Neely - Present day nearly Ely in N

[uax6]

The Sand Storm trains use 22 bogie opens, mainly ex-TML ones, in yellow (I think, or it could be green, I can't recall at the minute, nights plays with your mind!), but are pulled by a DB 66, which is the givaway. Although if you see the loaded trains, the cloud of sand following it is the bigger giveaway!

 

Andy G

[LNERGE]

Ely as Cambridge sees it..

 

[Joseph_Pestell]

It's a long time since I have been to Ely (back in the days of Network SouthEast and their anywhere all day for £5). But from what I remember, this is a pretty accurate depiction and could perfectly well be called Ely rather than Neely.

[Joseph_Pestell]

Terry

 

Thanks for the answer.

 

Before you start building a couple of Class 365 units, don't forget that GTR are planning new(ish) stock for the Kings Lynn service, I think they will be former Thameslink 377 units but not 100% sure.

 

Nick

 

365s are due to be available soon from Shapeways (see thread elsewhere on RMF). Don't think any 377s available yet.

[Neil Watson]

Well here we are terry after a small session on neely.some more detailed photos to get some interest. Let's hope we get some enquiries for the exhibition circuit.

[roundhouse]

You certainly deserve to get some invites.

 

Ian

[Steadfast]

I really like the layout Terry,there's some lovely details on there. Nice mix of trains too

 

The Sand Storm trains use 22 bogie opens, mainly ex-TML ones, in yellow (I think, or it could be green, I can't recall at the minute, nights plays with your mind!)

The ex TML KEA wagons we have down here on Mendip traffic are rust and grime brown. Oh with small yellow patches :-D

 

jo

[terrysoham]

Well here we are terry after a small session on neely.some more detailed photos to get some interest. Let's hope we get some enquiries for the exhibition circuit.

Thanks Neil. You really are quite an accomplished photographer.

 

By the way most of the stock in Neil's pix today are his - some of them have sound too.

[terrysoham]

Various Ely and District Club members operated Neely last night and whilst I heard the "shorting" sounder go off on a few occasions due to operator error, the session was again successful. We ran the repainted and decaled three car Abellio Greater Anglia class 170 in which I have installed directional lighting. I have used one decoder and carry the three lighting wires to the front and rear cars via couplings constructed from brass tubing. This is still experimental as I find that because of the wires, the couplings sometimes result in derailing the adjacent bogies. HOWEVER, I was pleased last night as I only had one derailment and I am now confident that the idea of solid couplings between the cars can be made to work.

[roundhouse]

Various Ely and District Club members operated Neely last night and whilst I heard the "shorting" sounder go off on a few occasions due to operator error, the session was again successful. We ran the repainted and decaled three car Abellio Greater Anglia class 170 in which I have installed directional lighting. I have used one decoder and carry the three lighting wires to the front and rear cars via couplings constructed from brass tubing. This is still experimental as I find that because of the wires, the couplings sometimes result in derailing the adjacent bogies. HOWEVER, I was pleased last night as I only had one derailment and I am now confident that the idea of solid couplings between the cars can be made to work.

Would be interested ot see how you have done the lighting in photos etc. I have started one cab on my 168s with a function only decoder and pick ups os they can be separated for storage but its not working  properly yet and is an expensive way of doing the lights.

Edited June 10, 2015 by roundhouse

[terrysoham]

Roundhouse,

I have another GF class 170 to which I will be fitting lights in the not too distant future and I will take step by step photographs and then do a "MasterClass" type presentation on here.

For your information the three car train is a fixed rake which is stored as such in a cassette and whilst the cars can be separated it would involved unsoldering the wired connections. I have looked at ways of fitting a plug and socket and none of those that I have seen are small and/or robust enough.

Terry

[roundhouse]

Roundhouse,

I have another GF class 170 to which I will be fitting lights in the not too distant future and I will take step by step photographs and then do a "MasterClass" type presentation on here.

For your information the three car train is a fixed rake which is stored as such in a cassette and whilst the cars can be separated it would involved unsoldering the wired connections. I have looked at ways of fitting a plug and socket and none of those that I have seen are small and/or robust enough.

Terry

I may have to do something similar for storing my units as semi permanently coupled as I was struggling to find a suitable plug.

 

Look forward to seeing how you installed the lights.

 

Ian

[beast66606]

Very nice - I live not too far from Eccles Road and so I photograph as much of the interesting stuff as I can - and I also photograph the mundane, one day it won't be, it will be gone.

[F-UnitMad]

This is the infamous Neely underpass! The real Ely one is only 9 feet high and gets regular bridge strikes.

Sir; I wish to complain in the strongest possible terms concerning your depiction of a van stuck at the low bridge, & the damage such a depiction could do to the reputation of van drivers.

Surely any White Van Man worthy of the title would have got his vehicle much further under the bridge, or even clear out the other side with enough speed, just leaving the splintered remains of the van's fibreglass hi-top on the road at the start of the bridge??!!

 

The linked pics of the straw-carrying HGV at Ely make me shudder & despair; another blow to our reputation, speaking as an HGV Driver who has both been through Ely (via the level crossing route!!) & many years ago also unfortunately struck a bridge - a long story but basicly when my usual 4.2m trailer had been swapped by someone else for a 4.5m high one, & in the dark at 4am the next day I didn't notice the sign had "changed" on the trailer, & went my merry way on a regular route I'd been doing for two years, that involved a 14'3" bridge.... ...and yes it cost me that particular job & a fine/licence points, for those who want all HGV drivers lynched for their crimes.

I do think I'd have noticed a low bridge if I was approaching the girders at eye level, though....

 

Edit: meant to say, this is a cracking layout, & as has been posted before, close/recognisable enough to be called "Ely" anyway, rather than Neely (although I like the wordplay!)

Edited June 15, 2015 by F-UnitMad

[lmsforever]

Really like this layout crisp and well modelled the stock looks great you deserve to exhibit this layout and I look forward to be able to see it in the flesh keep up the news please.

[terrysoham]

Really like this layout crisp and well modelled the stock looks great you deserve to exhibit this layout and I look forward to be able to see it in the flesh keep up the news please.

Thank you for your kind words. Neely has one exhibition booking so far in Bury St Edmunds for September 2016. So far nothing in your area I'm afraid but I'll keep posting on here.

[terrysoham]

We had been having difficulty with the two car dmus coming off the ends of the storage tracks on Neely. I did think about putting a lever operated microswitch at the end of the track which, when the dmu pushed the switch’s lever, caused the track power to be switched off. The idea seemed far too complicated and I could foresee snags – for example, having to provide a way of resetting the track power.

 

So instead, I decided to go mechanical and fitted some small “buffers” at the ends of the six dmu storage tracks. Initially the buffer uprights were made from blocks of wood and had foam squares glued in place. However we found that when in place they interfered with the protective covers which we put over Neely when we transport it.

 

So I constructed the mark II removable version. The first photograph shows the short length of brass tubing which is fixed in place in the baseboard. Number 2 shows the second piece of tubing which is a

push fit into the first (photo 3). This piece of tubing has a small piece of foam glued to it using impact adhesive (photo 4). The final photograph shows it in use.

 

The buffers normally remain in place. When we want to move the layout, the buffers are removed, the protective covers are put in place over the baseboards.

 

Operators can now confidently drive a dmu into the storage siding at a reasonable speed without fear of the train coming off the end of the track.

[terrysoham]

Neely has been up in our Clubroom for the past 6 or 7 weeks whilst I've spent all my spare time working on the Club's N scale layout at home. The Club layout called Westgate Park was started some six or more years ago by two members who got so fed up with the layout that they moved on. It has never worked successfully because of its extremely complex wiring making fault finding a nightmare. After the success of Neely at the Ely exhibition in May, it was decided that I would convert Westgate Park to DCC and CBUS operation. This is now complete and, yesterday, I dismantled Neely on my own in the same time that it took three of us to do after the exhibition not for any other reason than the old adage that practice makes perfect!

So last night, Neil and I erected Westgate Park in the Clubroom and lo and behold, with no more than minor hiccups, we had a fully functioning layout. All credit to MERG kits.

 

Anyway Neely is now in sections back home and I shall be getting on with various tweeks over the next few weeks and months. Firstly, doing all those small repairs that all layouts need from time to time including various minor repairs to stock. As and when I come across something interesting I hope to share it on here.

 

Finally, I have attached a photograph of the touch screen computer which does all the route setting on Neely using JMRI.

[danstercivicman]

Ely has a special place in my heart, when my grandad was dying we used to get the train from Leicester via Ely then meet my dad who worked in Cambridge and go to visit him in Norwich!   As someone who grew up in the fens- you have captured the area well, esp the stupid bridge that truckers never seem to realise there is a bypass bit!!

[terrysoham]

I saw in another topic on here that there is an interest in dust covers/protection when transporting so I thought that I’d show you my baseboard covers for Neely.

 

Photograph 1 shows one of the covers in situ. You can see how I made it slide into small brackets on the two long edges of the baseboard. The covers and the brackets are made from 3mm thick MDF. The three pieces of the covers are joined using 10mm square timber sections screwed and glued together to provide substantial protection to the scenery and track when they are being transported. We have found that it is best to locate them in the van or car on their long edges – there seems to be very little damage occurring when we do this.

Photograph 2 is a closeup of the bracket fixed to the long edges of each baseboard. The brackets are designed such that we can insert 75 - 100 mm high Perspex sheets on the front of the layout to discourage the “finger poking” brigade and 50mm high MDF sheets along the rear and sides to minimise the chance of stock accidentally falling off the layout.

As an aside, I cannot stress too strongly the need to have lightweight and robust baseboards if your layout is to be demountable. Moving Neely is a doddle even on your own.

[terrysoham]

Neely has been broken down and transported back home after a successful sojourn at the Clubroom. These are the baseboards and legs in the corner of my railway room at home. Presently, it is holiday time in our household involving either being away ourselves of taking care of grandchildren so I am not doing a great deal of modelling. However, I have been working on the printed circuit boards for the front and rear lights for my GF class 170 using surface mounted leds and resistors and, now that we have the Club's layout, Westgate Park, operational I've spent a little time using JMRI to build its control panel.

[terrysoham]

It seems ages since I last posted about Neely, so I thought that I’d bring you up to date. (By the way over the summer, I have been converting the club’s N scale layout to CBUS and dcc which, fortunately, proved to be a successful venture.)

 

As Neely now has an important outing at the Nottingham exhibition in March 2016, I have started to look at the robustness of the electrics before I re-erect the layout in my model railway room.

 

By design, each of the baseboards has a robust protective cover (for photographs see earlier postings) which means that I am able to invert the baseboards on top of my trusty Workmate and work on the electrics in ease and comfort.

 

Whilst CBUS and dcc considerably reduce the amount of under baseboard wiring, there are still wires to/from the 15 way D connectors at each end of the boards which form part of the wiring bus between the adjacent baseboards and from each of the CBUS modules to the solenoids, Tortoise motors and signals.

 

A lot of the wiring is of the 7/.2 variety and, mistakenly, in many cases I had put a blob of solder on the end to give the screw connectors something to “bite on”. When I came to check the first baseboard, two of these wires were loose in the connectors even though the multimeter indicated that there was a good electrical connection. It appears that it is not a good idea to solder the ends of wires but rather to crimp a metal ferrule to give a suitable termination. So I have started to crimp ferrules to all the 7/.2 wires.

 

At the same time, I am checking that the heavier, 16/.2, wire doesn’t have soldered ends. Where it does I am cutting off the solder and doubling over the wire so that the screw connects to more wire. I have also flattened the ends of the dcc bus wires where they poke into the connectors.

 

Additionally I am re-routing the wiring where necessary so that it doesn't hang down below the baseboard as well as improving the overall neatness.

 

I have now completed 4 of the 9 baseboards. Hopefully this will make for a minimum of electrical problems in the future.

[terrysoham]

I have been busy in the past few weeks tidying up Neely. I have now completed checking the wiring and connectors on the baseboard - I do hope that it works correctly when I assemble the layout in the near future.

This last week I have been painting the baseboard covers a bright red! These covers are essential when packing the layout into the van for transportation as they protect the scenic areas as well as the trackwork in the storage yards.

I have also started to paint the sides of the baseboards using blackboard paint.

You can see the results in the attached photographs.

[Neil Watson]

I have been busy in the past few weeks tidying up Neely. I have now completed checking the wiring and connectors on the baseboard - I do hope that it works correctly when I assemble the layout in the near future.

This last week I have been painting the baseboard covers a bright red! These covers are essential when packing the layout into the van for transportation as they protect the scenic areas as well as the trackwork in the storage yards.

I have also started to paint the sides of the baseboards using blackboard paint.

You can see the results in the attached photographs.

 

 

Terry I must say that now you have painted the boards it looks a lot smarter and professional for presentation. It also makes the scenery stand out more. Funny how small changes make a large difference to a great layout . Maybe I should do that on mine. ( volunteers lol)

[terrysoham]

I've just returned from the Missenden Railway Modelling Autumn Retreat which is a posh name for a weekend's practical course at Missenden Abbey in Buckinghamshire building MERG electronic kits.   I managed to build, test and fit a point position indicator, a train on track indicator, a new USB connection so I can operate the railway from the computer without going through the control panel and a feedback CBUS board which communicates with the computer.    So all in all a very productive weekend and the accommodation and food are good too!!

 

If anyone is interested the weekends are held in Spring and Autumn.   Try Googling Missenden Modelling Weekend for details.