Les1952

A couple of details-

Backworth's wooden shutters- all locos ran with these.

Backworth's cleanliness.....

Note 71515 only had two lamp irons on the bunker!

No.6 with WD/OE number showing through and showing Backworth didn't have bunker lamp irons at all, just a holder for an electric light-  6, 9, 48 and 49 were all the same in this respect, as were Stephensons 44 and 16- i.e. 6 out of 6 of the locos I photographed........

All the very best

Les

Ooohhhrrrrr Backworth!!

 

I'd rather 6 or 9, or even either of the 48's (at the end there was two 48's at Backworth!!) but beggars can't be choosers.  As the H people did 49 I suppose that's out.

 

The original WD number was visible under the paint on the back of the bunker on one, I think it was 6 but might have been 9.

 

Happpyyyyy!!!!

It was 6 that had its WD number showing through- I think this one came via the Opencast Executive.  Shame the Backworth loco is pristine black- they didn't get really strong on cleaning until the unlined blue period.

BTW this one and the Cromford one really could do with wooden cab shutters (Backworth on one side only).

Les

PS- any chance of a couple of these (71515 and No.4) in N please?

PPS - there were also two locos numbered 49 at Backworth at the same time (but not at the same time as the two numbered 48).

Hello.

Again thanks, gents, for all the info. 

Firstly on Dawdon coal- it couldn't travel up the NCB line to South Hetton and Hawthorn Cokeworks as the two inclines were self-acting, which meant that wagons coming down had to be heavier than those going up as the weight difference was what made the incline work.  These inclines were originally for coal coming down into Seaham Harbour but later for stone to be loaded into coasters for tipping at sea, rather like the stuff that was tipped from Sunderland pits. All that could go up the inclines were empties.  One of the Marsden videos has some good footage of the inclines and of the South Hetton WDs working to the top.

I've probably got a similar D20 photo on the coast line- though the trains were longer than I've room for.  Through trains from Newcastle to Middlesbrough loaded to eight bogies.  There are also records of occasional B1s finding their way onto these in the fifties but my B1s have enough options without taking on passenger.  I suspect tender engines were rare as they had to be turned at each end where an A8, V1/3 or L1 (which were the usual power) would only need to run round and take water- or if a Teesside loco "drop back" to the next Southbound working without needing to go for turning first.

One thing I did find out from reading through 1959 Trains Illustrateds- I picked up a very tatty bound set really cheaply- was that the Metrovick Co-Bos were run in from Middlesbrough to Newcastle via Sunderland and back on eight-coach trains said to be "Mark 1 stock".  They also worked a Middlesbrough- Harrogate-Leeds-York-Middlesbrough turn, presumably with the same stock.  I'd not really realised they were built at Stockton.  I'd sold my Metrovick when planning this layout- I'll not replace it with another kit as there wasn't really enough room inside to chip it.  If an r-t-r version appears then I have an excuse for buying one.....

If there is an entry for Dawdon Colliery to Billingham ICI then the loco could well have been a Teesside J26, but how many can tell a J26 from a J27 on an N-gauge model?  I can for some locos but I'm a bit of a geek..... My surviving pair are J27s- one isn't yet chipped.  My J26 has died and donated its tender to another J25.

Some pics-

At the top of the slope from the coal drops the new smoother crossing by the new pointwork- makes it a bit more plausible that road wagons actually could have gone through the pit yard.

Progress with bedding in the line into the screens where the point has been removed.

The reason there are no pithead wheels at Hawthorn Dene- they've been taken down and are being scrapped- must get another welder and some more rust paint.  It does look like a main line in front.....

To whet the appetite for the new German layout- this weekend's purchases for that line running in on HD.  You'll not find that opne in a working timetable (or out at exhibition.....)

And finally....

Model railways are built on tea and coffee, in my case mostly tea.  My teapot was more than a little past it so I've treated myself to a new one. 

It is of course bigger on the inside......

All the very best

Les

nore typos removed, but never all.

Thanks for all this info- 

Now a teaser- I've got a picture of coal fulls at the South end of Dawdon with a J27 (or could be a J26) on the front and something (possibly No.60, a WD saddletank with a Lambton cab) giving it an almighty shove up the rear - seemingly working a bit harder than the J26/J27.   So from this I deduce that not all Dawdon coal went out through Seaham staithes, and that odd loads at least went off to Teesside.

Similarly there is a picture of another J27 arriving at Dawdon from the South with what looks like coal fulls- could this be a train of Easington, Horden or Blackhall stuff for shipping at Seaham?   Certainly these trains weren't the normal run of the mill, but as the coastal pits didn't all work the same seam there would be differences in the quality of the coal produced.

I also remember sitting on Seaham station for an hour after just missing a train (not long after the end of BR steam, I'd been trying and failing to get into Seaham Colliery) and two class 37s came through with coal empties, one Northbound and the other southbound........

There is a last week picture of one of West Hartlepool's WDs on the inland route.  They also worked to Thrislington via Billingham, and there are a couple of good pics of them between West Hartlepool and Seaton Carew on Southbound coal, but this could have come down the inland route to Old Hartlepool.

I do need an excuse to run coal trains as they were the staple diet of the line- if I've set the layout on the only stretch that didn't have any I'm going to have to bend reality a bit.   the D20 is very much a flight of fancy as they seem to have been very irregular on the line since WW2, most passenger being V3 or L1 hauled up until the first DMUs in the mid-fifties- these were 8-car sets by the way!    An 8-car DMU was a replacement for an L1 + 8 coach train. 

I lived at Darlington until 1970, then three years at Durham, five at (West) Hartlepool and two at Eston before moving to Notts at the start of 1980.  Oddly enough there is a picture in the NERA Express, (no.215- the centre spread) with an aerial view of Faverdale works, and in the lower right is the house I grew up in drying out after building before the first owners moved in.......

All the very best

Les

Just a thought- I have 6 double sockets in the workshop and STILL have two multi-outlets and two extension bars........

Against that I'm not forever plugging and unplugging from hard-to-reach wall points.

TWO double sockets in each corner?

Les

Another six-coupled tank to whet the appetite.

RSH 18 inch outside-cylindered job, one of the ten mopst powerful 0-6-0 tank types in the UK....

Pics of No.16 in service at Backworth and awaiting restoration at Tanfield, and of the restored No.38 at Tanfield.

Just a thought....

Les

Still awaiting the move...

Not a lot of point moving clubroom until the power is on (and for that matter the water in the loos....)

Progress report shows the partition is up and mostly sealed both sides, and the floor is painted. Our area is at the far end.  We still don't have our own light switches (or for that matter a complete set of lighhts, and the power points need adding to.  Cleaning is continuing while we await the electrician.

On the layout front, we've been trying out more of Trevor's buildings on site- ready to dig foundations once the move is done.

This is one of trevor's competition pieces.  The diorama will be cut in two and this end will be installed at track level with the fancy side of the tower facing the punters.

This end of the same diorama will go next to it but with the PW trolley facing the track and thereby largely undeen by the punter.

Meanwhile Geoff has almost completed the station cottages.  

Jim and I have been up at the new clubroom while all this has been going on, getting lungfuls of dust.....

All the very best

les

Many thanks for all the comments and compliments, gents.  I'll try to deserve the latter...

The roster for goods trains on Hawthorn Dene at Grantham show last September looks a bit like this (which includes "flights of fancy" and "might-have beens")

Southbound loaded 21-tonners - coal (long train) with J27 usually

Northbound empty 21-tonners (long train) with tender-first B1

Northbound steel girders (bogie bolsters) with Tyne Dock O1 - sets this as a Teesside to South Shields train

Southbound empty bogie sulphate wagons with West Hartlepool WD - no idea if these ran on the Coast (probably not) but they all say "Empty to Haverton Hill" on the side so the back story is they're coming from Sunderland docks...

Southbound fast goods, mainly vans, with B1/V2/pacific.  Includes fish so probably started at South Shields and will pick up again at West Hartlepool

Nothbound and Southbound slow freights with J25 etc

Southbound 5-plank tarpaulins with Class 24 (25/0) and brake tender- thought of as limestone from Fulwell or Hawthorn quarry.

Northbound coal fulls, Blackhall or Horden to Sunderland docks or Tyneside power station, Class 24- may become Q6

Northbound oil train (not really prototypical but local tankers from Robbies) with J39

Northbound and Southbound parcels- I was worried about the Northbound one being too short but have found a picture of a Sunderland to York parcels with three bogies and a brown van hauled by a V2, just as well as my V2s are weaklings....

There are also two Northbound and one Southbound expresses with Pacifics , a local with a D20 and celerestories including an NER brake, a DMU, 2MT with inspection saloon and a Class 37 with one or two brake vans.

The list will change/develop as I get more exhibitions under my belt.

The sound fitted locos are lemberg on Southbound express, the West Hartlepool WD and the 2MT on the inspection saloon.  The two Southbound ones are stopped by the signal and the saloon stops to inspect the PW gang....

I do know that three expresses is one too many.

Hope this helps.

Les

 

 

I hope to see Hawthorn Dene at one of the NE shows.

 

Are your A3s Dapol? If so how do they run?

 

Regards,

 

Roy Marshall

Hopefully I'll get further North than Nottingham once the layout has appeared in Railway Modeller.

All the A3s are Dapol and run very well, as do the A4s.  One A3 lost its piston rod from its guide and had a warranty repair to fix it and a second had a broken pin on delivery casued by a transit bounce, again fixed underr warranty  but there are 11 A3s and 5 A4s and all run very reliably- the only faults to manifest themselves are a couple of Bachmann decoders inside them losing their addresses after shorting out when derailed due to operator error- these chips will be replaced by Lenz or Zimo as and when I can afford it.

Lemberg with sound is very impressive- I've had it reblown with a Pauliebanger sound file rather than the Youchoose one as the whistle is more impressive on Paul's.  I'll have to try for another video of it.

All the very best.

Les

Hello- Thanks for the pics.

I think I'll stick to the 5-plank wagons with tarps, as these were used elsewhere for stone and the only wagon photos I have at Fulwell Quarry are 5-planks (I've yet to find wagon pics from Hawthorn Quarry which would definitely have been routed along the coast).

I've spent quite a look at the Chris Davies pics (and trawled through 806 of them) but couldn't find any "Hawthorn Colliery" (which I assume to be Hawthorn Combined Mine).  One or two of the locations seem a little suspect- "Seabank Colliery" is most likely Seaham Colliery, and "NCB Loco Juno" was a seaham Harbour Dock Company machine.  Can't fault the choice or quality of the photos, though!

Some pics of mine from 1972 at Hawthorn Combined Mine and South Hetton Colliery.

A couple of the steamers.

Beta ex- Brandon Pit House.

The Hawthorn Combined Mine was a bit further North and in No.2 Area- I've set Hawthorn Dene just over the border in No.3 Area.

To finish with, one at Shotton in 1975 or so (I forget the exact year but it was the year before it closed)

Having been a bit of a catalyst for the Q6 I wonder If I can persuade Dave Jones to follow his Hudswell (Boldon No.1513 was this type) with an outside-cylindered Hawthorn- the 16" would do nicely, No.63 at Philadelphia worked from South Hetton at one time......

All the very best

Les

unusually this time not edited for typos, but having started the post on the laptop I had to change computers when under Win8/IE it wouldn't manipulate the images.  As a result I had to dash downstairs to use the machine on the desk....

Some more rebuilding

Further testing of the colliery showed that the point from the loop to the pit itself is also shorting- it seems I have a point with duff insulation as this shorts when set to the yard and with no power supply beyond it.

I've looked at the layout and I didn't need the point (which is just as well as I'd have had to remove the flight to get the new one in).  I've replaced the point with plain track and the lines now all run.  Just a little cleaning and removal of surplus ballast to make it run smoothly with all locos.

A couple of test shots for the pictues I've used on UK Model Shops. the light area on the bank is sunlight shining over next door's roof (just) and onto that end of the layout....

Hawthorn Dene is now listed in the  eLayouts section under 3mm or less Nottinghamshire.   Hopefully it will attract an exhibition or two....

All the very best

Les

Les,

 

I'm late to this, so I hope you're still progressing. I'm also very interested in the Durham Coast line (in N Gauge).

 

You mention COVHOPs going to Bristish Steel and ICI, but I saw lots of them go to and from Steetley at West Hartlepool. I think they may have come from Thrislington and probably by a Southern approach, unfortunately. But perhaps they also travelled further North on the Coast line.

 

A couple of thoughts on sources, if you still need any:

 

- The North Eastern Railway Association produces a number of inexpensive booklets - Line Diagrams of the NER Stockton - Hartlepool - Sunderland - Newcastle; Workings of Local Freight Trains.... Darlington District 1953; Passenger Locomotive Working Darlington, Newcastle and Sunderland Districts 1948 all give useful background, though I realise they're a bit early for your setting. Google will help to update the line diagrams (1920s) but relevant photos will help show what infrastructure was still current in the 1960s.

 

- Pictorial sources abound on the Web - Time Capsules as part of the Photo Forums website is free - if you look for a contributor called Chris Davies, he has lots of pictures of NE England including a set showing a WD tour including Hawthorn Colliery - definitely worth the trouble.

 

Regards,

 

Roy Marshall

Many thanks for this-  I have pictures of the Covhops at Billingham so know about the Southern route- I'm still trying to work out where the stuff from Fulwell and hawthorn quarries went, and in what sort of wagons, though the tarps give a good looking train that looks the part.   I may not be able to afford a rake of Covhops in any case as I'm getting together the bits for another new layout at the moment (German again and in a different time period to Furtwangen Ost).

I am an NERA member and have the line diagram- but I'll get a copy of tyhe freight train diagrams as that should confirm the presence or absence of lime and/or sulphate traffic.

All the very best

Les

Colliery Track lifted and replaced

I've finally got the defective point on the colliery lifted, and also replaced the one before it (the king point).   The broken point didn't come up in one piece.

Pictures show the new points in place but no scenic repairs done yet.  The industrial nature of the colliery track is shown well in the second picture- it does run properly and trains lurch prototypically as they pass through.   Good news is that there isn't a short any more.  Bad news is that there isn't any power to the king point at the moment- job for tomorrow.

Les

Update

The grass is now completely relaid and the layout has had its dust cover put over it until I've got the trackwork on Hawthorn Dene finished.

I'll re-do the overhead and replace the switch before the end of November, hopefully.

Les

Some very nice modelling!!! wil follow this now.

Your club building looks like an old ww2 installation..

 

 

cheers neil..

We're on the old RAF Newton site- the "old" clubroom we're vacating is the former chapel.  This is due for demolition for new housing.  One of the hangars is opposite the new clubroom and our building is in a designated buffer zone of light commerce between the houses and the hangars.  It looks as if we are sharing the building with the police dog unit and training school, and with the ghurka security guards.  Who is in the other parts of the building we've yet to discover.

All the very best

Les

A tale of two rooms this week.

In the old room, Trevor, Alf and Geoff have been looking at buildings from Trevor's collection to see what would fit where on the layout.

Close-up of the row on the bank top, posed in the wrong place so the sun is in the right direction..

The scrap yard will be at the end of a new lane along the front of the layout.

A row of older cottages at the front of the layout, and a woodyard against the endscene, both to be bedded in.

The row of houses from one of Trevor's competition pieces will be placed in Top Valley Market,  with the row from the first picture in its own place behind.

Meanwhile at the new clubroom certain things have happened, and others not......

The pile of industrial fridges and freezers dumped in front of the door hasn't been moved.  However a gang has moved the left-hand row since the picture was taken.

A hanging power point is still hanging....

The wall between us and the unit next door is now all-but finished.   There will be another work session tomorrow with mops, buckets, floor paint and tile sealant to get the floor on its way to sorted.

Much to do.

Les

Looking at the plan- right at the bottom is the line between the crossover and the lower branch of the Y-point redundant?

All the very best

Les

A little more progress on the move.

We've got the dividing wall between us and the next-door tenants all-but finished and a lot of scraping done on the ceiling.  Quite a few floor tiles removed so an area needs some floor paint and the walls in places could do with a lick of paint.

The second half of the ex-office wall in place with glazing happening.  The first sheet of board for the studding wall between the two ends now in place.  The door will have a pair of bolts on our side to make it a fire exit.

Scraping the flaking paint off the end of the room to be used by the OO-gauge section.

Our corner (as decided by Trevor).  Lamps need replacing but this end of the room will be shared between the three N-gauge projects.

Much still to do- we can't move in until a load of industrial fridges are removed from outside the main door.

All the very best

Les

Very many thanks for the comments, gents.

The setting for the layout is "somewhere South of the viaduct and probably North of the more modern Easington Colliery"  ie a fictional location with a flavor of the real area.

With the half of the white steps modelled  being about 200 scale feet from the Easington Colliery underbridge (which is modelled the opposite way round to the prototype) and an aerial flight that is more Blackhall than Easington if the truth were told, you can tell I've lifted features to give an impression rather than doing a full prototype location.  I just hadn't enough space to do even one end of the real Easington Colliery and in any case I was scuppered when I couldn't manage to actually buy the etched brass pithead gear I'd originally planned.

Still, it has had good comments at Grantham, and attracted one of the magazines' scouts (hence the photographer and article- publication next Summer.)   Now, is there an exhibition manager in the North East with a show next autumn who wants a DCC N-gauge NE region layout that comes complete with a free magazine plug for his show?   The feelers I have out take me East and South if anything comes of them and the only confirmed shows are in Nottighamshire and Leicestershire at present.

All the very best

Les

edited for grammar rather than the usual spelling......

A small addition.

At Aldershot show earlier this month I got a pack of farm animals to share between Furtwangen Ost and Hawthorn Dene, and a pack of shrub tubs to use in Furtwangen's tram station.

First out of the pack were a pair of pigs, added to Mr Rose's pigsty, and a dog that looks like a bear, put on Furtwangen with the hurdy-gurdy player.  Two of the shrub tubs had distinctly fewer flowers than the others, so the most herbal one has gone to Mr Rose's allotment- there is a goat to go in here so he will need to keep the herbs beyond the end of the goat tether.

The more flowery of the two has gone in Mrs Her-next-door's back yard at No.2 Lilliput Cottages.  Large flower pots did exist in 1960, my aunt had one in her back yard in Darlington.  Only two for the whole layout, though.   There are also four more good bikes to share between the two layouts, and HD is due to have a motorcycle parked somewhere, probably near the colliery workshops.

Now I've almost finished the repairs to Furtwangen I can get on doing the colliery pointwork in a week or so.  Pics when I get started.  It may be delayed a bit if Bingham's clubroom move is delayed any more.

All the very best

Les

Edited because in a fit of amnesia I forgot which allotment I'd added to...

Mostly re-grassed

I've had a good weekend working on the layout, and have got most of the grass relaid at the incline bottom.  

These are the two ends of the loop- just a little more to do at the incline end.   I've managed to match the grass matting rather better than last time, so the colour is better.

At the front of the tram stop the infill wasn't going to go back as the track itself seems just a little wider.  I've turned the infill upside-down and made it into a flowery border.   There are also seven shrub tubs in the middle of the tram station.  I'll probably put two advertising boards in there as well, to break up the line between the tracks.

This week is curtailed by working on the clubroom, so not a lot will be done on Furtwangen.   Once the clubroom move is done I can get on with the repairs to Hawthorn Dene.

All the very best

Les

Addition and enhancements

Still working slowly at restoring scenery- some of the bits for FO have found their way to Hawthorn Dene as well.

New addition to stock-

From Rails via eBay- cheap(ish) because it had a broken pantograph.  Now with a single-arm pantograph off a Taurus body in the scrap pile.  It has a 6-pin interface, which means it will work on the new layout when made (more suitable for late seventies than current).

The new poles are a result of viewing one of the fuhrerstandfahrt videos on YouTube- or rather a series of them.  Freiburg tramways now have something I'd not seen on my visits there- on the grassed reservation sections they've allowed vegetation to grow up the tramway masts, which makes them look a lot more environmentally friendly.  So- nothing ventured- all of the poles on the grass track now have vegetation- which makes the tramway look even more different to the usual way of doing things.  The removed railway catenery masts will be resued on the new layout- which is getting further through the planning stage.

New pic of a bit from two years back- a close-up of the loading dock fence, which gets appreciative comments at shows, usually from the fairer sex.

Must get on- more grass to do- and fingers to separate again afterwards......

Les

A little more progress and starting the move.

Jim has been working on the rock faces- this is the one above Geoff's Top Valley tunnel portal.

Last week we spent a great deal of time discussing exactly where the roads were going to be on Rise Park Estate- or the little ficticious corner that reaches the modelled area.  As a result I went in on Thursday evening last week and painted in where they were going to be- it helps make more sense of them.   The showhome is on the site of the detatched house here- though it isn't the one standing there, which Alf has decided is too tall (reminds me of an old director who would send chorus members to the back row- "too tall, too tall, too tall....." as she went down the line).  The terrace at the back is just showing where the house backs for the second row will be.

Today was the first day of getting the new clubroom ready- the space in the new building has been divided into three, one of which has been separated off by building a brick wall.  We're using internal wall panels that had created two offices in "our" space to make a new wall to divide us off from the other user of the bigger space- we think that is Notts Police, but aren't yet sure on that.   Here Jeff (who did this sort of thing professionally) is securing one panel of the partition to the concrete ceiling beam that delineates our territory.  Rather than shorten the panels to fit under the beam they're being fastened to the side.  Some panels are too short.  These are supported by those either side.  The top may be finished off with plywood.

Each panel has a window in it- BMRS Sectetary Martin and I managed to work out how to put the glass back into the first panel - gloves tomorrow so we can do the rest.

View of what we have achieved so far- not bad for a small group of over-sixties in three hours.  This is seen from the other tenant's side of the wall.  The windows will either be painted or made reflective before we finish.   Tomorrow dismantling the second office and making the other end of the internal wall.  The gap in the middle will be done with studding.

Knackered.....

Les

NEWSFLASH!

Hawthorn Dene has been invited to Nottingham East Midlands Model Railway Exhibition on 21st and 22nd March 2015.

I've also finished and sent off the magazine article I was asked to write to go with the professional photoshoot.   More details later.

Added to that Howard Staniforth has asked me to operate Armathwaite for him on March 7/8 at Mansfield- I can't have done too badly at Aldershot.

All the very best

Les

Trams running again....

OK, as promised, a blow-by-blow set of photos showing getting the track back down...

Firstly the other end of the new Tomix track connector.  This was cut off leaving...

... bare wires.    These in turn were passed through ...

... a new pair of holes (one for each track) drilled through the town sub-board and the main baseboard.  The smaler hole here was the foundation for the tramway mast mid-loop.  As the wires aren't long enough to reach the tag strip the old power feeds are connected to they were  soldered to another tag strip nearby and the shortened old feeds used to connect to this from the main tag board for the tramway. This was done after the track was down.

Very quickly it became obvious that the old track wasn't going to connect to the straight at the archway end of the loop due to a bit of solder on the rail end that had been needed to get some electrical connection to the tram stop.   This dodgy rail had to come out and be replaced with a new one.

The dodgy rail replaced.  At this time the rails-in-street were still unconnected at the far end.

Next the opposite end of each line in turn was connected clear of the board and sprung back into place.  The front one had to be done twice as I managed to pull the connector off the underside of the track first time.

The trackwork sprung back into place- not glued down in case any connections need re-doing (which one did, see above).   The new feeds were soldered to the old at this point in the sequence and a test tram run to make sure the whole thing works

Test tram doing its duty.  One side-effect is that with the point to the depot working and the depot wired up (which it always has been) trams can now run into the depot for the first time- just as well the interior is detailed as there won't always be a tram blocking the view.....

Lastly, off the workbench comes a new addition.  This was bought from Paul Martin's estate at Aldershot show last weekend, as a non-runner needing repair and TLC.  Having got the motor retaining clips bent back into shape it runs, but slips even when running light-engine.  The rest of the repair basically is sourcing a new set of traction tyres and working out how to fit them.  The TLC will involve cleaning and re-oiling it while the mechanism is in bits for the new tyres.

Must dash- Bingham MRC's clubroom move now has a definite date, and I need to go and box up bits belonging to the Rise Park group.

All the very best

Les