Portland Grove

[Guest Dave.C]

Hi Andy, just stumbled across this thread for the first time.

 

 

Terrific carpentry! Good luck with the rest of the construction.

[Heinz57]

Hi Andy,

 

I have been following the topic on here, and your YouTube chanel for a while now.

 

The layout is looking great! Keep up the good work!

 

Matt

[McGomez]

Hi Arte and Heinz57.

 

Thanks for the comments.

The next installment should be uploaded soon.

[McGomez]

By the 21^st August 2010 I had gone to town on the trackbed that skirts the middle board before reaching the fiddle yard entrance. This was given a coat of battleship grey before tracklaying could commence.

 

 

The ply trackbed is supported via ply offcuts that are screwed to the open framed cross members.

 

[lordhinton]

have fun with wiring

 

 

dan

[McGomez]

Hi Dan.

 

I take it you´re not willing to help out then?

[lordhinton]

it does look out rageous! i would not even know where to start :S it is a great layout though

 

 

dam

[Grimleygrid]

That really is an impressive layout, great woodwork and serious amounts of fun to be had operating it! Love the photos of the Blue and Grey HST.

 

I look forward to seeing more updates.

[McGomez]

Thanks Grimley for the comments. Just for you, here is a video of the HST in its full 7+2 formation.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSYv5RZdQhw

 

 

I must admit, I nabbed a photo of yours off here a couple of years ago now. One of your blue grids on a train of HAAs traversing Grimley. Insprational photo that I had as wallpaper on my computer for some months. Fabulous weathering you did on that rake.

 

I am getting a rake together too and hopefully will be able to weather it to a decent standard. It will only be around 20ish wagons as compared to your rake of 31.

 

Boxenby is going to be one monster layout. Following that thread too.

[McGomez]

The 23^rd of August 2010 sees the track laid and a DCC supply hastily added………

 

 

…..and ready to test that gradient.

 

A couple of crocodile clips can be seen at the end of the video on the right hand side hanging down (from the lines going over the viaduct) providing the juice.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ljx-MonDi2A

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is basically the track plan as of the 31^st August 2010.

 

Any scenic details on the plan below should be taken with a pinch of salt.

 

[Grimleygrid]

Hi Andy,

 

Thanks for posting the video clip, the HST looks superb passing by. I have always been a big HST fan and used to really enjoy a trip out on the East Coast or Midland Mainlines sitting in the TGS listening to the power car revving up on departure! Intercity Swallow was my favourite livery for them.

 

I was very pleased with how the MGRs turned out and they looked really good behind 56006, I have missed driving her on Grimley! HAAs always looked good behind a nice BR blue Romanian Grid! I look forward to seeing your MGRs, behind your blue 56.

 

Still keep looking at all the different tracks on your layout, superb!

 

We are off to Spain soon on holiday!

[7APT7]

Hi Mate

 

I'm loving all you photos, as this Layout look Complex and huge, is it a Personal or Club Layout, it brilliant, keep up the hard work and I’m sure the end result will be many years of pleasure and adding the minor detail to it as the years roll by... etc

 

Warm Regards

Jamie

[McGomez]

Hi Jamie.

 

Many thanks for the kind comments.

It is a personal layout. As I said before, we don´t intend on moving so it was now or never. Having seen family and friends pass away in the last few years has made me realise that I should make the most out of life and model railways are a great way of releasing stress and forgetting lifes little problems. It obviously comes after family and work but it is up there in third place at the moment.

Sorry to get all sloppy there but now you know

[McGomez]

September´s photos show no advance in layout building whatsoever. October, November and December show the same.
They do show the stock boxes had been emptied and the track was given a good shake down before scenery work could start!
I put the exclamation mark in there, as of now, (late July 2011) the only scenery work that has been done is 3 test patches of ballast.

Truth is, work got in the way. I won´t go into the ins and outs but I had very little time for modelling. It wasn´t until the middle of June 2011 that things started to settle down to.
Attached are a few video montages of the shakedown period.

First up, a few passes of a Deltic on MK1 stock

Next up, a Pendolino goes hammer and tong and does the full circuit in 96 seconds. I didn´t have it on full power as it is not mine! The kids would have killed me if it had come off and broken. That statement doesn´t work the other way around funnily enough, as I caught them freewheeling an MFA wagon down the helix at full throttle and seeing how far it would get in the fiddle yard!
Full throttle is what I nearly did to them!

I actually measured this long circuit once and it is approximately 48 metres long, only including 1 road through the fiddle yard. The shorter circuit, over the viaduct is 15 metres in each direction.
 

[Guest 37deltic]

Great job Andy,

 

And thanks for the link the helix photos have given me food for thought.

 

 

Sam...(Hillside Model Railway)

[McGomez]

Having stated in an earlier post my favourite layouts, mention should also be made of another favourite layout of mine and a catalyst that has kept me focused on continuing with “The Groveâ€.

 

I got to know Steve Boley of Stroley International fame http://www.stroley-i...national.co.uk/ through a question he asked on a website a few years ago now, and as he holidayed in this area of Spain we met up and have kept in touch ever since. Always welcoming and willing to give advice, my thanks go to him for the last couple of visits to Warley (Nottingham & Ally Pally too) which have strangely coincided with visits to see my family back in the UK!

 

In fact Steve (and his wife) was, until quite recently, the only other modeller who had ever visited Portland and the trains’ weren’t even working back then. Hopefully they’ll have the opportunity of holidaying in Spain again soon. These visits are always a good reason to try and advance the layout a little bit more.

 

He also gets the blame for converting me to the new-fangled age of multiple liveries on multiple units and the modern scene. He is also my test engineer for any Ebay purchases from the UK! (My sister refuses to build a test track at her home!! Her loss.)

 

A London Midland class 170 was the latest purchase. It can be seen running-in on Stroley International. I don´t know whether mine is the first or second unit but Steve ensures me that it certainly didn´t come as a 4 car unit !

 

 

 

Steve has always said I should do a website for The Grove but lack of time and the fact that Telefonica won’t connect us to the WWW at home has prevented this.

 

Mainly through Steve’s website and his links to my original You Tube channel http://www.youtube.c...41?feature=mhee

 

we have now forged a little group of like minded individuals who basically like to play trains with various services now emanating from:

 

 

- The Hillside model railway in Northern Ireland, http://hillsidemodel...m/features.html

 

- Stroley International, somewhere in Middle England. http://www.stroley-i...national.co.uk/

 

- and Portland Grove here in the South East of Spain. www.I´m the only one who hasn´t got a website.com

 

 

 

Our latest convert is Gérard from the Perpignan area of France who has built a fantastic EWS depot called Falconstower http://falconstowertmd.webs.com in the middle of his French themed railway http://villefranche-ho.webs.com which is obviously a handy stop-off point for any freight/passenger turns that run between the UK and Spain. Check out the traverser in the depot.

 

All three of these layouts can be seen on You Tube. Follow the links on their respective web sites.

 

Before anyone says anything, yes we know Northern Ireland doesn’t have a tunnel linking it to the main body of the UK and Spain uses a wide gauge system but in the end we are just playing trains, yes we are grown men (well, I´ve just turned 18 actually!) but in the end it is a great hobby for both the individual and groups/clubs alike.

 

Enough philosophy for today. The next post will be back to the layout. I promise.

[McGomez]

 

I forgot to say earlier that the other visitor to come and see Portland was my mate Rob from Manchester now living in the Malaga area (another You Tube contact and known as Ridgeback on here) who brought some stock up at Easter for a run on The Grove. So engrossed in talking trains were we that day, I forgot to take pictures of the event. We chipped Rob´s new class 70 and had it running-in plus his DRS class 66 and his sound fitted class 25 (want one). Hopefully he´ll be back soon with the RENFE high speed train he bought recently. (The one seen in the photo a few posts back).

 

Regards

Andy.

[McGomez]

During autumn 2010 I acquired 4 Loksound chips off Spanish Ebay. 2 V3,5 chips and 2 V3,0 chips. 2 of the chips were from a Spanish electric loco and sounded like hairdryers and the other two were from Spanish Alco diesels. I wasn´t too impressed with either.

 

I managed to wangle a visit to the UK in mid November which coincided with Warley weekend. It was worth going just to see Blackmill.

 

I left the 4 chips with the boys from Howes with instructions to load them with class 37, class 40, class 60 and class 153 sounds and they sent them to Spain when completed.

 

The V3,0 chips have the disadvantage that they have less functions but still sound the same as the more up to date chips. Lacking are the auxiliary sounds of “track groan†“Compressorâ€, “Sanding equipmentâ€, etc. I don´t use the the majority of the sound functions if the truth were to be told so it doesn´t worry me too much.

 

 

Here is the class 40. Not much room inside for a speaker so it has the standard 23mm version, not located under the fan assembly but at the number 2 end.

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzPNdV7yBJo

 

Next up is the class 153. This is one of the V3,5 chips and has the full compliment of buzzers, bells and opening and closing of door sounds. I´m not too sure what happened on start up as everything seems to sound at once.

This has a DCC Supplies base enhanced 40 x 20mm speaker fitted in the underframe.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSudEaTn41U

 

This is the class 60 vid. My favourite privatisation livery although I´ve only ever seen 1 class 60 in my life and it was not the Loadhaul scheme.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1MQfBLaVW8

Last up my Backmann large logo class 37, Aluminum 100.

I bought this off the Bachmann "returns" stand but can´t remember from which show. It wasn´t that much of a bargain either especially as it had a dodgy motor, non working lights and a wonky wheelset. I only found that out when I got home though. I bought a Mashima 1833 can motor which is a close match sizewise to the original and managed to fix the wheel problem by using a plastic insulating bush from an old Hornby wagon axel I had lying around. The lighting problem was just a case of bad contacts.

When trying to take the body off to install the sound chip and speakers I couldn´t release 1 of the screws. It took a long time, as in weeks of prising to get the damn thing to come loose but it was worth it as this is my favourite of the 4 sound equipped locos. It has a DCC Supplies base enchanced 40 x 20mm in the tanks and a standard 23mm speaker under the fan.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPyzsiuOevc

[STEVIE B]

Hi Andy,

 

Even though you kept this narrative a secret, and having followed your layout progress for many, many months, may I congratulate you on this terrific, well written article. Long may you continue to build this epic layout and I really look forward to seeing it in the flesh sometime in the not too distant future. It's great fun being in partnership with you, Sam and Gerard (Portland Grove, Hillside Model Railway and FalconstowerTMD / Villafranche) and continuing success with this narrative and the layout building.

Kindest regards,

STEVIE B.

www.stroley-international.co.uk

[Lee m22]

I don't believe I've commented on here before, though I've dropped in regularly. This layout is amazing. It's certainly the most complex layout I think I've seen, and to see these videos with the trains running really gives a sence of how long the lines are.

 

I'm a massive fan of HSTs so I love the video of the full train passing. I will deffinatly be keeping my head in this thread and looking forward to more updates.

 

Truely brilliant stuff!

Regards

 

Lee

[mobi323]

That's a huge project you have undertaken there. You have done a great job!!

[ridgeback]

Hola Andy

 

Thanks for the mention a few posts back. Fellow RM Webbers , I had the privilige a few months ago to meet this extremely talented man, his lovely wife and two fine children.

 

I came across Andy,s you tube vids following a link from Strolley International. As he was living in Spain and I have just recently settled here I was curious to know wereabouts he was as english railway modellers appear to be as rare as rocking horse ----

 

It turned out he was 250 miles north of me , close to were a freinds son lived. Our freind was over in May and so the plan was hatched to visit her son and I was to meet Andy.

 

We drove north from near Vellez Malaga, the 250 miles to her sons home. After an overnight stay, the next day I drove the forty miles to Andy's and brought with me a few deisels for a'' play''. WOW , I was blown away with the complexity of the trackwork. This project looks good on paper but to see it in the flesh so to speak is incredible. The 4 hour drive was so worth it. He chipped my class 70 and fixed the sound on my class 25. Clever man. Then it was playtime. To see these locos I have bought but never run going round the helix , dissapearing and reappearing was fabulous.

My 2 or 3 hour visit became 8 hours broken up with a very tasty prawn curry. I had left my phone in the car to return and find 7 missed calls from my wife . By now she had thought I had left her for a man I had just met on the internet.

 

Andy,s project has spurred me on to complete the rennovations and creation of the rail room at my house over here

 

My aim is to be invited to join European operations and send olive oil and tomatoes via Murcia ,SouthernFrance,Stroley International onwards to Northern Ireland. May I also advise readers who have not followed Andy,s links to his european partners to do so now. They are great websites with a mine of information.

 

Keep up the great work.

 

Regards Rob

[McGomez]

37Deltic

Hi Sam. Have you had any more thoughts on your helix?

 

 

Hi Steve

Thanks for your comments. As soon as the temps start falling, I´ll be back down to the railway. Looking forward to your visit.

 

 

Lee m22

I am subbed to your layout thread too. Anything with a bit of BR blue is good in my book. You´ve done some nice weathering on both your wagons and track, especially the oil staining.

 

 

Mobi323.

Thanks for your kind words. Hopefully I’ll be able to start the scenery soon. Just hope I can get that bit looking right, otherwise……. I don´t want to think about it.

 

 

 

Hi Rob.

Thanks for the kind comments. (You´re allowed back now ;-) …………As long as you bring that Spanish high speed train you own)

Say sorry to your wife too, although I thought she´d forgiven me by now. Maybe she was cross because she missed the curry?

Glad to know it has spurred you on to get your house works finished and the railway room started.

 

 

Next installment coming up in 5 minutes.

[McGomez]

Fiddle yard lighting.

 

Spring 2011, and my modelling mojo had deserted me. I was working all hours and permanently knackered. I was given some LED samples at work so I thought I´d put them to good use. Just to see if they were any good you understand (Hope my boss isn´t on here!)

 

 

The fiddle yard was always dark and dingy so I put a string of LEDs along the framework of the station board shining inwards and it now looks like something from a SCI-FI movie once you turn those lights on.

 

 

 

 

 

Bimey! I´ve just noticed I´ve got a Freightliner class 57 under there!

 

 

 

This last picture also shows some of the DCC bus and associated wiring.

[McGomez]

Overhead Lighting.

 

Once I´d tackled the fiddle yard lighting, my attention turned to the layout lighting. A couple of years previously, I´d bought 6 fluorescent lighting units and hung them above the base boards. 2 above each section. The middle board is illuminated by the original tube that gave light for general garage lighting. The more I looked at photos the more the layout looked like a wet Wednesday in Manchester. (Sorry to all you Mancunians out there).

 

I employed some composite panels from work that had been damaged in transport and returned. These aluminium/polyurethane/aluminium panels are light in weight and can be milled and bent to shape easily. They are also pre-painted Silver/grey one side and gloss white the other. The fluorescent tubes were re-used and some ballasts were obtained to power the tubes. The layout lights are divided up in to 3 groups. One for each wall of the garage so that if I´m working on just the station area, I only need to turn those lights on.

 

Below you can see the difference. All light is forced downwards.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are two rows of tubes placed towards the front of the units to try and alleviate any shadows at the front of the layout. The white painted surface reflects all the light downwards therefore avoiding the wishy washy effect previously seen and caused by light escaping upwards. The tubes used are of the "Cool Daylight" type.