My first love really is 009 although if pushed I may say railways of the late Victorian era.  I still intend to build the Traeth Mawr and Twll Du railway which runs from the coast up the Naf valley to the town of Twll Du where there is a slate mine.  There are exchange sidings for the slate in Traeth Mawr with the Cambrian Railway.  Traeth Mawr is 5 minutes by rail north of Barmouth and is a market town and seaside resort.

I had never really intended to build the Cambrian Station at Traeth Mawr unless it was part of a bigger layout with the narrow gauge as well but life has intervened.  The intervention is….. grand children.  The eldest is now nearly four and she has been told about Grand dad's railway.  There is no way that children of that age could be let near a 009 layout and as she is the daughter of my eldest son and I have two other sons either married or nearly married I am sure others will be on the way and if one is 'helping Grand dad' then the others will want to as well.  Grand children also mean that it must be a roundy roundy.

Therefore, I have decided to build a 00 layout which apart from any stock that I can build will also be able to run any R-T-R 4 or 6 wheel stock and maybe something bigger as well.  The track will be Peco 100 as I need to get something up and running.  To add to the fun it will have to be able to be taken down and put up as the railway room also doubles as a visitor's bedroom.  My son has just moved and they have a playroom which he has said that he would quite like me to be able to put my railway up in it.  This means it must be transportable.

Measuring up the bedroom and their playroom, I can have a layout of 9' x 4'.  My car is a Peugeot 308 SW and with the back down, I can get baseboards in of 3' x4' or 5' x 3'6".  These are maximum sizes.  Hopefully, they will be built in co-operation with my son's father-in-law who is an ex woodwork teacher and has a workshop in his garage.

Bored yet?

The year is 1895 although the calendar may say anything up to 1914 on it.  The Cambrian is running the line but has a few motive power problems.  (Basically there are no easy kits or R-T-R engines for the Cambrian and they will take me a while to build).  The GWR has therefore exercised its running power to run trains from Dolgelly down the branch to the main line.  However they do not stop at Barmouth but run onto the next station of Traeth Mawr.  This means the station has to have a bay platform as well as its goods shed and exchange siding.  I am assuming that I will have to scratchbuild most of the buildings.

The problem with Cambrian coast line stations is that they are long and thin so very difficult to depict without a massive layout.  However, it may mean that I am able to get at least the station forecourt, coal merchants and one road in the scenic section which should be the front three feet. 

I attach the track plan for your thoughts.

INDEX

Penlan pointed out on another thread that mine was now rather large.  It may seem egotistic to have an index but this thread has benefitted from a number of experienced and knowledgeable contributors who have added information concerning life and railways in the late 19th century.  It would be a shame if that information was 'lost in the fog'.  The index will happen slowly, as I want time to model and as always life will get in the way, and have two parts, hopefully with links to the posts, but if any are missing click on the 'Page' icon above and put the page number in when the 'Go to' function appears.  People have told me there is good stuff in this thread, mainly the historical stuff, and most of that is from outside contributors so please read and enjoy.

The links now do not work as we have had two changes of software, and is woefully out of date.

Modelling

Building Plans                                                  2

Baseboard                                                       2, 4, 12, 13, 21

Honeymoon Cottage                                       3, 15, 22, 25, 31, 79

First Class Coach                                            3, 6, 9, 10, 11

Parade                                                             3, 5, 8

Baseboard Legs                                              4, 7, 9

Painting Tweed                                                5, 9 12

Teacher's Gowns                                             7

Available Victorian Figures                              9

Coach Lighting                                                 10

Tweed Trial                                                      10, 11

Figures                                                             11, 12

2 plank wagons                                                 12, 13, 16

Hornby Clerestory Coach                                  15

Stadden Station Staff                                        16, 17

J15 and staff                                                      19

Seaham Tank                                                    20

Aston Goods                                                      20                                                                      

Cambrian Buffer Stops                                      40, 41, 88, 89

LNWR Kits                                                         22

Cambrian Coach discussion                              22

Chairs for the cottage                                         23, 24

Varnish discussion                                            23

Revised track plan                                            23

Cork laid                                                            24, 25

Types of controllers                                           25

Making coach roofs                                           25

Cottage sideboard                                             25

Shelter                                                              77, 82, 84, 90

Coach Lighting (again)                                          73

Platform Surface                                               77

Platform height                                                 75,76

Straw Boaters                                                  77, 82, 83, 84

Station building                                                77

6 wheel Coach wheels, cleminson etc            20 , 21, 77, 78

Spray painting primer                                       78

Welsh dresser                                                  78

Cutting point motor 'prongs'                              81

Trains Running                                                  83

517 discussion                                                  85

Cambrian Loco discussion                                85, 86

Parliamentary Coaches                                     87, 88, 89

Other 4 Wheel coaches                                     87, 88

Historical

Colours of Victorian Clothing                            13

Timetable 1895, discussion on WTT                13

Private Owner/Special Goods traffic                 14

Cambrian Wagon Running Numbers                 15

Historical Railway Staff Image Links                 16

Through Carriage List 1904                              18

Marshalling of through Coaches discussion     18

2 Plank wagon at Aberdovey                            18

Station Staff Numbers discussion                     18, 19

Spiers and Pond Refreshment Rooms              19

Working Time Table                                          20

Through Carriages                                            20, 21

Trevor Charlton Kits List                                    21

Six Wheel Drawings in Mags                             21

HMRS Coach drawings                                     21, 22

Cambrian Tickets                                               22, 23

Cottage Interiors and St Fagans                         26

 Welsh Housing                                                   26

Wash houses, outside privy etc,                        26, 27

Websites of Pictures of Barmouth, Dolgelley     27

Gas Works Dates                                               28

Coal for Traeth Mawr, where from with links      28

Front paths and roads                                        43, 44

MS&LR Coaches                                                   72

Victorian Prisoners, Prisons, Broad Arrow uniform 74, 75

Welsh dressers                                                        78, 79

2 plank wagons                                                        79

Larders in houses                                                     79, 80, 81

House internal layouts from Planning Drawings,      82

Fire Buckets                                                              83, 84

Tank Wagons                                                           84

Astons Advertising                                                    87

Cambrian Green                                                        89

Invisible Green                                                          89

Coach braking                                                          90

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c98e1pp6z7ro

Jonathan

I have some photos including an article on a proposed layout, but would welcome any more

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c74qzqj149do

But no money

Jonathan

Sarn is a village near Kerry in Montgomeryshire. It never had a railway, but I have rewritten history a bit.

The origins of this layout are actually the frames for a baseboard which my son and I made about 20 years ago. It was to be a P4 4ft x 2ft shunting layout called Pixie Green (a real place), a sub off the twig that was the Mid Suffolk Light Railway. But my son left home and the frames were put away, only to resurface when we cleared the garage of our house in Harpenden to move everything to Newtown.

Now I have retitred, it seemed a good idea to get something running fairly quickly and in EM since that is what most of my stock is, and Sarn is local to where I now live, so why not?

The revised history is that when the Cambrian Railways were proposing to build the Kerry branch there was a difficult land owner near Glanmule (the branch never did actually get to Kerry, by the way). In addition, the citizens of Church Stoke, right on the English border, were trying to persuade the Cambrian (or anyone else) to put them on the railway map. So the Cambrian looked at a new route continuing further up the Mule valley and then turning left through Sarn, then parallel to what is now the main Newtown to Craven Arms road, to reach Church Stoke – but only if the residents of that metropolis stumped up some of the money. Of course, said residents promised to do so, so construction started and got some way beyond Sarn before the Cambrian realised that they would be lucky to get a fiver from Church Stoke. Construction ceased and the line was opened as far as Sarn (Goods), the track then disappearing across a road and through increasingly deep woodland until it petered out. In due course the Kerry Tramway was built for timber extraction, but linked to Sarn rather than Glanmule.

Because it was only ever intended as a minor wayside goods station, Sarn was not built with a passing loop, so trains have to be propelled from Abermule.

Progress so far is completion of the baseboard and a “fiddle yard” – actually just one line plus some room for wagons – plus laying of the track. At the moment I am in the process of connecting up the turnouts to the lever frame. This has proved to be rather fraught. I started by trying to use Mercontrol tubing but could not find a way of holding it down reliably so have used straight nickel silver wire and angle cranks, with the wire constrained by short lengths of brass tube. This has worked for two of the turnouts, but the linkage to the third had just too much slack in the many angle cranks (including needing to get the rodding below the baseboard), so a slow motion point motor has been used with my own design of actuator. The layout will be fully signalled – just one signal based on a slotted post home that used to be at Glanmule to protect a level crossing.

Most of the layout is wired up but I have not yet been able to connect and test all the microswitches that will switch the crossings. And I have found during testing that in places the pointwork is a little under gauge despite using EM roller gauges throughout construction. So some remedial work has been needed.

A close look at the board will reveal that the plain track is SMP and the pointwork is largely built with SMP sleepers and chairs, but with soldered construction where strength is needed such as at the crossings and some ply sleepers as replacements where the plastic ones have curled up during construction. So cosmetic chairs still have to be added to the soldered sections.

Meanwhile I have been looking through my many stock boxes (my favourite activity seems to be building, but never quite finishing, wagons!) to see what is suitable for the 1930s (obviously none of my Rhymney Railway stock). But that is for the next post.

Here are a couple of photos of the board before track was laid so that you can see the construction. Also one of the track before it was laid so you can see most of the layout.

I suspect that my progress from here on will be slower than that of ChrisN and Anotheran, so it seems appropriate to put this thread in the Railways of Wales section.

Jonathan David

what is the update on the tfw 153,  are they keeping them or are they to hand them back like the 175??

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-58517351

I am sure the original bridge did not "lift". It did lift a little and then ran back over the fixed section. But on the whole not a bad piece.

Jonathan

https://www.ipernity.com/doc/312383/album/1305186

https://www.countytimes.co.uk/news/24699551.knighton-meeting-future-heart-wales-line/

Jonathan

Thanks

I need some help please.  Not living close to wales, I am attempting to model the B&M.   I am building a goods shed.  Can someone please guide me on the stone colour that would have been used on the B&M in the Brecon area....is the attached too light, not brown enough etc...

All help gratefully received.

Many thanks in advance.

Index to the following pages giving page and post number:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-65115780

Any chance of some pictures of progress or the new stock?

Jonathan

England please note.

Jonathan

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cxr0eg9drepo

Someone must have good contacts with the BBC or they were very shortm of news.

But nice pics.

Jonathan

Firstly looking at the sectional wooden buildings, would the window sections be replicated on both the platform and road sides?

Would the goods sheds be built from locally won stone or be brick built?

I have a few books on the LNWR lines in South Wales but they are light on images of both sides of station buildings and the goods facilities.

My interest is in the Swansea area if this would help with any answers.

In the spring or early summer of 1845, Thomas Powell, colliery owner and director of the Taff Vale Railway, purchased one (or probably two) locomotives from the London & Croydon Railway. These were No.2 Croydon and No.6 Archimedes — 2-2-2 types completed by G.&J. Rennie in May 1838 and April 1839, respectively. They had 13x18-inch inside-connected cylinders and 5-foot 6-inch drivers. (Croydon & Archimedes Table.pdf)

I presume that Powell bought the engines for use around his own works, but he subsequently sold one to the Taff Vale, by which time it was renamed Llantwit — Powell paid for a branch line between his Llantwit colliery and the Taff Vale at Merthyr Mawr, opened 25 April 1844. Croydon and Archimedes appear to have been very similar to the Taff Vale’s first pair of engines from Sharp, Roberts & Company, so this may have been the attraction.

(The Taff Vale also purchased two Norris-types from the Birmingham & Gloucester Railway in September/October 1845. The Aberdare bought one as well, in January 1846.)

The Taff Vale connection is noted in James W. Lowe’s British Steam Locomotive Builders under G.&J. Rennie; and also in D.S.M.Barrie’s The Taff Vale Railway. Unfortunately, both sources are short on details; and the only official Taff Vale listing I have for the period dates from 1841, and does not list engines by name.

Consequently, I have three questions:

1) Can anyone confirm Powell’s purchases in 1845, and subsequent resale to the Taff Vale Railway?

2) What dimensions were reported by the railway?

3) How long did it/they stay in operation?

I have no access to any Welsh railway material here in Canada, so any help or ideas will be gratefully received.

Dana

(On a matter of curiosity: In 1835 Sir John Guest, Lewis & Company bought Liverpool & Manchester Railway Planet-type No.20 Ætna for £250. I take it that the engine was put to work on the company’s tram roads around the Dowlais Iron Works. Could someone possibly tell me if this was so, and how long the engine lasted in the company’s service? I know that in 1848 the Dowlais Iron Works employed six standard gauge engines, but I have no details.)

I've made a half hearted attempt at making a list of Cambrian themed layouts but didn't get very far, so I thought I'd give it another try If you know of any others I've missed please add them in the comments and I'll keep this first post updated

There's some big gaps in the network to be filled Happy Cambrian modelling!

*****

February 13th 2015 Update - Thanks for feedback and corrections, some new layouts added.

*****

Mainline Layouts - Shrewsbury to Aberystwyth

SHREWSBURY (P4) - WIP BR(W) era layout of Shrewsbury Station by Ray Warner

Coastline Layouts - Machynlleth to Pwllheli

ABERDOVEY (OO) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/62254-porth-aberdovey/

BARMOUTH BRIDGE (O) - need a link

BARMOUTH JUNCTION (OO) - http://www.gtbuildingsmodels.co.uk/page24bj1.html

MORFA (EM) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/47984-morfa-spring-clean/

MORFA BACH (OO) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/852/entry-8959-morfa-bach-update-170312/

TRAETH MAWR (4mm Fictional) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/82047-traeth-mawr-planning-baseboards-questions/

SHELL ISLAND (EM Fictional) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=24923

AFON WEN - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/59813-afon-wen/

PWLLHELI (OO) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/60560-pwllheli-next-stop/

RHYD-Y-CLAFDY (4mm Fictional) - https://www.model-railways-live.co.uk/Articles/336/Rhyd-y-Clafdy_-_BRM_December_2002/

BODUAN JUNCTION (4mm Fictional) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/81357-rip-boduan-junction/?hl=%2Bboduan+%2Bjunction

Barmouth Junction - Dolgellau Layouts

ABERGWYNANT (EM Fictional) - http://rushbys-railways.blogspot.co.uk/2009/09/abergwynant.html

PENMAENPOOL (OO) - http://dukedog9017.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/steam-on-cambrian-my-layout-update.html

PENMAENPOOL (OO) - http://www.gtbuildin.../page24bj1.html

DOLGELLEY (O) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/79053-cambrian-and-gwr-0-gauge-loft-layout-building-baseboards/

Branchline Layouts

DINAS MAWDDWY (7mm) - http://forum.gn15.info/viewtopic.php?t=5305

LLANFYLLIN - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/80077-llanfyllin-branch/

TANAT VALLEY - http://apavalley.blogspot.co.uk/

Oswestry Area Layouts

OSWESTRY (2mmFS) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/82283-oswestry-in-2mm-fs-1955-65/

OSWESTRY WORKS (P4) - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/78071-oswestry-works-diorama/

Fictional Layouts

JOHNSTOWN ROAD (7mm) - Fictional 1908 Cambrian layout owned by Barrowmore Model Railway Group

EATON GOMERY (OO) - Fictional 1908 Cambrian/GWR/LNWR junction, station buildings based on Montgomery by Leamington & Warwick Model Railway Society

GENNIGAEL (OO) - Fictional Mid-Wales line Terminus, GWR & BR(W) by RosiesBoss

ABERGWYNANT (EM) - Fictional branch between Arthog and Penmaenpool

SARN (4MM) - Fictional Branch based on Kerry by Corneliuslundie

https://www.hattons.co.uk/newsdetail.aspx?id=594&utm_campaign=mar-376-hattonsgenesisrender3%2Bartwork&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Klaviyo&_ke=eyJrbF9lbWFpbCI6ICJuY2JAbmNiLm5kby5jby51ayIsICJrbF9jb21wYW55X2lkIjogIkpHUWVYaCJ9

The Cambrian drawings I have at the moment are the 4 wheel coaches in Mike Morton Lloyd's Tanat Valley Light Railway and the 6 wheel coaches in an MML article in September 1964 Model Railway Constructor. The most obvious matches to me seem to be:

a) 5 compartment all-third 6 wheel coach; about 4' too long, but the right sort of look.

b) 6 wheel full brake; also about 4' too long, but very similar, the Cambrian upper panels are somewhat narrower than the Hatton's.

c) 4 wheel 4 compartment composite coach; about 9 inches too long but the right sort of look.

There are of course a load of other Cambrian coaches which might be better matches. Whatever, someone looking for a quick addition of some Cambrian might find something useful.

The simplest conversions might be to take the SR olive green versions, slosh some white over the upper panels if you want a pre-1909 look, some red over the brake ends for a pre-1911 look, then decorate with WRRC Cambrian transfers.

There are issues of detail. The Cambrian had a habit of sticking W irons outside the springs on some of its coaches, and the roof furniture may or may not be appropriate.

Any thoughts?

Nigel

Jonathan