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Theory of General Minories


Mike W2
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Most wouldn't want that, but if you're a terminus addict...

 

It would work best as a pair of layouts (I guess they'd be about 11' long each, which is classic Minories + 4' traverser size) which operate independently for much of the time that get connected on occasion via the hidden junctions whenever the owners decide they want to.

Edited by Zomboid
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On 12/06/2020 at 08:30, Harlequin said:

I'm afraid this is not very clever but here's an attempt at the anti-Minories, Seironim.

 

20822955_Seironim2.png.0b133898d4af4a67741375961fec911d.png

 

It's another small double-track terminus in a cramped urban location but a different style.

  • It's the same size as Minories SP35 - i.e. 7ft by 1ft.
  • A central road can be used either for loco release or for carriage storage.
  • At Seironim there's less need for pilots - locos can release themselves from their trains and quickly scuttle back to Minories.
  • Van traffic has to be shunted across before it can depart.
  • Long trains arriving at platform 2 should just fit but the loco will be trapped and either have to shunt the empty carriages back a bit or be released by a pilot.
  • When connected to Minories it would work best with Zomboid's hidden FY access in between to expand capacity and allow shunting movements to remain hidden.
     

 

Per earlier posts, I like the Seirinom you've come up with.  To complete my own Minorying (?) though, this is the best I could come up with in 7' x 1':

 

(Sorry, pictures no longer available)

 

It's not as elegant - and uses mainly short points (except long point "A").  It is almost a mirror of Minories, so the only reason I share it is because I think it still ticks a lot of the boxes, namely:

 

The first point encountered when incoming is still a trailing point.

I have a 4' Platform as the principal departure platform again.

Trains in or out of Platform 1 don't have to diverge at any facing points (unlike Minories).

There are still 3 platforms, with the shortest (Platform 3) still 3'6" long.

Easy shunting for tail end traffic arriving on Platform 1 Trains into the Parcels bay, which is no longer on a kickback

 

As with my American Minories during the week the kickback is now for locos only - this line could go through the Scenic Break to an "Engine Shed" cassette if there was room.

 

This might be better looked at as an alternative Minories rather than to go alongside it. 

 

Hopefully at the weekend I'll make progress on my layouts (which are totally different :unsure:). 

Edited by Keith Addenbrooke
Edited for text only as photo no longer available
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I find myself asking the layout planner within me "If you have 18ft to utilise, would you build 2 7ft stations and a 4ft hidden section between them?"

 

The answer is a resounding no!

 

Minories is, to me, a crammed in, minimum space design. If you have enough space to do a terminus to fiddle yard with decent facilities and storage, why squash 2 crammed in stations in? A twig off a branch in front of the fiddle yard maybe, to keep it scenic all the way down. 

 

So I think I am having one of those "If I was going there I wouldn't start from here" moments.

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OK, so trying to bring this together in the form needed to compile General Minories' Theory of Termini:

 

- Minories is brilliant, especially in its later form with the added goods facility;

 

- Harlequin's Seironim is also rather brilliant, with perhaps greater appeal to the more advanced modeller;

 

- Connecting them face-to-face amounts to having too much of a good thing.

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Okay, I feel a bit silly; The last time I dropped in there were discussions about Bastille in Paris, now I drop in and see we're talking about Seironim and assummed this must be another French station, the penny's dropped now ............. silly me:blush:

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52 minutes ago, t-b-g said:

I find myself asking the layout planner within me "If you have 18ft to utilise, would you build 2 7ft stations and a 4ft hidden section between them?"

 

The answer is a resounding no!

Most people would agree. It's really a solution for an 11ft space with occasional potential to expand to 18ft. Or it's a solution if you don't want to be having a FY.

 

Given 18ft by 18in, what would you do though? I suppose in order to remain mildly on topic it ought to be a city terminus, but perhaps it wouldn't be. As it happens my American interpretation from a few pages ago is 16ft long, but much more than 18in wide in the balloon loops...

 

Edited by Zomboid
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35 minutes ago, t-b-g said:

I find myself asking the layout planner within me "If you have 18ft to utilise, would you build 2 7ft stations and a 4ft hidden section between them?"

 

The answer is a resounding no!

 

Minories is, to me, a crammed in, minimum space design. If you have enough space to do a terminus to fiddle yard with decent facilities and storage, why squash 2 crammed in stations in? A twig off a branch in front of the fiddle yard maybe, to keep it scenic all the way down. 

 

So I think I am having one of those "If I was going there I wouldn't start from here" moments.

I fully agree.

 

When I started Sheffield Exchange the club I was a member of had an Minories inspired layout. One member suggested that the club layout and my layout could be exhibited together sharing a middle fiddle yard. My first thoughts were why? I didn't say no but the idea was not pursued.

 

The club layout had been donated by a club member, it was working but had not been sceniced . I suggested we finish it off and put forward some scenery ideas, no let us add a run round loop, a parcels bay and a a freight yard. Again why? By the time the alterations would have been put in place it would have ended up like a branch line station with an additional platform. Lack of motivation meant it sat there gathering dust.

 

Earlier on signalling was mentioned.

859504391_sheffieldexchangesig.png.4ea581293f00d5e0f749c9f6e8c332c1.png

 

Point rodding

1852281335_Sheffieldexchangeroding.png.518ae2e7fe4fb25ffe46c30d685abc75.png

 

Track Circuits

1693327638_sheffieldexchangetrackcircuitswip.png.88c3bfdda3a2a3370b7f3d2efe629ee3.png

 

I even worked out the signal wire runs and where the detectors needed to go. Here are a couple of examples.406427041_sheffieldexchangewirewip1617.png.6589141d732ab40ab8791cfdae015007.png

 

433578398_sheffieldexchangewirewip2223.png.126392fcdb654b4ce6297c3b1e9762ce.png

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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34 minutes ago, Zomboid said:

Most people would agree. It's really a solution for an 11ft space with occasional potential to expand to 18ft. Or it's a solution if you don't want to be having a FY.

 

Given 18ft by 18in, what would you do though? I suppose in order to remain mildly on topic it ought to be a city terminus, but perhaps it wouldn't be. As it happens my American interpretation from a few pages ago is 16ft long, but much more than 18in wide in the balloon loops...

 

 

Having built Mansfield Market Place at 20ft x 16" I was pretty close.

 

That has a 12ft station and an 8ft ladder of points type fiddle yard and is capable of taking 8 carriages and a big loco.

 

It is a variant of Minories. I illustrated it during construction (it still is!) earlier but here are a couple of reminders t save people trawling back.

 

The ladder of points fiddle yard allows a single operator to run the station for a long time without attending the fiddle yard.

 

If I had 18ft I would do similar with a 7ft fiddle yard and an 11ft station and knock the train length down to 6 or 7 carriages, depending on length. Mine are short 50ft pre-grouping types.

 

I don't have room to set it up at home though. My biggest room isn't 20ft long or wide. So that one is for exhibition only.

 

1780258273_ControlPanels.jpg.8b338fad43812088c8e4d60f5a32a080.jpg 103073241_NewLayout034.jpg.90de675386ed8ce68e6f2a25008316d0.jpg668744918_NewLayout030.jpg.a3a8eda71de02aa31366d063d4cafc91.jpg498385319_NewLayout032.jpg.12db7773643a23b719cac217797689e7.jpg

Mansfield_Market_Place_016.jpg

New Layout 031.jpg

New Layout 033.jpg

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I should have added a photo of the fiddle yard as I think it may be a novel idea.

 

The actual sidings are all off a single road to save complex points. The up and down lines both have what is in effect a headshunt.

 

 

I used Y points throughout including two Ys made into a 3 way with all routes curved to save length although some routes give much "wiggling" and a few items of stock, built for another layout that had much straighter routes, did struggle a bit, so we had to be selective about what went in which road.

 

Although you cannot arrive and depart at the same time, you can arrive or depart a train and shunt alongside it either side.

 

New_Layout_024.jpg.a705c19ef0227d5cc208ecd8991cdfa1.jpg 

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On 12/06/2020 at 15:11, t-b-g said:

 

If I had 18ft to play with, I am pretty sure Minories would not be the plan that came into my head. Taking one highly crammed in station, designed for minimum space, adding a second crammed station and then adding a 4ft hidden section between them just doesn't sound like the way I would go if I had the luxury of that length to use.

I probably would stick with Minories (or my very slightly modified version of it) as the extra five feet  would allow me to run six instead of four coach trains and possibly even have a couple of feet of open main line between the terminus and the lengthened fiddle yard.

Your fiddle yard idea is brilliant particularly as Minories probably would require some shunting beyond the throat.

Meanwhile with my room limit of four metres I have discovered that with the right choice of stock  I can just fit in a Pacific or a 141P Mikado with four coaches and a four wheel fourgon or even a 241P Mountain with four of my longest coaches (DEV Inoxes for those who know Ep III SNCF coaches) but no baggage car. With more modern coaches I think I'd be stymied.

IMG_2436.JPG.4ed812d8f6981fbd6e4edec4cb2eb70f.JPG

I'm afraid this picture of a departing train is very grainy (Panorama mode on my iPhone doesn't seem to be working )

The train consists of four coaches- CIWL Pullman, Restaurant, and two short (but aurthentic) OCEMs- each about 265mm over couplings, an OCEM Fourgon D (Brake/baggage van) about 150mms and a 231K Pacific loco about 280mm. It just fits in 1.5m (with nothing to spare not even for buffer stops. However, the throat doesn't quite fill its metre long baseboard so there are two or three inches of wriggle room (but no more)  

My current idea is that the station building  (not this one but something very like it) is where it is with an overall roof the length of the building and there would be a 0.5m extension baseboard to the left.  a bridge where the hinge is and the end of a goods shed to act as the scene blocker at the right hand end of the throat which is well beyond the edge of this picture.  With suitable view blockers I think I could live with four mainline coaches plus a baggage car as the longest train but I need to measure the total length of some other possible trains and think about the fiddle yard options - probably a traverser- before committing this plan to an actual layout. 

Edited by Pacific231G
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23 minutes ago, Pacific231G said:

I probably would stick with Minories (or my very slightly modified version of it) as the extra five feet  would allow me to run six instead of four coach trains and possibly even have a couple of feet of open main line between the terminus and the lengthened fiddle yard.

Your fiddle yard idea is brilliant particularly as Minories probably would require some shunting beyond the throat.

Meanwhile with my room limit of four metres I have discovered that with the right choice of stock  I can just fit in a Pacific or a 141P Mikado with four coaches and a four wheel fourgon or even a 241P Mountain with four of my longest coaches (DEV Inoxes for those who know Ep III SNCF coaches) but no baggage car. With more modern coaches I think I'd be stymied.

IMG_2436.JPG.4ed812d8f6981fbd6e4edec4cb2eb70f.JPG

I'm afraid this picture of a departing train is very grainy (Panorama mode on my iPhone doesn't seem to be working )

The train consists of four coaches- Pullman, Restaurant, and nd two short OCEMs- each about 265mm over couplings, an OCEM Fourgon D about 150mms and a 231K loco about 280mm. It just fits in 1.5m (with nothing to spare not even for buffer stops. However, the throat doesn't quite fill its metre long baseboard so there are two or three inches of wriggle room (but no more)  

My current idea is that the station building  (not this one but something very like it) is where it is with an overall roof the length of the building and there would be a 0.5m extension baseboard to the left.  a bridge where the hinge is and the end of a goods shed to act as the scene blocker at the right hand end of the throat which is well beyond the edge of this picture.  With suitable view blockers I think I could live with four mainline coaches plus a baggage car as the longest train but I need to measure the total length of some other possible trains and think about the fiddle yard options - probably a traverser- before committing this plan to an actual layout. 

 

I think we are both of a similar mind, that if we had more length, we would increase train length rather than try to add a second station.

 

I look forward to seeing yours develop. Very few non UK railways appeal to me but those French designs have a certain look about them that overcomes any prejudice I may have!

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For me, once passenger trains get to 3 or 4 coaches, extra length wouldn't add to my enjoyment.

 

If I was doing a city terminus then something like the Union station that I posted previously would be my choice. If I were doing it in the UK then I'd want to do a pre grouping station very like a Minories, based on the LSWR building a full sized line to Bank by building some through lines at Waterloo. Before electrification I suppose it would be regular M7s and the like on frequent short distance trains (Wimbledon via Putney and the like) and the odd tender engine on longer distance services to Reading and Windsor. I'd struggle with the width limit though, manually fiddling isn't my idea of fun so I'd really want a balloon loop.

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18 minutes ago, Zomboid said:

For me, once passenger trains get to 3 or 4 coaches, extra length wouldn't add to my enjoyment.

 

If I was doing a city terminus then something like the Union station that I posted previously would be my choice. If I were doing it in the UK then I'd want to do a pre grouping station very like a Minories, based on the LSWR building a full sized line to Bank by building some through lines at Waterloo. Before electrification I suppose it would be regular M7s and the like on frequent short distance trains (Wimbledon via Putney and the like) and the odd tender engine on longer distance services to Reading and Windsor. I'd struggle with the width limit though, manually fiddling isn't my idea of fun so I'd really want a balloon loop.

 

In terms of lack of fiddling, a return loop or loops is certainly the best bet. In my case, the kit and scratchbuilt locos won't go round much under the 3ft 6ins radius they were designed for, so sadly, set -track radius curves that RTR can negotiate wouldn't work for me and the loop would end up bigger than the layout!

 

We don't do too much fiddling on the layout shown above. We have spare locos, so the way we work it is that an express would depart for the fiddle yard.  The loco that brought the express in will then depart tender first "to the shed" but couple back to the set in the fiddle yard.  When the express runs again, the loco trapped at the end of the fiddle yard can then arrive light engine "off the shed" to take it back again. You can rotate and swap locos around to ring the changes but there really is no fiddling! Just an uncoupling magnet in the fiddle yard.

 

Local services always have a spare loco in the fiddle yard, so when a train arrives, the spare would go on. When that goes back, the loco that brought it in becomes the next "spare". So the locos rotate through the different sets and make it look as if we had more trains than we really did as each set can run with 3 or 4 different locos. The last time we ran it, we had 2 express sets, 3 locals plus a van train. It was astonishing how much fun you can have with so little stock!

Edited by t-b-g
The t on my keyboard is acting up!
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4 hours ago, Keith Addenbrooke said:

 

Fair point - I'm just going off my memories of Moor St - IIRC the ECS line (which was "south" of the running lines as we have them) could reach all the way across to Platform 1 (the "northernmost" - as here).  Afraid I've not been able to find a plan or photo to check.

This is what I've come up with for an inbound relief/ slow, which only has access to Platforms 3 & 4.

Minoriesrelief.png.b61414872a339ba86ae2eb6fa90eddc7.png

I'd imagine the Relief/slow doesn't go more than a block section away from the station, it mainly allows slow trains (which typically only use P3/4) to wait for a free platform out of the way of the fast trains which use P1/2. ECS for 3 & 4 can wait out of the way on the relief/slow, too.

 

This uses short points, but thanks to the magic of Peco it could use any of their range if longer space is available. As the pointwork is over 4ft long it would be hard to make it into a portable layout.

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Relief lines into urban termini sometimes go out as far as the carriage sidings (on cheap land, so sometimes a fair distance). The SR got into making them "reversible" quite early on, and would put them into "in" or "out" mode to match the tidal flow of trains - not quite the same as modern bi-directional I think, less flexible, but not far short.

 

It did strike me yesterday that Twigg Street would be realistic as a set of carriage sidings, but they would be such a boring thing to put in front of a FY, even if modelled realistically, which they rarely are, that I kept the idea to myself. Until now. Sorry.

Edited by Nearholmer
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6 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

It did strike me yesterday that Twigg Street would be realistic as a set of carriage sidings, but they would be such a boring thing to put in front of a FY, even if modelled realistically, which they rarely are, that I kept the idea to myself. Until now. Sorry.

 

A couple of years ago, I wrote a short article on a presumed Suffragette arson attack on some Midland Railway carriages stabled at Kings Norton carriage sidings. Modelling something based on that incident might liven things up?

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26 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Relief lines into urban termini sometimes go out as far as the carriage sidings (on cheap land, so sometimes a fair distance). The SR got into making them "reversible" quite early on, and would put them into "in" or "out" mode to match the tidal flow of trains - not quite the same as modern bi-directional I think, less flexible, but not far short.

 

It did strike me yesterday that Twigg Street would be realistic as a set of carriage sidings, but they would be such a boring thing to put in front of a FY, even if modelled realistically, which they rarely are, that I kept the idea to myself. Until now. Sorry.


Dunno - at Tyseley (which does meet the ‘fair distance’ test) you could model a set of carriage sidings with a Heritage Steam Depot.  You don’t have to worry about the absence of passengers, or trying to fit in big platforms, and if you include a washing facility you can justify pristine stock (which, given today’s prices, might be appealing to those reluctant to weather such valuable purchases).  It’s OK to have more stock than you can run, and how many people would know if you’ve modelled some of the details for convenience rather than accuracy, shall we say.  It could make a very plausible “in front of fiddle yard” scene with Minories.

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There is a thread on here somewhere with a lot of detail about carriage sidings, BR(S) specific, but probably transferable to some degree, should anyone want to go that way. Once washing, sweeping-out, cleaning, watering, crew accommodation, rubbish disposal etc are represented, they aren't quite as boring as I implied, just still not very interesting!

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9 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

 just still not very interesting!

 

... but ideal if you're a keen carriage modeller and want to display your handiwork, rather than keeping it hidden away in the fiddle yard.

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Has it been suggested that, because Minories only needs a 1’ width, it could itself be used as the scene in front of a fiddle yard, perhaps to add a small or secondary terminus to a room-sized continuous run layout (I.e: not necessarily just as part of an end to end layout feeding a bigger terminus - which would be off to the right in that scenario)?  Must have been done by someone?
 

Another idea: the straight concourse ends to the the platform tracks could also be used for a Nearholmer-Chimer Scenic cassette (certainly Platform 3, and maybe even all three - Moor St. traversers in the extreme case).  Carl Arendt once suggested a micro-passenger terminus in which a traverser was hidden under an overall roof, for example, to hide the fact it served all the tracks, and was not just for loco release.

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13 hours ago, Zomboid said:

For me, once passenger trains get to 3 or 4 coaches, extra length wouldn't add to my enjoyment.

 

If I was doing a city terminus then something like the Union station that I posted previously would be my choice. If I were doing it in the UK then I'd want to do a pre grouping station very like a Minories, based on the LSWR building a full sized line to Bank by building some through lines at Waterloo. Before electrification I suppose it would be regular M7s and the like on frequent short distance trains (Wimbledon via Putney and the like) and the odd tender engine on longer distance services to Reading and Windsor. I'd struggle with the width limit though, manually fiddling isn't my idea of fun so I'd really want a balloon loop.

 

Waterloo did have through platforms to Waterloo East.

 

https://maps.nls.uk/view/101201649

 

The bridge is still there above the Wellington pub on Waterloo road.

 

 

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16 minutes ago, Keith Addenbrooke said:

Has it been suggested that, because Minories only needs a 1’ width, it could itself be used as the scene in front of a fiddle yard, perhaps to add a small or secondary terminus to a room-sized continuous run layout (I.e: not necessarily just as part of an end to end layout feeding a bigger terminus - which would be off to the right in that scenario)?  Must have been done by someone?
 

Another idea: the straight concourse ends to the the platform tracks could also be used for a Nearholmer-Chimer Scenic cassette (certainly Platform 3, and maybe even all three - Moor St. traversers in the extreme case).  Carl Arendt once suggested a micro-passenger terminus in which a traverser was hidden under an overall roof, for example, to hide the fact it served all the tracks, and was not just for loco release.

 

If modelled in a decrepit and run down state, Minories could be the actual fiddle yard?

 

Mike.

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3 hours ago, Keith Addenbrooke said:

Has it been suggested that, because Minories only needs a 1’ width, it could itself be used as the scene in front of a fiddle yard, perhaps to add a small or secondary terminus to a room-sized continuous run layout (I.e: not necessarily just as part of an end to end layout feeding a bigger terminus - which would be off to the right in that scenario)?  Must have been done by someone?
 

Another idea: the straight concourse ends to the the platform tracks could also be used for a Nearholmer-Chimer Scenic cassette (certainly Platform 3, and maybe even all three - Moor St. traversers in the extreme case).  Carl Arendt once suggested a micro-passenger terminus in which a traverser was hidden under an overall roof, for example, to hide the fact it served all the tracks, and was not just for loco release.

Hi Keith, not even as wide as a foot. The original  Minories plan was 9" wide. Using three foot radius points would probably make 10" more comfortable but Brian Thomas' Newford was 22" wide in O scale and that had an extra road between platforms 1 & 2.

 

I can see definite advantages to a hidden traverser. The catch with them as actual feaures is that, AFAIK, the only passenger termini they were ever used at were Birmingham Moor Street, Paris Bastille, St. Kilda in Melbourne and I think one or two rack railways in Switzerland. I assume that was because unlike turntables they needed to be powered to be useful so weren't feasible until electrical power became practical. With it's wagon lifts, powered capstans and I think a conveyer for goods and  traversers at the platform ends, Moor St. seems to have been a bit of a showcase for all the exciting things the GWR could do with electricity - just not powering their trains withi it.

Turntables were far more common though BofT rules seem to have required those serving multiple platforms to have spurs so an incoming train would always face a set of buffers rather than a void.

718508710_ramsgateharbourstnTTarrangement.jpg.2c99cf739e84dfa36b684df61bd846c1.jpg

 

Ramsgate Sands/Harbour is the one example I know of this but I can't think of any others on main line platforms .  

1456694745_RamsgateSeafronttrainturntable.jpg.7cd2132c0ab3afe047b4b55d1a93a7bb.jpg

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IMO, at some point(!) the reduction in real operating potential, and the artificiality ramp-up to a degree that prevents a thing being “a proper layout” and turns it into “ a diorama with moving bits”. I get pretty twitchy once points that ought to be part of the station get replaced by stuff happening in the fiddle-yard, for instance.

 

Very old-fashioned attitude, I know, and I don’t condemn “bitsa” layouts, many are beautiful, but they aren’t my mug of coffee (“You’ll have to imagine the handle - it’s beyond the over bridge.”)

Edited by Nearholmer
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