Signalbox on an embankment.

[Ruston]

The photo below shows a section of track on my new layout that doesn't actually go anywhere and no trains will ever run on it. It's purely a scenic device and the tracks end at the backscene board. To help disguise this I plan to put a signalbox at the end but I don't know exactly how it would be levelled up.

 

Would a retaining wall be built around the area that the box is to sit on (as I have begun to make in the photo)?

Or would the signalbox itself be built taller at the rear and its main timbers be embedded into the embankment?

[APOLLO]

Fir Tree House signal box Ince Wigan was on an embankment held up by a wooden frame.

 

 

 

Nearby (next box) Platt Bridge Junction was a larger, similar box but started to slip down the bank so a new box was installed in the 1950's on a deep brick base.

 

 

 

Brit15

Edited July 31, 2023 by APOLLO

[Ruston]

Thanks for that. I do like the idea of having it on an open timber frame.

[Ray M]

Or Bewdley

[sir douglas]

At Agbrigg, the junction from the Wakey-Ponte line at Doncaster Road up onto the Midland at Oakenshaw had the signal box on 4 brick plinths which are still there, no photos to hand right now

[Mark Forrest]

I built a retaining wall around one in a similar position on Black Country Blues; always regretted doing that - a taller base or timber frame support seem to be much more likely based on prototype photos.

[Michael Hodgson]

Signal boxes could be modular, prefabricated and flat-packed rather like a garden shed.  If that style of construction is used by the company concerned, it would probably need a level supporting base to stand on.  Or it could be built from scratch on site, in which case the main upright timbers would be longer at the downhill end,

A brick or stone supporting wall is not wrong, and is easier to model than an open timber frame.

[sir douglas]

Nipped round this morning

[delticman]

Meadow Hall box on the former Sheffield to Barnsley branch of the Great Central had its main corner timbers driven deep into the embankment but later in life had to have large timber baulks to shore up the rear of the box to prevent it falling backwards into the river below. I remember talking to the signalman when I was taking photos of the box and he remembered being on duty one night when he heard the timbers groan followed by a window pane cracking..... he was out of that box like a shot!!!

[roythebus1]

Revelstoke Road on the East Putney-Wimbledon line had the big timbers under the back of the box.

[Ruston]

14 hours ago, delticman said:

Meadow Hall box on the former Sheffield to Barnsley branch of the Great Central had its main corner timbers driven deep into the embankment but later in life had to have large timber baulks to shore up the rear of the box to prevent it falling backwards into the river below. I remember talking to the signalman when I was taking photos of the box and he remembered being on duty one night when he heard the timbers groan followed by a window pane cracking..... he was out of that box like a shot!!!

That's interesting. I remember Altofts Junction box being shored up with timbers at the rear, in the same way. I just can't recall what the box itself was sat on. I guess it must have been a similar set up. 

 

I have a friend who used to work for BR/Network Rail. She once told me about how she got a call from the signalman in the box at Oakenshaw Junction who was refusing to man the box as he felt it would blow over in the high wind. Apparently,  most of the main timbers were rotted through and the entire box would sway as you so much as walked up the stairs.

Edited August 6, 2023 by Ruston

[PerthBox]

Here's Usan box the day before it was demolished. The brickwork at the rear descends about three metres below the track level.