Eastfield: a large 00 running track that is evolving into a layout

[Dr.Glum]

There was a request in one of my threads on building scenery that asked where the layout was described - it wasn't, so here goes.

 

It started in 1999, when I hadn't run trains since ~1990 (which then were 7mm, all kit built, demountable 18ft long plank on demountable shelving system along the wall of the hall upstairs), but a couple of months after a house move in September 1999, I started buying RTR 00. I was banished to the loft which I had avoided because of low head room. (After a few years I finally realised what a boon that was: so much space, or rather length, because width was only just enough for main line radii of 36 inches at the ends.) From April to October 2000 I lashed up baseboards made from old hollow-core doors and old melamine coated book shelves, and laid the track.

 

The purists had better look away now. The tracks were laid down with the sole aim of running big trains and having a lot of fun. It was conventional DC, with two controllers, one each to inner and outer main. Points were large radius Peco Insulfrog because I didn't understand what Electrofrog were, so the points switched sidings on and off. There were a few isolating sections, especially around the Peco turntable. The mainline was fed on both the south side and the north side of the loft, with a few secondary feeds for the loops and the leads to the sidings. There were no soldered track joints. Where tracks crossed from one board to another, they were joined with rail joiners, so almost everything was modular. This was an enormous benefit during later changes. (The only exception was the curved sidings from Board 1 to Board 6, but even these could be easily removed by lifting 3 to 4 pins per siding.)

 

The track plan is shown as it was from 2000 to mid-2004.

 

Before I give you the notes to explain the above diagram, let me say that I cannot stress highly enough just how much fun it was get something built quickly and without much planning, to just run the trains. I'll admit it was a lash-up, and I didn't take the time to learn how to make immaculate joints on curved track, and a host of other issues. But it worked, and it worked damn well. The trains ran smoothly, there were few derailments, and in general, running sessions were stress free. On a work day, after eating and doing a few jobs I could retire to the loft with a couple of beers and either just watch the trains going round, or perhaps run one, while slowly making up a different one from stock that wouldn't fit on the layout. Bliss!

 

Explanation of the diagram:

1. East is to the left, west is to the right.

2. The dark green outline is the limit of the area of the loft, at the height of the layout (which is between 29 and 31 inches above the boarded floor which goes up and down). The tick marks are at 10 inch intervals. The pale green outlines are the baseboard edges: six boards numbered clockwise from No.1 which is the wide one with the turntable on it. Boards 1, 2, 4 and 5 are Contiboard. Boards 3 and 6 are old doors extended with Contiboard.

3. The 2 blue circuits are the inner and outer main.

4. The inner main has a loop at the west end. The outer main has a loop to the north and east. Both loops will hold trains of either 14 carriages or 50 wagons.

5. There was no scenery.

 

There are few photos of the early days. This one shows most of Board 6 at the east end. It's origin as a door is obvious. Track is pinned straight onto the suface. Heresy - no scenic treatment at all! It might look slapdash, but a lot of care was spent on the track to get 100% reliable running. Modern locos and stock ran so astonishingly well - it had been about forty years since my last use of RTR (as Triang TT).

 

In the period to mid-2004 I added a few sidings and three extra boards, while being distracted in Spring 2003 by going DCC. The diagram below shows the state of things for the next two years.

 

By now I had properly placed the layout and the loft into a CAD model, and was able to work out in minute detail future schemes. So some temporary oddities were appearing that would only make sense when later stuff was built. I found this design work almost as fulfilling as sitting watching the trains go round.

 

Changes and additions are:

1. A replacement Board 2 is wider to accomodate track leading to new Board 12.

 

2. Board 12 is built (amended) from a baseboard that I made in 1979. It's a sort of fiddle yard with 8 sidings.

 

3. Of the group of curved sidings 1 to 8 on Boards 1 and 6, no,5 has been extended and split to feed a coal sorting yard on new Boards 7 and 8 which lie alongside Boards 5 and 4 on the north side of the loft.

 

4. New Board 7 has the start of a steep climb (1 in 30) that will (in some long distant day) climb a total of 6.2 inches to a colliery (not shown) either side of the water tank in the west end of the loft. It crosses a girder bridge over 2 new coal storage sidings.

 

5. A half inch high incline leads up to a new infill area to the west of Board 3. It is designed as a diesel depot and has a turning 'wye'. However, as soon as it was built, I decided it would be more interesting as something else, and I settled on a coal yard (landsales).

 

6. There was no scenery, but the odd item was bought and plonked to designate the function of a particular area e.g. coal sales building in the coal yard.

 

7. New Board 9 at the west end.

Working on the track laying on the new Board 9, which at that stage was to be a diesel depot, hence the shed and the Deltic for space checking. Note the advantage of a layout with nothing fixed above rail level: you can use it as a workbench for new modules.

 

During this period I gradually replaced the insulfrog points with electrofrog ones, starting with cross-overs. That meant carriages no longer derailed occasionally while propelling long trains through them. It also removed the annoyance of a black dirt build up in two places near the crossing nose. (Note that current Peco insulfrog points may be different to the ones I bought in year 2000.) As I had gone over to DCC, by now most rail joiners were soldered (except board joints) and there were multiple track feeds from the bus under the baseboards.

 

I was by now becoming accustomed to adding bits to the layout and regarding the design as fluid. I wanted to design better operational potential. Within CAD, anything was considered. Various ideas simmered away for a long time, but I was aware that I would lose the ability to relax with the trains for a long time. Finally I took the drastic step of demounting most of the boards and performing a radical rebuild. This took from 12th March 2005 to 9th June 2007; that is 455 days. A milestone was day 179 when I actually managed to run a train around the new inner main. It was most painful to be unable to just go up in the loft to play trains during that long period. I had estimated it might take 6 months. Buggrit!

 

The revamp involved getting hold of the wide Board 1 and the adjoining south end Board 6 and swinging them round so that Board 1 pointed diagonally across the loft. New legs and supports were built.

 

The inner and outer main are still shown in blue. A blue 'siding' coming off the inner main (bottom left of diagram) is a downwards incline that presently goes nowhere, but will 'later' (e.g. year 2014?) be a second reverse loop that will rejoin the outer main at the north-west corner. The other blue 'siding', that connects to both mains and runs diagonally across the loft, drops at 1 in 75 and will eventually (e.g. year 2016?) reach a very low level set of storage sidings in the southern end of the loft.

 

Construction of the new junction in the south-east corner of the layout. The fixed nature of proprietary points made this a very difficult design and build exercise. It was only just possible to get everything in with minimum plain track radius of 30 inches. The idea of including connections to a descending incline was only worked up about 4 months after the rebuild began, and you can see evidence of revisions made. Working under the sloping roof didn't help.

 

It wasn't just a matter of additions: all areas worked on were to be properly tidied up and sprayed with grey primer. Wiring and cabling was also improved. Switches were rerouted to the north side of Board 1 as I was now sitting with the controls in the space at the north-east corner of the layout.

 

The major changes were:

 

1. I now had a reverse loop feeding into the inner main on the south side. Trains could be made up from the main sidings and despatched in either direction without propelling. The following view shows an outer main freight coming across the junction (taken before the work was finished).

 

2. It allowed an extended loco yard and an extra carriage siding 0 between it and the original sidings 1 to 8.

 

3. The outer loop was extended all around the outside of the east end. Apart from extra capacity, it removed the need for the curved point that it previously ended with. As far as I could detirmine the most tightly curved rails in this point only had a radius of 24 inches, whereas everything else I was building on the main was minimum 30 inches. It had to go! For operational flexibility I created a scissors crossing between the loop and the outer main, about half way along. What a game that was! Despite a wicked kink in the route from main to loop, everything runs without derailment or hesitation, so that'll do then.

 

(Photo was taken while laying junction for incline down to reverse loop)

 

4. At the east end there will be a platform outside the loop and an island platform between the inner and outer main. They will be very narrow and it will be a bit of a sketch of a station. Some low relief station buildings will run along the east wall of the loft, with something bigger in the south-east corner. That's a long way in the future.

 

5. Board 12 had no place in the plan until I realised that temporarily (hah!) it could go in the 'el' of the loft and be temporarily connected up via the coal yard and a temporary Board 11. The other coal sidings on Boards 7 and 8 have not yet been reinstated: next job.

 

So that's that. Here's an overall view. You can see the difference between the rebuilt east and the untouched west end.

 

Until 2009, the layout had no name. The name Westfield came unbidden into my mind one evening, and I liked it. It had the advantage that it didn't pin the layout geographically. I could continue to dreamily float the location somewhere between North London and an invisble line from Liverpool to Leeds. Then a few days later I realised the only station on the layout was at the east end. So it became Eastfield.

(Some coincidence here: the layout in RMweb that I most wish I was building is Eastwood Town!)

 

Cheers, Tony

[gordon s]

Hi Tony, really enjoyed reading about the construction of your layout and how it has evolved. It great to see a large roundy roundy that will allow full length trains where operation and running initially takes preference over the scenic side. You have plenty of time to develop that side of your layout and you made the right decision to get something running and take some enjoyment first. Good to know someone else has gone down the CAD route. It really makes life so much easier and eliminates wasted material and more importantly, wasted time and the demotivation that brings.

 

I was a bit taken aback by your last comment. It's really nice to know someone is following your build...

[Mallard60022]

Lovely. What a great loft; advantage of a house built in the good old days!

This is what I should be doing, the stuff is all there but not the track!

I look forward to seeing the progress. Running big trains is what it is all about!

36E

[Southernboy]

All I can say is - WOW - that track plan is so much more than I expected, especially in terms of sidings!

Considering the time and detail you're putting into the scenic side, this is going to be some layout

[Rammy]

Great space and interesting trackplan.

This one's going to be good!

[Dr.Glum]

Hello Patient Readers,

If you've been waiting for updates on progress, then ha! It's been a long time since May 2009. I did about one more year's worth of construction, before I totally lost interest and stopped going into the loft to play trains, except when a visitor insisted. But now I have hope of things moving on, even if not for some months.

 

The layout has to leave the loft, as I am house hunting and the wife is keeping this house. I find that I am interested in the railway again, so am very interested in the size of the lofts that I am seeing. Most will need more work, but I've seen a couple that even provide more headroom. That is not to be sneezed at. I need a minimum clear space at layout level of 18ft6in by 7ft6in to fit in the basic oval. The grandiose plans for expansion may never happen, but I'll have enough on my plate rebuilding the junctions that straddle joins between baseboard modules. It's a good job I wrote copious notes about how things were put together. Oh well, it'll be worth it in the long run. Seasons greetings to y'all.

[class"66"]

Realy nice plans!! wil be watching how this comes along

 

cheers neil..

[d winpenny]

Looking good

 

David

[sub39h]

Hi mate, impressed with the sheer size of your layout. I hope the house move is going/went well and that you've fired up your plans again. Would love to see an update

[Dr.Glum]

Good day to y'all,

It's been a long time since I've posted. Brief update. I moved out in March 2014. Have been gradually removing stuff and layout from the loft. My new house is smaller, and it's been a bit of a shock how much ancillary stuff one has to support the modelling, even without workshop machinery. Box upon box of materials and kits and stock boxes and who knew what else! I found great reluctance to actually start dismantling boards, and last year (2015) only took down some of the easier boards. To be frank, it was painful, I had nowhere convenient to store them, and I had no plan for cutting the areas that were too big to get down through the loft opening.

Anyway, in the last few months I have found renewed interest (and pressure from the ex-wife) to deal with the really difficult sections. I have even wielded the dreaded saw, only once. My new place has a medium size conservatory and I've been working up plans for a temporary running track around that, and buying additional stock (not that I need any!).

I have a plan as to how to preserve the main junction that caused me so much pain to get right, have found that lifting and preserving laid track has been less destructive than I thought (and the fact that it was spray painted means it keeps it's curved shapes), and am trying to decide how to spend the money to either 'convert' the loft in my new place, or be totally radical and install a converted 8ft x 24ft shipping container to be situated at my new lady's place - a farm in North Wales.

So a lot of planning is called for. I have some photos of the demolition job over the last 18 months, so I will post them when I can. I bought a J15 way back in January and it kept calling to me from the cupboard, so I now have the means to move stock around in my dining room. I even bought some radius 4 setrack curves so that I could set up a large oval on the floor. It was great to have trains running, BUT it proved to me I have to have them running near eye level when I'm sitting down.

[Dr.Glum]

As a finale to this thread (as the layout no longer exists), I'll try posting links to the few videos that I took. Here's the first, as a test of the procedure.

[Dr.Glum]

https://youtu.be/M5TdoqdQd5k

https://youtu.be/MIZRXyOICvc

[Dr.Glum]

I've been looking back through my collection of images of the layout and found a few that show how it was in the latter days.

Below: Trying out the buildings in the far corner of the layout. Very constrained by the slope of the roof.

Below: Temporary wiring attached to power the lights.

[Dr.Glum]

Further view of the corner scenery module, built as a trial exercise (not finished).

Below: testing the down incline during construction.

Below: the same line after installing the retaining wall. It was planned that this route down would loop around at low level (on a circuitous route climbing at 1:130) and re-join the outer main. This would mean there were reversing loops in both directions. Never to be, unfortunately!

Below: I just planted a few things to log the fact it'll be a coal yard.

Below: only view I have of the temporary line from the storage sidings in the other part of the loft, to the main layout.

Below: general view looking west.

Below: general view looking east.

Below:  south side junctions. Outer loop, siding, two running lines and the incline down.

Below:  trains running - not much else to say!

Below:  another incline going nowhere fast. A projected route to low level storage sidings long enough for 12 coach trains (never built). At 1:75, this would have been an interesting task fro steam engines - need a banker?

Below:  Bit of fun, with the yard lights on in the gloom.

 

[Dr.Glum]

I previously mentioned photos of the dismantling (which isn't finished). Here's a few.

Below: Some boards were easy to separate. Card retaining walls were carefully prised away from the structure (only lightly fixed with PVA). Joining plates were unscrewed. The rail joiners had not been soldered up, so a gentle pull of the left-hand board started the removal. 

Below:  General chaos as I work my way towards that far wall. At this stage there were still a lot of boxes of 'stuff' to be removed by the car-full.

Below:  Some of the scenery modules stacked waiting to travel. They were easy to remove as all lighting wiring went via chocolate blocks, and the modules themselves screwed to the layout. E.g. via the 5 little square wood blocks along the back length of the face-down module.

Below:  Some boards from the end that was never rebuilt (and hence no sleepers at rail joints, not sprayed grey, etc.). The big board was the west end of the layout and has to be further taken apart to fit through the loft opening.

I hope that if I post any more photos, it'll mark the dismounting of the most tricky section of the layout. Sawing will be involved!

[Dr.Glum]

Been working in the old loft – the job is nearly done and I’ll post no more photos after these two. In the first view I have uncoupled the big board from the wall and its supports, and moved it away from the end wall so I can work on it. I’m about to snip through some soldered fishplates and lift the foreground tracks (and label them) so that I can separate the extension pieces that they run across.

The last photo shows the boards ready to leave the loft – but not today, I’m worn out. It makes clear why I had to lift track – all those sweeping curves crossing multiple board boundaries. If it wasn’t for the need to get the boards through the loft opening, I would not have had to separate so much of this area of the layout. Note that I first started with two hollow doors in year 2000 and although they do have disadvantages in use, they have not sagged or warped and are light enough for me to pick up unaided.

And so one more session should see my stuff out of the loft and out of the house. Some of those boards are heavy and I’ll have to get a mate round. From here on, all progress will be logged in the following topic, so thank you for following this one up to here. Happy New Year!

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/118435-eastfield-ii-phoenix-from-the-ruins/