Hills of the North - The Last Great Project

[LNER4479]

Still cogitating.

 

Now added mock ups of the WCML trackbed (furthest away) and Crown Street goods (nearest) as a further check before taking saw to wood. The check is really to make sure that the bridges of these two upper lines cross the lower goods lines at a sensible angle - start curving the goods lines round too soon and the bridges become elongated and implausibly skewed.

(the third bridge, carrying the M&C route into the station is the furthest away of all, so is least affected, hence why not mocked up above)

Also shown, just as strips of card for now (slightly to the right of centre) is the approximate position of the St Nicholas bridge. Its alignment is horribly distorted by the nature of the (non-prototypical) 180 Deg curve; however, I'd like to include it nonetheless (and not for reasons of vanity or anything like that!)

 

Anyhow ...

 

In the meantime ...

 

Thought I'd tackle something more straightforward:

 

OK - tongue slightly in cheek there! With delivery on Thursday of the THIRD single slip required for this formation, I'm up to my usual tricks here. This is the heart of Upperby Junction (as I understand Carlisle No.12 box was called) and only a small part of it had been loosely done prior to the recent running session. Out of necessity, it's on a curve (the real one wasn't) and there's more to it than this. However, get this bit right and the rest fits around it to a greater or lesser extent.

 

You can see the curving effect here. On the left is the 'straight ahead' route from the down goods reception towards the Crown Street goods lines; on the right is the down goods line.

 

And from the other direction, we're now looking across the junction, ie points set to come across from Upperby to Citadel and vice versa.

 

There's a lot of patient - and rather boring(!) - work in the months ahead. Quite apart from getting the pointwork modified and laid such that stock will run across it reliably, there's the little matter of point motor installation/wiring (all points will be paired up to work as crossovers), frog switching and 'black section' switching.

 

I may be gone some time ...

 

Edited December 2, 2023 by LNER4479

[30368]

25 minutes ago, LNER4479 said:

Thought I'd tackle something more straightforward:

 

Flippin heck! Glad I am not sorting out wiring that lot up!

 

Kind regards,

 

30368

[Michael Edge]

The bridges can’t be curved, both are straight girders, concrete deck on the Crown Street one. The M&C bridge is also a straight girder but the tracks are sharply curved on it, leading to it being much wider as I pointed out before.

 

[LNER4479]

The bridges will be straight, Mike. But I can't guarantee the authenticity of other aspects of the alignment, being as the whole thing is approached on a 3 & half foot radius curve!

 

I'm hoping that things will be reasonably convincing from the St. Nicholas bridge towards the station, although the M&C lines are going to have to appear from under it 🤨

[LNER4479]

9 hours ago, 30368 said:

Flippin heck! Glad I am not sorting out wiring that lot up!

 

Kind regards,

 

30368

 

Looks even scarier when placed in position!

 

Some further work this afternoon to make the join between the top single slip and the curved point beyond (45mm track centres).

 

You can begin to see the full effect of the junction here and the five lines involved - goods reception sandwiched between goods lines and WCML.

 

Despite the apparent convoluted nature of it all, the 'flow' of the goods lines is maintained through the junction. These lines will continue on to the 180 deg. curve round to Bog Junc.

 

The unpainted points (four) have been removed again and are now in the spray treatment area ...

[LNER4479]

Meanwhile the cogitating (prevarication even, maybe?) is at an end - saw has been applied to wood!

 

So, in the end, it's quite an insignificant looking piece of wood. The further piece of wood round the bend will be removable for access.

 

And with some tracks temporarily plonked in position?

 

Doesn't look too bad. The divergence is established beneath the WCML bridge, meaning that there's room for the central support columns. But that's a bit in the future just yet.

 

[John76]

10 hours ago, LNER4479 said:

There's a lot of patient - and rather boring(!) - work in the months ahead. Quite apart from getting the pointwork modified and laid such that stock will run across it reliably, there's the little matter of point motor installation/wiring (all points will be paired up to work as crossovers), frog switching and 'black section' switching.

 

Boring to some and fascinating to others. Section switching and interlocking (I'm hoping) is fine with me. Look forward to hearing all about it.

 

John

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

Wooden Origami, brilliant!

 

Mike.

[coronach]

10 hours ago, LNER4479 said:

 

Looks even scarier when placed in position!

 

Some further work this afternoon to make the join between the top single slip and the curved point beyond (45mm track centres).

 

You can begin to see the full effect of the junction here and the five lines involved - goods reception sandwiched between goods lines and WCML.

 

Despite the apparent convoluted nature of it all, the 'flow' of the goods lines is maintained through the junction. These lines will continue on to the 180 deg. curve round to Bog Junc.

 

The unpainted points (four) have been removed again and are now in the spray treatment area ...

Very impressive Graham- lovely alignment. Not many layouts include realistic complex junctions such as this. I look forward to further progress.
 

The signalling will be equally impressive- will it be semaphore?

[LNER4479]

8 hours ago, coronach said:

Very impressive Graham- lovely alignment. Not many layouts include realistic complex junctions such as this. I look forward to further progress.
 

The signalling will be equally impressive- will it be semaphore?

Thanks 🙂

 

If there's one aspect of the hobby I love almost more than anything else, it's poring over a trackplan / signalling for a prototype location, working out all the possible routes through the junctions and how it might have been operated - and then trying to distill that down into model form to catch the essence of the place. Very few locations can be modelled exactly (Carlisle in France being a notable exception!) so it's about choosing which lines, sidings, pointwork to ditch, what to compress, etc whilst replicating the prototype operability.

 

Signalling will be predominantly semaphore - certainly, Carlisle No.12 & 13 boxes (Upperby) will be all semaphore. The only place where colour light made serious inroads in my timeframe will be the Carlisle No.5 (station approach from the south and the south end of the station) - the lovely LNWR signals were replaced there in the early 1950s. Carlisle No.4 (north end of the station) was a mixture, still quite a few semaphores there in the 1950s.

 

The immediate work ahead looks like this:

 

- Construct baseboards and lay goods lines from Upperby, through Bog Junction and connect up with existing goods lines through Dentonholme (that, inter alia, requires completion of Upperby junction - or certainly the goods side of it, laid for keeps with point motors affixed). It also includes the double track, plain crossing arrangement at Bog Junction.

- Install Bog Junction lever frame and associated relays, with wiring to activate frog switching through the plain crossing. Until that's done, the layout is out of action, as the double track, plain crossing crosses the running lines out of Central

- Remove temporary Upperby control panels, install M&C trackbed (rising up out of Central) and construct permanent Upperby control panel

- Thence lots of wiring up point motors and associated relay panels!

- Complete installation of Upperby turntable (roundhouse) tracks, lay rest of MPD and goods yard (more wiring!)

- Complete tracklaying at Dentonholme goods yard and install Dentonholme control panel

 

That little lot should keep me busy for at least the next 12 months!(!)

 

Sempahores will be added as and when. Their operation will be built into the control system (including interlocking) but their actual installation can follow on behind (hopefully not TOO much so!)

 

All of the above 'subject to' (God willing and all that)

 

 

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some holes to dig for point motors. Or is that some baseboard structure for the goods lines ... ?

 

Edited December 3, 2023 by LNER4479

[Michael Edge]

You will definitely need some black sections for Upperby Junction - and make sure you leave room for the signals.

A view on our layout from the south, St Nicholas bridge in the distance. Although Upperby is compressed (the scale section ends at the bridge) we do have all the main line and connecting junctions in here and it wasn't easy working out how to control it and interlock the signals. Signals, as with all the semaphores, are from Steve Hewitt and are interlocked in the sense that they show which route has been set, no worries with sections, this layout is all DCC. This view from 2019, the scenery has been completed since but the track still han;t been ballasted yet

[coronach]

2 hours ago, LNER4479 said:

Thanks 🙂

 

If there's one aspect of the hobby I love almost more than anything else, it's poring over a trackplan / siganlling for a prototype location, working out all the possible routes through the junctions and how it might have been operated - and then trying to distill that down into model form to catch the essence of the place. Very few locations can be modelled exactly (Carlisle in France being a notable exception!) so it's about choosing which lines, sidings, pointwork to ditch, what to compress, etc whilst replicating the prototype operability.

 

Signalling will be predominantly semaphore - certainly, Carlisle No.12 & 13 boxes (Upperby) will be all semaphore. The only place where colour light made serious inroads in my timeframe will be the Carlisle No.5 (station approach from the south and the south end of the station) - the lovely LNWR signals were replaced there in the early 1950s. Carlisle No.4 (north end of the station) was a mixture, still quite a few semaphores there in the 1950s.

 

The immediate work ahead looks like this:

 

- Construct baseboards and lay goods lines from Upperby, through Bog Junction and connect up with existing goods lines through Dentonholme (that, inter alia, requires completion of Upperby junction - or certainly the goods side of it, laid for keeps with point motors affixed). It also includes the double track, plain crossing arrangement at Bog Junction.

- Install Bog Junction lever frame and associated relays, with wiring to activate frog switching through the plain crossing. Until that's done, the layout is out of action, as the double track, plain crossing crosses the running lines out of Central

- Remove temporary Upperby control panels, install M&C trackbed (rising up out of Central) and construct permanent Upperby control panel

- Thence lots of wiring up point motors and associated relay panels!

- Complete installation of Upperby turntable (roundhouse) tracks, lay rest of MPD and goods yard (more wiring!)

- Complete tracklaying at Dentonholme goods yard and install Dentonholme control panel

 

That little lot should keep me busy for at least the next 12 months!(!)

 

Sempahores will be added as and when. Their operation will be built into the control system (including interlocking) but their actual installation can follow on behind (hopefully not TOO much so!)

 

All of the above 'subject to' (God willing and all that)

 

 

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some holes to dig for point motors. Or is that some baseboard structure for the goods lines ... ?

 

It’s going to look superb when fully installed. A realistic track layout with the correct provision of semaphore signals and a disciplined operation of trains is what turns a train set into a model railway - irrespective of scale, detail or whether the rolling stock has the correct number of rivets.  

[LNER4479]

Anyhow, wot's 'e been getting up to on 'is workbench these last couple of weeks?

 

I'm ever so glad you've asked me that. Apparently, some people recoil in terror at the very mention of the name 'Brassmasters'.

 

That makes it sound like a challenge to me. And I do rather like soldering things up from brass (or nickel silver) etches.

 

Some parts are indeed insanely small.

 

Especially when it'll either be difficult or downright impossible to see once the vehicle is on the track?

 

Completed inner frames, at least so far as can be done before fitting wheels and affixing in position.

 

So here we have the visible (outside) tender frames.

 

Soldering on those rivetted strips - that was fun (not!)

 

Rear buffer beam ...

 

... front dragbox

 

Ok, so perhaps you might be getting an idea now?

 

I won't leave you completely in suspenders on this occasion. The eagle eyed might have spotted the slightly closer wheelset spacing - this is indeed an LMS 3,500 gallon tender. It's for a Jubilee project - but which one?

 

[Barry O]

@LNER4479.. you forgot something on your "to do" list.. ballasting loads and loads of track...

 

Baz

[Enterprisingwestern]

9 hours ago, LNER4479 said:

It's for a Jubilee project - but which one?

 

Your 100th?

 

Mike.

[65179]

Jutland?

 

Simon

[30368]

49 minutes ago, 65179 said:

Jutland?

 

That was in 2016.

 

30368

[Jol Wilkinson]

Not this Jubilee, I expect (not a Brassmasters kit).

 

 

 

 

[65179]

54 minutes ago, 30368 said:

 

That was in 2016.

 

30368

 

Oops. Was it that long ago?  Mind you it still wouldn't be finished now if it was built to my timescales!

 

I'll go for a Scottish exile then, 45665.

 

Simon 

[LNER4479]

3 hours ago, 65179 said:

Oops. Was it that long ago?  Mind you it still wouldn't be finished now if it was built to my timescales!

 

I'll go for a Scottish exile then, 45665.

 

Simon 

Nope - you were right the first time. It is indeed destined to run behind 45684. Well worked out (altho I know you know yer stuff when it comes to Jubs). According to my research, one of a relatively few WCML sloping throatplate Jubs that ran with a Stanier 3,500 gall tender in my 1950s timeframe.

 

It's just the tender I'm building for this one. I have recently come into the possession of a full Brassmasters Jub kit (with Fowler tender) that I will tackle subsequently. This current mini project is a warm up (!)

[Clive Mortimore]

3,500 gallon tender. Mine is a cut and shut Hornby body on a shortened Bachmann chassis. The loco will become 45580 Burma, my great grandfather fought there in the 1890s and my father also saw combat there during WW2.

 

Graham, are you also going to have a flat sided tender? Bachmann Fowler tender was the starting point. This loco is going to be named after myself, 45710.

[richard i]

11 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

This loco is going to be named after myself,

What, spider?

[Clive Mortimore]

44 minutes ago, richard i said:

What, spider?

No I am changing my name by deed poll to 45710.

[Porkscratching]

6 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

No I am changing my name by deed poll to 45710.

Is that Clive 45710..  or 45710 Mortimore...? 

[LNER4479]

(Captain) Fantastic!

 

Not tempted by 45726, then?(!) I might do that one one day just for a bet.