Branch Line Terminus in Restricted Space Help Needed

[Harlequin]

Hi John,

 

I think everything's still OK. This is what happens where the branch line enters the scene:

 

I just need to connect the branch line to the first curve again and I will do that by sliding everything very slightly to the left.

Notice that the engine shed line in my proposed plan just crosses the edge of your lift-out section (the dashed line is my best guess as to where it is). The easiest solution would be to swing the engine shed more to the left, more diagonal, so it remains on the fixed baseboard. So only one line to cut if you need to remove the lift-out. What do you think?

 

Edited February 23, 2020 by Harlequin

[JST]

40 minutes ago, Harlequin said:

Hi John,

 

I think everything's still OK. This is what happens where the branch line enters the scene:

 

I just need to connect the branch line to the first curve again and I will do that by sliding everything very slightly to the left.

Notice that the engine shed line in my proposed plan just crosses the edge of your lift-out section (the dashed line is my best guess as to where it is). The easiest solution would be to swing the engine shed more to the left, more diagonal, so it remains on the fixed baseboard. So only one line to cut if you need to remove the lift-out. What do you think?

 

 

Thant looks fine Phil. I don't think it is necessary to swing the ES over any further as the lift out section is really planning for rain in the Gobi desert and I hope never to have to use it. If it becomes necessary it will mean I have problems much greater than cutting one bit of track!

I have just come back in from my workshop having discovered I don't have enough of the right sort of timber to make the fillet - sod's law! Everything shuts on Sunday here in sunny France so it will have to wait until tomorrow. In the meantime I can amuse myself by making a list for another ceremonial emptying of my wallet at Hattons!  

[JST]

On 21/02/2020 at 20:38, Nearholmer said:

The ‘advance’ rail fare is actually c£100, exact amount depending upon train/day, and isn’t available on all trains. £189 is a ‘walk up’ fare ...... goodness knows what that is by plane, because they price ‘walk ups’ according to how desperate you look!

 

The advanced ‘plane fare varies from £20 to £150 depending on day/flight.

 

I can’t be bothered to check, but I would expect the gap to close considerably for a return trip, because the rail fare is often barely more than a single.

 

From my prospective here in Europe it looks like the UK has lost the plot a bit on rail fares. Last October I went by train from Poitiers to Brindisi (in the deep heel of Italy) via Paris and Milan and the cost was less than I used to pay from Taunton to London. The London trip was about 1.5 hours whereas the Brindisi trip took 24 hours and included a sleeper. I will be touring Spain by train in October very cheaply as well.

[Harlequin]

Here's the revised drawing with the new info about corner angles taken into account:

I've turned off some details and added a 100mm grid to try to help with setting out the curves.

 

[JST]

Things move on! I have now made, fitted and painted the revised fillet in accordance with Harlequin's design data.

 

 

And have actually laid a bit of track. This is the bit that comes out of the tunnel. I have measured so that it is in exactly the right place so I will now fix and ballast the first bit up to the point where it needs to start the curve. That way, with a bit of luck nothing will shift when I start track laying in earnest. The tunnel is a lift out piece which needs a lot of work yet.

 

 

I have put in my order for track to Hattons so it is just a case of waiting for the French postal service now.

[JST]

I have spent some time with rulers and pencils plotting the key points on the baseboard. Having then plonked a few spare bits of track in the rough positions, I feel it will work well!

 

Just have to await the parcel from Hattons now although the bad news is that there seems to be a shortage of electrofrog medium right hand points.

 

 

 

 

[clachnaharry]

It's great to see one of Harlequin's superb plans being turned into reality so quickly.

[JST]

While I wait for the Hattons parcel I thought I would do some of the boring stuff like putting the bus wires in and thinking about the electrics. Whilst doing this I hit a snag I had for some reason not spotted before. Basically the points motor for the first set of points after the tunnel will have to be surface mounted as there is insufficient clearance/access to fit it under the baseboard.  I have used Peco surface mount points motors before but wonder if anyone has any other recommendation for an small surface mount motor and how best to disguise it although, if I am lucky, I can site the ES coaling place to mask it.

[Harlequin]

9 hours ago, JST said:

While I wait for the Hattons parcel I thought I would do some of the boring stuff like putting the bus wires in and thinking about the electrics. Whilst doing this I hit a snag I had for some reason not spotted before. Basically the points motor for the first set of points after the tunnel will have to be surface mounted as there is insufficient clearance/access to fit it under the baseboard.  I have used Peco surface mount points motors before but wonder if anyone has any other recommendation for an small surface mount motor and how best to disguise it although, if I am lucky, I can site the ES coaling place to mask it.

Could you mount the motor under the board but offset from the turnout and use a cranked arm to connect the two?

[JST]

Not really Phil as I can't very easily reach the underside of the board where the  point is. It is in the 11 cm space between the upper and lower baseboards. However, looking at your design again I think I could extend the operating arm of a Peco surface mount and hide the motor in a PL hut or small shed of some sort. Come to think of it I could use an ordinary motor in a shed and use cranks to connect it. All in all a very problem in the scheme of things!

 

Cheers

 

John

[DCB]

The Peco extension arm is pretty ugly,  How about a length of piano wire to link motor to point. it bends at a right angle easily and can be fixed to the point with a small hole in the tie bar and the surface mount base the same way.  Take the spring out of the surface mount or the point wont throw.    To minimise the adverse appearance most of the length can be in a tube, I would use brass tube, and laid in a groove in the baseboard surface.

People used to use wire in tube to operate points without motors but its a bit flintstones engineering.

 

[scottystitch]

13 hours ago, JST said:

Not really Phil as I can't very easily reach the underside of the board where the  point is. It is in the 11 cm space between the upper and lower baseboards. However, looking at your design again I think I could extend the operating arm of a Peco surface mount and hide the motor in a PL hut or small shed of some sort. Come to think of it I could use an ordinary motor in a shed and use cranks to connect it. All in all a very problem in the scheme of things!

 

Cheers

 

John

 

Could you not then place the turnout motor under the board, in a location it can be sited, with an extension arm?

 

Best

 

Scott.

[JST]

The problem is Scott that I can't get to the point under the baseboard to fit anything. However, I am now toying with the idea of using a remote motor in the SC and then using something like DCC Concepts rodding system.

 

Here is a pic of under the board. The wires you can see are the droppers for the track coming into the BLT and are about 10cm beyond where the points actuation is.

 

 

And to give an idea of scale, here is my pudgy mit!

 

 

John

 

 

[mdvle]

30 minutes ago, JST said:

The problem is Scott that I can't get to the point under the baseboard to fit anything.

 

It also won't be the issue of the initial fitting, but also access should any fixing/maintenance be necessary.

 

Putting on top is likely to be a necessary evil in a case like this.

[JST]

Progress is annoyingly slow as although I have received my Hattons parcel with most of the points, I am still short of the out of stock right medium points. I have placed an order with another supplier who had some but this has not arrived yet. It is particularly irksome as I want to set the bay platform track first and I need the right medium to do that. I have plonked a gash left medium in the wrong way round way as a temp measure but the geometry is not correct. So in the meantime I am back to measuring and marking to see roughly how it will look.

 

 

 

I have used the time to do some work on the tunnel entrance and ballasting the bit of track in the tunnel.

 

 

I am a lucky chap in as much as my wife does all the kit building for the layout so, as we speak, she is busy at the dinning room table building the loco shed and goods shed. I think she has built in excess of 50 kits so far!

 

 

I guess I have to accept that there will be no more progress until next week. 

[DCB]

41 minutes ago, JST said:

Progress is annoyingly slow as although I have received my Hattons parcel with most of the points, I am still short of the out of stock right medium points. I have placed an order with another supplier who had some but this has not arrived yet. It is particularly irksome as I want to set the bay platform track first and I need the right medium to do that. I have plonked a gash left medium in the wrong way round way as a temp measure but the geometry is not correct. So in the meantime I am back to measuring and marking to see roughly how it will look.

 

 

I have used the time to do some work on the tunnel entrance and ballasting the bit of track in the tunnel.

 

I am a lucky chap in as much as my wife does all the kit building for the layout so, as we speak, she is busy at the dinning room table building the loco shed and goods shed. I think she has built in excess of 50 kits so far!

 

I guess I have to accept that there will be no more progress until next week. 

There is a geometry problem at the bay end.  The platform is very narrow at around 1" wide  The tracks on the baseboard certainly don't look anything like as nice as the drawing.   Not quite sure how to fix it, maybe a bit of straight between first point and the bay point to throw the bay line wider. The  reverse curve between platform and run round looks a bit tight on the drawing as well.

[JST]

I don't know yet David and will reserve judgement until I get the correct point. However, your comment about inserting a short straight is a good idea if I find that the platform is too thin to look good. It would mean the bay would be a slightly smaller radius curve but I could probably get away with that.

[scottystitch]

58 minutes ago, DavidCBroad said:

There is a geometry problem at the bay end.  The platform is very narrow at around 1" wide  The tracks on the baseboard certainly don't look anything like as nice as the drawing.   Not quite sure how to fix it, maybe a bit of straight between first point and the bay point to throw the bay line wider. The  reverse curve between platform and run round looks a bit tight on the drawing as well.

 

I would suggest that a 6ft ish platform isn't un-prototypical, at least two platforms at Edinburgh Waverley narrow to the two metre mark, for instance.  Iw ould argue that the problem might be that as the platform heads toward the station building, it doesn't appear to get that much wider, which might be problematic.

 

Best

 

Scott.

[Harlequin]

In the drawing the squared off end of the platform is 26mm wide and the track centres are 20mm either side. The platform widens to 55mm by the water crane and you would not expect passengers to be allowed that far.

 

[Flying Pig]

3 hours ago, Harlequin said:

In the drawing the squared off end of the platform is 26mm wide and the track centres are 20mm either side. The platform widens to 55mm by the water crane and you would not expect passengers to be allowed that far.

 

 

How far back does the rear coach of the required 4-6-0 plus six come on arrival?  Might it be possible to trim the narrow extremity of the platform?  It probably doesn't matter visually if an obviously long train fills a platform that is otherwise very generous for the local services, but passengers will of course need access to the van.

[DCB]

26mm approx 1" is very narrow, Ok its unavoidable in some locations.   See Pic.

I was down Kingswear last week and took some pics of the platform. Very similar station in many ways to Harlequin's drawing    Platform  looks like a scale 3 or 4 inches to me.

[JST]

Thanks for this David (nice pics BTW!)

 

I have been looking again and moving bits of track around and think that the platform can maybe made wider without ruining Harlequin's design by following your suggestion of putting a very short bit of straight between the long point and the first medium. It doesn't need to be much. It would mean that the curve into the bay would be a tad sharper and the goods siding would be correspondingly shorter. It will of course be easier to see when I get the correct point but I will mess about with a paper template in the meantime. In the final analysis I would rather have a skinny platform than ruin the track design... but we shall see.

 

The shortage of right medium points has also made me toy with the idea of putting my irrational dislike of Insulfrog double slips aside and maybe reverting Harlequin's original plan for the goods yard.

[The Stationmaster]

Required width of a platform was minimum 6ft clear of all permanent obstructions or double that if it had two faces used by passenger trains.  so either 24mm (say 1 inch) or 48mm (say 2 inches) in 4mm scale - the change to inches giving a bit of wriggle room for lamp posts etc.  There were platforms with two faces which were narrower than that towards their outer ends or even over a greater distance (Merthyr High St is a good example).  But on the West of England branches that were greatly improved between the wars for the growing holiday trade the nature of the traffic the result was more akin to what can still be seen at Kingswear with wide platforms over their full length allowing through holiday trains to be dealt with safely over their entire length.  As photos make clear even at Kingsbridge - where the bay was added in 1915  - the Requirement was observed to the end of the level part of the platform with it only reducing considerably in width from the top of the ramp downwards.

 

And a  four wheel platform barrow of the GW pattern was not exactly an easy thing to turn on a 6 foot wide platform; at least one of those would be needed to deal with peak summer luggage if nothing else.

[Harlequin]

Hold your nerve a bit longer, John!  

 

I think your preference for electrofrog is wise and the double slip could look overcomplicated. There will be Medium Radius electrofrog turnouts again one day soon. (You could look at the classifieds on here or put a Wanted request up.)

 

I'm happy to try to widen the platform and adjust the trackwork if you want. However, consider these points:

• The bay will probably have to be shortened. Maybe that's not a bad thing.
• The two goods sidings will be shorter (as they will if a short straight section is inserted).
• The platform has been compressed both in length and width and I would argue that it's roughly in proportion with the prototypes. It might, in fact, look odd if it's made much wider!
• It does meet the regulations from the water crane back and, as the knowledgeable folks above have pointed out, there were cases where platforms became thinner than regs, so we're not doing anything outlandish.
• We can plausibly explain that the platform is that size, and maybe couldn't be widened, because of the proximity of the tunnel and the local geography.

 

Edited March 1, 2020 by Harlequin

[JST]

25 minutes ago, Harlequin said:

Hold your nerve a bit longer, John!  

 

I think your preference for electrofrog is wise and the double slip could look overcomplicated. There will be Medium Radius electrofrog turnouts again one day soon. (You could look at the classifieds on here or put a Wanted request up.)

 

I'm happy to try to widen the platform and adjust the trackwork if you want. However, consider these points:

• The bay will probably have to be shortened. Maybe that's not a bad thing.
• The two goods sidings will be shorter (as they will if a short straight section is inserted).
• The platform has been compressed both in length and width and I would argue that it's roughly in proportion with the prototypes. It might, in fact, look odd if it's made much wider!
• It does meet the regulations from the water crane back and, as the knowledgeable folks above have pointed out, there were cases where platforms became thinner than regs, so we're not doing anything outlandish.
• We can plausibly explain that the platform is that size, and maybe couldn't be widened, because of the proximity of the tunnel and the local geography.

 

 Hi Phil,

 

 

I am keen not to mess your design up! I have been and done some more measuring/head scratching and come up with three things:-

 

 

1 Looking again at your design again I think I may have misled or failed to give you the full picture on the station building end of things. The main platform track will in fact go to the very edge of the board before the triangular bit on the end (which is where the forecourt will be on the same level as the platform ) whereas on your plan it stops 10cm short. This gives us an extra 10cm we could chop off the platform at the other end. The station building area will only intrude 30cm into the length meaning that the bay could in theory be another about 40 cm longer! 

 

2 I found that a 4cm straight bit inserted between the long and medium point added to the platform width without affecting the look of the curve but also makes the laying of the points that come off the long right and the fitting of their associated motors somewhat easier as they would not be adjacent.

 

3 This one is a bit off the wall which you may rule out of court straight away. Looking at DavidCBroad's first photo of Kingswear, there is a spur coming back off the bay. What would be the practical, visual or prototypical effect by doing the same on Fernhead and joining it to the  goods siding using a long point and thus creating a run around for goods trains?

 

John