHO). I also want, as far as possible, to reduce the overhang of coaching stock through visible curves (don't we all?) - if I can avoid that, then I also know I won't have loco bogies pointing out beyond the bodies (another big no-no for me!)

 

I do have a big roll of paper now which I can take measurements from, so drawing up into XTC should theoretically be a little easier than working "blind" as I was before!

 

Meanwhile, must draw up my latest plan (and the tweaked version) and scan it in here as promised!

 

HOURS (AND HOURS) OF FUN!

[Zomboid]

I maintain that "The Optimistic Pencil" would be a great name for a model pub...