Schooner's (Mostly Maritime) Musings

[Mikkel]

4 hours ago, Schooner said:

But look, who cares?

 

I do. I love a good chat but it's great to see some modelling 

 

Those Midland locos are so Victorian that they look like the queen herself.

[Compound2632]

8 hours ago, Schooner said:

Whilst on the subject of the Midland early stock set for Ingleford, below is an updated roster of 8 standard wagons + 3 wildcard for feedback, please:

• Kirtley brake 
• 1-plank, LNWR D.1 
• 3-plank, early  x 3 (empty; sheeted; unsheeted)
• 3-plank D.305 
• 5-plank, early 
• 5-plank D.299 
• Meat van D.370 
• Goods van, LNWR D.32
• Timber wagons, LNWR D.13

All to be sourced from Mousa Models. Twice the three-planks to five-planks which I think is about right for mid-1880s and about twice the opens to anything else. For reference, the previous iteration, with an equal number of three- and five-planks, looked like:

 

Looks good. I think you're probably right to have more of the early (Drawing 10) low sided wagons, with 2-plank ends, than the Drawing 213 variety, though most of the latter had been built by 1885. I would have the high sided wagons in mineral traffic but I would throw in some dumb-buffered mineral wagons in Midland livery. There's a well-known photo of Derby, with a couple of NSR goods brakes in front of the Pullman shed in the foreground and the engine sheds in the distance; the sidings inbetween are full of hundreds of high-sided wagons loaded with coal - presumably loco coal - a handful are Drawing 550 (later D299*) but the vast majority are ex-PO dumb-buffered wagons in Midland livery. There are whitemetal kits from 5&9 and Roxey or one could bash some from the Cambrian Wheeler & Gregory 4-plank kits.

 

You are right to avoid the Slaters kits as they are either completely inappropriate for this period or need some work. The exception could be the single-ended brake, of which there were already 295 by the mid 1880s, but again some work is needed.

 

To be a puritanical historicist, I would say no LNWR wagons at all... but without them there's a lack of variety.

 

*Diagram numbers are an anachronism at this period; I think the diagram book was first issued sometime in the first five years of the 20th century.

[Schooner]

9 hours ago, Mikkel said:

Those Midland locos are so Victorian that they look like the queen herself.

Don't they just! And thank you. No intent to fish for compliments, nor make light of the support available here  

 

5 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

I would have the high sided wagons in mineral traffic but I would throw in some dumb-buffered mineral wagons in Midland livery.

Makes sense, and I've been eyeing up 5&9's selection of PO wagons for a while! For now, I think I'll be sticking with Mousa for ease (in part one supplier, but mostly the 3D prints are quick to get up and running, a real bonus whilst I'm still in project-mode), but will see if we can shake off an interloping LNWRer or two...  

 

Once the layout is up and running, with less pressure felt to get things completed before the next trip, I'm looking forward into getting stuck into this as a hobby proper. Getting there...!

[Schooner]

Well, the layout is up and running, and the next trip began the day after the previous post at minimal notice.

 

Sorry for the lack of better progress reports whilst there was progress to report, it was all a bit of a rush before and since! However, there would have been none at all without you supportive, helpful and knowledgable lot. Thank you.

 

And now I have a model railway

 

...which looks as if a small Victorian industrial concern has sprung up on a lava field next to a glacial crevasse...but a model railway nevertheless!

 

Cheers,

 

Schooner

[Schooner]

Home, home again
I like to be here when I can
And when I come home cold and tired
It's good to warm my bones beside the fire

 

Can confirm.

 

It's also good to take stock of where the layout got to before I left, and what the next steps are now I'm back. It'll make for a tedious post, but a useful one for me. Forgive the splurge before settling down (hopefully) into a series of little-and-often updates/queries/findings etc.

 

Layout 

• Fix issue with one frog not getting power - that's going to be right after this post
• Fit the S&W uncoupling magnets
• Ballast - chinchilla dust
• Start on the scenics

 

Buildings

• The canal bridge is mocked-up, and Mk.1 can be begun in earnest
• The wharf shed needs dimensions confirmed now the track is down, then drawn up
• Finish the 'old wharf' pub (scribing stonework; fitting stone lintels etc; roof; paint)
• Keep chipping away at the painting of the other buildings. Detailing can wait, I think.

 

Stock (Existing - a batch of geography-appropriate Dapol RTR PO wagons with a W4 on shunting duty)

• Paint the interiors
• Weather (simply a dark wash, a light dry-brush and pinchlette of weather powders. Just to have a play and start getting a feel for the process)
• Fit S&W couplings

That'll probably do for now!

 

In the initial rush of 'I'm back, I must do everything and do it now!' I thought I'd have a little go with some track prep:

 

Petite Properties 'Muck' paint is used on most of the wood on the layout, so I'm giving it a shot on the sleepers too. Rails painted with a mix of Vallejo 'Saddle Brown' and 'Orange Red', which were to hand, turning this

 

 

to this

 

 

Rushed, rough and ready - but as a proof of concept it shows it's worth doing on exposed trackwork, which not much of it will be. Not when I've got so many ground cover options to play with:

 

 

 

 

First crack at chinchilla power ballasting (shown here still dry, not yet glued). Plan A is to ballast all the track in this way - sleepertop or just below - to help hold it all in place, and provide a decent underlay for the 'top' ground cover. Largely happy with the product, and the process. Next was to get out the DAS and The Tool and have a go at some setts:

 

 

Again, blame the workman for the end result - the embossing tool is great, a really tidy little thing that works exactly as hoped. Forgive the slopiness of the end result as the speed-run it was, and the fact that the area seen here was gone over three or four times in different ways so the clay was getting over-wet and over-worked. Drying now, but think it's a goer!

 

Bits and bobs, and into the future

• Following @Compound2632's helpful suggestions, the MR stock-set is now ready for the order to be placed with Mousa:

 

The LNWR timber wagon stays because I need a timber wagon, otherwise I think we're largely into bog-standard MR stock...ideal! Even so, the only repeated design are three early three-planks. Eight wagons, as per The Rules, plus a gratuitous Kirtley brake, as per 'cos I want one. It isn't needed, the wharf is meant to be at the end of a short spur from the main station and goods yard, but would be for a future project so into the basket it goes.

 

Matched motive power will be a Manning Wardle H (Hardies bodykit on W4 chassis, RT Models details, as previously). Once the layout is proved with the trial stock, this is the very next thing to happen.

 

After that, an order will go in to 5&9 to provide Stephen's suggested dumb-buggered PO coal waggons to bulk out the MR set (there now being a plan for coal to feature on the wharf in a meaningful, traffic-generating, way); and to provide the next stock set in support an indulgence which is now progressing...

 

 

The GWR stock-set has opened its account, with two of the Rails minks arriving last month, and a couple of David Green 3-planks safely stashed away for when I've got some whitemetal practise in. Further suggestions welcome.

 

In search of locos which 'feel' right, I came across Swindonised-795 which I would stretch the timeframe for, should the parish W4-trasmuting wizard happen to be passing and take inspiration...

 

 

More realistically, an 850ST is the obvious choice I suppose, if I can find one on that auction site, but I can't help but wonder if this is my excuse to indulge in a tender engine... There's room in the headshunt to take a Standard Goods (for Dean, a Mainline&co body on a sympathetically-geared High Level chassis?)* and I would like a tender engine somewhere in the mix, although I was thinking more along the lines of something contract-built for the (fictional) Stroudwater Canal and Railway Co:

 

 

...which I think would fit the tone of the layout better. Anyway, a ways off yet.

 

 

Erm...what else...that'll probably do for now! Time to settle down with a notebook and the Farthing blog...

 

Cheers all, happy Saturday

 

Schooner

 

*Well, there's room for a second-batch lined Dapol Mogul if I'm really pushing it, but a little overkill for Ingleford's shunting requirements...it's exactly this kind of enthusiasm that the 'loco and matching stock' rule is supposed to curb!

 

Edited January 29, 2022 by Schooner
Fixing all but one of the typos

[sb67]

Those cobbles look good, that tool is a handy gadget. 

[Schooner]

Create

 

Destroy

 

Combine

 

Seperate

 

Carry out Very Important Research into magnet placement for half the afternoon

 

Lessons: 

• If using Sharpies for blacking, at least give it a chance to dry before handling
• 'Lower' S&W method is slightly more obvious, but significantly quicker. Probably the way forward, at least for these Dapol wagons.
• It's possible to propel wagons around the sharpest layout radius without buffer locking, so there is scope to snug the couplings up a bit
• Less is more with magnets...well, fewer is better. One at the start of each siding and one at the midpoint of the headshunt* to allow any wagon, or the whole cut, to be uncoupled and the propelled to its spot.
• This playing trains lark is alright, isn't it!

*almost twice as long as officially allowed at c.500mm; but it's right for an enlarged puzzle to fill the layout for longer play sessions. It also allows this flexibility with uncoupling and dodges the Uncouple Shuffle; and leaves room a spot of rope shunting action...

[Compound2632]

Just now, Schooner said:

but it's right for an enlarged puzzle to fill the layout for longer play sessions. 

 

Brilliant. Published as: S. Blackburn, 'Inglenook Shunting Puzzles', The Electronic Journal of Combinatorics, Vol. 26, No. 2 (2019), P2.8, pp. 1-18.

[billbedford]

I just though you might like to see a photo of real sets:

 

 

Note that the top foe each set is flat, the edges are uneven and the infill is only slightly lower than the top of the set. 

[Caley Jim]

46 minutes ago, billbedford said:

Note that the top foe each set is flat, the edges are uneven and the infill is only slightly lower than the top of the set. 

And they are not particularly regular, either in size or alignment.

[Tom Burnham]

5 hours ago, Caley Jim said:

And they are not particularly regular, either in size or alignment.

Or indeed colour although they all look to be granite of one variety or another.  Perhaps recovered from other sites?

[Schooner]

On 03/02/2022 at 15:44, billbedford said:

Note that the top foe each set is flat, the edges are uneven and the infill is only slightly lower than the top of the set. 

 

Noted, thank you.

 

Embossing into 3mm foam gives flat tops, and shallower relief.

 

However, a thin layer of clay (RHS, on top foam) and a gentler touch shows an improvement too. More could be done. Add in textured paint to build up the infill, maybe a bit off a buff before the clay is fully hardened to flatten the tops further. Feedback invited

 

The foam was out to block the proposed paved area:

 

Step by step...

Edited February 5, 2022 by Schooner
Are the teams in test rugby now irrelevant, the result being determined by refereeing alone? Discuss.

[Caley Jim]

If you break the rules you pay the penalty! 

 

Jim 

[Phil Traxson]

On 03/02/2022 at 15:44, billbedford said:

I just though you might like to see a photo of real sets:

 

 

Note that the top foe each set is flat, the edges are uneven and the infill is only slightly lower than the top of the set. 

I  achieved this effect by using "Slaters" dressed stone walling embossed plastic sheet as the ground surface for my quayside layout. It has the similar size variation and almost flush infill. How successful this has been I will leave viewers to judge. This is  7mm/1 ft  narrow gauge.(0-16.5). I seem to think (looking back about 15 years) that the walling is for 4 mm scale walls so maybe use 2 m scale for 4mm setts.

 

Edited February 5, 2022 by Phil Traxson

[Regularity]

3 hours ago, Caley Jim said:

If you break the rules you pay the penalty! 

Very timely.

As an Englishman living with a Highland woman, I am today aware that this is a poor excuse for losing…

[billbedford]

4 hours ago, Schooner said:

However, a thin layer of clay (RHS, on top foam) and a gentler touch shows an improvement too. More could be done. Add in textured paint to build up the infill, maybe a bit off a buff before the clay is fully hardened to flatten the tops further. Feedback invited

 

I think the real take-away from looking at the real sets is that the sets have a sheen to them and by contrast the infill is matt or even mossy. 

[Schooner]

17 hours ago, Caley Jim said:

If you break the rules you pay the penalty! 

Absolutely, no argument! A thoroughly enjoyable, (otherwise) clean match with a fitting end result  My attempted point was more that as teams become better, and better matched, the refereeing becomes the pivot on which the game turns. It's always been the way to some extent, but 'a chance for a shot at goal' now more frequently becomes 'an award of three points' (for example). No qualms about the decisions or about the rugby, just interesting to see how two interact as the game develops. I wonder how accurately you could read a match seeing nothing but the decisions, and if some sort of ref v. ref meta-game would be possible!

 

It makes for excellent entertainment, and this is shaping up to be another 'best Six Nations ever'. Looking forward to it all  

 

17 hours ago, Phil Traxson said:

I  achieved this effect by using "Slaters" dressed stone walling embossed plastic sheet

Interesting, I'd wondered about that approach - it looks to be very effective. I think I've got some stashed away, will investigate... Thanks for the pointer.

 

13 hours ago, billbedford said:

...the sets have a sheen to them...

Agreed. I think the excellent Copper Wort used wax to bring the sets to a shine. Due a re-read  

 

More generally, I'm aiming not for what you would see going to Gloucester Docks today:

 

https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/train-track-gloucester-england-uk-1353246905

 

but what was in place before the turn of the last century:

 

http://www.corse.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/587/2017/08/1.png

 

A better proxy still would be the yards at Dudbridge, Nailsworth and the two Strouds, but I'm still on the hunt for decent pics of those. The 'old wharf' side of the layout is well covered by the various books on the Stroudwater and Thames and Severn I've got my sticky mitts on, but (as ever) it's the invention which requires more work to make convincing...

 

I'll aim to get some paint on that trial piece today, see how it comes up...

 

Cheers all 

 

 

[Schooner]

Frank Gegg & Co of Cirencester continue to come up trumps on the inspiration front:

http://latton.bravesites.com/files/resized/332068/500;236;4db65a0dae8fb3ea95cf36dd4f004d47a72df0ee.jpg

 

...which won't embed, but is worth looking at if you like coal carts, tiny weighbridges or large signs. It's primarily the weighbridge which has caught my attention. There isn't one at Ingleford Wharf yet, and there really should be. The trouble is there's isn't much space, and none of it is that convenient for the set up of a standard weighbridge-and-office set:

 

I was thinking about trying something like Gegg's own at the rear-centre of the wharf, between the 'sidings workshop' and 'warehouse 1'. Opinions welcome.

 

Today's been a bit of a mixed on, with a little bit of this and that. Spot the difference:

 

I was aiming for subtle weathering, but plenty of scope for a second lap! Those wagons with moulded planks have also had them painted in a variety of Lifecolour bare wood paints.

 

The setts have had a variety of things done to them, but the process is ongoing... 

 

On the layout itself the ground relief is being built up, rising gently to the RHS and rear. This is initially being done in more foam, copydex'd down to the Carr's underlay which covers most of the baseboard. The aim is to isolate the plaster which will go over the top from the vibration of running trains. Whilst that dries thoroughly, I might make a start on the canal...

 

Butterflies are efficient, right...?!

[Schooner]

 

 

 

 

 

Little trial with some offcuts...interesting, and worth keeping in mind, but I don't think I'm convinced for this (for larger paved areas...say...around warehousing in London's docks, I'm sold!). Good one to try out though, thanks for the idea

 

Mr Gardner takes a moment to contemplate his life choices on the way back to Flora after a night at the wharf pub. Looks like Placeholder Bridge* is about right in arch height...

 

*take for Cosmetic Junction Station and False Perspective Row

 

...but given that the following morning he could lead a thumping great 17-hand shire horse through, I think I might have overshot the inspiration. It does look about right for a 'proper' bridge, but I was purposefully aiming for something smaller and lighter-looking to try to support the idea of countryside beyond. However, much easier to make smaller than make bigger! ...and then I can use it as a template for Mk.II

 

Tomorrow...continuing with the canal, platforms and perhaps a further stock-tickle.

 

I should probably also say that I've updated a proper layout thread for Ingleford, link in signature, and I'll try to bring it up to date in the coming days and start putting these kinds of updates there.

 

Evening all, morning Annie!

 

Schooner

[Annie]

It's really nice to see you back and posting again Schooner, - you have been missed.

[Schooner]

Cheers, kind of you to say! It's nice to able to start plugging away at the layout again  

 

Sadly, it's been a pretty frustrating few days failing to get the chinchilla-powered ballast to an acceptable appearance (and as you can see, my standards are not over-stringent!) with method after method being tried and found wanting. Still not got the answer, but at least progress is being made. 

 

The less said about the accidental addition of PVA to the Sculptamold mix the better...

 

Might knock up some point levers by way of a treat  

[Schooner]

Just do it, then it's done*:

 

Overviews

 

I got fed up, so painted things brown until I felt better. It worked  The layout narrative now stands thus:

 

 

Begining

I think I'll have a crack at doing the setts in 3mm foam for various reasons; with the insets and wharfside being done in DAS for greater control and greater relief. The Bachmann Grain Warehouse has gone because...

 

Middle

...I think I'd like a little weighbridge and hut in the middle here somewhere, and want to keep it feeling spacious enough. This is the scenic run of the layout, after all! It's possible a little leat might be dug behind that little wall on the RHS building. Add, with your mind's eye if you would, also coal piles and carts, and a long boat alongside.

 

 

End

...alternative, unlikely, ending with the Wills barn doing service as a more explict wharf warehouse:

 

V much still WIP but it feels like the layout's taken a step forward.

 

Questions

• Gound cover: Up to sleeper-top for the Middle (beige) section; railtop for the End (brown) section. A skin of DAS? Sculptamold?  Build it up with chinchilla dust? 
• Weighbridge position - as per plan below. Sanity check please. Inspiration: https://www.antiquesnavigator.com/archive/2017/02/12/142270509594.jpg
• General layout - as per pic below. Plausibility and sanity check please, for gate position, platform dimensions etc

 

 

I think that's it by way of an update. Tomorrow I'm hoping to make a start on the bridge Mk. 1, after which I'll be able to start building up the landforms on the RHS and rear. Pressing setts into the foam to be done along the way in between other bits and pieces, and can be done away from the layout. If done in situ it turns out the track pops out of the chairs...who knew...

 

Cheers for stopping by, all feedback welcome!

 

Schooner

 

 

 

* AKA: Stop trying to do the job properly and just kin do it!

[Caley Jim]

Weighbridges were usually near to the entrance gate so that all incoming goods could be weighed.

 

Jim

[Schooner]

Understood, and agreed! 

 

My proposed excuse is three-fold

• It was near the yard gate...before the yard was expanded, the new wharf dug and the rail provision increasing from single siding to kickback yard! Main road access for the yard is supposed to be offstage to the LHS*. 

 

• Small, coal-factor-only WB - see the inspiration, and its location. Effort would be made for the WB tie into the 'small and old' vibe - timber hut, maybe even timber platform. Just able to take a 4-wheel cart, but better with 2-wheelers. Definitely not the standard brick office and large metal plate as per all the kits!

 

• Where else? Would it be better left off completely? I'm aware the whole layout concept is a bit , hanging together mostly through paintscheme, and it won't take much to push it too far  

 

*I was wondering about a ramp up to the loading dock (up to where the timber wagon is in the last photo of previous post) from the left to help support this. 

 

Convincing, or not so much?

[Schooner]

22 hours ago, Schooner said:

I was wondering about a ramp up to the loading dock (up to where the timber wagon is in the last photo of previous post) from the left to help support this. 

 

Mock up:

 

Sorry it's all so white! Centre foreground is where we're looking for a trial of the ramp idea. 

 

Thoughts, dear pre-Groupers?