Wright writes.....

[Headstock]

22 minutes ago, Chamby said:

 

Carrington station on the GCLE just north of Nottingham Victoria: it’s cutting was just 154 yards long between the Tunnels!   Not a location for viewing long expresses at their best, but at a little over 6 foot long in 4mm,  it would be a manageable prototype to model without compression!

 

Phil.

Evening Phil,

 

fantastic photographs. Carrinton Station a been mentioned before, unfortunately nobody was very interested (busy planning their Nottingham Victoria's on a 3' by 2'. Despite my aversion to stations, I think that it has outstanding scenic potential. You would still require a sizable fiddle yard to accommodate the fifty wagon coal trains and the larger express trains. Though some compression could be achieved due to the whole train not being visible at one time. Notice the wonderfully typical strengtheners on the local behind the B1. There was an eclectic mix of these from all four corners of the LNER stabled alongside the main platforms at Leicester Central station.

Edited March 7, 2019 by Headstock
remove word

[Tony Wright]

1 hour ago, Chamby said:

 

Carrington station on the GCLE just north of Nottingham Victoria: it’s cutting was just 154 yards long between the Tunnels!   Not a location for viewing long expresses at their best, but at a little over 6 foot long in 4mm,  it would be a manageable prototype to model without compression!

 

Phil.

 

Edit:   to clarify, the photographs were originally posted by DaveF of this Parish, in a different thread.  Credit should go where it is due.

Fantastic photographs indeed.

 

Is the Pelham Hotel still standing above the southern tunnel mouth, I wonder? 

 

I used to stay there when exhibiting at the Nottingham Show, many years ago. Great fun, lots of drinking and precious little sleep!

[Clive Mortimore]

Going back to the photograph of the approaches to Gasworks Tunnel, the most interesting thing in the photo is the early green 350hp shunter with a small "D" in front of its number.  Pity the wall is obscuring part of the number. It is an early plain door loco without a vacuum exhauster on the right hand running plate, so it could be either an 08 or a class 10. Kings Cross had quite a few Blackstone engineed locomotives in the early days of dieselisation. 

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, Chamby said:

 

Carrington station on the GCLE just north of Nottingham Victoria: it’s cutting was just 154 yards long between the Tunnels!   Not a location for viewing long expresses at their best, but at a little over 6 foot long in 4mm,  it would be a manageable prototype to model without compression!

 

Phil.

 

Edit:   to clarify, the photographs were originally posted by DaveF of this Parish, in a different thread.  Credit should go where it is due.

Carrington would be a pointless layout......but nice to model with a succession of trains to watch.

[great central]

58 minutes ago, Tony Wright said:

Fantastic photographs indeed.

 

Is the Pelham Hotel still standing above the southern tunnel mouth, I wonder? 

 

I used to stay there when exhibiting at the Nottingham Show, many years ago. Great fun, lots of drinking and precious little sleep!

 

Not quite above the southern tunnel mouth, there's only a double roundabout where Mansfield Road and Gregory Boulevard meet. The Pelham was, if memory serves, on one of the roads off Sherwood Rise above the northern tunnel. 

If it's the one I'm thinking of they decided they could make more money, regularly from DSS clients so didn't want our business any longer. It was then we transferred to the Westminster Hotel on Mansfield Road for around 25 years.

The nearby hostelry was the Grosvenor, still there but the statue of the horse over a gateway has now gone I believe. Many years ago someone, as a stunt, painted it up in zebra stripes. No mean feat given it was probably 15 ft off the ground, I don't think to this day anyone knows who did it.

 

Edit: Googled Pelham hotel and it's still listed on Pelham Road

Edited March 7, 2019 by great central

[DaveF]

2 hours ago, Chamby said:

 

Carrington station on the GCLE just north of Nottingham Victoria: it’s cutting was just 154 yards long between the Tunnels!   Not a location for viewing long expresses at their best, but at a little over 6 foot long in 4mm,  it would be a manageable prototype to model without compression!

 

Phil.

 

Edit:   to clarify, the photographs were originally posted by DaveF of this Parish, in a different thread.  Credit should go where it is due.

 

At one time I lived quite near to Carrington station and could hear the trains at night when I was supposed to be asleep - sometimes you could feel them too - our house was almost over the tunnel.

 

If anyone wants to see more photos of Carrington there are some in the thread where the ones Chamby posted came from, they are in this thread:   

 

 They were all taken by my father.

 

He often thought of modelling Carrington but in the end decided on East Leake which he built in his loft in his loft in the late 1950s.  He had to shorten it to get it to fit.

 

David

Edited March 7, 2019 by DaveF

[great central]

2 hours ago, Chamby said:

 

Carrington station on the GCLE just north of Nottingham Victoria: it’s cutting was just 154 yards long between the Tunnels!   Not a location for viewing long expresses at their best, but at a little over 6 foot long in 4mm,  it would be a manageable prototype to model without compression!

 

Phil.

 

Edit:   to clarify, the photographs were originally posted by DaveF of this Parish, in a different thread.  Credit should go where it is due.

 

 

There's a couple of mixups between up and down in those photos, may have been pointed out when originally posted. The signal box was on the up platform and the double arm semaphore in the down. For as long as I can remember the up side signals were a pair of searchlight arranged in the same way as a semaphore.

Also the A5 in the first picture wouldn't be 69877, more likely 69827? Can't tell on my phone.

[great central]

5 minutes ago, DaveF said:

 

At one time I lived quite near to Carrington station and could hear the trains at night when I was supposed to be asleep - sometimes you could feel them too - our house was almost over the tunnel.

 

If anyone wants to see more photos of Carrington there are some in the thread where the ones Chamby posted came from, they are in this thread:   

 

 They were all taken by my father.

 

He often thought of modelling Carrington but in the end decided on East Leake which he built in his loft in his loft in the late 1950s.  He had to shorten it to get it to fit.

 

David

 

 

I had a childhood friend who lived in the house at the top of the forest, looks like a Greek temple small version, his father was head groundsman for the forest recreation ground. There's a basement underneath you could definitely feel the trains there.

As an aside when the Nottingham tram was being planned the feasibility of breaking into the tunnel alongside Mansfield Road was investigated, Carrington station site having only been filled in a very few years earlier.

I used to live around 1/2 mile from New Basford, with bedroom windows open all year round I could easily hear the trains heading uphill.

[Theakerr]

Post deleted - see below.

Not sure what is going on here.  I thought I had put up a specific few days ago but when I tried to add a new reply (see below) this post came up in the reply box.  So i pressed a couple of keys and it ended up being posted today.  So far I cannot find a way to see if this was posted previously unless I go back through many pages' unlike the previous software system where I could do a search.  Anyway if it is a duplicate - apologies.  I have just found a way to see if had been posted and it had, hence the deletion

Edited March 7, 2019 by Theakerr
Post deleted and an explanation

[St Enodoc]

7 hours ago, APOLLO said:

how do you model this type of (smokey) atmosphere ?

Get all the operators to smoke pipes...

[St Enodoc]

7 hours ago, t-b-g said:

 

If you want a model of a small GCR station that can be represented in a reasonable space, there are many. Just not on the branch line to London.

 

If you look further North, along and around the main line, which ran East to West across Woodhead, there are many variations in style, landscape and traffic. There are also minor lines like the North Lindsey Light railway and the LD&ECR, which were worked by the GCR (the LD&ECR after 1907). One of the stations at say Whitton or Winteringham on the NLLR would make a very attractive small model, although the operation would be limited.

 

Sadly, in my view, many GCR modellers see the lines as the London Extension plus a few other bits "up north", when in reality, the bits "up north" have much interest, variety and modelling appeal.

 

 

 

Did somebody mention Kiveton Park?

[Theakerr]

After locating and rejected (one was incredibly expensive and the other whilst advertised is not actually produced) sets of more or less appropriate station lamps, I have finally been able to make something that IMOHP is not too bad from my 'resources' box.  Starting with a set of H0 swan neck lamps picked up many years ago on the basis that I might

need them someday, a little bit of amateur lathe turning on my dremel and fitting into some 3D printed chimney pots that were not used for another project.  The small picture shows the outline of the real thing.  No ladder arms but the station sign can be used.

Thanks to all who provided links and other help.

Edited March 7, 2019 by Theakerr
added thks

[St Enodoc]

5 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

As for locations with a tunnel each end, Bangor. Again width would be a problem if the shed and yard were to be incorporated. 

Here's my friend Anthony Ashley's layout, which will incorporate Bangor:

 

https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/71151-north-welsh-coast-railway-welsh-dragon-rail/&tab=comments#comment-1027253

 

[Tony Wright]

3 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

Did somebody mention Kiveton Park?

A little time ago, John,

 

I still haven't decided whether to build it or not, as my 'final' exhibition layout.

 

I reckon it could be done (with selective compression) in 24' x 9' in OO. The main problems would be disguising going on/off stage and deciding which of the curves at the ends would have to go the wrong way. 

 

It would probably be viewed from the south, looking over the Chesterfield Canal, so the eastern curve would be the one going the wrong way. 'Strategic' bridges would have to be moved nearer to the station to hide the goings on and comings off, but it might be still 'convincing'. 

 

Unlike on the ECML, other than a few of the freights, trains would be much shorter. And, I don't have to make any locos or stock!

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

[St Enodoc]

3 minutes ago, Tony Wright said:

A little time ago, John,

 

I still haven't decided whether to build it or not, as my 'final' exhibition layout.

 

I reckon it could be done (with selective compression) in 24' x 9' in OO. The main problems would be disguising going on/off stage and deciding which of the curves at the ends would have to go the wrong way. 

 

It would probably be viewed from the south, looking over the Chesterfield Canal, so the eastern curve would be the one going the wrong way. 'Strategic' bridges would have to be moved nearer to the station to hide the goings on and comings off, but it might be still 'convincing'. 

 

Unlike on the ECML, other than a few of the freights, trains would be much shorter. And, I don't have to make any locos or stock!

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

I know - that's why I mentioned it!

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, St Enodoc said:

Here's my friend Anthony Ashley's layout, which will incorporate Bangor:

 

https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/71151-north-welsh-coast-railway-welsh-dragon-rail/&tab=comments#comment-1027253

 

Wow that looks a much bigger project than my little thing. 

[Willie Whizz]

7 hours ago, westerner said:

 

Or go the Iain Rice way and just model the veg ends of the platforms, he calls it "bitsa  station".

 

Thank you, gentlemen, for the several replies to my post on problems designing a satisfactory GC London Extension-style track plan in a modest space.

 

I probably should have said it, but the answer I've settled on is the one above - i.e. only show part of the station, and arrange the scenery  to lead the eye to think the line carries straight on.  It has to be "London Extension"-style to meet my geographical area of interest. 

 

Carrington?  Sorry, but no - basically nothing happened there, and hadn't since 1931, and I want at least some operation besides "watching trains go by".  Incidentally, some time in the late 1980s a friend invited me on a small 'organised' walk that began at the former Carrington Station building, by then a newsagents, and went through the tunnel beneath Mansfield Road and emerged at the north end of the "big hole" where the Victoria Centre stood on the site of the former station.  An interesting and rather spooky experience (one which is no longer possible as the north end was subsequently sealed and over-built).  It was easy to identify the 'up' and 'down' lines from the wider area of ceiling 'cleaned' by the exhaust blast of locomotives ascending the gradient on the latter.  The roof was blue brick, but the sides were just carved from the sandstone.  And right at the very heart of the lengthy, ballast-strewn tunnel was ... a Tesco trolley!

 

A year or two later - long story - I found myself working on the project team developing the concept for what became the Nottingham Tram system, and was able to use the knowledge I'd gained.  We really did hope to serve the Victoria Centre, and the suggestion to run parallel to Gregory Boulevard and descend on a curve to break into the ex-GC tunnel was actually mine!  We had hoped to continue south using the trackbed of the two lines that had originally been left to run around the side of the Victoria Centre when first built in connection with freight train use via Weekday Cross.  However, it turned out the shopping centre had subsequently encroached onto that area; there was no longer enough space or headroom, and the cost of excavating even a new short tunnel would have been prohibitive.  So thoughts turned to on-street routes instead, which is what we have today.

[Jesse Sim]

1 hour ago, St Enodoc said:

Get all the operators to smoke pipes...

Funny enough John, a mate of mine used to smoke this vape thingys, we were all one day, ( a few beers in and having a giggle) and we got him to blow the smoke through the tunnel from the fiddleyard. It was a cool sight my sound P2 cock coming through with the all the vape smoke. I have a video somewhere. 

[jamie92208]

I seem only to be able to model a real location and have had great satisfaction doing so.   We all have different constraints.  For me, modelling in 7mm, the layout had to fit into my church for testing, that gave me the maximum size.   I was only able to put it up for about 8 or 9 days a year.   After my frst layout of Long Preston, which fitted the church with 1.5" to spare, I chose Lancaster Green Ayre as my next prototype.   This is the 1910 OS plan of the area.

I had discovered Templot and also had a list of about 10 things that I had to get right.  Obviously it had to fit in the church for testing so the first thing I did on Templot was to draw a rectangle that was the same size as Long Preston.   I think I have well over 100 iterations of the plan for Green Ayre but this is what I eventually built.

There obviously had to be many compromises.  However the station area from the south end of the rail bridge over the river to the road overbridge is virtually to scale.   I had to change the curvature quite a bit to make it fit into an oval but I was able to get transition curves into the visible sections.   The loco shed/goods yard are had to be compressed by about 10' but it still works.  The Castle Branch (To the left) has a tighter curve than I wanted but again it just fits within the rectangle that you can see.   Fortunately I was able to increase the width slightly which enabled me to get the main line curve over the river bridge to an acceptable radius.   The only problem was that it left a single slip across a baseboard joint.   The main line oval had to be compressed a bit so that all the Overhead Lines were on the main set of boards.  The down platform fences are on the front row.   I've had to lose a couple of sidings in the loco shed/goods yard but the layout can still be operated in a prototypical fashion.   The curved line on the right is the disused horse tram track over the road bridge.   All in all it has fitted into the space available.   The Goods shed had to be shortened to look right from 3 bays to 2 bays.   I did at one time produce a plan that showed the actual area on the OS map covered by each board. A few were rectangles others were some very strange shapes.   However I can't find the plan on the computer.

 

I never dreamed that I would have more space to put the layout up than I could have ever dreamed of but that's how life has worked out.   This is what it looks like at the moment illuminated by it's own lighting rig, actually 2/3rds of it as I'm waiting for a new power supply for the other third.

 

Jamie

[St Enodoc]

56 minutes ago, Jesse Sim said:

Funny enough John, a mate of mine used to smoke this vape thingys, we were all one day, ( a few beers in and having a giggle) and we got him to blow the smoke through the tunnel from the fiddleyard. It was a cool sight my sound P2 cock coming through with the all the vape smoke. I have a video somewhere. 

Everything old is new again Jesse!  A mate (well-known to Barry O and others here) used to blow his cigar smoke (Hamlet, as I recall) through the hole in the backscene on his Laxford Bridge layout when a train was emerging. That was over 30 years ago...

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, jamie92208 said:

I seem only to be able to model a real location and have had great satisfaction doing so.   We all have different constraints.  For me, modelling in 7mm, the layout had to fit into my church for testing, that gave me the maximum size.   I was only able to put it up for about 8 or 9 days a year.   After my frst layout of Long Preston, which fitted the church with 1.5" to spare, I chose Lancaster Green Ayre as my next prototype.   This is the 1910 OS plan of the area.

I had discovered Templot and also had a list of about 10 things that I had to get right.  Obviously it had to fit in the church for testing so the first thing I did on Templot was to draw a rectangle that was the same size as Long Preston.   I think I have well over 100 iterations of the plan for Green Ayre but this is what I eventually built.

There obviously had to be many compromises.  However the station area from the south end of the rail bridge over the river to the road overbridge is virtually to scale.   I had to change the curvature quite a bit to make it fit into an oval but I was able to get transition curves into the visible sections.   The loco shed/goods yard are had to be compressed by about 10' but it still works.  The Castle Branch (To the left) has a tighter curve than I wanted but again it just fits within the rectangle that you can see.   Fortunately I was able to increase the width slightly which enabled me to get the main line curve over the river bridge to an acceptable radius.   The only problem was that it left a single slip across a baseboard joint.   The main line oval had to be compressed a bit so that all the Overhead Lines were on the main set of boards.  The down platform fences are on the front row.   I've had to lose a couple of sidings in the loco shed/goods yard but the layout can still be operated in a prototypical fashion.   The curved line on the right is the disused horse tram track over the road bridge.   All in all it has fitted into the space available.   The Goods shed had to be shortened to look right from 3 bays to 2 bays.   I did at one time produce a plan that showed the actual area on the OS map covered by each board. A few were rectangles others were some very strange shapes.   However I can't find the plan on the computer.

 

I never dreamed that I would have more space to put the layout up than I could have ever dreamed of but that's how life has worked out.   This is what it looks like at the moment illuminated by it's own lighting rig, actually 2/3rds of it as I'm waiting for a new power supply for the other third.

 

Jamie

It is a lovely layout in the flesh, but what layout wouldn't be with a 990 class 4-4-0. I feel very privileged to have been invited "around the back" by Jamie a couple of years ago at Nottingham.

[Headstock]

1 hour ago, Willie Whizz said:

 

Thank you, gentlemen, for the several replies to my post on problems designing a satisfactory GC London Extension-style track plan in a modest space.

 

I probably should have said it, but the answer I've settled on is the one above - i.e. only show part of the station, and arrange the scenery  to lead the eye to think the line carries straight on.  It has to be "London Extension"-style to meet my geographical area of interest. 

 

Carrington?  Sorry, but no - basically nothing happened there, and hadn't since 1931, and I want at least some operation besides "watching trains go by".  Incidentally, some time in the late 1980s a friend invited me on a small 'organised' walk that began at the former Carrington Station building, by then a newsagents, and went through the tunnel beneath Mansfield Road and emerged at the north end of the "big hole" where the Victoria Centre stood on the site of the former station.  An interesting and rather spooky experience (one which is no longer possible as the north end was subsequently sealed and over-built).  It was easy to identify the 'up' and 'down' lines from the wider area of ceiling 'cleaned' by the exhaust blast of locomotives ascending the gradient on the latter.  The roof was blue brick, but the sides were just carved from the sandstone.  And right at the very heart of the lengthy, ballast-strewn tunnel was ... a Tesco trolley!

 

A year or two later - long story - I found myself working on the project team developing the concept for what became the Nottingham Tram system, and was able to use the knowledge I'd gained.  We really did hope to serve the Victoria Centre, and the suggestion to run parallel to Gregory Boulevard and descend on a curve to break into the ex-GC tunnel was actually mine!  We had hoped to continue south using the trackbed of the two lines that had originally been left to run around the side of the Victoria Centre when first built in connection with freight train use via Weekday Cross.  However, it turned out the shopping centre had subsequently encroached onto that area; there was no longer enough space or headroom, and the cost of excavating even a new short tunnel would have been prohibitive.  So thoughts turned to on-street routes instead, which is what we have today.

 

Good evening Willie,

 

fascinating stuff. I take it a cord line in the middle of nowhere has little appeal. The GCLE up and over Island platform design does suit itself rather well to the bitsa design. What station have you settled upon? Off course there is always Nottingham Arkwright street, things happend there, at least in the middle of the night.

[Tony Wright]

10 hours ago, Jesse Sim said:

 It was a cool sight my sound P2 cock coming through with the all the vape smoke. 

Jesse,

 

Apologies for being flippant, but what might an unsound P2 cock look like coming through, especially wreathed in smoke? 

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

[Jesse Sim]

1 minute ago, Tony Wright said:

Jesse,

 

Apologies for being flippant, but what might an unsound P2 cock look like coming through, especially wreathed in smoke? 

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Pretty much the same Tony. 

[gr.king]

All of mine are unsound. Should I worry? Would it help? 

Edited March 8, 2019 by gr.king