Mid-Cornwall Lines - 1950s Western Region in 00

[St Enodoc]

On 04/06/2020 at 21:07, Stubby47 said:

The Land's End signpost ?

I've just remembered this:

 

Singapore is of course where Veronica and I met and Chatswood is the suburb of Sydney where we were living at the time.

 

Edited July 17, 2023 by St Enodoc
images restored

[Barry O]

A stuffed labrador? 

 

Cliff face???

 

Baz

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, Barry O said:

A stuffed labrador? 

 

Cliff face???

 

Baz

Hi Baz

 

I think you might have upset Gus the Gundog

[lofty.ian]

3 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

I've just remembered this:

 

Singapore is of course where Veronica and I met and Chatswood is the suburb of Sydney where we were living at the time.

 

You can't take that photo now.  We went 2 years ago and you can't get close unless you pay your money to join a queue, extra for the special signs.

On another aspect, I have on a shelf above my desk two (unfortunately empty) bottles of St Austell beer with customised labels, souvenir of the same holiday.

Lofty

[acg5324]

10 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

Wait and see.

Trago Mills!

[St Enodoc]

9 hours ago, Barry O said:

A stuffed labrador? 

Nope.

 

9 hours ago, Barry O said:

Cliff face???

Cliff who?

[St Enodoc]

7 hours ago, lofty.ian said:

You can't take that photo now.  We went 2 years ago and you can't get close unless you pay your money to join a queue, extra for the special signs.

'Twas the same 10 years ago, Lofty. We were there on a chilly spring day with a strong breeze and there weren't many folk around. There was no queue so the bloke in the wooden hut was very pleased to see us. We paid him for the official photo and took several of our own. Because there was no queue he was happy for us to work out the distance to Chatswood by subtracting a bit from Sydney and also for us to put an extra destination up instead of our names or the date.

[St Enodoc]

4 hours ago, acg5324 said:

Trago Mills!

Highly unlikely.

[St Enodoc]

17 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Sanity

Clive, I know that as a general rule you don't like people pointing out typos here but this time I couldn't resist!

[St Enodoc]

It's a long weekend here so I thought I'd make a start on ballasting yesterday.

 

It turned out to be a false start, because I seem to have lost the knack of spreading ballast on SMP track so that a) it is clear of the tops of teh sleepers and b) the spaces between teh sleepers are filled. I last did this about 10 years ago on the last St Enodoc layout and to be honest I ended up with too much ballast, which stuck up in humps above sleeper level and didn't really look all that good. Anyway, after a couple of tries I gave up.

 

Today, after an invigorating walk round the North Arm of Sugarloaf Bay on Middle Harbour, I decided I'd try a different way.

 

The challenge with SMP track (and C&L I suppose) is that the sleepers are only about 1mm thick, which is not much different from the size of the N gauge ballast I use. So, I decided to follow the footsteps of @Captain Kernow and @gordon s of this parish and put the glue down first rather than the ballast first. Ballast-first seems to work well with Peco and other thick-sleepered track because there is room for several grains' worth of ballast in the gaps. I'd actually used the glue-first method more than 40 years ago on the first St Enodoc (the branch terminus) but again there was too much ballast really, probably because I used too much glue.

 

This is, theoretically, a more time-consuming method than ballast-first but by the time I factor in the frustration of going round in circles trying to get just the right amount of ballast down in the right place I don't think it will actually be too bad. There's only (only!) about 30 yards of track on the visible main lines and Porthmellyn Road station to do, so taking it a little at a time I think it will be OK. Once I'd made some progress I'll be able to do other jobs such as building the viaduct and installing some signals to break up the routine.

 

CK's and Gordon's methods differ slightly. Both involve painting neat PVA between and along the ends of the sleepers, sprinkling the ballast then vacuuming it up. However, CK only does about five sleepers' worth at a time and applies all the glue in that area at once. After sprinkling the ballast he tamps it and lets it dry before vacuuming. Gordon, on the other hand, deals with the centre of the track and the two sides separately, doing about a foot at a time and vacuuming the ballast away (carefully - I found that bit out myself!) immediately after it is laid, without tamping and before the glue has dried. I'm sure that both methods work well but given that Gordon has a big layout and CK a small one I thought I'd try Gordon's variation first.

 

Here's my trial piece, a short off-stage section of Chapel Siding no 1. It's a bit messy in the middle, as I let the vacuum nozzle (covered with two old handkerchiefs) get too close to the track at one stage and it sucked up all the ballast and glue from there. I reapplied a bit of glue and ballast and all was well, although I'm sure you can see the join.

 

Anyway, I've concluded that this is probably the way to go if I'm going to have any chance of getting the ballasting done before the Ballastmeister's next visit (2022?) so for better or worse I'll start to work my way round from Paddington in the Down direction tomorrow.

 

Wish me luck...

Edited July 17, 2023 by St Enodoc
images restored

[Stubby47]

The way I did it on Tinner's was to ballast first, apply weak pva, then when dry turn the baseboard over to shake off the excess.

 

It might work for you.

[St Enodoc]

On 07/06/2020 at 18:01, Stubby47 said:

The way I did it on Tinner's was to ballast first, apply weak pva, then when dry turn the baseboard over to shake off the excess.

 

It might work for you.

Stu, that's what I did on the last layout, which was sectional so that it could be packed away when the room in which it lived was needed as a spare bedroom:

 

Ballast-first is very tricky with thin-sleepered track like SMP though. It can be done but I can't motivate myself to practice enough to get the knack back. Another problem with the current layout would be turning the baseboards over...

Edited July 17, 2023 by St Enodoc
images restored

[Stubby47]

( just waiting for Clive to mention you're already upside down.. )

[Captain Kernow]

50 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

Wish me luck

Well, I was going to anyway, so 'Good Luck!'

 

Presumably you have something strong and liquid on hand to sooth the nerves?

 

[Oldddudders]

38 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

 Another problem with the current layout would be turning the baseboards over...

Call yourself an engineer? Pah!

[Clive Mortimore]

19 minutes ago, Stubby47 said:

( just waiting for Clive to mention you're already upside down.. )

Wot?

 

I cannot really add anything to the ballast debate. I am in the old fashioned gang of sprinkling the lumps of rock around and between the sleepers. Using a brush to get the stuff of the sleepers. I apply the watered down PVA with the drop of washing up liquid in it to the ballast with a dropper. Then watch as the ballast starts to swim in the liquid  and make its way back on the sleepers. Go to bed and not sleep cos I messed it up again. Get up and I am surprised to doesn't look too bad. I then spend the next couple of months ungluing points, digging out lumps of rock that have found their way into the moving parts of points and wondering why they are no longer electrically working. 

 

I hope that is of some help.

[Oldddudders]

I have yet to confront the ballasting on Beaworthy. I did try a test piece on a separate baseboard, sprinkling ballast, then wetting it. Sadly, the gentle spray of falling water was sufficient to displace the (chinchilla dust) ballast so it was already a mess on the sleepers before I got to the eye-dropper with PVA. Perhaps a finer atomiser, giving smaller droplets, might limit the displacement. Where I find that I have yet to divine, maybe Amazon. 

 

Edit. Amazon order placed. Likely to get here within a week or so. Unlike Royal Mail items from ebay which are taking weeks and weeks to arrive. My last Amazon order took all of 4 days from Dunfermline to delivery. 

Edited June 7, 2020 by Oldddudders

[31A]

For what it's worth I've more or less standardised on a method, applying the glue after laying the ballast.

 

Using Woodland Scenics finest grade ballast I spread it along the line using my thumb and a soft brush.  Not putting too much on; using Peco Bull Head track, I'm trying to keep the ballast top below the bottom of the rail so that you can see daylight beneath the rail; and I want to keep it off the sleeper tops.  I use the soft brush to sweep the edge to make a neat cess and six foot.  One tip I read somewhere was to tap the rails after you've spread the ballast, so I do this by tapping the head of the rail with a teaspoon and you can see the grains dropping clear of the rail, and settling into the bays.

 

Then I drop Woodland Scenics Scenic Cement from a pipette; no pre-wetting, diluting or washing up liquid required.  I try to put one drop in each bay (in the four foot) of the stretch I'm ballasting, Then add one drop per bay between the sleeper ends; these tend to meet up with the first drops in the four foot, and spread out towards the ballast edge.  I then go back and add more drops until the track is virtually swimming as Clive says, and again as Clive says then go to bed in order to resist the temptation to go and prod at it before it's dry.

 

That's usually all there is too it; once you get used to it, it's quicker than I've made it sound.  In the morning maybe one or two grains to ping off the sleepers but usually hardly any.

 

The other day I managed to get the glue to run underneath the moving tie bar of a set of Peco bull head points. I washed the area with clean water to dilute the glue, and put some clock oil on the moving part (nearest oil to hand) in the hope it would stop the glue from sticking to it.  Kept going back and moving the points until I eventually did go to bed.  In the morning to my relief all was fine!  Not sure whether the oil had helped or not.

 

Hope that helps, but I realise I've only got a few feet to do!

[gwrrob]

I used a syringe to apply my pva/water mix to my Peco track after a fine misting of plain water from an atomiser as Ian has just said.

[St Enodoc]

1 hour ago, Captain Kernow said:

Well, I was going to anyway, so 'Good Luck!'

 

Presumably you have something strong and liquid on hand to sooth the nerves?

 

Thanks CK. Yes, before dinner I mixed a couple of Bloody Marys for Veronica and myself, then with our meal we opened a nice NZ Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc. I'm now feeling quite mellow and ready for anything RMweb can throw at me...

[St Enodoc]

34 minutes ago, 31A said:

For what it's worth I've more or less standardised on a method, applying the glue after laying the ballast.

 

Using Woodland Scenics finest grade ballast I spread it along the line using my thumb and a soft brush.  Not putting too much on; using Peco Bull Head track, I'm trying to keep the ballast top below the bottom of the rail so that you can see daylight beneath the rail; and I want to keep it off the sleeper tops.  I use the soft brush to sweep the edge to make a neat cess and six foot.  One tip I read somewhere was to tap the rails after you've spread the ballast, so I do this by tapping the head of the rail with a teaspoon and you can see the grains dropping clear of the rail, and settling into the bays.

 

Then I drop Woodland Scenics Scenic Cement from a pipette; no pre-wetting, diluting or washing up liquid required.  I try to put one drop in each bay (in the four foot) of the stretch I'm ballasting, Then add one drop per bay between the sleeper ends; these tend to meet up with the first drops in the four foot, and spread out towards the ballast edge.  I then go back and add more drops until the track is virtually swimming as Clive says, and again as Clive says then go to bed in order to resist the temptation to go and prod at it before it's dry.

 

That's usually all there is too it; once you get used to it, it's quicker than I've made it sound.  In the morning maybe one or two grains to ping off the sleepers but usually hardly any.

 

The other day I managed to get the glue to run underneath the moving tie bar of a set of Peco bull head points. I washed the area with clean water to dilute the glue, and put some clock oil on the moving part (nearest oil to hand) in the hope it would stop the glue from sticking to it.  Kept going back and moving the points until I eventually did go to bed.  In the morning to my relief all was fine!  Not sure whether the oil had helped or not.

 

Hope that helps, but I realise I've only got a few feet to do!

Steve, that's more or less the method I've used before, although with pre-wetting using dilute alcohol, and I know it works well with Peco and other thick-sleepered track. It's the knack of doing it on SMP that I've lost (to be frank, I don't really think I ever had it).

[acg5324]

I’m currently ballasting Kensington Olympia......a job I hate....but needs doing. I’m not going to post any pictures until it’s done. I’m ballasting the 4ft first letting it dry then doing the 6ft......all with the PVA, water, washing up liquid and pipette method.

[Barry O]

Practice makes perfect..especially with ballasting. It is very therapeutic. A mugadecaf or mugatea, a bit of classical music, a good stool at the right height to sit on...and the optivisor to see what I am doing.

 

I use a dilute IPA spray over the ballast (not directly at it) then diluted PVA from a pippette. Tapping the rails on smp track just bounces the ballast everwhere. A very small, vwry soft brush helps getting the ballast where it needs to be.

 

Baz

[St Enodoc]

17 minutes ago, Barry O said:

Practice makes perfect..especially with ballasting. It is very therapeutic. A mugadecaf or mugatea, a bit of classical music, a good stool at the right height to sit on...and the optivisor to see what I am doing.

 

I use a dilute IPA spray over the ballast (not directly at it) then diluted PVA from a pippette. Tapping the rails on smp track just bounces the ballast everwhere. A very small, vwry soft brush helps getting the ballast where it needs to be.

 

Baz

Yep, been there, done all that (not the optivisor bit - it's the hands that give me trouble, not the eyes). Might try once more with a smaller brush, otherwise it's glue first from now on.

Edited June 7, 2020 by St Enodoc

[Chamby]

I use rather more than a drop of washing up liquid in the diluted PVA mix, it works better that way.  Use a brand that isn’t coloured though!

 

C&L market their original thin sleepered track as requiring less ballast.  As you say though, it makes for a fine tolerance between too much and not enough.  You might find that mixing in a proportion of N gauge (fine) ballast helps fill the gaps and improves hold without detracting visually.  I have used a mix of C&L’s thicker sleepered track and Peco bullhead on my layout, you do end up using more ballast but it is way easier to level.

 

Even so, looking at the completed trackwork I clearly had some better days than others when ballasting.  It is a job where you definitely have to be in the right frame of mind to do it well.