SRman's Current Layout - Newton Broadway

[SRman]

And today, while getting frustrated with the computer, I finished off the third and fourth rail laying on the branch line. I have to add the flattened ramps at the ends of the outside (third) rails ... when I find where I have put them!

 

This now completes the third and fourth rail this end of the layout - roughly one-third of the visible track. I have to keep going through the station loops, then the crossover and plain track at the other end where I tend to take most of my photographs (it has the only greenery at the moment!).

Edited January 12, 2015 by SRman

[SRman]

I have been breaking my back lately, not just with the third and fourth rail laying, but also wiring up the points. I deliberately left the tags only slightly bent over on the Peco point motors, so I could remove them to solder the wires on without too much difficulty. That was the easy bit, as reinserting them into the slots from underneath while trying not to dislodge the Peco micro-switches proved a little awkward with a couple of the points which were positioned behind some of the framework under the boards.

Peco studs and probe are used for control, and power comes from the 16V AC output of my ancient H & M Duette. On test, even the crossover can be thrown with no hesitation whatsoever from both solenoids throwing at the same time (from the same contact). I have been using twisted pairs of wire to double-up the feeds to allow full current to be carried. Even so, I ran out of coloured-pairs for colour coding the wires, so there are a couple of mismatched feeds I'll just have to live with.
 
While there is not much to show, the studs in the control panel give the game away, and also show that I still have one crossover left to wire up. I ran out of wire, although I know I have another reel of it somewhere l tidied it up and can't find it!



Behind the panel, I have sealed each of the contacts with hot glue to ensure no possible contact between adjacent studs.

Edited January 19, 2015 by SRman

[DougN]

SRman your getting further on this layout in a shorter time than your last layout!

[Markeg]

Hi Jeff,

 

The layout and control panel are looking good.  Excellent progress.  Streets congested, so where's the smog?

 

Colour coded wiring always runs out at some point.  I have run out of brown wire which I use for isolated sections, so have used some grey as well.

 

Mark

[SRman]

Mark: I might have to try using some dry ice to produce some smog, although the wisps of smoke when soldering could be wafted through the streets for effect too.

I really need to weather a few more road vehicles too, as most are too shiny and clean to be realistic. I must take a leaf from P.C.M.'s book for this.

Doug: Progress may slow down again once I return to work at the end of this week. I am pleased with progress though; I really feel as if I am achieving something right now. Having all the points on the LT section remotely operable means that next time I have a few people over, I won't have to keep doing the shuffle just to reach the far end of the loops.

[SRman]

I bought some more wire today to finish off the last of the point motors. I couldn't get the multi-coloured ribbon wires I like so settled for some fairly substantial automotive wire instead. It has totally destroyed any semblance of colour coding I had for the rest! It all works now, though, although one of the polarity feed wires dropped off the micro-switch while I was reseating the switch, but all fixed now.

This is very similar to the previous shot but shows the last empty holes now filled with the Peco stud contacts.




And this is what it looks like from behind. Note many of the signal switches are still unwired. That's for another day.

[Gwiwer]

Good progress Jeff.

 

I do hear you when it comes to wire colours.  Mine had a rhyme and reason - points feed = black, points return = red, points common = green, lighting = yellow out, orange back.  Then I ran out of black and couldn't get any more quicklyso there's a lot of blue wire around my layout connected to points and lights alike.  Then there's the bus lines which are white and white/red in pairs with the red banded always on the return side .....

 

Heaven help me if I ever got into functional signals!!!  

[Peter Beckett]

Jeff,

As an ex electrician who did his time with the SEC at Hazelwood and Morwell power stations and spent most of his apprenticeship wiring up conveyor panels that fed Hazelwood PS from the Morwell Open Cut, I was schooled in colour coding and neat wiring. So I can appreciate what you and Rick are trying to achieve.

I am proud to say that my wiring resembles a coloured rats nest but old timers has not set in yet so when a fault appears, a multimeter and memory lane helps me fix the problem. I still have half a reel of the multi coloured ribbon wire and use it for my points (Tortoises and cobalts) so I guess some of the old training is still used. But I use cable ties to keep everything tidy which were not invented when I was a lad, we used waxed string for all the looms.

 

Peter  

[emt_911]

I am proud to say that my wiring resembles a coloured rats nest but old timers has not set in yet so when a fault appears, a multimeter and memory lane helps me fix the problem. I still have half a reel of the multi coloured ribbon wire and use it for my points (Tortoises and cobalts) so I guess some of the old training is still used. But I use cable ties to keep everything tidy which were not invented when I was a lad, we used waxed string for all the looms.

 

Peter  

I must be showing my age, I was taught to use looming cord as well

[SRman]

A little lighter relief: I should start a new thread "How Unrealistic are Your Trains?".

I bought three pre-grouping vans from the local swap meet, all Roxey etched brass kits and well made, although a little battered from unsympathetic handling. Each cost me $20, (compared to the £27 each for the flat kits, still currently available) and was fitted with EM gauge axles and wheels. I have slowly regauged or replaced the wheels and axles, with two of the vans retaining their compensation at one end, while the S&DJR van had to lose its compensation unit as it was too wide to fit within the OO gauge wheelset.

I fitted NEM pockets from Parkside, with a 60 thou packing piece to negate the Parkside requirement for cranked couplings, and plugged in some tension lock couplings.

The S&D milk van is in a blue colour, which I may retain, while the other two LCDR/SECR vans were in a rather insipid green colour. One is now in EWS red (a reasonably close match to what I can ascertain is SECR  red/maroon), while the other is in Humbrol leather colour to represent a teak finish, as used by the LCDR. All require further work before adding transfers, and two of them are rather stiff runners, so more work required there too.

Making up a rather unlikely combination, I have posed my two LSWR M7 tanks with the three vans plus the previously worked on SECR (ex-LCDR) brake van. It does make for a colourful combination, although the purists are probably screaming in the background!




(Edited to replace the photo with a slightly clearer one.)

Edited January 21, 2015 by SRman

[SRman]

I wired one more signal in today, a small two-aspect signal in the tunnel mouth.






After that, I had a short running session. A Western interloper was seen passing Newton Broadway on the loop line. The green cab interior is actually just the green signal shining in and reflecting off the light cab interior walls!




All of the signals and the signal box interior lights are being run off a dedicated 12V DC supply. They are all a bit on the bright side, even with the correct resistors in line, so I will experiment later with an extra resistance at the source to step the voltage down just a little.

Edited January 31, 2015 by SRman

[DougN]

SRman, remember it is logarithmic in scale so if you had 470ohm you may well need over 1k more to drop the light level down!

[SRman]

Here's one that might interest DougN: we had a friend drop over for a visit the other day. She has a G gauge garden railway but decided she rather liked the Model Rail 4mm LNER D11, so bought one and as a result, Newton Broadway had an unusual visitor. This was the first time it had been out of the box, but it ran beautifully when placed on the tracks (on DC analogue power).










I have to admit that apart from cropping the photos, I have "photoshopped" the third one to eliminate the baseboard edges.

Edited February 28, 2015 by SRman

[DougN]

Looking very nice there. I am waiting on the LNER versions to become generally available before committing but I think that may be a way off. the J15 and the K1 are higher up the list at the moment. 

[Neil_S_Wood]

Coming along nicely Jeff.

[SRman]

I couldn't resist a bargain at the recent Sandown model railway exhibition. I bought a Heljan Dutch livery class 26/1, 26 038. The locomotive has been weathered and has Kadee couplings fitted to the locomotive base plate, with the snowploughs fitted around those. While class 26s don't belong on a Southern based layout, I have always liked the BRCW locomotives (I have six class 33s!), and when this one was offered at a price I couldn't refuse ... I couldn't refuse!

As with all of my previous Heljan locos, it runs superbly.




I also recently purchased a Hornby RailRoad TTS class 37 (97 301), with a view to using its sound decoder in a ViTrains 37. Here is the Hornby model, straight out of the box. It uses the old Lima body moulding, which lacks the proper tumblehome at the base of the sides, and the windscreens are really not the right size and shape, but overall it was still not too bad a moulding. I will probably still try to sell the remains after the sound removal.




The ViTrains model has been in my possession for some time, being one of the first issues, complete with traction tyres and slightly dodgy assembly of the nose ends (they still pop out occasionally). I repainted the rather plasticky finish of the yellow ends. The sound decoder from the Hornby model pops straight in, but the speaker installation needs a bit more work. I have swapped to a high-bass Soundtraxx speaker but that seems a little mushy at the moment. I'll have to try a proper plasticard sealed box around it to see if that improves it. It still works out as a pretty cheap sound installation, and the TTS sound is not too bad at all (not perfect by any means, but good value for the price).

Because Hornby stuffed up the wiring for the light outputs (they work in reverse to what they should), I took the simple expedient of swapping the white and yellow wires on the decoder's 8-pin plug. That way the lights will work correctly on any locomotive I choose to put the decoder in, and the ViTrains 37 will work correctly with any replacement decoder if I swap things in the future.

[Gwiwer]

Those Heljan BRCW's are lovely little beasts aren't they?  I'm delighted (and my credit card scared) to note another respectable batch of class 33s just announced which includes all three major variants.  If ever I find myself with more room and money than I know what to do with I'd also have a fleet of "McRats" on a large Scottish-themed layout.  Jeff knows I don't do things by halves when it comes to layout size!

[P.C.M]

Hi Jeff,

I saw that class 26 too, must admit I was very tempted. They are a great little model.

 

37428 is looking good too, I sold mine and got the Bachmann 37/4.

 

Cheers Peter.

[SRman]

Not entirely convinced that the Vollmer viaducts are doing what I want, I have been experimenting with the Wills viaduct. The Vollmer ones have the brick finish I really want but the arches are a little narrow and don't quite give the view through to the trains that I would like. The Wills one has wider arches but is only available in a stone finish.

Anyway, I bought a three-arch kit to start with and have been cutting down the piers to suit my needs. The leftover pier components have provided material for a nice buttress to support the girder bridge section.

I have another arch and pier kit on the way. Once that arrives, I can paint it all properly, but in the meantime I have done a wash of Humbrol #29, with a thin wash of their dark grey weathering wash to fill the mortar joints. I will be picking out stones in more colours but I want to do the whole lot in one go to keep it uniform. Then the full weathering will follow.

The clearances are very tight, so I may have to remove a little from the bottom sections of the piers at the baseboard edges, or I may add a thin strip of wood to the edges (25mm x 25mm square section, perhaps?).

[St Enodoc]

Not entirely convinced that the Vollmer viaducts are doing what I want, I have been experimenting with the Wills viaduct. The Vollmer ones have the brick finish I really want but the arches are a little narrow and don't quite give the view through to the trains that I would like. The Wills one has wider arches but is only available in a stone finish.

 

Anyway, I bought a three-arch kit to start with and have been cutting down the piers to suit my needs. The leftover pier components have provided material for a nice buttress to support the girder bridge section.

 

I have another arch and pier kit on the way. Once that arrives, I can paint it all properly, but in the meantime I have done a wash of Humbrol #29, with a thin wash of their dark grey weathering wash to fill the mortar joints. I will be picking out stones in more colours but I want to do the whole lot in one go to keep it uniform. Then the full weathering will follow.

 

The clearances are very tight, so I may have to remove a little from the bottom sections of the piers at the baseboard edges, or I may add a thin strip of wood to the edges (25mm x 25mm square section, perhaps?).

 

 

 

 

Jeff, have you considered the old Tri-ang three-arch brick viaduct? You still see them on eBay from time to time.

[SRman]

Jeff, have you considered the old Tri-ang three-arch brick viaduct? You still see them on eBay from time to time.

I have used those before on the old layout, converted to double track (each arch needed three of the Triang/Hornby items to get the width), and have 'recycled' part of it as a place-holder for part of the viaducts further along. Some of the dummy arches under the track bed on the right-hand end are leftovers from those conversions, also.

 

 

 

 

Edited April 6, 2015 by SRman

[Neil_S_Wood]

Looking good there Jeff.  That panel for the switches looks good.  Did you make that?

[SRman]

Hi Neil. The panel was made with a faceplate of clear acrylic, with a track diagram done in Microsoft Word, printed out and laminated, then bolted to the faceplate. Holes for the switches and studs for the point motors were then drilled through both layers.

The other, temporary panel with the two switches for DC/DCC is just a piece of plasticard hot glued and Blu-tacked to the woodwork. It will be replaced in the near future with more permanent switches that will switch the whole underground (lower level) to one or the other, so there can be no "accidents" with trains crossing over between the two systems.

[Neil_S_Wood]

Thanks Jeff, that looks very good.  Where did you get the acrylic from?

 

Cheers

 

Neil

[SRman]

The acrylic came from Bunnings in a much larger sheet, which I just cut to suit the bits I want.

 

​There is more than enough in that sheet to cover my needs for the next panel for the main lines (upper level), as well as replacing either if I make any mistakes (quite on the cards!) or revise or change the layout at any time.

Edited April 9, 2015 by SRman