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Cranby Junction in N (Finescale) Planning


daniel8910

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Hello all

 

After several false starts, on projects which were almost always far too ambitious, I have found what seems to be the perfect plan. Some of you may remember the plan 'Cranby Junction', which was featured in one of the railway modelling magazines a loooong time ago (were talking decades here), which featured a medium size station, goods yard, and a dock on a different ground level, all completed with beautiful flowing trackwork.

 

There is a hitch however; I first looked at this plan about 12 months ago, and made a rough mock up of the plan at the time on templot, before soon after becoming occupied with more pressing matters (the vicious tempest that is golf). I now cannot find the original plan anywhere on the internet, however still have the templot plan. It would be really useful if anyone who has any memory of the plan could help me with my search for the original plan!

 

Anyways, I will attach my mock up of the plan on templot, and due to my own inexperience of templot/trackwork design, would greatly appreciate some feedback on any places I may have gone wrong on the plan. Please note that I have not included a fiddle yard in this plan as the file would have been to big to attach. The plan is 2mm scale, but will be built with N-gauge handbuilt track with DC control.

 

Thanks for reading

 

Daniel

cranby.box

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PM'ed you with the plan (not sure if it's under copyright or not)

 

EDIT: If you need advice on the technical side post your plan on 85a.co.uk/forum/ (the Templot forum). They can help you with anything Templot. :)

 

Quentin

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Here is the original plan, hopefully my templot attempt is relatively close to the original.

 

Once the plan is complete (if such a thing is possible), Im going to start having a think about baseboard joins etc...oh the joys!

 

Regards,

 

Daniel

 

post-18147-0-04669000-1435526887.jpg

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Just realised I have made a huge blunder with the templot plan...instead of N gauge, I drew it in 2mm :cry:

 

Back to the proverbial drawing board...

 

Go to gauge > other gauges... . Select N gauge. Click the convert group button.

 

Martin.

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I did a conversion from 2FS to N gauge and found problems the first time I tried it. Standard 2FS has 22.33mm track centres, whereas standard N has 25mm centres. The conversion threw out the alignment of much of the track.

 

I worked out that if I altered the control template to N gauge with 22.33mm track centres before converting all the other templates, more or less everything still aligned OK.

 

I figured that I was using the same stock in both instances, so whilst strictly correct, the difference in track centres was not strictly necessary. Might be worth checking any really sharp curves though, just in case stock might collide on adjacent tracks.

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Unfortunately it is not mathematically possible to do a perfect conversion unless the gauge:scale ratio and the gauge:flangeway-gap ratio remain the same. In practice this means only the proto gauges convert closely: S7 - S - P4 - Proto87 - S2 etc., and even then there may be some tiny differences.

 

For other gauge conversions there are likely to be some slight mismatches, overlaps or gaps between the templates which need tidying up. But usually this is much quicker to do than starting again from scratch. The plain track templates will always convert exactly, so these shouldn't need changing and make a useful guide in re-adjusting the pointwork templates to fit.

 

If you have changed the scale, and you have used a background map or scan as a guide, note that this will need scaling up or down to match the new model scale. First reset the notch on the grid origin, or on the background shapes dialog, change the picture options tab > scaling lock options to grid. Otherwise you may need to shift the position of converted background to re-align with the converted tracks. Then on the background shapes dialog, select the picture shape in the list, click the modify shape tab > scale by... button. Enter the required percentage change as new scale / old scale x 100. Click the ? info button and read the notes.

 

Martin.

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Yet another issue on the plan...due to my making the plan a while ago, I didn't realise that it would be easier to use a small selection of points to create the layout plan with rather than using the entire spectrum that templot offers to be used (e.g. B8s, C10s etc..)

 

I have ended up with a plan with many many different kinds of points, something I would like to avoid, so ive deleted all the pointwork templates, and am in the process of standardising and replacing the pointwork templates.

 

Daniel

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For flow I would suggest the exact opposite. If you use standard templates you've effectively negated the point of Templot, which is to create site-specific trackwork just like the real world does (or perhaps did).

 

It's a good idea to set a minimum and a maximum angle, say only using 7, 8, and 10 (or whatever) but every frog you do will have to be slightly different anyway to fit. That's the stark reality of it. What you had before looked wonderful but you will not achieve that kind of grace and flow with what you're proposing. 

 

Also, a say B8 can take on an infinite number of forms. Straight, curved, contraflexture, wyes, split-deflection wyes, etc. So you might as well give up the notion of standardizing in the extreme sense. Unless of course you mean "only natural turnouts" curved to suit location or something to that effect.

 

Quentin

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'Mightbe'-

 

You make a very good point there; the railways were often a bit of a hotchpotch of many different types of points, and therefore makes it more prototypical to model the layout with a wide spectrum of points. However, cranby isn't a prototype (unfortunately), so im unsure as to which points would go where etc... I thought that by narrowing my selection down e.g. only 6 & 7 in the goods yard, and 8-10 on running lines, it could simplify the plan. Another aspect I took into account is the 'mass production' of frogs for the layout, in order to keep the number of jigs etc I have to make down.

 

Your natural turnouts suggestion is exactly what I will be attempting to do, continuing to use curved turnouts etc but just being a bit more methodical in how I create the plan

 

Best regards,

 

Daniel

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Jeff; Its incredible how much N gauge has improved, the detail is stunning! Its starting to become a much more viable option for people nowadays

"N" gauge has improved, my eyesight has deteriorated..........sorry.

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"N" gauge has improved, my eyesight has deteriorated..........sorry.

Snag is that you'll be looking at any other scale/gauge through those same deteriorated eyes. :-)

 

G.

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Eyesight and model railways is a thing that doesn't really get discussed so much (as far as Im aware), but I would imagine it would put a lot of elderly people off trying the smaller gauges? N may be ok for us young sprightly things, but for those who have aged a little they may find it difficult to do the tasks that require a bit of precision such as handbuilding track or modifying stock...

 

Daniel

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I'm certainly no longer young and spritely and have more than my fair share of ocular issues, but in general I dont have problems with seeing N gauge. The smallest individual parts/details are no smaller than those in 'larger' scales. Just that there's a heck of a lot more of them on 4mm/OO models.

 

But back to the thread layout subject - surely even if there's no exact conversion of the plan the essence and overall trackwork plan could be closely replicated.

 

G

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Very true there graham, I suppose it depends on what modelling your doing...

 

Re the layout plan, still not started the revision of pointwork. Been really busy with work/festival-going so haven't got round to it yet. Will hope to achieve some progress in the coming week and will update the thread as and when I manage to get some work done

 

Daniel

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