Lancaster Green Ayre - The Barn Owls have returned.

[jamie92208]

A very good evenings work at the club in peace and quiet and the first two signals now obey the control panel.  It's taken a bit of doing but I eventually got there.   Hopefully the others won't take as long.   I even managed to capture a few seconds of video of it.   It was a great boost as modifying wiring is not easy.  The wiring still needs tidying up under the board but it looks good.   This was actually being operated by the switch on the control panel down some 25 ' of leads.

 

 

 

Jamie

Edited March 27, 2014 by jamie92208

[sparks]

Slightly off topic, but I recently came across the Hamburg-Altonaer Stadt und Vorortbahn (Hamburg-Altona City and Suburban Railway) which was electrified in 1906 at 6.3kV 25Hz AC. The catenary designs shown on the Wikipedia page below are very similar to Lancaster-Heysham a few years later. The original EMUs were of interesting design with a motor bogie at the driving end and a single fixed axle at the inner end!

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg-Altonaer_Stadt-_und_Vorortbahn or via Google translate:- http://translate.google.com/translate?depth=1&hl=en&rurl=translate.google.com.au&sl=de&tl=en&u=http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg-Altonaer_Stadt-_und_Vorortbahn

 

The line became part of the Hamburg S-Bahn in the 1930s although a move to 3rd rail DC traction was delayed by WWII, with 3rd rail DC units and overhead AC units running side by side until 1955. One of the later AC units (with an articulated bogie instead of the single fixed axles) is preserved:-

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_1589a/b_bis_1645a/b or via Google translate:- http://translate.google.com/translate?depth=1&hl=en&rurl=translate.google.com.au&sl=de&tl=en&u=http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_1589a/b_bis_1645a/b

 

Some more early photos here:-

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=2&hl=en&rurl=translate.google.com&sandbox=0&sl=de&tl=en&u=http://www.reflektion.info/html/4000_100807_1_sb-hh.html&usg=ALkJrhjzwZOcc3zrRcNBiW6rrmr8OdRseA

Edited March 28, 2014 by sparks

[jamie92208]

Slightly off topic, but I recently came across the Hamburg-Altonaer Stadt und Vorortbahn (Hamburg-Altona City and Suburban Railway) which was electrified in 1906 at 6.3kV 25Hz AC. The catenary designs shown on the Wikipedia page below are very similar to Lancaster-Heysham a few years later. The original EMUs were of interesting design with a motor bogie at the driving end and a single fixed axle at the inner end!

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg-Altonaer_Stadt-_und_Vorortbahn or via Google translate:- http://translate.google.com/translate?depth=1&hl=en&rurl=translate.google.com.au&sl=de&tl=en&u=http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg-Altonaer_Stadt-_und_Vorortbahn

 

The line became part of the Hamburg S-Bahn in the 1930s although a move to 3rd rail DC traction was delayed by WWII, with 3rd rail DC units and overhead AC units running side by side until 1955. One of the later AC units (with an articulated bogie instead of the single fixed axles) is preserved:-

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_1589a/b_bis_1645a/b or via Google translate:- http://translate.google.com/translate?depth=1&hl=en&rurl=translate.google.com.au&sl=de&tl=en&u=http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_1589a/b_bis_1645a/b

 

Some more early photos here:-

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=2&hl=en&rurl=translate.google.com&sandbox=0&sl=de&tl=en&u=http://www.reflektion.info/html/4000_100807_1_sb-hh.html&usg=ALkJrhjzwZOcc3zrRcNBiW6rrmr8OdRseA

Thanks very much for the post.   The Altoona line was actually the main inspiration for the Midland's decision to go for High voltage AC and Dalziel and Sayers, the two brilliant young engineers who did the work at Lancaster went there in I think autumn 1906 just before it opened to the public.  They also looked at some DC installations and I think a Swiss one in their tour and decided to go for the 6.6 KV ac.   I use a rather poor picture of an Altoona unit in the talk that i give about the electrification  so thanks again for the links. 

 

Jamie

Edited March 28, 2014 by jamie92208

[jamie92208]

Another good evening at the club.  We started by moving some baseboards around so that we can ballast the next two in line (A5 & B6)  This takes us on to the start of the station platforms.    While Dave got busy with the modified vinegar bottle doing ballast I started to sort out the next signals that all go on board B7.  These are the exit signal from the coal yard to the Up main, the up Starter on Platform 2 which also has the distant for Ladies Walk on it, and the starter for Platform 3 (the bay platform) which is actually a rotary ground signal.  This might cause some consternation amongst rivet counters at shows when they see main line trains starting from platforms via a ground signal.  I will then produce the photo.   After last nights success. I dscided to wire up the Merg board first and then connect all four signals and set them via the laptop.  This is a lot easier than crawling under the boards plugging and unplugging servo cables.  This was done and all four work correctly and even at the correct speed.    I now have to curt the mounting holoes and get them installed.   All good fun but great progress.

 

Jamie

[supersonic]

Another good evening at the club.  We started by moving some baseboards around so that we can ballast the next two in line (A5 & B6)  This takes us on to the start of the station platforms.    While Dave got busy with the modified vinegar bottle doing ballast I started to sort out the next signals that all go on board B7.  These are the exit signal from the coal yard to the Up main, the up Starter on Platform 2 which also has the distant for Ladies Walk on it, and the starter for Platform 3 (the bay platform) which is actually a rotary ground signal.  This might cause some consternation amongst rivet counters at shows when they see main line trains starting from platforms via a ground signal.  I will then produce the photo.   After last nights success. I dscided to wire up the Merg board first and then connect all four signals and set them via the laptop.  This is a lot easier than crawling under the boards plugging and unplugging servo cables.  This was done and all four work correctly and even at the correct speed.    I now have to curt the mounting holoes and get them installed.   All good fun but great progress.

 

Jamie

The 'vinegar bottle' makes me sound like some kind of pervert.  However, I am finding the ballasting somewhat therapeutic and the end result is rather satisfying.  More and more of the underpinnings are now starting to disappear under scenery and the result is encouraging.  When we moved the boards around the other evening we took the opportunity to sweep the floor - a much avoided chore which gives an easier, less trip prone working environment - to be recommended.  Work continues!

[GWC1]

If using the MERG Servo4 boards, you might find it necessary to thread the servo leads via a couple of turns on a ferrite ring as they are prone to chatter, especially if the leads run near the traction supply. Even worse interference can arise if the traction supply is DCC. You will need to get a ferrite ring big enough to thread the servo plug through. If you like I will look up the details of the ones I used on Netherwood Sidings - I can't remember whether they came from CPC or Farnell (same company, actually).

[jamie92208]

Thanks very much for that Graham.   At the moment they don't seem to chatter but the traction supply is carried in the same multi way leads.  I'dbe grateful for the RS stock number.  Thr power supply is totally separate from s different trasnformer but I haven't yet tried the signals with locos running.  Fortunately I don't have to worry about DCC.

 

 

Jamie

[sparks]

Thanks very much for the post.   The Altoona line was actually the main inspiration for the Midland's decision to go for High voltage AC and Dalziel and Sayers, the two brilliant young engineers who did the work at Lancaster went there in I think autumn 1906 just before it opened to the public.  They also looked at some DC installations and I think a Swiss one in their tour and decided to go for the 6.6 KV ac.   I use a rather poor picture of an Altoona unit in the talk that i give about the electrification  so thanks again for the links. 

 

Jamie

 

Not a problem. I think I may just taught my grandmother to suck eggs though!

 

I had a feeling that there must have been some connection. My interests have mostly been 3rd rail but since I started Riverside I've been looking at the early overhead schemes too. I've recently realised that the original 1500v DC Melbourne gantries from 1919 (many of which are still in use) are the same design as those on the NER Shildon line, as the Engineer was the same person. Similarly, looking at pictures of Woodhead, some of the various gantry designs correspond to the different styles used in the postwar extensions to the Melbourne and Sydney systems. I wonder which came first?

Edited April 4, 2014 by sparks

[Jon Fitness]

Thanks very much for that Graham.   At the moment they don't seem to chatter but the traction supply is carried in the same multi way leads.  I'dbe grateful for the RS stock number.  Thr power supply is totally separate from s different trasnformer but I haven't yet tried the signals with locos running.  Fortunately I don't have to worry about DCC.

 

 

Jamie

You may find that any locos with dodgy pickups will show up by making the signals twitch a bit as they pass!

JF

[jamie92208]

You may find that any locos with dodgy pickups will show up by making the signals twitch a bit as they pass!

JF

With the state of some of mine they'll be very twitchy.   On another tack is it ok to use the power supply to the servo 4 boards to powertheLEDS's on the signals.

 

Jamie

[Jon Fitness]

With the state of some of mine they'll be very twitchy.   On another tack is it ok to use the power supply to the servo 4 boards to powertheLEDS's on the signals.

 

Jamie

Not a good idea as the lights may flicker while servos move/twitch!. I usually have the lights off a completely separate power source..

JF

[jamie92208]

Not a good idea as the lights may flicker while servos move/twitch!. I usually have the lights off a completely separate power source..

JF

Thanks Jon,   I've got a standard 12v supply for all the auxilliaris such as point motors, relays etc so that should do.

 

Jamie

[ozzyo]

Sorry bud, I won't bother about the first bit about L.M.&H. electric railways.

 

OzzyO.

[jamie92208]

Things haven't ground to a halt.  The re-wiring of the Modratec lever frame switches is now complete and more ballasting has been done.   The platform edge walls are now clad in stone and some more foam has been laid ready for Hydrocal to go on top.  

 

We have been waiting to ballast the coal yard as we had run out of dirty clag to simulate ash ballast.  However one of our younger members is an engine cleaner at the Keighley and Worth Valley and on Friday he brought a gallon container of smokebox clag from the Midland 4F that they ahve there.  I've just ahd chance to start seiving it to the right size and now have a couple of soup containers of graded clag that will make great coal yard ballast.  He's going to get us some fine loco ash for the shed yard so hopefully tonights AGM will be over quickly and we'll get some ballasting done.  I think that clag from a real Midland 4F is very appropriate.

 

Jamie

[jamie92208]

Got down the club last night and was sad to hear that one of the team, who had been ill for a year, died that morning.  Keith Smith was a marine Electrical officer on gas tankers, and had helped a lot with the wiring of the control panels after he joined the club.  However he had a lot of health problems.  He will be sadly missed and our thoughts go out to his wife and son.

 

Anyway two of us got started on the berm that runs between the lines and the river bank.  This only shows up on photos.  We are making it with plywood formers every 6 to 8 inches and then chicken wire stapled over them and shaped.  This is then covered in squares of garden floss soaked in Hydrocal that has been coloured with poster paint.  After 2 or three layers have been smoothed on it provides a very had and light finish.  Just beyond the berm is the river wall.  This is at ground level but a couple of feet above the tracks with a wire fence running along it.    When I constructed the baords I didn't allow for the curving river wall and should have 'dropped' the baseboard edge so that it wasn't seen by spectators.  I did think of re doing that part of the board but by then we had the track laid and the wiring in and it would have been a nightmare.   Anyway I tried an experiment with some brass weights about 20mm high placed along the line of the wall.  I then stood the right distance away on the other side of the layout, where the public will be.   This proved successful and I couldn't see the basebaord edge.  I suppose that it acts like a 'ha Ha' in a landscaped garden.  Now all I've got to do is to make the wall and then the coping stones to go on top of it. Finally plant dozens of fence stanchions and thread some wires.   I did take some photos on my phone to illustrate this but I'm having trouble downloading them.  I'll try and find the right lead tomorrow.   It will probably make more sense with some piccys.

 

 

Jamie

[jamie92208]

Good morning.  Virgin Media have obviously put some more coal on the fire and I've managed to download the pictures so hopefully the above post will make some more sense.

Here you can see the berm formed from the chicken wire.  the sea wall will be to the left of the berm.

The brass blocks were then placed approximately along the line of the edge of the sea wall.

Finally I retreated to the normal viewing position and took this photo from my eye height to check that the baseboard edge isn't visible.

 

I just hope that it all work out when it's finished.

 

Jamie

Edited July 23, 2022 by jamie92208

[jamie92208]

Good afternoon from a wet and rainy Gildersome.  i couldn't do the carpentry that I was planning, as the drive is my workshop so I've got on with other things. This week a friend cut the panel for the Fiddle Yard Control panel, to shape ad made the cutouts for the controllers. he advised me to use Chinagraph's to mark it out.  First problem source some chinagraphs.  I eventually found some in a little shop in Heckmondwike, via the web and had to buy a pack of 12.   However I then thought, how do I mark iut out on the reverse side for drilling, so as not to spoil the nice shiny top side.  I eventually came up with making a mirror image of the CAD drawing and using that to mark it out.

This is the result (With it's frame built on.)

 

You will see the 4 vertical rows of 5 large circles,. These were intended for my interlocking push buttons that I had saved from Long Preston. (They are no longer obtainable). I took the panel to the club and held a brains trust with two potential operators.  This was very useful and some good ideas resulted.  The aim is to make it as intuitive as possible to operate with the least workload on the operator.   One major problem was that we couldn't work out a way of using the interlockers and came up with the idea of a mix of toggle switches and interlockers. Anyway today after breakfast I had another look at it and found a way of controlling the 4 motors for each end of the yard with the 5 interlocking buttons with the addition of 2 diodes and a relay to each set of switches.  The holes have now been centre punched and everything is ready for me to start building the panel. 

 

All in all a good 24 hours.

 

Jamie

Edited July 23, 2022 by jamie92208

[jamie92208]

Well more has been done on various parts of the layout.  We've now cracked the seawall problem and it's starting to look good some pictures will arrive in due course.   O finally found my last set of interlocking switches today and got most of the switches mounted on the fiddle lard panel.  I also got the base ofr all the signalling relays (18 of them) sorted.  This needs to go in a fairly cramped corner of the panel and it wouldn't be easy to hinger it for access to the wiring.  After a bit of thought I came up with strips of velcro and now it's mou nted on 4 pieces of 2 by 1 with strps of velcro on them.  It works.  Last night at the club Dave John Patrick and I and I got another 5 feet of the seawall sorted.  Today, in amongst various family things I finally got my soldering iron plugged in and started wiring the relays.  3 hours later I'd got the coil drivers wired to all 18 of them.  I'm doing the board as a sub assembly and then when it's all wired and tested I'll wire it into the panel.  It's much easier to work on that way.  Anyway if I gfet some more done tomorrow I'll try and post a photo.

 

Meanwhile on a  slightly more serious note Tony Bond, a key member of the team is in hospital recovering from a very serious operation.  He seems to be making good progress and I'll go and visit him tomorrow afternoon.  The team all wish him well and want him to hurry up and get back to work on Greyhound Bridge.  I did refrain from taking more pieces of etching this week after his op.

 

Jamie

[trisonic]

Sorry to hear about Tony B. Get Well Soon is the order of the day....

 

Best, Pete.

[jamie92208]

Some more progress on several counts tonight.  I went to see Tony B and he is doing well and getting back to his old self and anxious to get home and start on bridge work.  I had a couple of sessions today on the wiring, in between various other committments.  I managed to get 5 relays out of 18 wired and a few more partially done so things are coming on.   I'll try and post a photo tomorrow.

 

Jamie

[jamie92208]

Well I've now got 12 of the 18 relays fully wired and so am on the home straight.   It's been a complicated process keeping tack of what does what and which wire goes where.  The relays are in banks of 3, each bank performs the same function for a different set of track, thus they are all numbered 1,2,or 3.   I created a little chart for each set of 3 relays showing what colour wire goes to each pin and where it goes to.  Another chart showed me the different termination points for each set of relays.   Another factor was what order to tackle each wire in.  I eventually settled on working from the top left of each row right across then the next row etc.  As I'm right handed this makes more sense than starting on the right.   Anyway the workspace looks like this now.

with the various reference charts in the background.

 

The actual relay board looks like this

All a mess at the moment but when all the wires are tidied up it should look a lot neater.  The Velcro pads can be seen that hold it in place.   That's my eyes gone for the time being but tea now beckons then off to the hospital to visit Tony.

 

Jamie

[jamie92208]

Just opver a week later and there has been significant progress.  The rats nest on the last post has now been  installed in the panel and the wires terminated at their correct destinations.  The Velcro idea seems to work well.  Yesterday I made up the first 6 of the LED pairs that will act as point indicators. Today I started to wire up the point motor controls.  These are the interlocking switches which worked well on Long Preston.  The first of the diode ,matrices wasw assmbled and wired up.  I then connected it to the switches and applied power.  As it's not connected to the boards I needed an easy way to see if the polarity of the point motor feeds switched correctly and thought of using a couple of the LED pairs.  These were connected and at first the relay didn't click over.  Investigation showed a dry joint.  That was solved and suddenley everything started to work properly with the lights changing in the correct sequence as the buttons were pressed.   At the club the sea wall and Skerton bridge are coming on a treat.  Hopefully some paint will be applied on Friday and we will see how the sea wall idea works.  I suppose it could be called a HaHa.

 

Jamie

[jamie92208]

Well I've managed to get some more photos to explain what's happening with the control panel.

Here's the rats nest complete with Minnie inspecting it to check that it didn't need killing.

 

I finally got it fully installed earlier this week and here it is.but without the relays at the moment as they'll get in the way.

The relays and diodes for switching the points with the interlockers were finished and are now partially installed.  I've just completed the first bank of five.

The relays are connected to the back of the interlockers and each point motor feed is connected to a pair of LED's.

These were all connected up.  I then realised that I'd used the relay for the Up yard entrance for the Down yard exit but it doesn't matter as they are all wired the same way.

I then took my life an my hands and powered it all up.  To my great amazement all the LED's lit up.  Some pairs were the wrong way round but that was easily sorted by swopping the yellow connector wires.  The end result was  like this.

 

Very pleased to me and they all work as they are supposed to.  It will all make a lot more sense when I get the track diagram on with the coloured sticky tape.

Now it's off to the library and chip shop before an evening doing scenic work down at the clubroom.

Only 3 more banks of switches to go then the controllers.

 

 

Jamie

 

Edited July 23, 2022 by jamie92208

[jamie92208]

Well we had a successful evening down at the club.  Unfortunately i couldn't find the black poster paint so the scenery is various rather light colours, but at least it's not white.   We did our usual with Hydrocal and squares of garden floss and lid it over the layers of foam and chickenwire behind the sea wall.   This was the result.

The sea wall edging can be seen just projecting over the wall.   Behind it is the waste ground which should look a lot better once it gets some scatter material on it.  Once the woodwork is painted we can glue or pin the handrail stanchions, which are simple lengths of L girder.  these need 4 small holes drilling in them ready for wire passing through.  Fortunately I've got a lot of spare etched L girders from the platform awnings that should do,   

The main test though was to go to the far side of the double row of baseboards and allow a barrier width (eg stand against the wall) then see if the 'Haha' hides the edge of the baseboard.

That seemed to work so it was worth the effort.  The picture was taken from my eye level so for most punters it should work.

 

Jamie

Edited June 8, 2014 by jamie92208

[sir douglas]

there are 2 articles on the electrification of the Morecambe & Heysham line in "The Engineer"

 

 

 

12th July 1908, page 10*

http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/images/b/ba/Er19080612a.pdf

19th July 1908, page 8*

http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/images/b/b2/Er19080619a.pdf

 

* = the page number of the PDF file are different to the actual magazine page number, as the issues were split up into weekly files.