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progress in the fiddle yard looks good. The paragraph you added about Peterborough Pilot locos was very interesting. I knew C12s were used, and eventually N2s, but I was unaware of the vintage of the C12s, and the use of N5s in between, as a Peterborough resident, with great interest in the station, and New England shed, that was very interesting, thanks!

 

I look forward to further updates!

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Yes please. Any information I can get is most welcome.

 

I have uploaded Peterborough North x2, Werrington Junction, New England North, and Crescent Junction.

 

http://richard2890.fotopic.net/c710126.html

 

If you want them emailed directly drop me a PM with an email address.

 

Edit... I've somehow managed to post Werrington Junction in the wrong place...

 

http://richard2890.fotopic.net/p66770264.html

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I've spent a little while studying the various Peterborough signalbox diagrams. I have to say that operation must have been very interesting. The down goods starts on the down side, crosses to the upside at Spital Junction and crosses back to the downside at Werrington Junction. There seems to be various routes through the yards, crossed by up road lines, loco lines, transfer lines and just about anything else. The up goods fairs a little better but look at the up goods departure at Peterborough North..post-4034-128284576727_thumb.jpgThis really has to be an afterthought?

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I've spent a little while studying the various Peterborough signalbox diagrams. I have to say that operation must have been very interesting. The down goods starts on the down side, crosses to the upside at Spital Junction and crosses back to the downside at Werrington Junction. There seems to be various routes through the yards, crossed by up road lines, loco lines, transfer lines and just about anything else. The up goods fairs a little better but look at the up goods departure at Peterborough North..post-4034-128284576727_thumb.jpgThis really has to be an afterthought?

 

I reckon the whole thing was an afterthought! It just seems to have been cobbled together and then they have had to make the thing work.The up goods line as shown on the plan came as a surprise to me, as I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere as running like that. I knew there was an engine line from New England shed that came that way, but I understood that the up slow was used for goods if the up main was not available. All the 1950's photos of up goods trains that I have show them either approaching from the North on the up main, or using the up slow. As a result, I wonder if this plan is for an earlier period, although a great deal of it is the same as the formation I had settled on.

 

I can to a degree understand the logic of the down goods crossing to the up side, as the majority of New England yard was on the up side. I suppose the number of transfer movements from down to up side would have been even more disruptive than the blocking of the main lines at each end once? As I said earlier though, trying to apply logic to the arrangemets at Peterborough in steam days is rather unrewarding, because they defied logic in so many respects. I find it increasingly fascinating though. Every time I think I've got something sorted new information arrives which makes me think again. Nevertheless, I am very grateful that you have taken the time and trouble to let me have these hugely informative, if rather puzzling, plans.

 

Gilbert

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I seem to recall reading that the Up Goods Departure line was added during WWII as an attempt to speed things up. It was to allow a freight to follow a passenger train through the station as quickly as possible without having to cross the down lines. I think I can remember which book I read that in - I will check when I get home.

 

Rob

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I seem to recall reading that the Up Goods Departure line was added during WWII as an attempt to speed things up. It was to allow a freight to follow a passenger train through the station as quickly as possible without having to cross the down lines. I think I can remember which book I read that in - I will check when I get home.

 

Rob

 

I would be grateful if you can find it Rob. I suspect i need to run the layout entirely differently if this arrangement was still in place in the late '50's. I have an old copy of Trains Illustrated which contains an article by G. Freeman Allen about Peterborough in 1955. He makes no mention of an up goods like this then, though he does mention the engine line from the shed. I suspect that this up goods departure may have been a wartime expedient which ceased after the war ended, but it would be very nice to know for sure.

 

Gilbert

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I have uploaded Peterborough North x2, Werrington Junction, New England North, and Crescent Junction.

 

http://richard2890.fotopic.net/c710126.html

 

If you want them emailed directly drop me a PM with an email address.

 

Edit... I've somehow managed to post Werrington Junction in the wrong place...

 

http://richard2890.fotopic.net/p66770264.html

 

Richard,

Very interesting line diagrams.

 

Number 004, showing the ECML north of Little Bytham, seems to indicate that there may have been plans to 4-track the section north of Stoke, through Stoke Tunnel and down to Grantham. Anyone know anything about this?

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I found the reference - it comes from 'Milk Churns to Merry-Go-Round' by R.T. Munns. He talks, breifly, about the difficulties of the operating up freights through Peterbourgh and goes onto say 'During the second world war this hazard was eased somewhat by a siding between Spital Junction and Peterbourgh North being upgraded to a running line and duly signalled to enable a freight to creep forward to Peterbourgh North and dash through the platform line as soon as a margin between passenger trains permitted it.' Sorry but no mention of if they continued to use it after the war.

 

 

 

Rob

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I found the reference - it comes from 'Milk Churns to Merry-Go-Round' by R.T. Munns. He talks, breifly, about the difficulties of the operating up freights through Peterbourgh and goes onto say 'During the second world war this hazard was eased somewhat by a siding between Spital Junction and Peterbourgh North being upgraded to a running line and duly signalled to enable a freight to creep forward to Peterbourgh North and dash through the platform line as soon as a margin between passenger trains permitted it.' Sorry but no mention of if they continued to use it after the war.

 

 

 

Rob

 

Thanks Rob. I think it's fair to assume that it was a war time expedient, and that the lack of mention of it post war means that it was discontinued when things went back to normal.Unless anyone knows otherwise of course......?

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This is a later Peterborough North diagram and they have gone to the trouble to remove the north bay lines but the Up Goods Departure Line remains. Also by this stage one road is marked Loco Fuelling.post-4034-12830262988_thumb.jpg I would say this line remained in use at this stage.

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This is a later Spital Junction diagram. This is diesel era for sure and probably heading towards the end of mechanical signalling judging by the evidence of overlays, none of which remove Up Goods Departure from view.post-4034-128302644793_thumb.jpg Also of note on both diagrams is the line is track circuited.

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I have an old copy of Trains Illustrated which contains an article by G. Freeman Allen about Peterborough in 1955. He makes no mention of an up goods like this then, though he does mention the engine line from the shed.

 

Looking at that article I say that the 'engine line' mentioned by Mr Allen is the 'Up Goods Departure Line' shown on these diagrams. Maybe they used it for other purposes after the War.

 

Rob

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The Up Goods Departure line was still in use as such in 1971. A scan of part of Signalling Notice No.22 for alterations commencing 21.03.1971 is attached

 

Andy

 

Thanks Andy. That is conclusive - it was still there. I never cease to be amazed at the amount of knowledge there is on here, and people's willingness to share it. It is much appreciated. I still can't find any photos of this line in use though. All that I have show goods trains, including unfitted ones which have started in New England yards, approaching the platform end on the up main, or crossing to or using the up slow. That of course doesn't mean the goods departure line wasn't used, and it's hard to see why it should still be there and so described in 1971 if it was not still in use. Here is a page from the summer 1956 WTT.

 

post-98-128307302929_thumb.jpg

 

It clearly shows some trains using the goods line from Westwood. However, among the many plans that LNERGE has very kindly sent me are some which clearly show that the up goods did have access to the up main before Spital Bridge, so I'm not sure what that proves. Interestingly, Spital Junction is shown on the down KX- New England WTT, but not on the Up one. I guess that doesn't prove anything either on reflection, because the train would be either on the up main or the goods departure road before it got there! The WTT also shows trains shown as on the "goods line" changing from one running line to another at Peterborough North, but that could mean they were transferring from the up main to the up slow, or from the goods departure road to the up main. What we now need in an ex Peterborough signalman, but I guess that's a bit much to ask!

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A bit of progress has been made. The first boards have gone away for Norman Saunders to instal track, and hopefully will return at the end of the month. In the meantime I think I've sorted the design of the fiddle yard, subject to one potential problem, which I'll return to later. First though I thought some detail shots of the baseboards might be of interest, as they show how the Brilliant Baseboards concept works in practice. They come as flatpacks, but are easily assembled with the glue and brush supplied. Size is 1200mm by 600, though I see from the website that half size ones can be supplied as well. We just cut the 1200mm ones to whatever width was required at a given point. They're very accurately machined, and just bolt together.post-98-079221300 1284111459_thumb.jpg

 

This shows how easy it is to create a wider baseboard module.

 

post-98-081133500 1284111622_thumb.jpg

 

Legs can be supplied, but are a bit expensive, so Tom Wright made some himself. This shows how they were secured to the boards.

 

post-98-034214900 1284111761_thumb.jpg

 

This again shows the general arrangement of how it all goes together.

 

post-98-083412900 1284111853_thumb.jpg

 

Bolts are provided, and easily secured using the pre drilled holes in the boards.

 

post-98-003913100 1284111952_thumb.jpg

 

This again shows how easy it is to get whatever baseboard width you need.

 

post-98-000827400 1284112085_thumb.jpg

 

And here's a closer view of the completed unit.

 

post-98-008962900 1284112240_thumb.jpg

 

And finally Tetleys and myself admiring the results of the labours of Tom Wright and Rob Davey, to whom go many thanks for doing the majority of the work.

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There has been one other significant bit of progress. I have finally got my hands on a copy of the Summer 1958 Main Line passenger working timetable, which has already proved to be invaluable, and has brought home to me even more forcibly the advantages of modelling a prototype. I have been able to plot out a complete sequence, deduce which trains used which platforms, and see where the paths for freight trains occurred. I also have a 1956 freight WTT, from which I had tried to work out when the goods paths would be, and my predictions turned out to be pretty close to reality. I suppose that's not surprising really when one is lucky enough to have the official records.

 

Anyway, it's clear that in theory at least there were adequate slots, even in daylight hours, to get quite a bit of goods traffic through the bottleneck. 12 up coal trains and the same number of down empties between 0730 and 2130 for a start. So, the up main,on paper at least, would accomodate everything, which suggests to me that the up goods departure road would be little used, even though nominally at least it still existed. I hope so anyway, as otherwise I shall have to incorporate a double slip into the fiddle yard exit at one end, which I would much prefer to avoid if I can, as I can see problems getting long trains of four wheeled wagons through such an arrangement however carefully I try to align it.

 

What is very clear though is that the moment anything went wrong the whole thing became an operating nightmare, and complete gridlock must have been close on many occasions. One late running passenger train would I think be sufficient to foul the whole thing up. I have heard that there were often trains queued up particularly to get into the one available up platform, and it's easy to see why.

 

The operating sequence I have so far worked out requires 198 trains to be run. That does not include shunting and light engime movements which I haven't got round to yet. I suspect I may have been over ambitious, and that it will take weeks just to get through a single day's workings. Any views on that folks?

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There has been one other significant bit of progress. I have finally got my hands on a copy of the Summer 1958 Main Line passenger working timetable, which has already proved to be invaluable, and has brought home to me even more forcibly the advantages of modelling a prototype. I have been able to plot out a complete sequence, deduce which trains used which platforms, and see where the paths for freight trains occurred. I also have a 1956 freight WTT, from which I had tried to work out when the goods paths would be, and my predictions turned out to be pretty close to reality. I suppose that's not surprising really when one is lucky enough to have the official records.

 

Anyway, it's clear that in theory at least there were adequate slots, even in daylight hours, to get quite a bit of goods traffic through the bottleneck. 12 up coal trains and the same number of down empties between 0730 and 2130 for a start. So, the up main,on paper at least, would accomodate everything, which suggests to me that the up goods departure road would be little used, even though nominally at least it still existed. I hope so anyway, as otherwise I shall have to incorporate a double slip into the fiddle yard exit at one end, which I would much prefer to avoid if I can, as I can see problems getting long trains of four wheeled wagons through such an arrangement however carefully I try to align it.

 

What is very clear though is that the moment anything went wrong the whole thing became an operating nightmare, and complete gridlock must have been close on many occasions. One late running passenger train would I think be sufficient to foul the whole thing up. I have heard that there were often trains queued up particularly to get into the one available up platform, and it's easy to see why.

 

The operating sequence I have so far worked out requires 198 trains to be run. That does not include shunting and light engime movements which I haven't got round to yet. I suspect I may have been over ambitious, and that it will take weeks just to get through a single day's workings. Any views on that folks?

 

 

It's the perennial problem again - what to leave out I'll talk to you directly again soon.

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