Peak Forest 1948-68

[joseph benjamin]

Here's my attempt at modelling Peak Forest as how I remember it in the steam/diesel era when I took my younger brother there to see the Midland Pullman. It is in a nice dry cellar 26' x 7' and is firmly bolted to the walls with hinged covers made from old doors to keep our cats and dust at bay. The track is Peco code 100 some of has been salvaged from earlier layouts with most of the points being new large radius live frog operated by Hamant and Morgan point motors.

This is the fourth layout I've built in 64 years with the first two being dismantled due to house moves and like the third ran stock from all regions and were of no particular site. The third was a two level one with storage tracks on the lower level and 1 in 70 gradients which taxed all but the Hornby Dublo and Ks locomotives and by 1990 with the Peco foam ballast disintegrating I was disillusioned. A Christmas present of Through Limestone Hills by Bill Hudson convinced me to model Peak Forest 1948/68, I would have liked to have built the Blackwell Mill triangle but I didn't have the space.

In the 1990s I made a start by building the Buxton Firms crushing plant and the station working to drawings in the book together with photos with both built of 1/8” ply. The station construction being based on David Jenkinson's method of 1/8” ply covered with Faller dressed limestone cards unfortunately Faller discontinued it by the time I wanted it and the station was bare ply for many years. If I had used Slater's embossed plasticard I would had to rebuild it as it was thicker. The covid lockdown gave me the chance to deal with and I found a Noch building card which was passable but not perfect. The window frames are various Plastrut sections and the barge boards are Scalelink. The letters for the grinding plant were cut from plasticard as none that size were available.

I built the A1 models Fell diesel locomotive which was a challenge, the roof and sides were one etch but the roof was 4mm too wide, I ended up cutting the roof off and making a new roof. I also had to made new fly cranks as the real thing had two different sizes, inner ones bigger than the outer ones unlike the kit;s one size. I just had to build it having seen it numerous times in my school days on the Midland main line just half a mile from home.

In the mid 1990s I acquired 10 Peak model shop ICI limestone hopper wagons, these were a resin casting but built up into a passable cheap and cheerful wagon.

I also found two Kitmaster kits of the Deltic and the 9F which I'd built in the 1960s and returned to their boxes when they didn't run not even when pushed by another locomotive. The 9F was motorised with a Bristol models kit which has a super low ratio drive giving it a max speed of about 30 mph and the moulded on pipes and handrails were cut off and replaced with wire. It ultimately acquired a BR1K tender as fitted to 92166 the only double chimney 9F that I knew ran through Peak Forest. The Deltic was motorised with a Hornby power bogie and it was finally painted but the lining defeated me until I visited a local artists supplies shop which my wife used. While the wife looked for what she wanted I had a chat with the shop keeper and explained my problem to be told you want a rigger and produced a fine brush with bristles about 30 mm long. That solved my problem. It was put in the for sale collection as it didn't run over Peak Forest until I met a retired signal man who remembers it going through light engine to Derby.

Retirement in 2006 gave me the chance to dismantle the existing layout and start building Peak Forest, not wanting foam ballast I bought a pack of Slater's limestone ballast.

[joseph benjamin]

Father bought me a 1932 Austin Seven in 1962 as my 17th birthday present to keep me off motorbikes, it was a bare body on a rolling chassis with a mountain of bits which took me a year to reassemble and pass it's MOT test. I now have 3 of them all in running order and the railway takes second place in my interests. Oxford Rail produce a model of the first one.

Retirement in 2005 gave me the time to dismantle the previous Railway and set about designing Peak Forest which after some juggling on the drawing board I was able to squeeze in to scale length albeit minus one of the back sidings. The station approaches have been foreshortened which meant that I couldn't incorporate the second road bridge which gave access to Perseverance quarry filled in decades ago. The bridge steelwork is very corroded and I doubt that the authorities are aware of the bridge.

This is an analogue layout and with judicious positioning of the section breaks I am able to bank trains up the bank which in reality is level.

With the track work progressing I gave some thought as to how to construct the surrounding hills and bought an 8' x 4' x 2” sheet of expanded polystyrene from which I made all the hills. This produced many polystyrene balls which stuck to our 4 cats who distributed them about the house, I was not popular. Subsequent profiling was done on my band saw which was a lot cleaner before they received a copious coating of Polyfilla with extra thick layers for carving the rock faces. All of these sections are removable for detailing on my workbench.

With stock of all makes, Hornby Dublo, Triang, Triang Hornby, Hornby, Joueff, Mainline and kit built items I looked at the coupling compatibility problem. I'd noticed at many exhibitions that the Kadee couplings were becoming popular and bought a few including the recommended No 5. As I was soon to learn the No5 is the least used and I use the No 40 in all it's variations. The conversion took a couple of years but at last after 50 years I had coupling comparability much reduced gaps between vehicles and I could lift a vehicle out of a train without needing a screwdriver to release the couplings.

The station platforms were built up from plywood with 1/16” ply tops covered in Metcalfe tarmac and paving slab sheets.. It is only recently That I've bit the bullet and painted the platform edge white lines, I did a trial run with ordinary masking tape on a spare Metcalf paving sheet and found the paint bled under the tape and removing the tape lifted the top of the paving slabs. The solution was Tamiya masking tape.

The platform lights are modified Ratio Southern platform lamps fitted with grain of wheat bulbs fed using fine enamelled wire glued to each side of the lamp post prior to painting. The underside of the removable platforms has a slot routed in it for the bus bar wires feed to the lamps which run on about 6 volts.

Now Peak Forest never received the BR sausage totem signs, a friend bought them at a BR auction. How was I to model the originals? A chance visited to Wirksworth station provided the answer where I photographed the station sign and measured it. I then made a sign about 4” long with white letters as used at Peak Forest photographed it and reduced it to scale size on the computer.

With the track work complete and tested it was time for ballasting when I realized it required a cess so I set to using a curved chisel and cut the cess in the 1/2” plywood baseboard. To keep the ballast out of the cess I laid short lengths 4” to 6” lengths of 3/4” angle iron alongside the track and then spread the ballast. This was sprayed with a mist spray of water and isopropyl alcohol before applying a 50/50 mix of water and PVA glue. I found this task quite therapeutic. In no time I used up my supply of the Slater's ballast and phoned them for some more to be told we've just moved to Darley Dale and haven't had chance to go to the quarry for some more. What was I to do the Midland Railway used limestone ballast? Between family, Austin Sevens, and model railways I was a volunteer helping to keep a local path and the adjacent stream clear of the detritus of society. Now the biggest offender was BR who dumped all the spent ballast after a derailment in March 1992 between Hazel Grove and Cheadle Heath when they relaid the track. I went down and collected a bucket full and crushed and graded it for loads and ballast.

I find books, particularly by J M Bentley's, and old magazines are a great source of information on the line. J M Bentley recounts a few occasions when he went to the assistance of failed diesels in 8Fs. One photograph shows the recently restored Midland compound 1000 passing through Peak Forest with an officers special saloon on the 21 September 1959. This was obviously a running in turn using the Derby, Dore and Totley,Chinley, Derby, or the Derby Chinley Derby route. I then required a model of the compound.

 

 

[joseph benjamin]

I've got Peak Forest on one side of the room the question was what to model on the other side with the door, there was a drop down section in the doorway which had a river and bridges on. I finally settled on Ashwood Dale with it's river and bridges and to model Dove Holes tunnel south portal at one end, it's called modellers licence. The ends of the room each have 6 storage tracks with a mirror secured to the underside of the cover so I can see what's gong on.

Since childhood I've had a fascination with the railway bridges in Ashwood Dale and decided on using K and S brass extrusions and Scalelink mesh, I looked all the photos I had of the bridges and couldn't work out the dimensions. Armed with Toetectors, hi vis jacket, clipboard and tape measure I climbed onto one of the bridges and measured it and found that there was nothing regular in the spacing of the supports. I was so engrossed I hadn't spotted an approaching Network Rail Gang, I must have looked like I should be there and they said hello and carried on their way. After that it was quite easy to lay it out and solder it together.

With no manufacturer showing an interest in producing the Midland Pullman I decided to see what my late brother's 6 car Triang model was like as my brother ran it almost to death. I was quite surprised that it ran but the first job was to replace the driving wheels with Ultrascale wheels as I couldn't live with the howl from the knurled Triang ones. The next job was to replace the bogies with more realistic ones and because the axle boxes were worn down by at least a millimetre. Finally I fitted no 49 Kadee couplings which resolved the gap between the carriages. Then Bachmann brought theirs out, I wasn't happy but I had developed an attachment for the Triang one just like I still run the Hornby Dublo 8F, class 28 Co-Bo, the Stanier 4MT tank engine and the class 08.

On a visit to Stockport model railway exhibition I found the Uncommon Kits stand with an O gauge ICI limestone hopper wagon, it looked great and I asked if he did a OO one, yes but he would only sell me one. It is tab and slot construction and someone told me that the slots were too small so I left it for a while. When I did start it I found everything fitted perfectly with no adjustment needed, one of the best kits I've built. I returned to the exhibition the next year and put the finished wagon on his counter, it was the first built up one he'd seen. He said OK now I know you can build how many do you want, over the next couple of years I built 9 more. The kit represents the second batch build and I built a couple each of the first and last batches built. Then Hattons and Oxford brought theirs out and I bought 10 which run empty to show off the interior detail and the Uncommon kits run loaded.

On the internet one evening I found Hornby produced the West Country pacific Bude with a Stanier tender as it ran in the 1948 locomotive exchange trials so that joined the fleet and started a search for a B1 and the BR ex L&Y dynamometer car 45050 also used in the trials. Hornby provided the B1 and I eventually found That Stevensons Carriages produced a kit for the dynamometer car. I found the Princess Royal Class Trust most helpful in showing me round the recently restored dynamometer car at the West Shed at Swanwick junction on the MRT.

Building the dynamometer car led to buying Locomotive Testing on British railways 1901 to 1968 by Dave Peel which revealed that 45050 was a frequent visitor to the line. In the 1980s I built a diesel brake tender which was put aside for sale as I thought they weren't used over Peak Forest until the book revealed that one was used with a class 45 on a freight over the line.

[joseph benjamin]

Here's a photo of the other road bridge

Edited March 27 by joseph benjamin

[joseph benjamin]

What was this 2' 0" narrow gauge line for it doesn't go anywhere and is still there.

[joseph benjamin]

Another of brother's models was a Triang class 31 also ear marked for sale until I learnt that the first of the then class 30 D5500 ran on test Derby, Chinley, Derby in primer. Needless to say the model underwent some surgery to make it into a class 30 the main job being removal of the head code box and replacing it with a vent.

The history of the Matlock to Buxton line is littered with the mistakes of the government and it's agencies. The bridge over the A6 was rebuilt just 3 years before the line was closed. The government under the Beeching axe closed the line because of the problems with working loose coupled unfitted freight trains over the route requiring a banking engine to guard against the risk of a run away if a coupling failed, but as far back as 1937 ICI showed the way forward with block trains of wagons with vacuum brakes. So BR negotiated a contract with Westinghouse for 295,000 brake cylinders to be supplied at 1000 a week rising to 2000 a week in February 1958 for which Westinghouse built a new factory in Manchester. By June 1959 BR asked Westinghouse to reduce this to 400 a week and cancelled the contract in October 1961.

Then Peak Rail built a halt at Chee Dale and ran the highly successful Peak Rambler and Hazel Grove Explorer which provided a means for walkers without cars to access the Monsal Trail. It ran for 1 summer and in winter 1987 the D.O.T. stipulated that if passenger trains were to continue to use Ashwood Dale to Topley then the signalling had to be improved at a cost which Peak Rail couldn't afford bringing the Peak Rambler & the future of the Buxton site to an end. Surprisingly other rail operators have continued to run passenger trains over this route.

The Peak District National Park stipulated that Peak Rail couldn't have a terminus (temporary or permanent) within the Peak Park because of the traffic it would generate. However by opening the Monsal Trail tunnels in 2011, at a cost of £2.25m, the Peak Park has generated it's own traffic problems because the only access points are in the Park. They are now looking at ways of connecting Buxton to the Monsal trail, with one of the proposals involving a circuitous route via Fairfield common and Woo Dale. By the time most walkers have reached the Monsal trail (from Buxton) it will be time to return to Buxton. Perhaps they should have assisted Peak Rail a bit more when they were at Buxton, signalling Ashwood Dale for passenger train operation would have cost a fraction of the feasibility study cost. Walking or cycling down the A6 in Ashwood Dale is not an option, I know I tried it.

Just over half of my locomotive stud is well over 20 years old with a couple 60 years old and whilst the detail provided on modern locomotives is superb I'm somewhat wary of buying new after reading the tales of woe on this website. In particular the Heljan LMS Beyer Garratt and the class 17 and I have experience of the latter which was resolved by fitting a Mashima motor. With a man sized motor it didn't need the puny flywheels. Then we have the problem of mazak rot something I understood was resolved 60 years ago. Now I also rebuild carburettors for vintage cars of 1932 which are made of mazak and very occasionally I come across one which has obviously been stored in a damp or wet environment and is found to be is disintegrating. The vast majority are as solid as a rock so the manufacturers obviously knew what they were doing in making sure the material was uncontaminated. What the Chinese get up to is another question.

I am quite happy with some of my ancient ones I still have and run my first 2 rail loco a Triang 3F of about 1960 although the manufacturers wouldn't recognise it. After I'd corrected it's faults before Hornby and Bachmann brought out theirs. I run our Hornby Dublo 8F which after a chat with Scalespeed 40 years ago acquired one of their motors which has emptied the cab. I resurrected my Hornby Dublo class 08 after my almost new little used Bachmann 08 expired with a split final drive gear.

[joseph benjamin]

A Peak Rail magazine gave details of the Westinghouse P4 air brake distributor trials run in 1968 with two class 37s, 98 BR VIX ferry vans and dynamometer car DB 999500. The class 37s had yellow nose ends which nobody produced although I see Accurascale produce one now, but a search of brothers stock revealed two Triang Hornby ones one blue and one green which I duly repainted. I wasn't going to buy an expensive model and then repaint it. The ferry vans were easy there being loads available second hand I settled on 10 which all needed their ride height adjusting. The dynamometer car was a problem as it was damaged and scrapped after an accident at Winsford in 1974 and consequently information on it is scarce. I eventually found that Bill Bedford produced a set of etches for it with no drawings or instructions. I had photos of it's interior from the Railway magazine but a visit to HMRS at Swanwick junction provided some external photos which revealed so of the underframe etches were wrong.

[Ramrig]

Hi

Is that first photograph reversed? I think it should be this orientation. I maybe wrong. Do you know the location of the image?

Edited April 6 by Ramrig
Text added

[Peter Kazmierczak]

Broadholme loops, Steve.

PS  Orientation of the original photo was OK; there was a EE Type 3 on each end.

Edited April 6 by Peter Kazmierczak

[Ramrig]

I did wonder if that’s where it was as it looks like the A6 in the distance. It was just that the dynamometer car is at the rear of the train. Thanks for the clarification 

[joseph benjamin]

Yes the orientation is correct the head code is 3T 49. The dynamometer was at the rear for the brake tests to see how long it took for the brakes to come on. Here's a photo of it's insides.

[joseph benjamin]

One of the problems of kit built models is once they are built they won't fit in their box and the Beyer Garratt was the biggest problem to safely store, it it was split into three parts. I recently built quite a few stock cassettes into which the model could be driven which necessitated a end on loading siding I built at one end of the layout. The photos show the Garratt being driven into it's cassette and then the cassette being loaded into a purpose made case.

I occasionally visit Peak Forest and whilst there isn't the activity I remember the performance of the modern diesels is impressive by starting a loaded train on the bank without a banker.

It's a pity that the passenger train performance is so poor. In the 1970s I used to leave home at 0730 to walk one mile to Davenport station where I caught the 0750 train to Manchester Piccadilly arriving on platform 14. Followed by a walk across the footbridge to platform one where I caught the train to Ashburys and arrived in work, opposite the station, at 0820. The journey was so reliable it was boring but much faster than by car.

Then in the 1980s BR had to improve Piccadilly station by making the arrival and departure tracks bi directional and replacing the printed train information posters (displayed throughout the station) with electronic displays at the concourse end of the platforms. This doubled my journey time because:

We had to wait outside Piccadilly for a path into the station while another train left.

I had to walk to the concourse end of the platform to view one of the electronic displays to find which platform the Ashburys train was leaving from on that day. Inevitably while doing this the Ashburys train would depart. So I had a 30 minute wait for the next train.

The return journey was no better with the 3 car DMU replaced by a modern 2 car unit which was faster but with a carriage less the passengers practised being sardines and the station stops were longer while disembarking passengers struggled to get off.

Finally in 1990 Woodsmoor station was opened cutting my walk by 10 minutes, unfortunately because BR couldn't operate Piccadilly to a fixed timetable, as they did in the 1970s, I found I could drive into work and back in my 80 year old car in the time the train took for one way.

Then my experience of rail replacement buses, whilst Stagecoach operate a regular bus service to within 100 yards of Woodsmoor station the bus companies that the railways use stop half a mile away. I waited in vain one Sunday for a train, before giving up and going home where a check on my computer revealed there was a rail replacement bus service in operation. There were no signs at the station and it was anybodies guess where you waited for the bus.

[joseph benjamin]

Here's a photo of my favourite diesel loco, the much maligned class 28 Co-Bo on trial with the ICI limestone hopper wagons where they performed well however like many of the early diesels they suffered from the lack of dedicated maintenance facilities and experienced diesel fitters. It illustrated that the rush to get rid of steam was a political decision, why we didn't follow the German and French railways with a gradual changeover is beyond comprehension. Nothing illustrates this more than the winter of 1962/3 when a loco laid up awaiting a minor spare part froze up requiring a major rebuild. The engine cooling system would have had antifreeze/corrosion inhibitor in which if it had to be drained for maintenance and should have been drained into a tank with a pump to refill the engine. Unfortunately this wasn't available at a steam shed and so the engine coolant with it's expensive antifreeze was dumped and the engine refilled with water only. Generally the engine survived the freeze up but the radiators didn't. Trying to maintain a diesel engine in a steam shed with all the dirt and ash and firing up the steam breakdown crane to lift anything heavy was bonkers.

One of our neighbours at that time was in charge of locomotive allocation on the LMR and his tales of woe were numerous with quite a few occasions of 8Fs going to the aid of failed peak diesels over the Peak. Apparently the 8Fs managed well although the run downhill was somewhat exciting particularly if the the diesel burst into life and gave an extra push.

[joseph benjamin]

Just spent an evening repairing my Bachmann class 24 after a wheel cleaning session revealed it was only picking up from one bogie. After a few minutes peering into it's anatomy I spied the wire that should have been soldered to the brass wheel wiper was no longer soldered to it. Long gone are the days when manufacturers supplied drawings of their product with their product and that on the internet is incorrect so it took a while to extract the bogie and resolder the wire in it's rightful place. Being well experienced in repairing all manner of mechanical and electrical items I wasn't going to be defeated however I suspect some owners would be unable to effect a repair.

With the demise of Hattons I'm getting e mails on an almost daily basis from Rails offering all manner of models but nothing that ran over Peak Forest in my era. One loco I'd been after was the Fowler 0-8-0 but alas no manufacturer has filled this gap. I eventually found that Alan Gibson produced the coupling rods for it and phoned them to which they responded we do the whole kit to which I asked how much? Their reply we are a bit buy give us a couple of months to put a kit together. I gave them 2 years by which time I found that S E Finecast did a kit and I bought that. Needless to say it has my own modifications like a turned aluminium boiler barrel to replace the lemon shaped cast one and a nice low ratio gearbox in the firebox.