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Brampton Road


wireman
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Thanks for kind comments Imsforever and to Sigtech ( Steve ) for birthday wishes. The picture used on this cake was from a couple of years back, but myself and Nick ( Coleborne Junction ) were lucky to be allocated a place on this years Southern Locomotives Drive and Fire days, again on Manston, which along with Eddystone are my favourite loco's. Footplate pictures of both are on previous pages. I have mentioned before on the Coleborne Junction page, but I am sure you already know, that the Southern Locomotives Ltd. web site is a must for all things Bulleid with excellent pictures and restoration details of it's loco. fleet.

 

Thanks once again.

 

Brian. ( wireman )

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  • 3 weeks later...

Well, middle of January and only just started on the lifting flap renewal. I would like to blame Christmas, New Year, family commitments, weather etc. for the delay, but in reality it's none of these.  No, I just could not get started, every time I entered the shed to remove the existing flap, I ended up playing trains. However, at last, wood has been purchased, old flap removed and planning has begun.

 

 

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After cutting roughly to size, the board is layed to enable the final shape, hinge and catch positions to be marked out. Next step, cut to shape.

 

 

Regards Brian. ( wireman )

 

 

 

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Board cut to size.

 

 

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The rail built signal on the right in the previous pictures, is no more. Not any significant cost, just my time.  Never mind, I had already decided to buy a couple of operating Dapol Southern Rail built signals when they become available.

 

Regards Brian. ( wireman )

 

No! It,s to painful to recall.

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Case catches have been fitted to secure the flap when in use. If it looks as if this idea has been copied from Coleborne Junction, it's has. Thats where the catches came from.  Purchased obviously.  welI IOU actually.

 

 

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A support strip has also been added on the inner edge, the outer edge will be braced by the back scene board when I find a short piece of ply thin enough to curve round it.

 

 

Regards Brian. ( wireman )

 

 

 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Thin ply was obtained, curving it around the edge of the flap was quite difficult, but was achieved. However, it just did not look right, so was removed and instead two pieces have been used to angle it around the edge. A third piece was then fitted to the main fixed board, allowing the piece on the lifting flap to slightly overlap when in the closed position. Hopefully. it will look ok when sky paper is glued on.

 

 

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Once the paper is on and dry, I have the cork and track ready for relaying.

 

 

Regards. Brian. (wireman ).

 

 

 

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

A short burst of enthusiasm has resulted in some progress with the lifting flap. The one which I removed, had track alignment using small brass tubes soldered to the rail sides and a pin pushed through these to hold the rails in position and make the electrical contact to the tracks when operating. This time I had intended to just use the standard method of a copper clad sleeper soldered each side of the cut and wire the power supply across to the flap.

 

 

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Having started to do this, I made the decision to use a copper clad sleeper each side plus the brass tube system as before. The first picture below shows the gap with the cooper glad sleeper, the second shows the pin pushed in. The pin is a cut down panel pin with a short length of heat shrink sleeve shrunk on the end. The sleepers and tubes were soldered across the board gap before cutting through with an Exacto saw.

 

 

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The time taken to pop in the eight pins is a matter of seconds, and the track feed is reliant on these being fitted, this includes a short section running to the storage roads so nothing can run in this section if the flap is up, preventing anything going over the edge.

 

So, train running is able to resume, although ballasting this new track will wait for warmer weather.

 

 

Regards. Brian.  (wireman)

 

 

 

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HI Scott. I have several lengths of copper clad strip here and more than enough brass tube for the amount you are going to need. ( I took my brass tube to Coleborne Junction about a year ago. It was never used, but when I needed it, despite turning out every box and drawer I could not find it. So I bought a new packet. The following week at Coleborne, Poole boy found it.) Plus, if you want a bodge job done I could pop up and help.

 

Brian ( wireman )

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One small and obvious downside to using the pin in tube  system is that, if the flap is lifted with any pin or pins not removed, it is sure to damage the track.  To help avoid this, I do not keep spare pins, only the eight required, so all eight are placed in a small tray before releasing the flap catches. I have used this system for a few years now without any mishaps. ( Probably will have one now I've said that. )   In order to insert the pins, it may help if the sleeper chair in front of the tube is removed or trimmed back to allow them to be flat.

 

Regards. Brian  ( wireman )

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A small problem with the inner track at the lifting end of the flap is that it is a fairly tight curve and crosses the gap at an angle. My first attempt at this gap using the two copper clad sleepers worked ok, but in trying to maintain sleeper spacing the cut could not be made exactly on the board join, resulting in an overhang on the lifting section. This is not a problem as when lifted the overhang is up out of the way, when down and the pins in place everything ran well but I felt this was not going to be robust enough to last very long with frequent use. My solution was to replace the curve with a set track curve and by using four copper clad sleepers was able to make a staggered cut across the join.

 

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The two centre sleepers have been cut to allow lifting.

 

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 It looks a little untidy at the moment, but ballasting and painting will tidy it up. When lifted, the track on the lifting part still overhangs, but as before, it is up out of harms way when open and by using the set track , the curve is maintained.

 

 

 

Brian. ( wireman )

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Starting to ballast the new track today, so needed to know where the end of the scenic part will be before entering the storage roads. To have some idea of how things will be, I cut a very rough road bridge shape from card, and I think something along these lines will fit the bill. 

 

 

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The small bridge entrance near the edge of the board will be for the lane leading to the coal yard. Once the ballasting is complete, I will do a mock layout around this area and make a decision on construction of the bridge.

 

 

Regards Brian  ( wireman ).

 

 

 

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Hi Scott, did you mean the viaduct at Corfe or the road bridge by the loco shed. Either way, yes I would like the details. I have bought the Metcalfe PO246 Bridge kit to play with. My thinking is that as the storage road side will be just plain black card, I could use both sides of the kit joined together as the double arch and could cut the smaller road / lane arch from one of  the wall sections. At first glance I think the span of the main arches would have to be reduced slightly, which I don't think would be a problem and I would still fit the road on top and the internal brick lining in each span to give it some depth. I have ballasted the short curve from the lifting flap to the bridge area to enable me to press on with the bridge and although I have bought the kit, I may not use it or I may make a complete mess of  things and have to start again, ( This is not unusual when I start kit bashing ) so alternative ideas would be welcome.

 

 

Thanks. Brian. ( wireman )

 

I still have no idea where the spell check is.

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Having now looked at the bridge kit in detail, I have decided to reduce the arch width by removing 12 mm from the centre of each one, plus at the point where the two arches will join, another10mm from each, reducing the total width of the two joined together by 42mm. Before cutting, I photo copied the the arch, second picture, to see how much could be removed before the curve of the arch , was effected and found that anything over 12mm was noticable.

 

 

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Once the arch faces were cut, the inner bridge strengtheners had to be reduced in the same way, plus the right hand side one had to be cut at an angle on the end to allow the whole assembly to fit against the backscene at an angle across the tracks.

 

 

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The kit contained two brick arch linings, one  for a narrow road or a wide one if both bridge strengtheners were glued together to form a wide bridge. So in order to have two narrow linings, the narrow one was placed on the wider one which was then cut to create another narrow one. Why did I just not copy another narrow one from the original ?  Because I did not think about it until I was typing this. Next stage is to assemble these parts, from then on each plinth/wall etc will have to be measured to fit as required, cutting equally from each end to preserve the symmetry of the brickwork etc. Once this is complete I will plan how to cut a small arch in the left hand side wall for the envisaged road/lane.

 

 

Regards Brian  ( wireman )

 

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