Invernevis based on Fort William in N Gauge

[shanks522]

Looking good David, I think fort Bill is a perfect name to be honest.

 

Graham.

[Ronnie MB]

What about Garrisaig?

 

The Gaelic name for Fort William is An Gearasden (The Garrison).  Telescope Garrison into Mallaig.  It is also even a bit like Arisaig on the Mallaig Extension.

 

Sorry, just a thought.  I'll get my coat.

[David41283]

What about Garrisaig?

 

The Gaelic name for Fort William is An Gearasden (The Garrison).  Telescope Garrison into Mallaig.  It is also even a bit like Arisaig on the Mallaig Extension.

 

Sorry, just a thought.  I'll get my coat.

 

That's far better than any of my ideas! How is An Gearasden pronounced? Is it as it is written eg. phonetically "Gear - asden". My GCSE in German doesn't lend itself to Gaelic!

 

My thoughts were far more low-brow than that:

 

1) Fort [any stereotypically Scottish sounding male name] Robert, Douglas etc...

2) Something nicked from Game of Thrones - North of the wall obviously!

3) Fort (William) Wallace (see what I did there!)

 

Cheers for the suggestion.

 

David

[Urthra]

How is An Gearasden pronounced? Is it as it is written eg. phonetically "Gear - asden". My GCSE in German doesn't lend itself to Gaelic!

 

David

From what I know of Irish, its probably pronounced 'chicken'.

 

Its certainly not phonetic - perhaps, given the English pronunciation of garrison, it would be pronounced " an gerrisen".?

[David41283]

Hi everyone,

 

I'm still making slow progress with the baseboards which are now ready for undercoating.

 

Regards the name - I've been doing a little more research (WIkipedia - so take this with a pinch of salt!). I think it is important that the layout has a name that anyone can easily pronounce - including me!

 

The English name of Fort William is apparently a little controversial as it references the English Prince William - Duke of Cumberland who isn't popular north of the border. Different parts of the town have previously been called Maryburgh, Duncansburgh and Gordonsburgh. The area was historically part of the land of Clan Cameron. The areas of Inverlochy and Lochaber are also nearby. Apparently Invernevis has been mooted as an alternative name for the town.

 

So my shortlist is:

 

Fort Cameron - which works as a suitably scottish name to replace "william" and references the local Clan.

Invernevis - a name used by many properties in the town and linked to the nearby Ben Nevis

Duncansburgh - a former name of part of the town.

 

Cheers

 

David 

[Urthra]

How about inverlochy?

It has its own set of sidings, at least. It has a ring of anywhere-north-of-perth about it, yet is a genuine place immediately outside Ft William itself.

Fort William isnt that unpopular, at least not in the area. I have to say nobody of my aquaintance has objected to the name, just as Fr George and Ft Augustus ( named for George Augustus, elector of Hanover and King of the UK) are allowed their names without objection fromthe locals.

[Ronnie MB]

I think the name was much more controversial in the past.  My Gaelic is rudimentary, but An Gearasden would be pronounced An Gerr-ash-dun (the last somewhere between don and done).

 

I agree that being able to pronounce the name of your own layout must be a priority, which was why I suggested a telescoped name.

 

Sorry for sending everyone off on a tangent - I hope normal modelling service can resume shortly, because I am enjoying the development of the layout!

[David41283]

Hi everyone,

 

I did say my research was from Wikipedia - not always known for it's absolute accuracy!

 

I reckon I'm leaning towards Invernevis - this name is used in the area; Google brings up Invernevis hotels, Invernevis B&B's and Invernevis Care Home all in Fort William and it roughly means "mouth of the River Nevis" the location of which is Fort William.

 

In the meantime here is a modelling carpentry update.

 

Both boards have now been finished with sanding and filling complete. I have now fitted pattern makers dowels and heavy duty case clips (from Station Road Baseboards via eBay) to hold them together at the join.

 

I hope people don't find this boring, but I have never fitted pattern makers dowels before. I searched the forum for advice and found that most people seem to casually note "fitted with pattern makers dowels" without explaining how. They are certainly unforgiving of any errors, so here is how I did it:

 

• Once both boards were built and the glue had had several days to dry I removed any screw heads which hadn't fully counter-sunk and sanded the faces of each board to ensure that they were absolutely flush where they will meet.
• I then lined the boards up on a flat surface and tightly screwed a spare length of 2x1 timber across the join where the track will be - thus ensuring the track bed was tightly together and dead level in the crucial area.
• The boards were then tipped onto their side and two pilot holes drilled right through with a small drill bit. I then removed the bit of timber to separate the two boards. 
• Each pilot hole was then opened up with a 25mm spade bit - this is where things went a little wrong. As I was drilling out the recess for the pattern makers dowels into ply each lamination of the plywood tended to splinter away in one go- thus making it very hard to control the depth and I subsequently went too deep and the dowels barely met when test fitted.
• I remedied this by making some 25mm discs of good quality artist's mount board, 1 or 2 of these spacers were put into the recess along with plenty of PVA to bring the dowels back flush with the end of the baseboard. When the dowels were tightly screwed down through the spacers and the mount boards discs were squeezed tight it all dried rock solid after a couple of days.
• I then dug out the centre of the "female" half of the dowel with my dremel to allow the dowels to fully interlock.
• The pattern makers dowels now work perfectly, and with the heavy duty case clips the two baseboards join far more securely and accurately than I had hoped.

 

 

The boards just need an undercoat now before I can lay cork tiles on the trackbed - when I get a spare hour or so I will get this done.

 

I am still waiting for my delivery of track from British Finescale - my last order took over three weeks, so hopefully will be any day soon.

 

I've also decided to stick with DC operation - I have used DCC before, but as much as I found some benefits, I did get fed up with all the button pressing while shunting. There is also the factor that although my fleet for this layout is 8 locos, I have many more which may well find their way onto the layout too and with decent chips costing £25-£35 the cost implications are huge.

 

I may well order a cobalt point motor - the clearance below the track bed is 70mm and apparently they are 68mm deep! I wonder if it is possible to remove the connector block and make direct soldered connections to reduce the depth needed by a couple of cm. There's only one way to find out!!

 

Thanks for all the interest and input as ever.

 

David

[David41283]

I think the name was much more controversial in the past.  My Gaelic is rudimentary, but An Gearasden would be pronounced An Gerr-ash-dun (the last somewhere between don and done).

 

I agree that being able to pronounce the name of your own layout must be a priority, which was why I suggested a telescoped name.

 

Sorry for sending everyone off on a tangent - I hope normal modelling service can resume shortly, because I am enjoying the development of the layout!

 

Your input was extremely useful and got me thinking - thanks for taking the time to post!

[Revolution Ben]

 

Hi David,

 

One of the nice aspects of the model railway hobby, in my mind, is its diversity.

 

The discussion on place names is a good example. Setting the scene in our imaginary worlds can be fun and learning about local history, custom or traditions is an added benefit that enriches us all.

 

I've just spent a very enjoyable 10 minutes reading more about Scottish place names so thanks for prompting that and I learned that the Gaelic word for Fort is, apparently, Dun.

 

So my contribution : Dunwilliam. Or even, if you want to talk of the fort on the Nevis, Dun Nevis, or Dunnevis.

 

Cheers

 

Ben A.

[Ronnie MB]

I think he has Dunworrying now!

[David41283]

I think he has Dunworrying now!

 

I'm sure there's a "dunroamin" scottish layout name pun in here somewhere. However I don't think I'll ever come up with anything as good as "Kinmundy" which is well known. (Having said that I've always assumed Kinmundy is a pun! It may just be me!)

 

Thanks for everyone's interest and ideas, I'm sticking with Invernevis for now.

 

Cheers

 

David 

[David41283]

Good evening.

 

Some actual modelling has been taking place....

 

After 5 weeks the Finetracks parts I ordered arrived last week. (I am a big advocate of these "cottage industries" - but I reckon they could do with taking down the "Usually ships in 1-2 days" from their website).

 

I am going to try and use the Finetracks to build the track as if I were scratch-building. The kits themselves contain just enough rail to make a pair of points, which steers you towards effectively making your own set-track which you then join together, whereas when building your own track you tend to build flowing sections of pointwork as a single unit using long lengths of rail. (NB I have never built my own track - I get the impression this is the way!).

 

So I treated myself to a cheapo glass placemat from a discount homeware store for around £3. This gave me a dead-flat surface to start on. I then printed out the key section of my trackplan from Anyrail5 and stuck this down, then stuck on the point templates from the British Finescale website. The sleepers and bases were then temporarily stuck down onto this. I have added a few copper clad sleepers for strength and also replaced some parts of the points where I needed to move away from the supplied design.

 

After a few nights work, I have reached this stage, with a couple of the rails in place. I have used longer bits of rail rather than the short pieces supplied with the points wherever possible.

 

 

Cheers

 

David

[alibuchan]

Looks good so far. I think that's the best way to go, treating it like a flow of points rather than seperate ones

 

Given me something to think about, for when I (eventually, at some point, in the hopefully not too distant future) make my track work up.

 

Looking forward to seeing this progress

 

Alistair

[David41283]

Still making slow and steady progress with the track....

 

 

just the 6 switch blades to make up now. Everything so far runs very smoothly when tested with a couple of old Farish coach bogies.

 

Cheers

 

David

[60012 Commonwealth of Australia]

C

 

Good evening.

 

Some actual modelling has been taking place....

 

After 5 weeks the Finetracks parts I ordered arrived last week. (I am a big advocate of these "cottage industries" - but I reckon they could do with taking down the "Usually ships in 1-2 days" from their website).

 

I am going to try and use the Finetracks to build the track as if I were scratch-building. The kits themselves contain just enough rail to make a pair of points, which steers you towards effectively making your own set-track which you then join together, whereas when building your own track you tend to build flowing sections of pointwork as a single unit using long lengths of rail. (NB I have never built my own track - I get the impression this is the way!).

 

So I treated myself to a cheapo glass placemat from a discount homeware store for around £3. This gave me a dead-flat surface to start on. I then printed out the key section of my trackplan from Anyrail5 and stuck this down, then stuck on the point templates from the British Finescale website. The sleepers and bases were then temporarily stuck down onto this. I have added a few copper clad sleepers for strength and also replaced some parts of the points where I needed to move away from the supplied design.

 

After a few nights work, I have reached this stage, with a couple of the rails in place. I have used longer bits of rail rather than the short pieces supplied with the points wherever possible.

 

20160619_235458 (768x1024).jpg

 

Cheers

 

David

Could just be the post service. Here in Aus, I posted something to about 50km away. It sent it from Victoria to Queensland and back, before getting to the destination. Doubled the journey time. Same with Hattons, estimated 5-7 working day transit for international, took 3 and a half weeks to arrive. So not necessarily the company, but I don't know how Royal Mail works. All I know is Aus Post... Doesn't

 

(bit of an overstatement but still... Sending something 2000km away from where it's meant to go for a 4050km round trip when it should just be a 50km one-way trip is ridiculous)

 

That aside, I look forward to seeing progress! Bit outside my era (all 3 of them , N scale WWII, P4 in the 50s and 60s, and O scale pre-grouping) but have always had a soft spot for Scottish layouts whatever era!

 

Peter

[David41283]

Hi everyone,

 

After a month of enjoyable work building the pointwork for the station throat, I have had a significant change of heart.

 

I just don't think that hand-built finescale trackwork is for me. I feel I have given it a good go and got a reasonable feel for how it will work, but I just can't shake the impression that if I press ahead with building the track I am going to create a huge amount more work which I fear will detract from my enjoyment of building, running and (hopefully) exhibiting a layout which I am really positive about.

 

I want to be able to get the layout out, use it with my kids and take it to exhibitions. I don't want to spend the next 12 months painstakingly scratch building a whole town worth of buildings only for the points not to work, or blades need mending etc.. 

 

My main concerns are around the actuation of the points and the robustness of the tie-bar and blades assembly under the stress of a lot of use.

 

The finetracks design simply has a 1mm long peg which slots into a hole on the tie bar. I didn't find that this held together firmly enough so I soldered the switchblades to the tiebars. However this removes any possible rotation from the joint, which (especially on the shorter points A+B) means that the blade, which you have filed to a very fine point is bent into a shallow 'S' every time the point is thrown. In this instance this is exacerbated due to the relatively large distance the blade needs to travel to allow coarse N-gauge flanges to pass through. Not only does this not look "right", but I have seen first hand many, many accounts of frequent repairs to hand-made points around the tiebar/blade area and this stress is only going to lead to failures.

 

Reading other parts of this forum and other forums there are many, many incredibly inventive ways of actuating the points while still allowing this essential rotation where the switchblade meets the tie bar - people have invented all sorts of contraptions to allow a thin wire from each switch blade to move under the board, or flexible wire beneath the boards etc..

 

Anyway - I've removed the "finescale" from the title of the thread, and ordered around £200 worth of code 55 from my local model shop, along with point motors etc... 

 

Hopefully in a fortnight I should be able to update with the track laid, wired and working!

 

Please feel free to "unfollow" if you were interested in the progress of a layout build using the Finetracks system, but hopefully I can soon have some trains moving, a harbour wall, and nice buildings being made! 

 

My conclusion, and this is maybe stating the bloomin' obvious, building your own track, whether with kits or not, isn't just building your own track - the whole lot (wiring, alignment, track laying, point motors, platform height etc..) requires more time, thought, inventiveness and effort, and I have discovered that, for me, the gains in appearance aren't worth the extra work at this stage of a project. I tip my hat to those who can see this kind of endeavour through to a reliable, robust and successful conclusion - you have gained my respect over the course of the last month. I don't feel I've wasted my time or money, as I have learnt a valuable lesson about track building, improved my soldering and discovered where my tolerances end! 

 

Sorry for the long post - I feel much happier now I'm going to get cracking with the good old Peco, especially as most of it will be hidden behind the sea wall and platforms anyway!

 

Cheers

 

David

[Guest eddie reffin]

Hi David,

 

With a little bit of work, Peco code 55 is more than acceptable and certainly durable enough. For me, life is too short to be fiddling about constantly to get it right so code 55 fits the bill for me. Maybe I'm more pragmatic than others and that a layout needs to feel right as a whole. You can have perfect hand built track but then spend little time doing the scenery or vice versa. It's all one big balancing act!

 

Good luck, you won't regret it!

[dhjgreen]

My main layout is EM but for a second layout I was tempted to go for N by a stunning model of Millfield Yard by Pauline McKenna. It shows what can be achieved using code 55. My N gauge layout is now a work in progress.

[IanStock]

Hello David, entirely reasonable decision. Fine scale is not for everyone, and I nearly made the same decision, though in the end I decided to plough on. It's definitely true that there are hidden issues fine fine/hand built track, in terms of longer term reliability, and even getting the electrics right can be difficult. I had not expected, for example, the hours spent tracking down multiple stray short circuits between sleepers and in turnouts that kept bringing the whole thing to a halt. It is clearly better to build a little and get such things right, rather than build a lot and then discover the problems, as I did.

 

I've seen some of the French guys doing interesting things with Peco track. They seem much more prepared than us to cut out the whole sleeper web and spring mechanisms around the switch blades and re-do them with Tortoises or similar, while retaining the reliability through the crossing. Might be worth a try?

 

Ian

[dhjgreen]

...I've seen some of the French guys doing interesting things with Peco track. They seem much more prepared than us to cut out the whole sleeper web and spring mechanisms around the switch blades and re-do them with Tortoises or similar, while retaining the reliability through the crossing. Might be worth a try...

It is interesting you should say that as that is an area that I was not happy with.  With a background in EM, the concept of using the spring/side contact method of switching did not really appeal to me neither did the opposite polarity of the adjacent switch rail.

 

So, I removed the over-centre spring and cut the plastic on the back, where the hinge is, together with some on the adjacent stock rail (still with me) I was then able to solder the hinge solid and connect to the stock rail (setting the blades to mid position for least stress).  

 

The modification is completed by using a very narrow diamond cutting disc in a Dremel to isolate the common crossing and using the same disk to remove the solenoid motor fittings around the switch (no too ambitious though or the blades fall off).  Operation of the turnout by micro-servo and a switch for the common crossing polarity.

 

David,  I did buy some code 40 rail, but thought it would be nuts after I looked at it.  The above mods do go some way to satisfying my "fine-scale" ambitions, could be something for you in it?

[westhighlandline]

As for the name quest: as long as it's not Drumnadrochit, I'll be ok with anything.

[millerhillboy]

An interesting thread for me, having spent a lot of time with a blank baseboard in lieu of a decision between code 55 and finetrax. It would appear to be a decision I can't make,

I looked closely at finescale track on the DEMU stand at the recent Perth show and had a helpful conversation with the builder who gave great advice, I have to admit I was thoroughly impressed with the look but no matter how I looked at it I'm was struck by the potential flimsyness of the track and long term the reliability.

Reading this is pushing me back to code 55, I too have kids that I'd like to encourage so that's a factor too for me. 

[60012 Commonwealth of Australia]

Hi everyone,

 

After a month of enjoyable work building the pointwork for the station throat, I have had a significant change of heart.

 

I just don't think that hand-built finescale trackwork is for me. I feel I have given it a good go and got a reasonable feel for how it will work, but I just can't shake the impression that if I press ahead with building the track I am going to create a huge amount more work which I fear will detract from my enjoyment of building, running and (hopefully) exhibiting a layout which I am really positive about.

 

I want to be able to get the layout out, use it with my kids and take it to exhibitions. I don't want to spend the next 12 months painstakingly scratch building a whole town worth of buildings only for the points not to work, or blades need mending etc.. 

 

My main concerns are around the actuation of the points and the robustness of the tie-bar and blades assembly under the stress of a lot of use.

 

The finetracks design simply has a 1mm long peg which slots into a hole on the tie bar. I didn't find that this held together firmly enough so I soldered the switchblades to the tiebars. However this removes any possible rotation from the joint, which (especially on the shorter points A+B) means that the blade, which you have filed to a very fine point is bent into a shallow 'S' every time the point is thrown. In this instance this is exacerbated due to the relatively large distance the blade needs to travel to allow coarse N-gauge flanges to pass through. Not only does this not look "right", but I have seen first hand many, many accounts of frequent repairs to hand-made points around the tiebar/blade area and this stress is only going to lead to failures.

 

Reading other parts of this forum and other forums there are many, many incredibly inventive ways of actuating the points while still allowing this essential rotation where the switchblade meets the tie bar - people have invented all sorts of contraptions to allow a thin wire from each switch blade to move under the board, or flexible wire beneath the boards etc..

 

Anyway - I've removed the "finescale" from the title of the thread, and ordered around £200 worth of code 55 from my local model shop, along with point motors etc... 

 

Hopefully in a fortnight I should be able to update with the track laid, wired and working!

 

Please feel free to "unfollow" if you were interested in the progress of a layout build using the Finetracks system, but hopefully I can soon have some trains moving, a harbour wall, and nice buildings being made! 

 

My conclusion, and this is maybe stating the bloomin' obvious, building your own track, whether with kits or not, isn't just building your own track - the whole lot (wiring, alignment, track laying, point motors, platform height etc..) requires more time, thought, inventiveness and effort, and I have discovered that, for me, the gains in appearance aren't worth the extra work at this stage of a project. I tip my hat to those who can see this kind of endeavour through to a reliable, robust and successful conclusion - you have gained my respect over the course of the last month. I don't feel I've wasted my time or money, as I have learnt a valuable lesson about track building, improved my soldering and discovered where my tolerances end! 

 

Sorry for the long post - I feel much happier now I'm going to get cracking with the good old Peco, especially as most of it will be hidden behind the sea wall and platforms anyway!

 

Cheers

 

David

I doubt that you will regret this decision in the long term. I briefly looked at doing 2mmFS, but along with the fact that I already have a bit of Code 55 and the cost I have decided to go with N scale Code 55. To me, I think that as long as it looks realistic, it doesn't matter whether it's N/2mmFS; 00/EM/P4 or 0/S7 - a perfect example is Great Northern's Peterborough North, which is 00FS, but looks like it's P4. With 2mm, the difference between Code 55 and handlaid 2mmFS is so small that it doesn't really effect how the layout looks. But that's just my opinion and I'm no expert. With Dunoon, I'm going P4 as it's my long-term layout, and I want it to be the absolute best possible.

 

But as I say, I doubt that you will regret this decision, and I look forward to seeing some progress!

 

Peter

[IanStock]

Hmm. Each entirely to their own of course. Most of the points made above probably have traction. It is true that finer scale track is less sturdy and probably less durable in the long run. It is definitely true that it requires more work. But I can't agree with parity of appearance.

 

Each will have their own priorities and tolerances, but if there were no difference in the appearance, I don't think I would have persevered. Sad though I may be, I still sometimes just sit there looking at my layout (so far) and just soak up how much better code 40 rail with decent sleeper spacing and track geometry looks :-)

 

I thing that is more apparent that minute variations in gauge - and it's worth remembering that you can use code 40 rail, with care, without ne

eding to go the whole hog into 2mm FS.

Edited July 16, 2016 by IanStock