My old '00' tramway layout from 1960s

[dasatcopthorne]

Hello everyone.

 

I've recently been clearing out my parents house and came across a small part of the '00' tramway I built in the 60's.

 

When BEC Models bought out their first '00' tram kit (Leeds Horsfield), it started me off modelling them although I had no memories of seing trams in South London. That model soon went and the rest, which I still have, where all London types.

 

I developed a large layout but becoming very interested in girls bought an end to this and a move into Southern EMU modelling.

 

When the tranway was broken up I kept a small piece and this is what you can see below.

 

It was modelled on the terminus outside the Town Hall in Wimbledon, South London with a bit of licence.

 

Thought you might be interested in seeing it.

 

 

Cheers

 

Dave Smith

[goodmayes]

Golly,

 

That looks better than a lot of stuff on the exhibition circuits today!

 

Narrow flangeways despite "00", combination scissors crossover and double track widening. Amazing stuff!!!

 

Ted

[Red Devil]

Very nice, any plans to resurrect it?

[Southernboy]

I can see a lot of careful work went into that.

 

I like the location too - Wimbledon Town Hall is right next to the station and I've often thought it would be a good opportunity to combine a model railway and tramway into one. There was also a trolleybus turning loop there, adding potential for another interesting transport dimension.

[dasatcopthorne]

Been looking through some old negatives I have on file.

 

A couple of my old models and then some pictures of the '00' tramway that was at the Carshalton & Sutton Model Railway Club back in 1970/72#

 

Not very good quality but I hope some find them of interest.

 

Cheers

 

Dave Smith

 

These two above were my own trams.

 

Below is the Club layout.

 

 

Cheers

 

Dave

[coline33]

Dave, I have just caught up with your pictures of the tram section of the C&SMRC's "Manor Park" layout.     I still have two large boards from the Manor Park layout which I savaged when the club had to vacate.   Thanks for the photos, some of the tramcars shown are mine and that Feltham 2131 is still operational in the reserve fleet for the "West Croydon" exhibition layout.   Al the best, Colin.

[coline33]

Dave, I have just unearthed the last surviving "Manor Park" tramway board as per attached.   Also attached a view of Feltham 2131 passing through "West Croydon" in 2012.   This car remains in the reserve fleet but has not been required for service since.   The upper deck still survives of LPTB Type HE 270, that you pictured above alongside 2131 at "Manor Park".   This ex-West Ham car is currently awaiting a new lower deck and running gear to join my London Transport four-wheeler fleet which I run whenever I help out on the Croydon Model Railway Society's "Toop" tramway.   Enjoy, Colin.

[dasatcopthorne]

Dave, I have just unearthed the last surviving "Manor Park" tramway board as per attached.   Also attached a view of Feltham 2131 passing through "West Croydon" in 2012.   This car remains in the reserve fleet but has not been required for service since.   The upper deck still survives of LPTB Type HE 270, that you pictured above alongside 2131 at "Manor Park".   This ex-West Ham car is currently awaiting a new lower deck and running gear to join my London Transport four-wheeler fleet which I run whenever I help out on the Croydon Model Railway Society's "Toop" tramway.   Enjoy, Colin.

Hi Colin.

 

This brings back memories.

 

I haven ad a study of the top photo and I think you may be wrong about the board.

 

I seem to recognise it as one I built at home which ran across in front of the window in our spare (model tramway) bedroom.

 

I forget what actually happened to it now, but was it involved is a sale to an old gentleman who we went to visit and set up the tramway. I seem to remember a rather large British Bull Dog.

 

What do you think.

[coline33]

Thanks Dave for the observation.   The track layout on the control panel always left a query in my mind as its origin as it was not how I remember the two junctions at Manor Park by the doorway from the side room into the front room into which the overhead wired branch ran into open countryside alongside the railway.  

 

I had thus thought that board and another could have come from Wallington.   The 'other' board was a long straight and narrow one with change pit and an overhead terminal point.   It connected end on to the board in the picture.   I did modify the 'other' to suit a 'fiddle yard' but appear to have thrown it on the skip a couple of years ago when I decided to do a H0m layout the boards for which have now been modified to suit my 'CIRCULAR' layout currently under construction.   With "West Croydon" no longer housed in warm accommodation in the Croydon/Sutton area, since this year's Festival in Croydon, but in an East Kent garden shed, I have moth-balled my LT fleet.   Instead my new table-top layout will test the lightness and strength of balsa wood, 'Recreation21' 3D printed paved tram track (now that it has been modified to better suit me) and using my 'four-foot' gauge cars taking me back into working trolley overhead.   Reborn - I think sums up my situation!!!

 

Now from the past, I did have a cupola from the top of a cinema which I thought you built for Manor Park but again recently discarded as I now have a couple of low relief cinemas stored.   However, I do have a K's Type E single decker body, in red and white, which originally had 'Southorn Tramways'  on its lower rocker panels.   I cleaned it up some years ago to permit surgery when Adrian Swain asked me to state what had to be done to correct it for him to decide whether or not to re-release the old kit in the ABS series.   Finding it was major surgery, Adrian stopped there and the body survives with me intact!  

 

Do you remember the 'other' board, cupola and E-type, please? 

[coline33]

I meant to mention that the white streaks you see on the board are from when it was last used.   Some ten years ago a neighbour was interested in being a Tramlink driver.   He had an interest in railways but tramways were completely new to him.   "What's a swept-path?" he exclaimed at the start of an afternoon he spent with me.   Out came both those boards, rails cleaned and I had him driving 2131 and some four-wheelers whilst a placed road vehicles and people in differing positions (including parked vehicles) to illustrate street running and going through pedestrian areas.   He went ahead and was a driver for several years but his experiences on the 'revenue gang' caused him to leave.   I really do not have any further need for this board other than to recover the switches and point motors.   Whilst 2131, being the first BEC Feltham out of the moulds for me to construct and write the instruction sheet, can negotiate that bend, my fleet of eight OOC Felthams with their underfloor motors will not.

[rue_d_etropal]

Now that would be an interesting challenge for 3D printing. Not impossible(??), but would need some thinking about, and dividing it into sections to keep file size down.

And now that I have found some matching laser cut cobbled/stone sett street sections, it is even more viable.

[roythebus]

Does anyone here remember Adrian Swain's tramway layout that was doing the rounds in the 1970s and 1980's? I helped him run it at several MRC shows during that time.

[coline33]

Thanks Roy for asking about Adrian's layout upon which I remember running my trams.   I have asked Adrian if he has any photos of it and hope to revert in due course.   I have also sent to him views of my trams on an unrecorded layout to see if it was his.

 

Dave, if the attached views are on a layout that was not Adrian's then could it have been yours, please?   Otherwise David Voice will be my last resort on these.

 

My UCC 2131 certainly seems to have travelled many different routes since it was built in the late 1960's.   Both snowbrooms 022 and 034 still maintained an appearance on "West Croydon" at this summer's Festival in Croydon despite there being no snow!!!   Alas E/1r 1038 was scrapped as it was a conversion from that original extra wide BEC E/1 kit with end pivoting bogies, so looked out of scale against E/1 1039 built from the second BEC E/1 kit.

 

For anyone interested, I finally attach a view of the trams selected from my LT fleet prior to overhauling for this year's Festival.   Car 1039 is the furthest one in the third row from right.   

 

Look forward to your observations, Dave, and from Roy if he recognises the views to be on Adrian's layout.   Colin. 

.

 

 

[dasatcopthorne]

Thanks Roy for asking about Adrian's layout upon which I remember running my trams. I have asked Adrian if he has any photos of it and hope to revert in due course. I have also sent to him views of my trams on an unrecorded layout to see if it was his.

 

Dave, if the attached views are on a layout that was not Adrian's then could it have been yours, please? Otherwise David Voice will be my last resort on these.

 

My UCC 2131 certainly seems to have travelled many different routes since it was built in the late 1960's. Both snowbrooms 022 and 034 still maintained an appearance on "West Croydon" at this summer's Festival in Croydon despite there being no snow!!! Alas E/1r 1038 was scrapped as it was a conversion from that original extra wide BEC E/1 kit with end pivoting bogies, so looked out of scale against E/1 1039 built from the second BEC E/1 kit.

 

For anyone interested, I finally attach a view of the trams selected from my LT fleet prior to overhauling for this year's Festival. Car 1039 is the furthest one in the third row from right.

 

Look forward to your observations, Dave, and from Roy if he recognises the views to be on Adrian's layout. Colin.

.

Colin.

 

Yep, that's mine.

 

The right hand end of the piece above joined to the bottom left tracks in the last photo of post number 1.

 

The left hand end turned through a left hand 90deg corner and joined onto top of the large board in post 7.

 

Dave

[coline33]

Roy, as you would expect I had a reply from Adrian straightaway!   Yes, the layout still exists but with some damage from years in storage.   I will revert if a reasonable picture of it can be found.

 

Dave, do you know what!   That board of yours in the views was most likely the second board I had.   Before the introduction of the working OOC Felthams into my fleet, I had started to overhaul the two boards.   I fashioned the straight one to join the triangular one.   At the outer end I cut into the surface and created a traverser terminal with four single car storage roads.   The restoration was never completed because the OOC could not be used.   In a general home clearance exercise a couple of years ago, the straight board was declared redundant and went out in the skip.   How I came to having both boards I just do not remember let alone someone with a British Bull Dog.   However, please tell me if you would like the triangular board back and I will drop it down to you?    Colin.