Glenfinnan Station in O Gauge

[thegreenhowards]

2 hours ago, young37215 said:

 

7 roads at each end appears overkill to me, you are unlikely to have 14 trains to run? I am not sure what a typical working day back in the 60's was but I doubt that it involved 14 trains. Fast forward to the 80's and it was a maximum of 5 trains per day including the steam service. Even adding in an engineering train plus a special and 8 roads, 4 at each end, would appear more than sufficent. Smaller baseboard equals less weight and, hopefully, lower cost?

 

You may well be right Rob. I probably am being greedy. I plan to run it as a through the ages sequence starting in the early ‘50s with a V4 and Thompsons

 

 

…moving through green diesels.

..and ending with 37/4s in the late ‘80s. I should really stop with RETB in Dec 1987 but I like triple grey livery so I may push it a bit.

 

I seem to have about 16 trains at the moment….but I keep buying more! Unlike your layout on the WHL proper, there aren’t really enough trains on the extension to maintain interest for a full day’s operation if I stick rigidly to one year.
 

The alternatives would be to concentrate on either 50/60s or 70/80s for any particular exhibition or to incorporate some form of cassette system into the turntable. One also has to leave a spare road on the turntable so that trains from one end have somewhere to go. So a 4 Road turntable would mean 7 trains in total.

 

Andy

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

1 hour ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

7 does not seem unreasonable to me, particularly not for the Fort William end, where you might well want 6 or 7 different trains to choose from.

 

I have never built a layout with a turntable plate and it is a very long time since I operated a layout with one, but if your individual items of rolling stock are heavy - particularly a locomotive at one end of a train - then you probably want a reasonably heavy turning baseboard to make sure the centre of gravity remains within the turntable bearing ring.

 

If locomotives are particularly heavy, don't have all your trains facing the same way. Of course, in use, trains will naturally end up facing different ways, but it might be tempting at the start to have all the trains facing towards the scenic section.

 

I am sure Grainge and Hodder can give you better advice than I can, though.

I’ve never built or operated one either. I just think that they’re a very neat solution which avoids handling stock. I have seen 8’ turntables on O gauge exhibition layouts like Kensington Addison Road and they seem to work well.

 

I think that inevitably all the trains will point the same way at some point. They should all face the layout to start with. One then runs through the contents of the turntables with all the locos ending at the outside ends. Then the turntables are rotated and one starts again.

[Ray H]

I'd suggest something like 15mm/18mm thickness for the turntable with handles that fold down to prevent trains from running off the edge. Don't forget that you can only be at one end of the turntable as it turns so that could impact how much weight you can have at the other end.

[thegreenhowards]

15 hours ago, Ray H said:

I'd suggest something like 15mm/18mm thickness for the turntable with handles that fold down to prevent trains from running off the edge. Don't forget that you can only be at one end of the turntable as it turns so that could impact how much weight you can have at the other end.

I only have a basic sketch at the moment, with a full drawing promised in the next week. But from that it looks like he’s proposing a c.100mm deep framed ply baseboard for the turntable deck. I’m sure I could add some weight in the centre to move the centre of gravity if necessary.

 

[Ray H]

The widder the supporting frame the greater the support towards the ends of the turntable board, especially when that is at 90º to the frame. I'd still be thinking of something thicker than their usual 9mm (?) baseboard top material.

 

I have their boards on my static layout and can vouch for their build.

[thegreenhowards]

I’ve now broken the back of the eastern station throat board. It’s difficult to know exactly what level of undergrowth I should be aiming at, as every photo I find is a bit different. I suspect there was less tree growth back in the ‘80s than there is now, but there was still some.

 

Although more recent, this gives an idea of what I am aiming at.

 

 

And although the gorse wasn’t in bloom here, this is more in era.

 

 

A few days ago, my board was just plain grass.

 

 

I’ve added a lot of weeds/ undergrowth and trees, plus a fence and some sheep. Not sure about the sheep, but they illustrate the point of the cattle creep.

 

 

 

I’ve also laid my first stretch of point rodding.
 

 

 

This is the Wills OO product, which everyone says is over scale for OO. So I thought I’d try it in O gauge. To my untrained eye it looks OK. But it was very fiddly, so before I do any more, I’d welcome other peoples thoughts on it.

 

Andy

 

 

 

 

[GWR57xx]

On 28/02/2024 at 18:55, thegreenhowards said:

Changing the subject completely, I have been thinking about how the layout will operate when exhibited. In the garden it plugs into a circuit, but for exhibition use, I'll need a fiddle yard or two. I've been talking to Grainge and Hodder about their turntable baseboards. They have been very helpful and have drawn up bespoke design for a2400mm (8 foot) turntable with 7 tracks as shown below.

I would need two of these which would fit onto my layout as shown below.

I'd be grateful for any thoughts on the practicality of this and any other ideas.

 

 

Hi Andy,

I expect your turntable will be symmetrical, like:

I don't know what kind of support structure G&H propose beneath the top board, but presumably it will not provide 360 degree support such as:

The normal range of movement (when not turning through 180°) looks to be about +/-15° (to align the outer tracks with the central exit track):

 

so I'd be looking to provide as much support around the central area as possible using something heavy duty like:

 

 

with as many support rollers as you can, including at the outer edges e.g.

 

I'd also be thinking of providing some kind of latch mechanism to prevent the turntable being accidentally moved beyond the 15° point, so that the operator physically has to release the latch to be able to turn the table 180°.

 

The table will be totally unsupported at the ends beyond about +/-30° rotation and relying only on the central bearing & rollers, so the operator will have to be ready to provide any support needed for an unbalanced load.

 

This may seem a bit belt & braces, but the worst case scenario would be thousands of pounds worth of stock taking a nose dive to the floor so I don't think it's excessive.

Hope this helps.

[03060]

3 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

 

I’ve also laid my first stretch of point rodding.
 

 

 

This is the Wills OO product, which everyone says is over scale for OO. So I thought I’d try it in O gauge. To my untrained eye it looks OK. But it was very fiddly, so before I do any more, I’d welcome other peoples thoughts on it.

 

Andy

 

 

 

 

 

That looks spot on to me, Andy, little bit of paint and weathering to blend it in with the trackwork and done. The trees and gorse look good to me also, showing them in the earlier stages of their lives.

 

Regards,

Ian.

[GWR57xx]

Turntable again: don’t forget to add some kind of physical stop at each end of each track to prevent the stock flying off due to centrifugal force when the turntable is rotated.

[thegreenhowards]

Thanks ‘GWR57xx’, I appreciate the thought and effort which must have gone into that post.

 

I intend to use a much bigger central bearing like this one.

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/sourcing-map-Aluminum-Turntable-Dining-Table/dp/B0CDT8DG6S/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=38LSB3H9M7VXG&keywords=last%2Bsusan%2Bswivel%2Bbase&qid=1707752141&sprefix=Last%2Bsusan%2Caps%2C249&sr=8-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&th=1

 

It claims to take 200 KG, so even if I filled the turntable with nothing but Heljan 37s, I’d only use half its capacity!

 

Yes, you’re right about the 15 degrees and symmetrical nature of the turntable. The support underneath would just be in line with the turntable rather than right round. G&H do not recommend rollers. They suggest instead that the layers fit closely and are polished (beeswax?) for low friction movement. I’m slightly sceptical about this, but will probably follow their advice.

 

A physical stop at the end is definitely required. Not least because DCC sound fitted locos have lots of momentum. I’ll ask G&H to engineer one in.

 

Andy

[GWR57xx]

5 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

Thanks ‘GWR57xx’, I appreciate the thought and effort which must have gone into that post.

 

I intend to use a much bigger central bearing like this one.

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/sourcing-map-Aluminum-Turntable-Dining-Table/dp/B0CDT8DG6S/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=38LSB3H9M7VXG&keywords=last%2Bsusan%2Bswivel%2Bbase&qid=1707752141&sprefix=Last%2Bsusan%2Caps%2C249&sr=8-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&th=1

 

It claims to take 200 KG, so even if I filled the turntable with nothing but Heljan 37s, I’d only use half its capacity!

 

Yes, you’re right about the 15 degrees and symmetrical nature of the turntable. The support underneath would just be in line with the turntable rather than right round. G&H do not recommend rollers. They suggest instead that the layers fit closely and are polished (beeswax?) for low friction movement. I’m slightly sceptical about this, but will probably follow their advice.

 

A physical stop at the end is definitely required. Not least because DCC sound fitted locos have lots of momentum. I’ll ask G&H to engineer one in.

 

Andy

Hi Andy,

I don’t think that would do the job here.

How will you fix it down to the supports and to the turntable top? It appears to rely on suction cups?

Even if it can be firmly bolted down to both surfaces it will only cover the central circle (shown in red on my diagram).
I know it quotes some huge load bearing capacity but that is only in a vertical direction (I.e. compression). When your turntable is even slightly unbalanced there will be potentially considerable turning moments in the vertical plane that the lazy Susan isn’t designed to cope with.

I hope I’m wrong, but I wouldn’t want to rely on it.

Best wishes,

Peter

[young37215]

14 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

I’ve now broken the back of the eastern station throat board. It’s difficult to know exactly what level of undergrowth I should be aiming at, as every photo I find is a bit different. I suspect there was less tree growth back in the ‘80s than there is now, but there was still some.

 

Although more recent, this gives an idea of what I am aiming at.

 

 

And although the gorse wasn’t in bloom here, this is more in era.

 

 

A few days ago, my board was just plain grass.

 

 

I’ve added a lot of weeds/ undergrowth and trees, plus a fence and some sheep. Not sure about the sheep, but they illustrate the point of the cattle creep.

 

 

 

I’ve also laid my first stretch of point rodding.
 

 

 

This is the Wills OO product, which everyone says is over scale for OO. So I thought I’d try it in O gauge. To my untrained eye it looks OK. But it was very fiddly, so before I do any more, I’d welcome other peoples thoughts on it.

 

Andy

 

 

 

 

 

Nice work, this really looks the part with the point rodding blending in a treat. I'd be interested in a list of the products that you have used to achieve the look. 

 

[thegreenhowards]

11 hours ago, young37215 said:

 

Nice work, this really looks the part with the point rodding blending in a treat. I'd be interested in a list of the products that you have used to achieve the look. 

 

Thanks Rob,

 

The base is chicken wire covered with plaster bandage and painted to seal it. Then I use layers of static grass from WWS, starting with 2mm and then different colours of 4mm and 6mm grass. These are scrunched up with my fingers between layers to give the rough look. Between each layer I spray with cheap hairspray.

 

The rhodendendron is woodland scenics tree armatures bent out fairly flat. Then dark green clump material from woodland scenics. The pinky purple blossom is made from kids wax crayon put in the freezer overnight then grated with a cheese grater (when my wife is out!). This is attached to the trees with scenic cement sprayed on. 
 

The gorse is light green clump material with yellow crayon.

 

Most of the trees are from a ‘Forest in a box’ which is a large pack of sea foam. These are soaked to make them pliable the sprayed with scenic cement and covered with a mid green flock. I put several stems in a hole on the side nearer the camera to represent Sycamore coppice which seemed to be prevalent here. The bigger trees are stems made from Hebe in the garden with smaller bits of seafoam attached with hobby tac.

 

The bramble is rubberised horse hair with ‘bramble’ flock over the top.

 

The other shrubby weeds are small dead heads of sedum and astilbe from the garden, dipped in Modge Podge Matt medium and covered with different flocks.

 

The fence, which is a bit more wonky than I’d like, is cocktail sticks and cotton with the corner posts from firework rocket stems.

 

I hope that’s useful - is there anything I’ve missed?

 

Andy

 

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

13 hours ago, GWR57xx said:

Hi Andy,

I don’t think that would do the job here.

How will you fix it down to the supports and to the turntable top? It appears to rely on suction cups?

Even if it can be firmly bolted down to both surfaces it will only cover the central circle (shown in red on my diagram).
I know it quotes some huge load bearing capacity but that is only in a vertical direction (I.e. compression). When your turntable is even slightly unbalanced there will be potentially considerable turning moments in the vertical plane that the lazy Susan isn’t designed to cope with.

I hope I’m wrong, but I wouldn’t want to rely on it.

Best wishes,

Peter

Thanks Peter,

 

I will interrogate G&H on the subject of rollers.

 

Andy

[thegreenhowards]

Coming back to the subject of colours, I’ve bitten the bullet and tried some new colours on my signal box. 
 

 

Only one coat and it hasn’t covered particularly well, but I think you get enough of an idea of the colours. I’m trying to replicate the ones shown in my first post on this subject here.

 

I decided not to buy the Tamiya paints because a) I’m not convinced the colours weren’t spot on, at least for the faded state at Glenfinnan, b) I prefer enamels, and c) I have inherited (almost) unlimited supplies of Humbrol enamels from an estate.

 

So I went with.

1) Humbrol 101 (mid green) with a tiny amount of Humbrol 104 (Oxford blue) for the darker green;

2) 3 parts Humbrol 120 (light green) to one part precision signal yellow for the yellow green; and

3) Humbrol HR 103 (cream) for the cream.

 

I think the cream is a bit too yellow, so I may switch to BR coach cream for that. The others I’m quite pleased with, but I’d welcome comments as I know my colour perception isn’t the best.

 

Andy

 

[03060]

11 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

Coming back to the subject of colours, I’ve bitten the bullet and tried some new colours on my signal box. 
 

 

Only one coat and it hasn’t covered particularly well, but I think you get enough of an idea of the colours. I’m trying to replicate the ones shown in my first post on this subject here.

 

I decided not to buy the Tamiya paints because a) I’m not convinced the colours weren’t spot on, at least for the faded state at Glenfinnan, b) I prefer enamels, and c) I have inherited (almost) unlimited supplies of Humbrol enamels from an estate.

 

So I went with.

1) Humbrol 101 (mid green) with a tiny amount of Humbrol 104 (Oxford blue) for the darker green;

2) 3 parts Humbrol 120 (light green) to one part precision signal yellow for the yellow green; and

3) Humbrol HR 103 (cream) for the cream.

 

I think the cream is a bit too yellow, so I may switch to BR coach cream for that. The others I’m quite pleased with, but I’d welcome comments as I know my colour perception isn’t the best.

 

Andy

 

 

Hello Andy, could you try mixing a bit of white into all 3 of the colours to try and give them a more faded look (if that is what you're after ?)

 

The darker 'green' in the original photo is also edging more towards the bluer side of the spectrum than dark green .... could you try the Oxford or an RAF blue and try adding a touch of yellow in it and maybe white to fade if it needs it ?? (Not necessarily to try on the model just yet until you are happy.)

 

However I may have misunderstood the effect you want to end up with,  ie a faded look ? ... or a fresher look ?? .... and whilst I am a colour Printer by trade I am used to working with varying Black, Cyan, Magenta and Yellow ink levels rather than mixing paints .... a simple little side pallet should give you the chance to experiment with a bit of this and a bit of that, though, to 'move' the colour in different directions.

 

Hope this helps,

Regards,

Ian.

 

[thegreenhowards]

Back to the run round loop at Mallaig. I’ve been fortunate enough to have a real train to Mallaig today.

 

 

This was load 7 Mk 2F (mk 1 RU) and I can report that the run round loop is big enough for seven vehicles … but only just!

 

 

It was this tight at both ends.

 

This shows the loco having run round.

 

 

Andy

[thegreenhowards]

After the tour I spent a few days staying in Morar with some hill walking friends. And then on Thursday they all went home and I had a day mainly spent on a Glenfinnan site visit. I took loads of photos and some will trot out over the next few weeks as I continue detailing the layout. But I also spent some time checking out other iconic locations on the West Highland Extension in case I get the opportunity to include any around the garden.

 

I’ve put this video together as inspiration.

 

 

I hope you enjoy it. Sorry it’s only got sprinters in, but if there’d been decent trains out, I’d have been in them!

 

Andy

 

[03060]

5 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

After the tour I spent a few days staying in Morar with some hill walking friends. And then on Thursday they all went home and I had a day mainly spent on a Glenfinnan site visit. I took loads of photos and some will trot out over the next few weeks as I continue detailing the layout. But I also spent some time checking out other iconic locations on the West Highland Extension in case I get the opportunity to include any around the garden.

 

I’ve put this video together as inspiration.

 

 

I hope you enjoy it. Sorry it’s only got sprinters in, but if there’d been decent trains out, I’d have been in them!

 

Andy

 

 

Thanks for that Andy, I'm almost ready to start putting track down on a 'Mallaig Line' inspired N gauge layout which will feature one of the viaducts as it's main feature and whilst it will probably be Loch-nan-Uamh I still haven't ruled out changing this to either Morar (pre road bypass, Grrrrrr !) or Arnabol depending on which 'looks right' in the space and layout plan that I'm considering, so your video is very useful and timely to me, thanks for posting it.

 

Regards,

Ian.

Edited March 17 by 03060
Emotionally necessary additional comment added !

[St Enodoc]

7 minutes ago, 03060 said:

 

Thanks for that Andy, I'm almost ready to start putting track down on a 'Mallaig Line' inspired N gauge layout which will feature one of the viaducts as it's main feature and whilst it will probably be Loch-nan-Uamh I still haven't ruled out changing this to either Morar (pre road bypass, Grrrrrr !) or Arnabol depending on which 'looks right' in the space and layout plan that I'm considering, so your video is very useful and timely to me, thanks for posting it.

 

Regards,

Ian.

Ian, have a look at the Railway of the Month in RM March 1973.

[young37215]

10 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

After the tour I spent a few days staying in Morar with some hill walking friends. And then on Thursday they all went home and I had a day mainly spent on a Glenfinnan site visit. I took loads of photos and some will trot out over the next few weeks as I continue detailing the layout. But I also spent some time checking out other iconic locations on the West Highland Extension in case I get the opportunity to include any around the garden.

 

I’ve put this video together as inspiration.

 

 

I hope you enjoy it. Sorry it’s only got sprinters in, but if there’d been decent trains out, I’d have been in them!

 

Andy

 

 

The Mallaig run round was very informative as well, having seen a number of pictures of the BLS tour I am now regretting that I did not book on it. Interesting to see the dog box on the back of the 2 car unit crossing Glenfinnan, I thought these were intended for Oban trains only. 

[thegreenhowards]

5 hours ago, 03060 said:

 

Thanks for that Andy, I'm almost ready to start putting track down on a 'Mallaig Line' inspired N gauge layout which will feature one of the viaducts as it's main feature and whilst it will probably be Loch-nan-Uamh I still haven't ruled out changing this to either Morar (pre road bypass, Grrrrrr !) or Arnabol depending on which 'looks right' in the space and layout plan that I'm considering, so your video is very useful and timely to me, thanks for posting it.

 

Regards,

Ian.

Arnobol is very hemmed in by trees and is quite a rough hike to get to it. Probably why it doesn’t feature in train photos more often. Borrodale is even more hemmed in, although I could have done better if I’d left myself more time!

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

I answered some questions during my visit to Glenfinnan. The first was, that the water tank has no top.

 

 

 

 

 

I think the grp tanks postdate my era, so it would have been open and full of water. I gather the local kids used to swim and fish in it! I now have to consider scratchbuilding it. Those curved tops look challenging. Any suggestions as to how to proceed?

 

Andy

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

30 minutes ago, young37215 said:

 

The Mallaig run round was very informative as well, having seen a number of pictures of the BLS tour I am now regretting that I did not book on it. Interesting to see the dog box on the back of the 2 car unit crossing Glenfinnan, I thought these were intended for Oban trains only. 

Yes, the tour was very good apart from the safety b……s about not standing by the window. The 37 was audible through the a/c, but rather muted compared with fresh air stock.

 

The dog box  was a surprise to me. RTT didn’t have it in advance, so I think it was an on the day adjustment.

 

Andy

 

 

[BoD]

47 minutes ago, thegreenhowards said:

Those curved tops look challenging. Any suggestions as to how to proceed?

Plastruct semicircular tubecut down the middle and a lot of bodging onto the sides.  
Plastruct/Evergreen quarter circle rod if you don’t mind the underside being solid rather than hollow. As above bodged onto the sides.  
Brass sides with the top turned over as happens to coach sides etc.

 

Not particularly easy - but do-able. 
Im sure others will have suggestions too.