A shunting puzzle with a twist in 009 (eventually)

[009 micro modeller]

The other element of this that I need to work out is where exactly in the UK the layout is supposed to be set (and I am restricting it to the UK, as per the standard gauge wagons, use of 4mm scale rather than 3.5mm etc. etc., although there are prototype influences from elsewhere in Europe for the overhead electrification and use of transporter wagons).

 

East Anglia (either fenland as in Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire etc. or the more rolling landscape as found in Suffolk and parts of Norfolk) does have some appeal, and I did have a look at the never-built Oakington & Cottenham proposals (discussed elsewhere on RMWeb and particularly interesting in this context as it was to have been a 2’ 6” gauge roadside tramway, even potentially using transporter wagons). On the other hand, I’m not sure that, scenically, modelling the Fens will work on such a small layout, as I need to have a convenient scenic break and won’t really be able to create much of a sense of space. Also, if I later extend the layout with a station module (or other modules) it might be better not to be restricted to a specific real location. For the region generally, Southwold is a possible source of inspiration, as are (more loosely) the 3’ 6” gauge town tramway systems.

 

Although it’s a nice area with lots of interesting narrow gauge railways, North Wales (especially Snowdonia) is right out. Most of the lines there were focused on slate traffic, which (as on the Ffestiniog) was more likely to be hauled in quarry wagons along the line to a standard gauge connection (or previously to a port or canal basin) and then transhipped there. It’s a very unlikely setting for transporter wagons - the Padarn used ‘host’ wagons, but these are the opposite way round to the type I’m using, with the narrow gauge wagons riding on a wider gauge rather than SG on NG.

 

Mid-Wales (and/or across the border in Shropshire as well) is more interesting. The Welshpool & Llanfair in that area is a 2’ 6” gauge line connecting with a standard gauge railway station in a market town, and Calthrop did suggest transporters for use there at one stage. It also opened in 1903; for my freelance line I need a similar relatively late opening date to make the electrification plausible, and perhaps also to allow it to have used Light Railway legislation that wouldn’t have been available before 1896. (It could have opened as a steam line and been electrified later, I suppose, but not that much later because then things like competition from road transport and the ability to build practical internal combustion locos come into play, making the infrastructure costs of electrification a less appealing idea). A line designed around the use of transporter wagons also implies a later opening date (Leek & Manifold was 1904) because it must have been designed to connect with a standard gauge railway rather than a canal. So a line a bit like the W&LLR and in roughly the same area, but electrified, seems like a good idea; it also could be a good opportunity for me to do the same sort of scenery (stone walls made from individual cardboard pieces and slightly marshy fields represented with a mixture of scatter, grass tufts and pieces of plaster cast rocks) that I did quite effectively for my cake box diorama ‘The Visitor’ (see photo below). The catch with this idea is the amount of livestock traffic that would probably be involved; I don’t think cattle and sheep would be carried on transporter wagons because they can walk across from one wagon to the other, like people can. So if I’m going to do this I either need to feature livestock traffic (not on transporters) in some way, or show why it isn’t represented (perhaps loaded/unloaded elsewhere). Did the W&LLR transport any livestock right at the end in the 1950s or was it all incoming coal by that point?

 

 

Alternatively Yorkshire or Cumbria might be interesting settings, or perhaps the South West, although I haven’t looked into these options in as much detail.

Edited October 27, 2023 by 009 micro modeller

[JimRead]

Hello 009MM,

 

I went to a show a couple of times at Llandrinio not far from Llanymynech where the evidence of the railways that met there is still visible on Google maps, a lttle further south is the old Potts branch line to Criggion again still visible. The bridge across the Severn was in a bad state so they used that tiny inspection loco and a little coach to keep the service going.

 

They could have converted it to narrow gauge and revived the quarry.

 

Cheers Jim

[009 micro modeller]

2 hours ago, JimRead said:

Hello 009MM,

 

I went to a show a couple of times at Llandrinio not far from Llanymynech where the evidence of the railways that met there is still visible on Google maps, a lttle further south is the old Potts branch line to Criggion again still visible. The bridge across the Severn was in a bad state so they used that tiny inspection loco and a little coach to keep the service going.

 

They could have converted it to narrow gauge and revived the quarry.

 

Cheers Jim

Might be a good source of inspiration but I may be better off not sticking to a specific real location (especially one like a quarry with one dominant form of traffic - shunting puzzle layouts tend to be better with a more diverse selection of wagon types). Also would they really convert to narrow gauge only to then use transporter wagons on it anyway?

 

I’m sure it can’t be that complicated and I’m probably overthinking it, but it’s different from the industrial NG I’ve done before (which was quite specific, e.g. a quarry or a watercress bed) because, as a common carrier (a bit like the W&LLR or L&M), it isn’t quite as self-contained, but at the same time the geography of the area will relate to the sort of traffic involved. The motorised standard gauge wagons (which you wouldn’t usually see on an NG layout) also make the regional location a bit more obvious, although in the 1950s era that I’m planning to go for (i.e. with BR on the standard gauge, and the NG light railway probably in decline) this isn’t quite as critical as it might be for earlier periods.

 

Again I think it comes down to if I will want to extend it after the initial shunting puzzle layout is finished and add other modules. If I do, then it might be helpful not to restrict myself too much by picking a very specific location, but I’ll also have to put more effort into the fictitious backstory and making the scenery look geographically consistent. If on the other hand it is always just going to be a self-contained micro layout then the Cottenham idea seems interesting again (assuming it can be plausibly fitted into the area), or the Welshpool/Shropshire-influenced idea, but equally it could be anywhere, even somewhere totally fictitious and modelled in a fairly generic way without anything to tie it to a specific part of the country.

 

 I don’t think I’ve really had this issue before because my previous micro layouts have either been based on somewhere very specific (even if a bit freelance/‘inspired by’) or done in such a way that it doesn’t really matter. The quarry layout mentioned at the start of the thread is an example of the latter approach - people at exhibitions sometimes say they like how I’ve painted the rock faces and done the shading, and I am quite pleased with it, but it’s not really aiming to represent a specific type or colour of rock (which would be a distinctive feature of a specific region). But other than that it’s a 2ft gauge aggregate quarry with skips and a small diesel loco, features that were found all over the country.

[JimRead]

Hello 009MM,

 

Thanks for the reply good of you.

 

I went to this: https://www.railmaponline.com/UKIEMap.php# and found the branch lines to Spilsby and Horncastle and some small vilages to the north, east and west of both. One called Mavis Enderby near to Bag Enderby and both not far away from Ashby Puerorum. You could not make the names up no matter how hard you tried :-)

 

Cheers - Jim

[edit] Claxby Pluckacre!

Edited October 27, 2023 by JimRead

[009 micro modeller]

I’ve started with a quick, very rough sketch of how the layout might look (this is not to scale and is different from my earlier plans, which are more concerned with operations and getting correct siding lengths for the puzzle to work, but I’ll come back to those later).

 

 

The standard gauge siding is marked ‘SG’ at centre-left, and the road bridge is the scenic break. Possibly this will need to become a footbridge or occupation (farm track) bridge depending on how much space it takes up.

 

Essentially, I need three sidings with specific lengths, and one of them has to include the standard gauge unloading siding at the end. It’s a sort of modified Inglenook design, and during my earlier planning I managed to work out that this is the optimum way round to arrange things in terms of operational challenge and overall lengths, while allowing the loco to be visible for longer than it would be if all three sidings were served by the traverser (indicated on the right by dashed lines). The long siding with the standard gauge section is at the back, so that the wagons placed on it do not block the viewer’s view of the rest of the layout.

 

Obviously it’s mainly a shunting puzzle but to justify the track layout the backstory is that my fictional electrified narrow gauge line opened in the 1900s as a common carrier operation, but lost its regular passenger service to bus competition in the 1930s. Freight continued to run, but at some stage in the late 1940s a bridge was washed out part-way along the line, closing it beyond the location depicted in the sketch. There was never a proper station here, just a couple of sidings serving a nearby village and a few farms. Setting my layout in the 1950s, the railway is now in decline but these sidings continue to receive some freight traffic on transporter wagons; the loco runs round at the next station along, using the former passing loop, before propelling the wagons up to these sidings at the end of the line. The middle track was once the through line, so the end could be blocked off by an abandoned wagon (shown in red on the left).

 

I was partly inspired by some of the smaller Leek & Manifold stations, which simply had a low platform for passenger trains and then a single siding, with a standard gauge section at the end to allow unloading of the transporter wagons. I thought it might be quite nice to suggest that there was once some sort of (now disused) passenger halt as well, so I’ve indicated one on the left, below the abandoned wagon. It can be short and very minimal, perhaps a bit like Cynfal on the Talyllyn, but I’m still not sure it really fits into the plan or is really needed (it would be purely scenic because there isn’t any passenger traffic). The more ‘natural’ location for a halt platform, if I have one at all, is nearer to the road bridge, but that’s where the front siding needs to go.

 

Apart from that, I quite like this arrangement. The only major thing that bothers me is that using a road bridge like this as a scenic break is perhaps a bit clichéd (and perhaps it won’t be that effective, given that it needs to be tall to clear the overhead wires), and I find it unlikely on a narrow gauge light railway that the bridge would span two tracks, if it was at all possible to have the siding diverge further along. Also I suppose it’s a bit unusual to have two sidings, and for them to be on opposite sides of what used to be the main running line, but again I kind of need it that way round to suit the operation and make it work visually. Edit: although I could explain away that issue as well, by saying that the front siding is itself the stub of some sort of long-closed quarry branch, or WW1-era forestry branch, or something similar. Perfectly plausible in itself but perhaps a bit convoluted when put together with everything else.

Edited October 30, 2023 by 009 micro modeller

[009 micro modeller]

Enough waffling on about prototype inspiration and planning for now. After a busy couple of weeks at work I finally found time today to build the test loading dock.

 

This shows the complete operation and roughly how it’s supposed to work. On the left is a standard gauge wagon. It isn’t the motorised one at the moment because I haven’t wired up the power feeds for the standard gauge track and the NG track in the unloading area; today I was just checking for clearances and mechanical alignment anyway. The end of the overhead wire is out of shot on the right - when I build the final, proper version it will probably extend at least to the end of the NG siding to make it look better but for this test piece I preferred to maintain ease of access.

 

A closer view demonstrates the alignment of the rails on the dock with those on the transporter. Vertical alignment is fairly easy and just consists of building up layers of card and hardboard carefully to achieve exactly the right height. For horizontal alignment, in theory you could just build everything to really fine tolerances and it would all line up, but as I mentioned earlier I probably can’t achieve this and it may not be desirable anyway for the rest of the operation, because of the incredibly long fixed wheelbase of the wagons. The key issue is the sideways slop in the inside bearings, but the curved pieces of styrene guide the end of the transporter wagon as it comes in and avoid this issue (by guiding the body, not the wheels).

 

 

With the transporter pulled back out of the way the rest of the arrangement becomes visible. My other concern with this (which was quite well-founded, based on earlier experiments) was to avoid the transporter tipping up at the end as the  standard gauge wagon ran on and off. So styrene baulks are placed either side to stabilise the transporter and avoid this, again at exactly the right height (they are just slightly below the level of the transporter’s plastruct side girders, but not high enough to lift it off the track and break the electrical contact with the rails). These baulks are going to end up being the weakest bit from a scenic point of view, but I can’t think of a reliable alternative other than extending the wheelbase even further or requiring the rails from the dock to reach further over to connect with the wagon. I should be able to integrate it into the scenery anyway, but at the moment I’m wondering whether, on the final version, everything will need to be built from stained wood or something similar to avoid scraping the paint that will need to go on the styrene section (and this still doesn’t solve the problem of the transporter wagon itself, which will still be plastic). But the loading dock set-up all seems to work well enough and now I just need to wire it up and test the motorised wagon on it. I’ve already checked and the loco can easily move the transporter in and out.

Edited November 1, 2023 by 009 micro modeller

[009 micro modeller]

I’ve now acquired a couple of books on the Leek & Manifold (birthday gifts kindly given by family members). One is the Keith Turner book, the other is one of the Vic Mitchell branch line series, published by Middleton Press (Branch Line From Leek). I’m not modelling the L&M, obviously, but they are incredibly useful for understanding some of the operational quirks that come from using transporter wagons, as well as looking at track plans. For the plan sketched in my post above, the most similar real locations (as I previously thought) are Sparrowlee and Butterton, which feature a single point leading to a siding off the main line, with a standard gauge section at the end. Wetton Mill is also interesting, with its added passing loop (although I don’t think this was actually ever used as such, and I wonder whether it would have been there at all otherwise).

 

A terminus (intended as such, rather than the truncated former through line I sketched above) might work, but I would still need to assume that the main station and run-round was off-scene, beyond the bridge (or some other scenic break). This does help with my goods-only idea, but it seems a slightly odd setup. The actual L&M terminus at Hulme End included two standard gauge sections, each at the end of a separate siding. If most of my traffic is conveyed on the transporters (as on the L&M, with very few other wagons) then it would seem odd to have only one section of standard gauge at such a location. The other terminus (and junction for the standard gauge network) at Waterhouses seems to have been extremely well set-up, and again here there were three sidings where transporters can be unloaded and reloaded, rather than just one. I could slightly alter the track plan to give two or three unloading sidings (rather than one unloading siding plus two NG-only sidings, as currently) but this will probably make it harder to build and less interesting to operate. I could, however, imagine a fictional situation in a larger town, with less cooperation between the two railway companies, where the narrow gauge goods yard is served by a very long siding/branch line from the standard gauge one, so my SG unloading siding would just represent the end of this. I still find that a bit contrived and suspect that at a terminus they’d have given themselves more flexibility by making provision for unloading on all the sidings (as in Waterhouses goods yard) rather than making most of them NG-only, but would be interested if anyone has any other opinions on this.

 

Ecton on the L&M is an interesting station. Halt-style passenger platform on one side of the main line, goods loop on the other - same as many light railway stations. But off the goods loop are, firstly, the normal L&M single-ended siding with a standard gauge section at the end, and secondly the long siding to the creamery, where tankers were loaded without removing them from the transporters. The latter was private (and I think gated, which is good for my purposes as on a disused private siding or mineral branch the gate could be permanently shut to restrict the siding length). Apparently there was also a short-lived siding for loading limestone, although I’m not sure exactly how this fitted in with everything else. Ecton might be a good basis for my fictional set-up then, if I lose the goods loop and just have the two sidings accessed off the main running line. Depending on how much space it all takes up I might have to lose the (disused) passenger platform or assume it’s located off-scene. I probably still need a slightly contrived explanation for why the unloading siding and the disused private siding/branch are located on opposite sides of the running line, but it’s hopefully not as implausible as I’d initially thought.

 

Another interesting detail from the books - to avoid obstructing the standard gauge wagons running on and off, L&M transporters had very short, horizontal vacuum brake pipes, so the coaches had two pipes fitted to make sure they could definitely reach. The locos don’t seem to have had these but on my more boxy, coach-like electric locos I might fit them. They will probably be air-braked though, as it’s an electric line.

Edited November 4, 2023 by 009 micro modeller

[john new]

Ref a location - inside a factory complex? 

[009 micro modeller]

2 hours ago, john new said:

Ref a location - inside a factory complex? 

Not a bad idea (in fact scenically it potentially works a bit better than the more rural locations I had in mind). It would definitely be plausible to have a number of different types of wagons etc. On the other hand I think an internal factory railway directly off a main line would probably be standard gauge, and if located at the end of a light railway I’m not sure the light railway would be NG if so much of the traffic was in SG wagons.

[john new]

3 minutes ago, 009 micro modeller said:

Not a bad idea (in fact scenically it potentially works a bit better than the more rural locations I had in mind). It would definitely be plausible to have a number of different types of wagons etc. On the other hand I think an internal factory railway directly off a main line would probably be standard gauge, and if located at the end of a light railway I’m not sure the light railway would be NG if so much of the traffic was in SG wagons.

Only protype I know of in the UK using transporter wagons was the Leek & Manifold. Whether that will help with where they took the wagons too I've no idea but it least it gives a geographic location to work with.

[009 micro modeller]

34 minutes ago, john new said:

Only protype I know of in the UK using transporter wagons was the Leek & Manifold. Whether that will help with where they took the wagons too I've no idea but it least it gives a geographic location to work with.

As covered earlier in the thread I’m not modelling the L&M, although given its unique status in the UK it is an obvious source of inspiration. Ecton creamery though is a kind of factory I suppose, just not with particularly diverse wagon loads and types, and the nature of the milk tanker traffic meant that they didn’t need to be unloaded from the transporters at the site. I did consider something like a cement or concrete works (perhaps with the adjacent quarry now worked out and abandoned, so lime/sand/gravel etc. also comes in in SG wagons on transporters, the same way that coal would). The problem I had with this was that they would probably need to be trainloads of similar looking wagons, rather than the five different wagons with different loads that I ideally need for the shunting puzzle to work.

[009 micro modeller]

A bit of a busy few weeks, with work and then being out of the country on holiday, and then busy at work again, so I’ve not quite resolved all the issues with loading the motorised wagons yet. It’s getting there, but I’ll update when I’ve made a bit more sense of it.

 

Turning back to the standard gauge wagons though, leaving aside the experimental attempts with the Dapol van (which probably won’t be part of the final fleet), at the moment I have the already-converted Oxford Rail 7-plank wagon, a slightly smaller 13 ton Oxford Rail open awaiting conversion, and a Parkside kit for a ‘cupboard door’ 16 ton mineral (I’ve always wanted one of these, and I also wanted to see if it was easier to base the motorised wagons on a kit rather than hacking an RTR wagon about). I might have a look for a more conventional 16 ton mineral as well soon.

 

In terms of a location I’m still quite drawn to the ‘rural Shropshire’ idea I suggested earlier, but am wondering what sort of general freight traffic (as opposed to previous but now defunct mineral traffic, possibly not carried on the transporters) this would generate. The Oxford 7-plank now has a gravel load; it was what I had to hand when converting it but it could be for local road repairs or domestic/farm/light industrial use. The number of fairly standard open wagons might be a bit of overkill at the moment - one of the wagons will be coal (probably household), but I’m not sure the shunting puzzle will seem plausible if I have two coal wagons as I’ll potentially end up exchanging one for the other, even if they look different. A small amount of agricultural lime is a possibility, though I’m not sure what type of wagon this would go in (mineral wagon, sheeted open, bagged in a van, or one of those special wagons with a pitched roof, which I don’t think were as common in reality as they are in model form). Potentially ash could also be brought in for agricultural use. Some kind of van wagon will be needed to carry general packaged or bagged goods. I wasn’t sure about forestry and how well this would work with the combination of transporter wagons and the inability to motorise flat wagons on the standard gauge.

 

Any thoughts?

 

Merry Christmas everyone!

[009 micro modeller]

On 30/10/2023 at 09:05, 009 micro modeller said:

I’ve started with a quick, very rough sketch of how the layout might look (this is not to scale and is different from my earlier plans, which are more concerned with operations and getting correct siding lengths for the puzzle to work, but I’ll come back to those later).

 

 

The standard gauge siding is marked ‘SG’ at centre-left, and the road bridge is the scenic break. Possibly this will need to become a footbridge or occupation (farm track) bridge depending on how much space it takes up.

I’ve been looking at this again, but now with more reference to this comment that I also made:

 

On 04/11/2023 at 17:14, 009 micro modeller said:

I could, however, imagine a fictional situation in a larger town, with less cooperation between the two railway companies, where the narrow gauge goods yard is served by a very long siding/branch line from the standard gauge one, so my SG unloading siding would just represent the end of this.

The problem I have with the ‘scenic plan’ (as distinct from the proper track plan with siding lengths etc., which I’ve already sorted out) as sketched above is that really there needs to be some kind of road access to the back siding (with the standard gauge section), as was provided on the Leek & Manifold, to allow loading and unloading of the SG wagons left there, as in a more conventional goods yard. Unfortunately I’m not sure I can model this very convincingly in a small space, especially allowing for the road access to slope down to rail level on a sensible gradient and include turning space. Ideally I’d also like the front siding to curve away (or go straight but diagonally) slightly towards the front baseboard edge to suggest the stub of a disused industrial branch heading off elsewhere. That would also allow more clearance between the two front sidings but would need more space. The way to do it would be to make the SG part of the back siding the end of a long siding from a standard gauge goods yard (so there’s no road access needed but it is ultimately connected to the main railway network). Initially I thought this was a bit contrived but it could work, especially if this is perhaps a later addition and not the main standard gauge interchange on the NG line. This leaves open the idea of the middle NG track being a truncated former through line, which I still quite like. The standard gauge wagons would then just be left there for collection by a loco (which we won’t actually see on the layout, but only in the same way that you don’t usually see the wagons being loaded and unloaded). I just need to plan it out a bit more and in particular work out how the scenic breaks will work, but I’d be interested to know if anyone has any opinions on the plausibility of this.

[009 micro modeller]

I wired up the test rig for the standard gauge wagon to run a few months ago and got everything out again today for a little test run.

 

 

I’m still having a slight issue with the transporter tipping up slightly at the ends, causing the wheels to lose contact and therefore causing the standard gauge wagon to stall as it drives on and off. It seems incredibly sensitive to this. This is despite the guide beams being so high and close to the bottom of the transporter that the friction is a bit difficult for the NG electric loco when the transporter is loaded (it’s OK when empty as the transporter itself isn’t very heavy). Originally I thought it might be the guide beams themselves pushing the transporter too high and off the track, but I’ve largely fixed this now and it seems mainly to be that any slight imperfection in the beams causes the transporter to lift/move under the SG wagon’s weight, causing it to momentarily lose contact. Does anyone have any ideas for solutions? I’m thinking about some kind of guide above the transporter as well as below, but not sure of the best way to do this. Ideally I’d have less guiding pieces rather than more, to try and make it less obtrusive. I’ve thought of moving the wheels closer to the ends to reduce the moment around the axle when the standard gauge wagon pushes down, but that affects how the transporter can be constructed and whether I can fit couplings to it.

Edited March 25 by 009 micro modeller

[009 micro modeller]

And I may have fixed my own problem (well it needs a bit of work but you hopefully get the idea).

 

 

Please ignore (if you can) the fact that it’s a weight from a Triang clockwork loco, sitting on a postage stamp to insulate it from the metal rails (!). The point is that by applying weight to the end of the transporter it seems to have fixed it. The far end (relative to the standard gauge track on the berth/dock) no longer lifts as the SG wagon embarks, as the weight is enough to keep it down. The near end shouldn’t suffer the same issue as eventually the plan is for all the transporters to be single-ended, with some kind of improvised stop block to prevent the standard gauge wagons over-running the middle, so all I need is something heavy to function as a stop block (not too heavy though - I don’t want the transporters to tip up on end when empty and I’m not sure the NG loco would like it very much either). The other consideration is that at the near end the wagon still has one wheelset on the dock, so this is less of a problem since it has pickup and drive on all wheels.

[Mol_PMB]

The problem of the transporter wagons tipping up while being loaded/unloaded is absolutely an issue in full size as well. The solution there is to have some blocks on the ground either side of the narrow gauge rails and underneath the rail-support-beams on the transporter wagon. The transporter wagon should just be high enough to run over them, but only just. In reality they would be removable blocks - look at the far end of each of the wagons seen here:

A different location, you can see the strategically-placed offcuts of sleeper and other types of packing:

 

As for location, and considering you have an electric loco, how about a town street tramway? There were plenty of narrow-gauge city tramways in the UK, as well as abroad.

In the UK, I think only the standard(ish)-gauge tramways hauled freight wagons on their own wheels, but in Germany and Switzerland there were several metre-gauge tramways which used transporter wagons to haul standard-gauge freight. You could do a UK 'might-have-been'?

Some pics here if you scroll down to page 21:

http://blonay-chamby.ch/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/104-dÇcembre-2018.pdf

[009 micro modeller]

4 minutes ago, Mol_PMB said:

The problem of the transporter wagons tipping up while being loaded/unloaded is absolutely an issue in full size as well. The solution there is to have some blocks on the ground either side of the narrow gauge rails and underneath the rail-support-beams on the transporter wagon.

Essentially that’s what my styrene guide beams are doing (I’m hoping to have 2 separate bits on each side at either end of where the wagon goes on the final version, if possible - it’ll still be a bit clunky but rather less obtrusive than the current continuous beams and probably less friction for the loco to push against when propelling the transporter into place).

 

On my model, the idea is that you don’t directly stop the transporter wagon tipping up, but instead achieve that effect by using the guide beam to stop the opposite end from tipping down. Presumably this applies on the prototype you mentioned above as well? It’s therefore a bit odd that I should need any weight or guide pressing down as well, as in theory this shouldn’t be necessary. I have a feeling that it may just be that, as it’s only a test piece on a random (unframed, probably slightly warped) plank of wood, with the standard gauge section built up from odd bits of card and MDF, so nothing is quite as straight, level and well-built as it might initially appear. In which case, the solution seems to be to get on with building the proper layout, on a proper (level, braced) baseboard, and do the loading dock more precisely and with better materials, but I’m reluctant to start doing this when I’m still concerned that I might be unwittingly building some fundamental flaws into the final design. The original plan was to build a few more transporters and standard gauge wagons first anyway, so that I could use them to test couplings and check siding lengths when building the final layout.

 

22 minutes ago, Mol_PMB said:

The transporter wagon should just be high enough to run over them, but only just.

The issue with this is that it seems that for my purposes it needs to be so exact that the transporter actually skims the top as it runs over them - too low and the blocks/beams are not effective, too high and they force the transporter’s wheels off the track.

 

25 minutes ago, Mol_PMB said:

As for location, and considering you have an electric loco, how about a town street tramway? There were plenty of narrow-gauge city tramways in the UK, as well as abroad.

In the UK, I think only the standard(ish)-gauge tramways hauled freight wagons on their own wheels, but in Germany and Switzerland there were several metre-gauge tramways which used transporter wagons to haul standard-gauge freight. You could do a UK 'might-have-been'?

Some pics here if you scroll down to page 21:

http://blonay-chamby.ch/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/104-dÇcembre-2018.pdf

One reason for the electric loco is simply because I like quirky old electric trains, especially narrow gauge (and there have been more NG electric operations than people generally realise). The other reason though is to do with the transporters, because they pick up their power through the narrow gauge track. Powering the narrow gauge loco from the OLE (with return through both rails) allows the transporters to pick up power in a conventional 2-rail way, without causing problems when the loaded transporters run elsewhere on the layout. However, this also means that the wheels all need to stay in contact with the track when loading the standard gauge wagon. Even though I thought it was fine, there seems to be a tiny imperfection in one of the beams which is causing the transporter to sometimes tip imperceptibly and break the circuit. I suppose one idea would be to compensate or spring the transporter wheels (if that would help), but I’ve never built a compensated chassis before, it might introduce other issues and a tiny-wheeled, inside-bearing 009 chassis probably isn’t the easiest thing to do it on.

 

In terms of prototype I’d considered that but it’s a bit narrow to have been a UK town tramway (it’ll be 2’ 6” rather than 3’ 6” - obviously 009 is exactly 2’ 3” but I’m going with 2’ 6” as the established smallest gauge for transporters). I’m thinking it’ll probably be more rural and more like a slightly more modern (1900-1910 built, but set in the 1950s) and electrified version of the Glyn Valley or Alford and Sutton lines, electrification justified either by mineral traffic or the availability of hydroelectric power (or both). There’ll probably be a bit of influence from the Belgian Vicinal system and others as well. Interestingly though, the Leek & Manifold (among other British NG ‘common carrier’ lines, including Rheidol) did briefly consider electric traction but didn’t go through with it.

[009 micro modeller]

Thinking again about the effect of the weights on the transporter wagon issues and how they helped with the tipping up problem, it’s all to do with moments around a pivot point (in this case the axles are the pivots). I could actually weigh the standard gauge wagon and other various things and calculate the moments properly, but given how things have gone it’s perhaps best to eliminate them entirely and thus get rid of the see-saw effect that is causing most of the electrical pickup issues. I’ll explain what I’m thinking with the help of a couple of previous photos from this thread, suitably edited:

 

 

Cutting along the red lines would remove a short section from the end of the standard gauge rail at each end, as well as some of the supporting structure. To maintain the structural integrity more styrene could be added in the middle and elsewhere.

 

 

Meanwhile, turning the wagon over, the wheels would move to the very end of the brass subframes, shown in blue. The styrene strip round them would have been removed as above.

 

The result would be a transporter with a wheelbase of about 58mm (it’s about 32.5mm currently) but a standard gauge track length on the deck of only about 50mm (it’s currently about 76mm). The original concept was to have a transporter wheelbase similar to that of the standard gauge wagons, as I’d assumed that this would work best for weight distribution etc. when the transporter was moving. However, so far this hasn’t seemed to be a particular issue, whereas loading has. It should be more stable during loading than the current configuration because the standard gauge track would be entirely within the transporter’s wheelbase (the loading dock track would need to be extended out to meet it, but that’s not a problem). The standard gauge wagon as motorised with the Locosnstuff bogie is now pretty controllable, unlike the earlier iterations, so the shorter track length to pull up in once on the transporter shouldn’t be an issue (especially as I will be fitting some sort of chock/buffer arrangement eventually). If it does turn out to be a problem I can always build longer transporters - the main point is the different relationship between the wheelbase and length of track on the deck.

 

Edit: I suppose the issue with this idea is whether anyone thinks I might have problems with the standard gauge wagon not being supported (almost) directly under its own axles? I’m not hugely concerned about the scale 14’ 6” wheelbase of the transporter that would result - it’s almost absurdly long for a narrow gauge vehicle but, by using long vehicles and a minimum radius of 18” (i.e. larger than the 15” radius that might be used for a scale 15’ wheelbase wagon in 00) I’m at this stage effectively building a standard gauge 00 layout on which most of the track happens to be 7.5mm narrower. There isn’t quite the same space saving that I’d expect from a more conventional 009 layout, but I always knew that would be the case.

Edited March 26 by 009 micro modeller

[009 micro modeller]

A quick question in case anyone who’s been reading this topic has any opinions on it - could I alternatively attempt to solve the issues mentioned above by having a compensated chassis for the transporter? I’m not sure how I might do this, especially given that it is inside-framed and not particularly heavy when the standard gauge wagon is not on board.

[009 micro modeller]

Well, that didn’t work very well. Yesterday I attempted to rebuild both the loading dock and the transporter itself, successfully curing the see-saw effect but not completely eliminating rocking from side to side. I also attempted a system with more wheels, to aid pickup, but if anything that’s made it even worse, with a slightly outrageous, mostly rigid 8-wheel arrangement with a scale wheelbase of nearly 15’. I could probably rebuild it (or build another one) to its original configuration, or some other configuration, but at this point it’s become clear that anything that has a rigid wheelbase and has been inexpertly soldered up by me is particularly vulnerable to electrical problems caused by even slightly uneven track. A better, and perhaps more RTR/kit-based approach might be a good idea.

 

I was wondering about things like pick-up fitted pony trucks, coaches illuminated with track power etc., more conventional applications where a chassis is unpowered but still needs to reliably pick up power. Then I realised that a suitably modified loco chassis was a more obvious solution.

 

 

The photo shows the transporter, with its rather questionable modifications, next to a de-motored Kato 11-105 chassis. Importantly, the latter is about the right length - it might have more end overhang than the existing transporter in its current form but not enough to recreate the tipping up effect seen previously. I could of course lengthen it, but that would slightly defeat the point, which is that it’s a widely available, well-made bogie chassis, with all-wheel pickup and seemingly a fairly straightforward layout of bronze strips on top. I don’t really want to mess around with it too much and risk damaging the electrical contacts. I’d probably have preferred something like a Tomix Portram, simply because it’s inside-framed, whereas the outside frames on the 11-105 mean that the standard gauge rails will probably need to sit slightly higher than I’d like, but it’s what I had to hand so will do for now. To be honest, the centre of gravity doesn’t seem to have been a major issue so far so it could probably be fractionally higher without too many issues.

 

I’m not under any illusion that this will be a quick fix and it will all suddenly work perfectly; there’s still a need to add weight to the chassis and put everything together, but it looks like it might work quite well compared to my previous attempts.

[009 micro modeller]

On 08/06/2023 at 08:28, Stubby47 said:

I've finally dragged my 009/00 layout from the loft and taken a few photos.

 

1. The Baldwin arrives at the transfer dock with the transporter wagon.

 

2. The Sentinel pushes the standard gauge wagon to the edge...

 

3. ...and on to the NG wagon.

 

4. The Sentinel uncouples and moves away.

 

5. The Baldwin takes the transporter wagon and load off to somewhere on the munitions base.

 

And a couple of videos here :  

 

Sorry to dig this up and ask again but can I ask how stable it is, given that the standard gauge wagon sits well above the NG axle box height when in transit? I know the prototypes were usually extremely low to the ground and received wisdom seems to suggest that they also need to be like this in model form (which is how I originally got into rigid wheelbases and inside frames - no room for bogies to swing or for outside framed axle boxes). But if they don’t have to be quite so low that potentially makes everything a lot easier. Possibly it won’t work quite as well in my case as the motorised wagons are heavy and I want to be able to pull or propel two at a time, but it might be OK at low (accurate for shunting) speeds.

[Stubby47]

They are quite stable,  at low speeds, and with the slight dip in the 'rail' for the std gauge wagon, they don't roll off either.

 

I agree they should be much lower, but the 16.5mm wheel sets don't fit over the 9mm chassis ( that I used). Maybe inside framed NG wagons might be better?

[009 micro modeller]

6 hours ago, Stubby47 said:

I agree they should be much lower, but the 16.5mm wheel sets don't fit over the 9mm chassis ( that I used). Maybe inside framed NG wagons might be better?

I mean, if it works reasonably well I’m not overly concerned at this point. The designs I have been using were low and inside-framed but obviously the de-motored Kato 11-105 won’t be, though it seems very promising so far in terms of getting the pick-up to work reliably and it’s not really that much higher (maybe about 2 or 3mm - actually in some ways that is quite a lot).

[Stubby47]

With regards to stability,  I only use a maximum height of a 5 plank wagon to be transferred,  definitely not a box van.

[009 micro modeller]

4 hours ago, Stubby47 said:

With regards to stability,  I only use a maximum height of a 5 plank wagon to be transferred,  definitely not a box van.

I did originally think that I’d have to ban box vans from the layout anyway in case they were too high to fit under the overhead wire (I was OK with this, but fortunately it turned out not to be a problem anyway), so that wouldn’t be a project-ending setback. It might end up too high for this anyway, if the alternative transporter design is fractionally higher. I would ideally like to be able to run a van but currently I have 3 open wagons awaiting conversion (a Parkside mineral wagon kit, a Bachmann RTR mineral wagon and a wooden Oxford Rail one) in addition to the Oxford Rail wagon already converted, so I’ll probably have mostly open wagons anyway. One problem might be the extra weight of the motor making the wagons heavier and less stable (in which case I might have to look at alternative, inside-framed Japanese N gauge chassis to convert instead of the Kato 11-105), but again it’s probably only a millimetre or two so perhaps it won’t make much difference.