dmu 156

Great memories, I used to live in Woodhousee Park so not to far from yourself, Im a member of the Manchester Model Railway Society so I run my ICIs on 'Dewsbury Midland' , I moved to York 3 years ago but I still make the journey for club nights, or .at least I will do again when all covid restrictions are lifted.

They should at least provide you with a new motor.

Love the ICI hoppers, I have a full 18 wagon rake myself, as a driver at Northern Man-Picc until 3 years ago, I signed parts of their route, Chinley, Northwich as well as Buxton. Always loved driving through the Peak district.

The OLE on the layout is permanantly fixed except the wire at baseboard joints, these can be unhooked once the tension has been eased. The tensioner assemblies are made by me from brass and are dully working. I propose to do an indepth article on installing, tensioning and building the parts needed. Lookout for a more indepth article on the layout itself in the August BRM magazine as well as videos on the BRM youtube channel. I will be at the show at sometime after the 17th of July. Aron

The so called 'snowploughs' that are fitted to 150s, 153s, 156s are not snowploughs as they aren't low enough, they are called obstacle deflectors which are supposed to stop things like shopping trolleys and bicycles etc that are deliberately left on tracks by idiots from going under the units and causing damage. As a train driver I've heard them called snowploughs many times so I'm taking this opportunity to explain what they are.

This is a schematic drawing of the cross arm in the lowered position showing the the diagonal bracing

I have just completed the Judith Edge cross-arm pantograph kit. I see in the posts some of you have give this kit a go with mixed results. I did alter the upper arm configuration from the kit instructions in that I didn't use 4 pieces of wire and the cross bracing parts on the etch. I made the upper arms from 2 pieces of wire, bending each wire as a back to front 'N' , use the upper arm double pivot jig on the etch to form the first arm but instead of cutting the wire, feed it into the pivot on the lower arm, bend it up diagonally to the other side of the pan head, through the pan head pivot. bend it back down to the other lower arm pivot making sure its exactly the same length as the first upper arm. Repeat the process for the other side, this will give the prototype upper arm configuration. If you have an old Lima diamond pantograph this has the wire bent this way but with the diagonal wire going the opposite way forming an 'N' itself. I do intend to improve the kit further to make soldering up the moving parts easier for others using a micro brass tube where the lower arms and parallel linkages are soldered to the wire at the bottom. I'll keep you all posted on this.

Tube masts were used on Cheadle Hulme to Macclesfield line, part of the Manchester to Stoke route, they look about 12" in diameter.

A free to download book is available on the internet all about OLE in the UK called 'Overhead Line Electrification for Railways' by Garry Keenor, its pretty much up to date , 5th edition 2018

The option I use is to completely isolate any diamond crossing be it long or short from any adjoining track. As I use Peco streamline crossings then to control the feeds, I use the Peco DPDT switch that connects straight to the point motor that controls the route through the diamond crossing. I wire it so that when the point is set through the diamond [reversed] only that route has power, when the point is reset [normal] the other route through the diamond has power. This ensures no shorts even when shunting at crawling pace.

I emailed PH Designs last week to see if the pantograph base was still available, he replied he hasn't done any for awhile but he can still get them etched but isn't sure of the cost. If you contact him either by email or phone I'm sure he can give you that information.

A 323 would be a great unit to produce, drove them for 17 years , a driver's unit, known as the GTI of the network with 8 asymetric motors on, 4 on each of the outer vehicles and as I can model fully tensioned OLE either live or cosmetic it would be good to see one running around a layout.

Looks impresssive, I'm sure when you've sorted out the maths error it'll be a popular detailing kit.

Thank you, I saw it as a challenge to make all the working parts and enjoyed the experience. I should be able to get it working on DCC in the future and display it working on either 'Dewsbury Midland' or 'Barton Road' both Manchester Model Railway Society layouts. I'm currently working towards a fully working container gantry crane for the 'Barton Road' layout which is based on containerisation from the beginning to the present day.

There is a book all about OLE that can be downloaded for free, search for 'Overhead Electrification for Railways' by Garry Keenor this will tell everything about OLE in the UK. Loads of technical information covering all aspects of electrification.

I spent quite a bit of time modifying the Hornby Cowan Sheldon 76 ton crane, all the gearing, cable drums, derricking gear, pulleys, spreader bar, hoists, slew gear roller bearings all 37 of them, stabilizers and jacks were all made from brass. I turned a lot of parts on my lathe which made it a little easier to do. The drawbars are made of plasticard and the jib runner was formerly an LMS van. My aim is to have the both hoists, jib and slew gear working on DCC, the stabilizers and jacks would have to be manually operated, the jacks do screw down using a very fine screwdriver.

Another option to improve the pantograph on the Heljan 86 is to use an etched base from PH Designs with a Sommerfeldt 968 pantograph [remove the short legs and insulators], swap the pan head for a Sommerfeldt 980]. The pantograph fits perfectly into the etched base. This is one of several Hornby 86s that I have modified.

I'm currently installing OLE on a layout for Pete Waterman, the layout is being displayed at Chester Cathedral during the summer, a short video is available on you-tube called 'Making Tracks', the OLE is fully tensioned as per prototype so the contact wire is kept taught all the time although at the time of filming the tensioners were not installed [see 'Railnuts' facebook page for a picture of two tensioners]. When the layout is dismantled the tension is released at both ends of each wire run to allow removal of the wires at board joints. Keeping the wire taught makes running a pantograph in contact with the wire more reliable.

8BA or 2mm brass washers are perfect for this job, you can set your back to backs at 14.5mm which will leave tiny amount of play in the axle. Eileen's Emporium sell them in packs of 20.

Trafford Park industrial area had an extensive rail network. with a few trains still running in the late 80s or possibly early 90s.

The white triangle with 'S' on it in the 'Class 40 thrash' video posted by Big Jim on the 6th of May is indicating the location of spring points. These are in effect unworked trailing catch points so they will always derail a runaway vehicle travelling in the wrong direction on a falling gradients. It is a very steep gradient coming down from Dove Holes to Whaley bridge on the Buxton line. to allow wrong direction moves if needed, they would have to be manually clipped and locked for the movement. In the right direction trains just run through them with each twheel flange pushing the point blades over.

I'm used to be a driver for Northern out of Manchester Piccadilly so I signed the Buxton route, the solid yellow triangle you are referring to is for sighting of a foot-crossing that can be affected by the growth of vegetation . The idea is that if a driver cannot see the triangle, the vegetation needs cutting down. The triangle can also be seen by pedestrians at the crossing if a P Way inspection finds they can't see the triangle from the crossing the vegetation gets cut down. Its a way of giving the driver or crossing users time to see each other which avoids the need to put up whistle boards which now require planning permission, which you can imagine is difficult to obtain with todays anti- noise legislation. There are a couple of these triangles on the line between Stalybridge and Baguley Fold Jnc. The picture Big Jim has posted is what was used to show where there were trailing catch points on gradients back in the day of un-braked vehicles to stop runaways coming into conflict with other trains.

If anyone is going to see the Chester Cathedral layout and wants to ask any questions about the catenary in person then feel free to ask but unfortunately I will not be there for the 1st week so I will have to let you all know when I will be there as I live in York. I understand the entry to see the layout is free so you can visit as many times as you like.

Have a look at 'Railnuts' facebook page, there is a picture of two working cosmetic assemblies, I say cosmetic because you can't get scale weight in the system so the mechanics of the system are under the baseboard.

Thank you for your reply, the tensioners are made from brass and involved me using my lathe to make the parts. This may sound daunting to many but the tensioners had to be robust as its a portable layout so I've got a strong feeling I'm going to have to do an article on how to do it, the principle of tensioning is easier than you think so I'm sure modellers will come up with their only way adapting what I've done for their own needs.