Train spotting at Finsbury Square

[Mallard60022]

3 hours ago, 31A said:

The timetable sequence / loco rostering spreadsheet can throw up some strange combinations at times, and this is what a nocturnal spotter would have seen if he poked his nose over the wall at City Road loco at the end of today's session.  If he'd been to the pub, he might think he'd had one too many!  Perhaps it is the "Claud" that was rumoured to have been set aside for preservation?

 

 

At the end of the sequence, the loco yard will contain one loco from of each of the Express Passenger, GN Main Line, GE Main Line and Outer Suburban links, and two from the Inner Suburban link, one of which will remain in the yard "Spare" the following day.  Apart from fuelling, it isn't a place where much maintenance would be carried out so the "Spare" loco is just there to make the place look busier, get in the way and save me having to find somewhere to plonk it in the fiddle yard.  In this case the "Spare" loco is 69531 on the right, which has been put on the coal wagon road for now but will be in the way when more coal arrives around midday tomorrow.

 

 

 

Claud is half SR by the look of it……..bloomin' SR foreign things, coming over 'here', taking our Diagrams/Lamps/ Siding space/Turntable turns/ Coal/Water/ Air; not even got proper wheels. Shocking. 

A.N.I. Diot 

Edited January 11, 2020 by Mallard60022

[lezz01]

Incidentally wiring in a second motor with a flywheel is a way of making diesels with those awful pancake motor bogies run exceptably. It came about when some over clever so and so produced a complicated multiple flywheel system that you fitted to a diesel loco to simulate inertia mechanically. It did work really well but was really large and really expensive. We (CLAG) worked out that you could do the same thing just by wiring a second free running motor with a flywheel and doing the same thing electrically without any fussy electronics or heavy and expensive mechanics. It works a treat give it a go if you're that way inclined and have locos with a pancake motor. It's a good way to get those old Lima locos running well.

Regards Lez.        

[5BarVT]

9 hours ago, Baby Deltic said:

Geneva drives.

RMweb isn’t half educational. 

Thanks all, me being electrical not mechanical it was completely new to me.

Paul.

Edited January 11, 2020 by 5BarVT
Was all fnigers and thmubs before.

[31A]

1 hour ago, lezz01 said:

Personally I have always thought that the best way to operate a turntable is to just wire it to a controller and drive it like an engine. If you want to make it more of a challenge you wire in two motors one of them free running with a big flywheel and just get used to which way and how much juice you give it. Now days of course you just wire it to a decoder with only one motor and set the inertia to your desired level and learn how to drive it. Of course the fun comes when you let someone else drive it........but then I always did a a mischievous streak or is that sadistic....

Regards Lez.    

 

I have wired them to the controller in the past, but wanted this one to have a separate power supply.  Firstly because it is in order (and sometimes useful) to be able to move other locos around the yard while one is being turned.  Secondly (and a bit more tenuous I admit), I wanted it to be part of the 'infrastructure' a bit like the points and signals, and independent of the movement of the locos.  In fact I may not even wire in the electrical interlock with the traction supply that I have in mind, although I think it will be a useful safeguard against causing damage by inadvertently moving the wrong loco!

 

I didn't think of a free motor with flywheels, but this one does have flywheels to give it inertia (see earlier post); however I thought it important for the table to stop in the right place hence the 'de-clutching' gearbox, which I was quite proud of!  For avoidance of doubt and in case people hadn't guessed, my railway modelling is intended to be KISS in quite an old fashioned way so things like DCC decoders, stepping motors, servos, Arduinos, Raspberry Pis etc. are foreign animals to me.  I HAVE got a Meccano clockwork motor and did seriously think of trying to use that, but thought winding it up would be too much of a faff ....

[31A]

1 hour ago, Mallard60022 said:

Claud is half SR by the look of it……..bloomin' SR foreign things, coming over 'here', taking our Diagrams/Lamps/ Siding space/Turntable turns/ Coal/Water/ Air; not even got proper wheels. Shocking. 

A.N.I. Diot 

 

Half SR??  It's one of the Swedey's finest, even if Stratford couldn't be bothered to paint lining on the poor old thing by then.

 

L. Poole-Street.

 

[Baby Deltic]

17 hours ago, 5BarVT said:

RMweb isn’t half educational. 

Thanks all, me being electrical not mechanical it was completely new to me.

Paul.

I served a four year mechanical apprenticeship even though I was supposed to be electrical. I can work on both mechanical and electrical/electronic systems anyway so doing a mechanical apprenticeship worked out well in the end because it filled a skill gap. Various machines I have worked on have used Geneva drives in one form or another be it ATR lathes which trim toothpaste tubes and capping machines to Sherbet Fountain and Dip-Dab machines which also indexed round to form and fill packets using Geneva drives.

Edited January 12, 2020 by Baby Deltic

[Baby Deltic]

1 hour ago, 31A said:

 

Half SR??  It's one of the Swedey's finest, even if Stratford couldn't be bothered to paint lining on the poor old thing by then.

 

L. Poole-Street.

 

Could be worse I suppose. It could be a Claughton or a Precursor.

 

[St Enodoc]

4 hours ago, lezz01 said:

Incidentally wiring in a second motor with a flywheel is a way of making diesels with those awful pancake motor bogies run exceptably. It came about when some over clever so and so produced a complicated multiple flywheel system that you fitted to a diesel loco to simulate inertia mechanically. It did work really well but was really large and really expensive. We (CLAG) worked out that you could do the same thing just by wiring a second free running motor with a flywheel and doing the same thing electrically without any fussy electronics or heavy and expensive mechanics. It works a treat give it a go if you're that way inclined and have locos with a pancake motor. It's a good way to get those old Lima locos running well.

Regards Lez.        

The free-motor system pre-dates CLAG and Lima pancake motors by years, if not decades. It was described as a way to improve running of open-frame motors such as X04s.

[lezz01]

As it happens there were articles in the press previously and I do mean years back. We were discussing the multi flywheel and how well it worked but how expensive it was and I think it was Tony W who said "huh you only need to stick a second motor in it and it will do the same job", and then it kinda ran away with itself and we ended up with it making a tickover sound involving plasticard and a small something BA bolt through the flywheel like a playing card in a bike spoke kind of way but we dropped that coz it was all getting silly and as we were supposed to be serious P4 modelers we thought we had better pack it in and have a cupper instead. In my defence though I have tried it out in a Hornby 21/29, without sound effects, and it worked an absolute treat so that's how that came about. I've done it in a Lima 31 as well, with pancake motor and it ran really well too. 

Regards Lez.  

[Mallard60022]

15 hours ago, 31A said:

 

Half SR??  It's one of the Swedey's finest, even if Stratford couldn't be bothered to paint lining on the poor old thing by then.

 

L. Poole-Street.

 

But, but, but...….it have a white disc on the front bit Sir (yes I knows they wuz used in Anglias).

[Mallard60022]

In my dim way, can I ask what all the verbiage is about bloomin' TT drives. I was hoping to see some of Steve's 'ballasting' round the shed area and having to plough through pages of God knows what, all I can find is a load of stuff about whizzers and danglers + some sort of Physics about time and dimensions. FFS what the hell is that all about? With respect, if this was my Turntable mechanism I'd be patenting it for accuracy and telling all the 'use a donglebanglewhizzerplonker' system to please go away.  Give it a rest chaps, the man has made a brilliant drive system and as I have said three times now......it works and it looks prototypical when moving; give him a break.

Oh yes, best wishes for the new year to all.

Phil

Edited January 12, 2020 by Mallard60022

[St Enodoc]

2 minutes ago, Mallard60022 said:

In my dim way, can I ask what all the verbiage is about bloomin' TT drives. I was hoping to see some of Steve's 'ballasting' round the shed area and having to plough through pages of God knows what, all I can find is a load of stuff about whizzers and danglers + some sort of Physics about time and dimensions. FFS what the hell is that all about? With respect, if this was my Turntable mechanism I'd be patenting it for accuracy and telling all the 'use a donglebanglewhizzerplonker' system to please go away.  Give it a rest chaps, the man has made a brilliant drive system and as I have said three times now......it works and it looks prototypical when moving; give him a break.

Oh yes, best wishes for the new year to all.

Phil

It's my fault really, Your Duckworth (how's Mr Lewis doing by the way?). I asked a relatively innocent question about how fast turntables go round, which flew off through a topological twist in the space-time continuum to Geneva, of all places, as a consequence of which the answer to my question turned out to be "as fast or as slow as you like".

 

I promise to be a good boy and try not to do it again.

[Mallard60022]

10 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

It's my fault really, Your Duckworth (how's Mr Lewis doing by the way?). I asked a relatively innocent question about how fast turntables go round, which flew off through a topological twist in the space-time continuum to Geneva, of all places, as a consequence of which the answer to my question turned out to be "as fast or as slow as you like".

 

I promise to be a good boy and try not to do it again.

You are awful, but I like you...……( Duck pushes St. over as he flounces away).

I think things can get too complex sometimes, so I also shall try to be a good duck and not poke my beak in (well not today anyway)    Whoops, I appear to have pooped on the carpet.

 

[Oldddudders]

Railway modelling inevitably spills over into miniature engineering for those that have the bent (no slur intended!), so more exotic solutions to mechanical problems appeal. Those of us with stone-age technical abilities cope as best we can. 

[Baby Deltic]

40 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

Railway modelling inevitably spills over into miniature engineering for those that have the bent (no slur intended!), so more exotic solutions to mechanical problems appeal. Those of us with stone-age technical abilities cope as best we can. 

Ah yes, but even someone in the stone-age could fashion tools to shape materials to solve mechanical problems. How well those solutions actually worked is open to individual interpretation.

[31A]

1 hour ago, Mallard60022 said:

 I was hoping to see some of Steve's 'ballasting' round the shed area

 

Oh yes, best wishes for the new year to all.

Phil

 

Patience Phil and thanks as always for the support!  I'd like to be getting on with ballasting etc, but holding off for the moment pending decisions as to what will go where in terms of buildings, water cranes, yard lamps etc. before I smother the ground in chinchilla dust or other random materials.  Which will lead into a question that has been exercising my mind, when I decide how to phrase it!

[31A]

1 hour ago, St Enodoc said:

It's my fault really, Your Duckworth (how's Mr Lewis doing by the way?). I asked a relatively innocent question about how fast turntables go round, which flew off through a topological twist in the space-time continuum to Geneva, of all places, as a consequence of which the answer to my question turned out to be "as fast or as slow as you like".

 

I promise to be a good boy and try not to do it again.

 

Don't worry, it WAS an interesting question and the answers seem to have shown that there is no right answer.

 

I went to Geneva once; I saw a big fountain but don't remember any turntables.

 

[31A]

Not much reported recently, but I have not been idle.  Apart from the interminable painting of the sides of the rails, I've been making a new office / mess room building for the loco yard, to replace the handed down card & brickpaper one seen in some earlier pictures.

 

It's not a model of anything really, although based on the kind of building typically seen in such locations.  The proportions are based on the old Prototype Models card kit of Heckington station, and a drawing of Fletton Goods Office in Heritage Railway magazine from when the building was dismantled in 1999 and rebuilt at the Nene Valley Railway.  Having spent my life hanging around railways in one way or another, I think I know what they look like but 'freelancing' sometimes throws up unexpected difficulties.  In this case, deciding to put the chimneys along the back wall will make the rear gutter 'interesting', and I seem to have ended up with a room with two doors!

 

Anyway, this is where I've got to with it.  The walls are from Slaters embossed Plastikard laminated onto 40 thou; for this I used DL-Limonene solvent for the first time.  It was nice stuff to use (and smell!) and hasn't produced the warping that I usually get when I laminate layers of Plastikard together.  The roof is made up as a sub assembly from Wills slate material which I think gives a good representation of a Victorian slate roof, but is difficult to join sheets together.  Whether I've managed it will come with painting, I guess.

 

 

 

[Mallard60022]

Steve, the room with two doors. Will they be Green doors by any chance? Could it be that one of them is the 'Heads' and is just a partition to, say, the rest room next door which was originally the whole space. This, of course, was an additional facility added in 1939 to accommodate the women who were drafted in to cover for those brave lads (Cleaner Grade so not essential work force) that had signed up for the Forces. WC and wash basin in the Head, perhaps round vent holes in the top of the door?

Oh yes, superbio by the way and I may commission for a workshop on such construction as I have several to do myself.

Phil

[31A]

1 hour ago, Mallard60022 said:

Steve, the room with two doors. Will they be Green doors by any chance? Could it be that one of them is the 'Heads' and is just a partition to, say, the rest room next door which was originally the whole space. This, of course, was an additional facility added in 1939 to accommodate the women who were drafted in to cover for those brave lads (Cleaner Grade so not essential work force) that had signed up for the Forces. WC and wash basin in the Head, perhaps round vent holes in the top of the door?

Oh yes, superbio by the way and I may commission for a workshop on such construction as I have several to do myself.

Phil

 

Thanks Phil, yes the doors will in fact be Green!  A good story and excuse for my c**k up!  Actually, I don't really know what goes on inside the different rooms, and I just put the partitions in place to strengthen the model.  Although if I had given it more thought before I stuck them in, I would have put them in more logical places.  I don't intend to put any internal details in anyway, as you won't really be able to see in through the windows once the building is in place on the layout, unless you stand on your head!  I did think the small window at the right hand end would be where the "facilities" are although I must admit I didn't think of having gender specific ones - I don't know whether the real railways did in the 1950s, either?  I like the idea of ventilation holes in the top of the door though - I might do that!

 

[manna]

G'day Folks

 

Could you not just brick up the door, as if some re-modelling was done to the building in the 1930's, and using a different colour brick !!!!!!!

 

manna

[Clive Mortimore]

7 hours ago, 31A said:

Not much reported recently, but I have not been idle.  Apart from the interminable painting of the sides of the rails, I've been making a new office / mess room building for the loco yard, to replace the handed down card & brickpaper one seen in some earlier pictures.

 

It's not a model of anything really, although based on the kind of building typically seen in such locations.  The proportions are based on the old Prototype Models card kit of Heckington station, and a drawing of Fletton Goods Office in Heritage Railway magazine from when the building was dismantled in 1999 and rebuilt at the Nene Valley Railway.  Having spent my life hanging around railways in one way or another, I think I know what they look like but 'freelancing' sometimes throws up unexpected difficulties.  In this case, deciding to put the chimneys along the back wall will make the rear gutter 'interesting', and I seem to have ended up with a room with two doors!

 

Anyway, this is where I've got to with it.  The walls are from Slaters embossed Plastikard laminated onto 40 thou; for this I used DL-Limonene solvent for the first time.  It was nice stuff to use (and smell!) and hasn't produced the warping that I usually get when I laminate layers of Plastikard together.  The roof is made up as a sub assembly from Wills slate material which I think gives a good representation of a Victorian slate roof, but is difficult to join sheets together.  Whether I've managed it will come with painting, I guess.

 

 

 

Hi Steve

 

Don't listen to them, they are naughty boys trying to cause trouble.

[31A]

Thanks all for the constructive suggestions re. the room with two doors, and thanks to Clive for the voice of reason!  All good suggestions; however I have already made the doors, so I'm afraid bricking one up probably won't happen!  Perhaps it is the mess room, and demarcation dictates separate doors for drivers and firemen?

 

Anyway, I have also made the windows ready to insert after the brickwork is painted, and hope to get some materials to make gutters at Doncaster at the weekend.

[Oldddudders]

In my era, probably then, any demarcation would have been between footplatemen and other grades, not least guards. 

[31A]

28 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

In my era, probably then, any demarcation would have been between footplatemen and other grades, not least guards. 

 

Yes that's what I was thinking of really but don't think Guards would get in there.  Cleaners, maybe?