Nether Madder and Green Soudley Rly

[Regularity]

Soldering isn’t difficult. 
But you need to have enough heat (within reason) and remember the three key words:

cleanliness, cleanliness and cleanliness.

 

A hot enough iron allows you to get in and out before the metal (particularly brass) absorbs too much heat, taking it away from the joint you are trying to make and to one’s you have already made. 25W would probably work here, but I prefer 40W minimum.

Cleanliness #1: Surfaces must be physically clean. Red Scotchbrite is ideal for this.

Cleanliness #2: a chemical flux (phosphoric acid) will clean the joint further and also draw the solder into it.

Cleanliness #3: give it a good scrub with scouring cream and rinse with hot water at the end of the modelling session.

 

In practice, I usually run the two surfaces in advance: clean, flux, solder and wipe with Scotchbrite whilst solder is still (semi-)molten to leave a minimal amount, then join the surfaces, apply flux and hot iron.

 

People may tell you to use lots of different solders. Don’t bother. Standard “tin man’s solder, 60/40 tin/lead will do all of the work in skilled and practiced hands. Not falling into that category, I use 145 degree solder for applying overlays and details (it flows better) but not for anything requiring strength. Don’t ask how I know about the latter… For joint white metal to brass, I tin the latter first, then use 70 degree solder for the join: white metal to itself is done with just that. I don’t pre-tin white metal as the solder alloys to the surface.

 

I use a single flux: 9% phosphoric acid solution. Can’t be bothered with lots of different concentrations and that works in practice.

 

Except where I can’t get the standard solder to flow (see above) that’s all I use. 

Obviously if soldering stainless steel or making a crank axle for live steam (silver soldering) then things are different, but for most modellers a simple approach is fine.

 

I actually use a 50W temperature controlled iron now: it’s purchase about 20 years ago was the biggest step forward in my soldering I made, closely followed by the red Scotchbrite.

[Annie]

When I was still making tiny 19th century engines in P4 I used a pencil gas torch and jewellers silver content solder for all my soldering.  Using this approach does require good nerves, but for getting instant heat into one spot and removing the heat once the solder starts to flow it was a method that worked very well for me.  I had various chunks of brass that I used as heat sinks that I'd lay about the model around the items I wanted to solder and then it was in quick with the gas torch and the job was done.  I built a Manning-Wardle Class B  0-4-0ST using a pencil gas torch and nothing fell off it or came adrift while I was building it.  As I mentioned good nerves and a steady hand are essential equipment though.

[Weskie]

There are some instructions for assembling Bill Bedford (Mousa) W-Irons on Eileens Emporium web site.

https://www.eileensemporium.com/materials-for-modellers/product/instructions-for-bill-bedfords/category_pathway-1259

 

[St Enodoc]

2 hours ago, Regularity said:

I use a single flux: 9% phosphoric acid solution.

If you have trouble finding a source of phosphoric acid, try a home-brew shop. They sell a 10% solution as a sterilising agent.

[jwealleans]

Those Mousa wagons are very easy to put together - the easiest of any sprung suspension system I've used - and run very nicely once complete.  I don't use his couplings, but other than that you get more than everything you need in the box and as a rule you're looking at painting it in an hour or so.

[Martin S-C]

An engineers tool van repainted from a 2nd hand GW brass model and the mystery "Open A" given some TLC.

Edited December 21, 2021 by Martin S-C

[MrWolf]

It might be a fictitious livery, but the colour on the tool van looks very period, a sort of cardboard suitcase brown. I like it a lot.

[Martin S-C]

Thank you. I was trying to match Midland PW Dept red oxide and obviously failed completely!

"Suitcase Brown" is such evocative paint title as well. I need to use that colour more!

I have three other MR/LMS engineers vehicles and was hoping to match them. Derp.

Mind you I think I have discovered a lovely caramel colour that will do well for the loco livery if I ever decide to model the Railway Children's GN&SR

 

Edited December 22, 2021 by Martin S-C

[16Brunel]

Congrats on the 100 pages!

[Martin S-C]

Thank you, though I wish the layout had progressed further than it has! I'm now stuck waiting on an order of PECO code 75 BH large radius points which it seems are now like hen's teeth

[16Brunel]

That's OK, you've reset and are now heading in a more manageable and practical direction.  You're ahead of me - thanks, lack of budget - and have inspired me to reconsider my own plans.  Like you, I want a system railway manageable by one person, and your experiences have shown me that less is better than more.  Let's hope 2022 can allow us all some real progress!

 

- Scott

[Martin S-C]

4 hours ago, 16Brunel said:

That's OK, you've reset and are now heading in a more manageable and practical direction.  You're ahead of me - thanks, lack of budget - and have inspired me to reconsider my own plans.  Like you, I want a system railway manageable by one person, and your experiences have shown me that less is better than more.  Let's hope 2022 can allow us all some real progress!

Have you set out your plans and intentions anywhere on RMWeb or a blog, Scott? I am always interested in what others are doing.

I confess my layout can no longer claim to be a system but is really a terminus to fiddle yard scheme with a bunch of frills. There are a small number of freight and passenger moves I can do as though it were a "system" but I'm mostly faking it. My suspicion is, having failed spectacularly with my first attempt, that any system much bigger than something like the original Madder Valley or Aire Valley schemes would be more than a single person could manage. Simply keeping the track clean on my first layout was a major chore and sapped my enthusiasm.

Now if you had a club or informal group of 4-8 modellers whose interests all meshed you could build a wonderful system layout but the difficulty then is finding a group whose interests all lie in the same style of prototype and the operations that result. But a group could have a lot of fun if each person "was" a separate company and provided locos and stock for that company.

I have some plans for the fiddle yard area of my new layout and that is to make it scenic at least in basic terms. The two pairs of push-pull/railcar sidings I have now sketched in as crude small terminus stations so even though there will need to be some hand shunting I could name these Green Soudley and Snarling and allocate these some (off-scene) industries to make running short freight trains to them semi-meaningful.

[16Brunel]

Martin, all I've really come up with so far is a schemetic and some ideas...

 

 

No prizes for guessing the source of the names!  Mainline = black, branches = grey, both single track.  Set in the mid-1920s, ie the hedonistic times before the Great Depression.  Maximum train length = 4 4-6 wheel coaches + tank engine (see coaches from the Etched Pixels/Ultima catalogue below - very likely mainline candidates, and definitely not my work!).  Only tank engines need apply - island distances won't need tenders, and it saves on turntables.  Most likely to be in N-scale, both to fit more in and to allow room to breathe (ie bigger gaps between stations, wider scenery).  Any fiddle/storage yards will be inserted between stations - again to give the impression of longer distances.  I imagine the island to be in the English Channel, a few miles off the Cornwall/Devon coast, granite-based, and with a pitchblende mine amongst the WMC's assets (I fancy having a GWR Bullion Van as the only bogie vehicle on the line, for this expensive and dangerous commodity.  St Cecily's can be a world-leading centre for atomic research!).

 

Bunbury will basically be like Bembridge IoWR, but with a fourth point in lieu of the sector table.  Gwendolen will be like your main station, but on a much smaller scale (ie terminus with a through platform for the St Cecily's branch).  Port Augusta may be served by a small train ferry - yet to be decided.  Merriman's and WMC will be in there somewhere, just not sure where yet.  St Cecily's University will be an old monastry that converted itself into a university to avoid King Henry VIII's wrath, and will be overseen by Chancellor Chasuble.

 

 

Once I've got something up and running, with at least some scenery, then I might bring others into my world (ie join a club), but I'd like to go solo to start with.

 

- Scott (in Melbourne, Australia)

[ianathompson]

On 01/01/2022 at 17:19, Martin S-C said:

Simply keeping the track clean on my first layout was a major chore and sapped my enthusiasm.

 

What type of track and cleaning methods are you using?

I only ask as the AFK receives little track cleaning once in session, which can last for two months or more.

 

I use nickel silver track which is cleaned with a track rubber before the session starts.

Once the session begins a graphite pencil is used as needed.

Occasionally certain track areas might need a second pass with the rubber.

 

All loco wheels are cleaned before a session.

Certain (well known) characters can be troublesome but a quick session with the wheel celaning brush and a fibregalss pencil usually sorts this out.

 

Ian T

[Martin S-C]

Hi Ian

I have tried a variety of methods including both cheap and expensive track cleaning wagons, cloths dampened with methylated spirit or isopropyl alcohol, Peco track rubbers, pretty much everything. The issue was the amount of track, especially the amount inaccessible in tunnels and this was high on the list of things I was not happy with regarding the NMGS v.1 and hence why I've severely reduced the amount of hidden track in v.2 as well as simplified generally.

I do not mind track cleaning, but I do mind cleaning a lot of track!

[ianathompson]

3 hours ago, Martin S-C said:

The issue was the amount of track, especially the amount inaccessible in tunnels and this was high on the list of things I was not happy with

 I must admit that this is a problem.

As far as possible the layout was designed to minimise the hidden sections.

 

Somewhere or other there is a Fleischmann track cleaner waiting for conversion to a tamper.

These seem to be fairly reliable as they are self driven and can, by the look of it, be eaily modified to take home made cleaners.

Must get round to doing something about it one day!

 

Ian T

[Martin S-C]

I've been advised today that part of the large order of Peco pointwork is on the way  - though I don't know how much. I hope in a few days I can commence track laying. I'll begin from the buffer stops of the platforms.

[Compound2632]

13 hours ago, Martin S-C said:

I'll begin from the buffer stops of the platforms.

 

Conventional wisdom states that one works outwards from the most complicated piece of pointwork, e.g. the station throat.

[MrWolf]

58 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Conventional wisdom states that one works outwards from the most complicated piece of pointwork, e.g. the station throat.

 

That's where I started, in my case it was only four points, creating a crossover and two trailing points, but that dictated and defined the position of everything else on the layout.

 

[Compound2632]

Just now, MrWolf said:

That's where I started, in my case it was only four points, creating a crossover and two trailing points, but that dictated and defined the position of everything else on the layout.

 

and if @MrWolf submitted to the dictates of conventional wisdom...

[MrWolf]

Conventional wisdom is perfectly fine provided that you are certain that the person offering said advice is doing so in an altruistic manner as in this case.

I have found in the outside world it is often a case of someone else benefitting from your compliance or sacrifice, if only from their own sense of schadenfreude....

 

However, the way I did things with my own layout was to fit the bits of pointwork together and move them around on the baseboard (in the rough position) until I found the optimal position. This can be only a few millimetres either way, but it gave me the full length platform and most workable goods yard, from the point of view of both road and rail traffic, which is where a lot of model goods yards throw up problems! (Been there, ****ed that up!) 

 

Once you have the points finalised, you can draw sight lines on the baseboard and work outwards.

 

From the Odham's  book of sucking eggs and mending valve radios, 1948.

[Regularity]

5 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Conventional wisdom states that one works outwards from the most complicated piece of pointwork, e.g. the station throat.

 

4 hours ago, MrWolf said:

 

That's where I started, in my case it was only four points, creating a crossover and two trailing points, but that dictated and defined the position of everything else on the layout.

 

 

4 hours ago, MrWolf said:

Conventional wisdom is perfectly fine provided that you are certain that the person offering said advice is doing so in an altruistic manner as in this case.

I have found in the outside world it is often a case of someone else benefitting from your compliance or sacrifice, if only from their own sense of schadenfreude....

 

However, the way I did things with my own layout was to fit the bits of pointwork together and move them around on the baseboard (in the rough position) until I found the optimal position. This can be only a few millimetres either way, but it gave me the full length platform and most workable goods yard, from the point of view of both road and rail traffic, which is where a lot of model goods yards throw up problems! (Been there, ****ed that up!) 

 

Once you have the points finalised, you can draw sight lines on the baseboard and work outwards.

 

From the Odham's  book of sucking eggs and mending valve radios, 1948.

Aye, start with the throat pointwork, but as a single unit and move it around, checking clearances, etc. otherwise, you have the distinct possibility (probability? certainty?) of finding that but for half an inch of movement, you could have fitted in another coach/wagon and avoided a baseboard crossmember.

 

But if you know what the throat will be like, and you know you have room for manoeuvre with the approach to the throat, then there’s nothing wrong with starting from the stop blocks and making sure your longest platform will accommodate your longest train (including loco at the front) plus the station pilot, all within the signals clear of the nearest pointwork, or even with a new engine on the rear (now the front), if it is heading straight back out again, which it may do with just a portion of the train, which maybe are heading on to another station. (Think of an arrival at King’s Lynn, with a portion at the rear for Hunstanton. No idea if they did this at Lynn, but you get the idea.)

 

It depends on how tight everything is for space, and if your track laying/point operating units will have to be shifted to allow for existing baseboard framing, or if the framing is adjustable to suit the track. (Preferable, as the baseboard should support the layout, and be subservient to the needs of the layout and not determining the track layout, but not always possible, but “conventional wisdom” suggests building the boards first…)

[MrWolf]

You do need some kind of a foundation to start with. The size of the boards on my layout were dictated by the need to be semi portable. So I ended up with five at 1200x600mm. They're 9mm ply tops and sides with 28mm ply ends. You don't really want a point in the middle of a baseboard joint, but it can be accommodated. What I did do was leave out the cross bracing until everything that is likely to pass through the baseboard is in place, so that cutouts can be made in their upper surface where needed.

 

That way, the boards don't restrict what you're doing, but you are planning everything full size.

[Martin S-C]

I do have a proper plan to work to ... with baseboards ready built and set up with their framing placed away from all planned point motor positions. I realise that in the present company of the Most Worshipful Guild of Artful Bodgers this is tantamount to heresy and I may find myself bound to a post with a pile of faggots heaped around my lower regions to be shortly set alight by the crimson-hooded illuminati in control of the cultist masses, but I will press on and .... lay the station throat pointwork first. Besides which the station throat pointwork is below the main window so if it all goes nether regions over chest regions I will at least have a pleasant view of the hebe and hedge to enjoy as I weep uncontrollably.

 

 

This announcement has been brought to you by the We-Do-Actually-Have-A-Modest-Clue-What-The-Eff-We-Are-Doing Party and proudly sponsored by the Two Large G&Ts Bureau of Motivation. Thank you and good night

Edited January 8, 2022 by Martin S-C

[MrWolf]

Artful bodgers? Not me then, I was an engineer and even now spend much of my time undoing the results of other people's bodges.

 

I didn't have the luxury of being able to plot the entire layout on a computer and print it off full scale, something that would be very useful.

So I had to rely on a logical progression of actions in 3d.

 

PS. I don't think that you're allowed to say f*ggots anymore, just in case someone might get the wrong end of the stick and might be offended.

 

You're certainly not allowed to pile them up and set them on fire...

 

You'll definitely have the Veganazis after you!

 

 

Edited January 8, 2022 by MrWolf
Yep, f*ggot failed the system!