Nether Madder and Green Soudley Rly

[Nick C]

57 minutes ago, Martin S-C said:

Thank you both. The Hunstanton diagram is small but decipherable.

I'll add dummy ground signals then to control light engines leaving the platform roads and loops. I would rather not add shunt arms to the already impressive 5-arm bracket home signal since I can see this getting out of hand time- and cost-wise. I hope it would be okay to control the light engines back into Plat 4 for them to reverse again into the loco shed by use of the main home signals? They would not be entering a line that was occupied and I am modelling a secondary company that is not flooded with cash.

I will use short arms for the goods only departure road.

 

EDIT: Ah. I have taken a look at the Hunstanton diagram and the home signal that controls access to the platforms seems to be just a single arm with different locking levers for the different points that access the different roads. I currently have a (rather monstrous) 5-arm bracket signal with a separate arm for each of the 4 platform roads, plus one for the goods arrival. Am I going overboard with that? Would a single arm do as long as we worked on the assumption it was locked to the correctly set route?

It looks like the Hunstanton one has just two arms (main and shunt) and a route indicator - probably for exactly the same reason, it'd have been excessively complex otherwise!

 

It's fine to use a running signal to allow a shunt movement into an empty platform - in fact it's generally recommended, as it shows the driver that the route is clear to the next signal, wheras using a shunt arm or gound signal says that it isn't. What you can't do is to use a running signal when the line is occupied, or to use a shunt signal for a passenger train (with certain exceptions)

[Martin S-C]

It would certainly help to do away with both the main and branch junction homes - a total of 8 arms and replace each with a single arm and a shunt arm. How would route indicators have worked? I don't want to go with white lights so would that have been a small arm against a white board or something of that ilk?

[Compound2632]

Don't panic:

 

 

[Embedded link to Derby Registers DY 9723.]

[Nick C]

2 hours ago, Martin S-C said:

It would certainly help to do away with both the main and branch junction homes - a total of 8 arms and replace each with a single arm and a shunt arm. How would route indicators have worked? I don't want to go with white lights so would that have been a small arm against a white board or something of that ilk?

They'd have been mechanical, either raising or rotating a board to show a letter or number as appropriate for the route selected when the signal was cleared. There's a couple of photos near the bottom of this thread: 

 

[Regularity]

I believe that there would be a lever for each route, pulling one of them would pull the home signal off whilst displaying the appropriate route.

[Martin S-C]

Thanks again. As it happens the information side of that indicator board will be invisible from anywhere except if you go right to the end of the operating well and lean over sideways, so as Richard Mawer wrote in the thread you linked me to @Nick C it would be possible to model a mechanical indicator board that is a dummy and does not need to display the correct route code.

I need to bear in mind as well that the railway represents a middling to not-quite-impoverished secondary route company where economies of necessity would mean all but the essential costs have to be trimmed back. I still want to have a railway run on the bare bones of the Board of Safety's recommendations. This isn't the LNWR or GW. :D

One of my several inspirations is the M&SWJR.

[Regularity]

1 hour ago, Martin S-C said:

One of my several inspirations is the M&SWJR.

The one that installed this?

[Martin S-C]

Well... yeah... point taken.

[Compound2632]

Well, exactly. Not the sort of line that can run to newfangled technology such as route indicators.

 

The St Pancras gantry shown above was replaced by one using Acfield's route indicators in 1914. And that's at the London terminus of the second largest and undoubtedly wealthiest railway company in the country; that under W.C. Acfield's direction had one of the most forward-looking signalling departments. 

 

Edited June 29, 2022 by Compound2632

[lezz01]

MSE/Wizard Models do a route indicator. It's only a double but you can stack one in front of the other to make a 4 route box. You need a lever for each board and they all pull off the signal.

It would be quite straight forward but a tad fiddley to make it work but you will need to build a mechanism to make it all work. I can draw you a diagram to make it all work and even incorporate a bounce as I have given this a lot of thought. If you want to have a shunt arm as well then you need to have a fifth lever so that you can have the indicator work for both arms but even that isn't to hard to arrange.

Regards Lez.      

[Martin S-C]

It seems that concensus is swinging now against the indicator board as being too new-fangled and the original 5-arm behemoth is what Colonel Yolland will insist on as a minimum safe requirement. It's a pity as I'm a fan of taking the route of least resistance when possible. Mind you a 5-arm home signal would look a lot more impressive than a 2 arm + indicator board.

[Regularity]

Then there’s the possibility of having a calling-on arm beneath each stop signal.

To be kind, you might not need it for the goods route, so maybe only 9 arms…

[Compound2632]

2 minutes ago, Regularity said:

Then there’s the possibility of having a calling-on arm beneath each stop signal.

 

As in the St Pancras example. But would that be essential at a smaller, less busy terminus? Would bringing the incoming train to a stand at the home be sufficient, perhaps with a verbal caution? 

[Martin S-C]

1 hour ago, Regularity said:

Then there’s the possibility of having a calling-on arm beneath each stop signal.

To be kind, you might not need it for the goods route, so maybe only 9 arms…

I totally knew someone was going to suggest this. The answer I regret to inform you is an unequivocal "no". 😉

All trains coming to a stop at the home might be one solution. It would add another little operating wriggle to make things more interesting.

Edited June 30, 2022 by Martin S-C

[Regularity]

2 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

As in the St Pancras example. But would that be essential at a smaller, less busy terminus? Would bringing the incoming train to a stand at the home be sufficient, perhaps with a verbal caution? 

 

42 minutes ago, Martin S-C said:

I totally knew someone was going to suggest this. The answer I regret to inform you is an unequivocal "no". 😉

All trains coming to a stop at the home might be one solution. It would add another little operating wriggle to make things more interesting.

Seems reasonable to me!

(But it would be fun!)

 

There is also the possibility of a gantry….

 

 

I have assumed here that P4 is unidirectional, but P3 bidirectional. G for foods, L for loop. L and P4 are subsidiary arms (shunting only).

Also, what is the purpose of the siding at the west of P3? Is it a safety-siding, in which case the ground discs are not needed, or is it needed at all?

And I have added 4 more catch points…

[Compound2632]

54 minutes ago, Martin S-C said:

All trains coming to a stop at the home might be one solution. It would add another little operating wriggle to make things more interesting.

 

You don't need all trains coming to a stand at the home, only those that are entering a platform road that is already occupied - horse box or whatever at the buffer stops. Remember that the buffer stop counts as a signal fixed at "stop"! An incoming train will have passed a fixed distant signal, indicating that there is a signal at stop ahead; if the home is cleared, the driver knows he has a clear road only as far as the next stop signal - the buffers.

[Martin S-C]

21 minutes ago, Regularity said:

I have assumed here that P4 is unidirectional, but P3 bidirectional. G for foods, L for loop. L and P4 are subsidiary arms (shunting only).

Also, what is the purpose of the siding at the west of P3? Is it a safety-siding, in which case the ground discs are not needed, or is it needed at all?

And I have added 4 more catch points…

I've thought about a gantry I am just not sure it fits the mood of the model. I always feel gantries add an urban feel to things. We are supposed to be on the Gloucester-Herefordshire border here. Wye Valley area around Monmouth-Ross, etc, with the branch headed off into the Forest in a Coleford-ish direction. That doesn't seem like gantry-land to me. I'm sure there were some gantries around this neck of the woods, its merely the look of the thing that bothers me.
 

The spur at far west will probably have some engineers stock stabled there, or a crane at least. Then again these might live on the long road that runs past the engine shed. I must confess I saw that spur as just an extra place to put stuff. Its one of my planning weaknesses - a sort of CJF "stuff in extra things" syndrome, I just enjoy adding superfluous bits. I admit it's a terrible affliction. Perhaps a carriage gas tank charging wagon will stand there, or a fresh water tanker that will be sent up the branch from time to time.
 

We need to keep in mind that the layout will operate in two configurations - with and without P3/P4 being through platforms. I know this adds to the complexity but there we are. P3 and P4 will be the platforms served by the branch - most likely P4 with either a push-pull reversing there or the train loco running around via the west crossover if the door-bridging piece is in place, or an engine change with light engine released to shed if its not. So in its through-running configuration, yes, P4 is bi-directional but only in so far as it accepts terminating branch trains. P3 might actually be as well for the same operational need but I suspect I should make a hard decision on which platform will accept branch service terminations and stick with it.

But yes, in terms of setting up signals I need to have them control P3/P4 in both terminal and through road configurations.
 

P1 and P2 only ever serve mainline services so there is no need for a bracket arm on these - trains will only ever depart down the main, never down the branch. Ground signals will control shunt moves to/from carriage sidings or light engines to shed. Goods trains departing the goods yard shunting neck (loop adjacent to P1) can leave along the main or branch so will need a bracket arm. I can use smaller freight-only arms here.
 

12 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

You don't need all trains coming to a stand at the home, only those that are entering a platform road that is already occupied - horse box or whatever at the buffer stops. Remember that the buffer stop counts as a signal fixed at "stop"! An incoming train will have passed a fixed distant signal, indicating that there is a signal at stop ahead; if the home is cleared, the driver knows he has a clear road only as far as the next stop signal - the buffers.

Thank you for that. This is why I like RMWeb so much. People who know stuff are so willing to help out.

[Compound2632]

1 minute ago, Martin S-C said:

This is why I like RMWeb so much. People who know stuff are so willing to help out.

 

Careful though; that's not what I know but what I think I know. I always post in the hope (on the assumption) that someone more knowledgeable than I will refine my statement, ideally providing evidence from primary sources. I often preface such posts with "As I understand it" or some such caveat, on this occasion I failed to do so, for which I apologise.

[Nick C]

I think there was a discussion on this elsewhere on RMWeb recently. Generally, the clearing of a stop signal tells the driver that the line is clear to the next stop signal, and if the train is brought to a stop (or nearly so) at the signal, and it is then cleared, this tells him that the next signal may also be at danger - the equivalent of clearing a colour-light signal to yellow.

 

However, I believe that there was, for some companies, an exception to that for certain permissive terminal platforms - whereby the train could be brought to a stand, and the signal cleared, signifying that the line was not clear to the buffer stops - other companies used a calling-on arm for the same purpose. 

[Regularity]

There is also the difference between what was supposed to happen - drawing to a complete stop - and what actually happened, where the signalman would observe that the driver had the train under control (moving very slowly) and would drop the board so that the driver didn’t have to stop, to avoid (or reduce) the risk of a coupling snatch.

[Compound2632]

A further point is that, at least for the period I'm interested in, the rule was that a passenger train running in to a terminus station had to approach at a speed such that it could be brought to a stand using the handbrakes alone. This rule pre-dated the requirement for continuous brakes but remained in force, though the evidence from Accident Reports is that once the vacuum or Westinghouse brake was available it was usually disregarded. 

[Martin S-C]

Nothing to add for the moment, I just needed to post so that my own thread doesn't drop off the bottom of my own feed :(

However next session of baseboard installation along the colliery side of the room and around under the end window (fiddle yard end) will be happening in early September.

[Martin S-C]

Though please don't let me stop you lot nattering away. There's tea brewing on the pot-bellied stove in the (half-built) engine house and fresh bread and cheese at Mrs Poddling's bar across the (unballasted) tracks at the Camel in the Desert, a most fine hostelry at the end of Railwaymens Row.

And ... I still need to work out my lever frame numbers. Argh. In fact this is becoming imperative as track and points wiring approaches.

My brain has been so full of wargaming this last couple of months I've had no time to think about toy trains.

[MrWolf]

Good to see you back, perhaps the 8th Railway Company, Royal Engineers should receive orders to get busy and you can ease yourself back into layout building?

[Schooner]

7 hours ago, Martin S-C said:

My brain has been so full of wargaming this last couple of months I've had no time to think about toy trains.

Nice problem to have :)

 

7 hours ago, Martin S-C said:

I still need to work out my lever frame numbers.

Interesting problem to have. Well, not for me - I just love looking at your gorgeous signalling diagrams which illustrate those discussions - but I'm sure with a prompt or two the usual suspects will be along to lend their knowledge and support.

 

In the meantime, there was once an Excel-based traffic generating system for the NM&GSRy. Has it been updated to reflect the new layout? I remember it seemed very promising...

Edited August 28, 2022 by Schooner
Wurdz