PeteN92

The Signal Box

Safe to say progress has been very slow on Ilfracombe over the past 6 months or so. This has been due to my return to work and then buying a house. Currently the layout remains at my parents until such a time that a space can be made to accommodate it. This means that work has been very infrequent and often involved working on stock as apposed to the layout itself. 

One big step that has  been in the works for some time now is that me and Andy at Rail Model Laser Cut Model Railway Kits have been designing and building a laser cut kit of Ilfracombe box. This has  been a long process of tweaking elements but as you can see it is looking amazing to me. 

I started by taking the scale drawings of the box and then scaling them to 4mm scale I provided Andy with photos of the box and he then use these and combined them with other designs of signal boxes he had already produced.  

Lots of back and forth emails a recut front wall and a redesigned roof thanks to some odd dimensions and we are nearly there. 

The Box includes floor trusses supporting the operating floor, Roof detail and full interior window detail too.  I now have just the roof tiles to add, sign to add to the front, signal box interior and to full bed it into place. 

See below some photos of the process: 

The design stage

Mk1 signal box 

Roof detail

Nearly finished 

Once me and Andy are happy with everything the kit will go on sale as I know there is a good few other people who are building Ilfracombe based layouts, or just want a signal box of this type.

I hope to get things moving again now the house move has calmed down a bit and will try to post some more updates as I go

Cheers 

Pete 

Today I used my drawing to do an initial mock up of the goods shed in card.

 The offices will step in on the actual shed I just couldn't be bothered to model it on the mock up. 

Looking along the back of the goods shed.

Front of the shed showing the windows.

The Ilfracombe station skyline is now complete... At least in mock ups. Guess I ought to get round to actually making the buildings. 

Cheers 

Pete

I have been drawing up a scale plan of the goods shed at Ilfracombe. This has been the hardest of all of the buildings as I don't have any scale drawings to go from. I therefore have used measurements taken from scale plans of the site and compared them with the engine shed I have already drawn.  By studying photos I have then tried to ensure that it is all looking correct. 

I hope to again turn this into a laser cut kit but for now will print it out and stick onto a cardboard mock up of the shed to double check all my dimensions are looking right considering this has had a lot of guesswork.  

Thanks again 

Pete

I have just posted an update on my workbench page on a little 3d printing project I have been working on. To create a merchant navy series 3 replacement tender top. If interested my other page can be found here: 

Cheers 

Pete

When browsing through a copy of rail liveries I came across a picture of Bibby Line in rebuilt form but running with an original series 3 tender. The tender also has an upside down livery with the black at the top green at the bottom and boxed lining as per cut down tenders. Fair to say this unique mix was something I wanted to create. I had a word with @Graham_Muzand he replied as follows giving me a bit more insight on the photo

It's a 6000 gallon tender number 3347. Bibbly Line was paired to it between 25/5/56 and 14/7/56 (the picture is taken at Nine Elms.)

This was due to her being used for some dynamometer testing between Waterloo and Exeter. This still high sided tender was used instead of a modified one as it could between retain the cables between the loco and dynamometer car. 

Now getting hold of a model of Bibby Line was the easy part. The tender however would be an issue. Up until the other week we had only had the first run of Hornby's Original Merchant Navy locos and these commanded a very high price. I would be purchasing a spare just for a tender. Even now with the other versions coming out I imagine it will be a while till a spares and repairs or broken up one comes on the market. I therefore decided to stretch my new CAD and 3D printing skills to have a go at making one myself. 

After many hours and measuring the Clan Line tender I already had I came up with this: 

The body and the bunker itself is printed in two separate parts. Next up came the test prints and I can assure you there were a few. When it comes to resin printing it is good for detail so all of the extra bits I had added on printed out nice and clear. The downside on a large box such as this is that when curing it is prone to warping. I also had to adjust the supports and angles of the print in order to stop failures from happening. To get my final one I ended up adding supports that would keep the whole thing square while curing which would then be cut away once it was fully cured. 

A selection of failed and test prints leading up to the final example. 

Voila my completed series 3 tender. I plan to use the albert Goodall detailing parts from RT Models to add the vac cylinders, TIA tank, filling cap and the ladders and I think I may have a spare Hornby reverser handle for the front of the tender lying around. The coal bunker still needs gluing down and a small amount of filler will be need in some places where the supports took little divets out of the resin but overall I think its not bad considering its been designed and printed from the ground up. 

Cheers 

Pete 

Having mocked up three sides of the shed I'm pretty happy with how that's looking.

N class comes on shed 

The end that I will probably brick up.

Excuse the clutter 

Cheers 

Pete

Having already drawn the engine shed once and then lost the file due to corruption I have been putting off having a second crack at it. With my imminent return to work after getting my second jab the other day I decided it was time to have another go.  

I have used the drawings in Southern Nouveau and the Lineside and a Historical Survey of Southern Sheds which are a combination of original plans and line drawings of what was actually built. I have then checked against photos as well and in some places counted bricks in order to find the missing measurements required.  

On my version of the shed the mess rooms are flipped to the other end of the shed for space reasons and I will be bricking up one end of the shed as opposed to the open design of the original however these plans can now be used as a 4mm to the foot version of Ilfracombe shed. 

I can now also turn these drawings into a laser cut design by separating elements in order to make a kit of parts. This will also require drawing the support beams however these are included in the Southern Nouveau drawings so shouldn't be too much of a bother.  I will probably print my design out and mock it up into a card model like the signal box so I can further visualise it all.

Cheers 

Pete 

2 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

Pretty sure it entirely depends upon whoever wrote the sound file on the chip as to whether they include that function or not.

For that matter have Dapol ever said what sound project is on the chip / who it was done by I can't imagine it was done in-house?

Work has continued on the rodding runs first up was to draw a plan as trying to work out the runs based on my signalling diagrams was a pain. This diagram gives me a general idea of where they should be going and how many runs I'll need in each place.

I've then built up a long run for 9FPL and part of 10 points for the crossover. I've used off cuts of the sprue material to strengthen the it all and keep it straight. 

After previous trials with neodymium magnets had been unsuccessful I did a little more research and found that using round magnets wasn't going to cut it as they were attracting the kadee pins down. What you want is to attract them sideways, this allows the knuckles to disengage.

In January I ordered a packet of 100 3mmx3mmx3mm cube magnets  from China on eBay. These finally arrived however I was shocked to discover a tube of glue not magnets....

That will teach me to use those Chinese sellers on eBay to get a bargain. The worst / handy thing was I found packets of 50 magnets on amazon for around £9 with next day delivery. Happy days. 

The magnets are arranged in groups of 4 between the sleepers in some places I have had to dig the ballast out and places where I've yet to scenic they were simply stuck onto the cork with super glue. The important thing to check is that your poles are facing the same way or they will cancel each other out(which I did a couple of times).

I've got with two rows of 4 you can fit 5 in-between the tracks but it seemed unnecessary and a waste of an extra magnet.

When I initially had a single row I found that you would need to stop the train too precisely to uncouple, a second row meant there was a little more room for error. There would be nothing stopping you from adding more rows of you wanted a larger uncoupling space.

I've now added uncoupling magnets in many of the places on the layout where I frequently need to attach or uncouple and still have a few more places that need magnets added. I will then add ballast back over the magnets to cover them and will probably use a dot of paint on the sides of the rails to show where the magnets are. Below is a video showing how reliable they are as I shunt some stock around in the carriage sidings. 

Cheers 

Pete

1 hour ago, RailWest said:

The only photo that I could find was plate 114 of the Middleton Press book, which clearly shows it on the point, but sadly the switch toes are not visible. However given the proximity of the point to the Up Starting signal, I'm not surprised by its location.

 

Photo ref  341514  on https://colourrail.co.uk/gallery/steam gives you a better picture of the point down to the toe and its in colour which is nice to see.  

Cheers

Pete 

5 hours ago, RailWest said:

Were there any locations at Ilfracombe where the lock bar was ON the points rather in in rear? If so, are you sure that the bar was not in two parts, one on the fixed rail and one on the moveable switch rail?

I've only managed to find one clear colour picture that shows this particular point and the bar seems to only be on the switch rail. 

It could very well extend further but I've not managed to come across anything showing it being any longer. 

For now I think I'll just leave it as is unless another photo crops up that shows any difference. That is before I put down the ballast which will make things much more permanent.

Cheers 

Pete

So I had a go at 44fpl with locking bar and here is my first attempt. I designed a 3d printed the straight adjusting cranks as I didn't have any plastic or etched ones and used the rest of the components from the wills kit and some evergreen strip.

It's looks neat and doesn't foul anything when the points move however its miles away from the running rail. Also taking Paul's comments onboard and finding another reference photo I realised that the locking bar would only go as far as the end of the switch blades. 

 Mk 2 arrangement is now attached to the switch rail and the whole lot moves as the points move. I've attached a video to show them in action. I'm much happier with how this looks and will consider it as good as it's going to get without complicating construction further. 

Now just the rest to do. 

Cheers 

Pete

Am I right in assuming that all of these sound fitted models are being fitted by retailers instead of the Dapol factory fitted models. I saw the other day that rails have some sound fitted moguls for over £300 on their website and can only guess the associated price was due to Rails fitting DC models themselves? 

Cheers 

Pete

Actually having had a further look it seems I've now got most of them bar one.  Am I correct into thinking that where some an FPL such as 16 lever locked the end of the crossover and the up double slip there would only be one locking bar provided even though it ended in 3 places?  

The only one I cant find any photos of is for 32 FPL coming out of the carriage sidings/ run round.  Because of all the point work in that tight space am not even sure where a locking bar would have space to go. 

Suggestions welcome ? 

Cheers 

Pete

@5BarVT @RailWest after having a look further into this point lock conundrum. It's interesting. As you guys day there is definitely a locking bar coming from the facing points in platform 2. Although it goes forward from the toe of the point.

The same seems to apply on the points going into the goods yard.  Although the locking bar appears to be in rear.

Oddly though there seems to be some other rodding ahead of the v any ideas ? 

What's stumping me of that there doesn't seem to be locking bars on some of the other points where you'd imagine there should be such as the first crossover unless the single track circuit provided somehow interlocked ? 

Again this is the end of the double slip in the loco shed which should have an fpl attached but no locking bar seems to be present.

However one end of the down double slip  may possibly have a locking bar. Possibly behind the left rail I'm guessing that's where the cranks and rodding would connect to.

Another possible locking bar ? 

Although there is definitely some locking bars on some of the FPL's others seem to be missing. Could this be a case that there is a lack of photo evidence or possibly just that locking bars were only provided on certain FPL's. On the main possibly ? 

Any further ideas folks ?

Pete

1 hour ago, 5BarVT said:

On the inside of one rail as you approach the point.  Approx 1 coach long, rod from signalbox onto the outer end of the lock bar and drive to the FPL off the inner end.

Paul.

Right so as per the instructions they are getting you to set up and economical fpl which is missing the locking bar. Looks like I'll need to play around a bit more.

Cheers 

Pete 

51 minutes ago, RailWest said:

I will stand to be corrected here, but....

 

...unless the facing points did get track-circuits at a very late date, then there would have been mechanical lock bars for each FPL, so the rodding for the FPLs would go to the lock bar and not directly to the lock plunger.

How  would that look in practice chris ?  Am I right in thinking the lock bar would often run parallel to the rail head? 

Cheers 

Pete

I've been working on some of the rodding runs using a mix of wills point rodding kits some MSE crank etches and also modifying my PECO points and using parts that are left over. 

On all the points that do not have facing point locks I remove the molding that used to hold the the clips. These have been removed due to using the cobalt motors.

I also cut out the molding and will replace the hole with a sleeper to match where there are the ends of already on the moulding.

On the points with FPL's I replace the removable moulding with the parts from the wills point rodding kit as I personally believe these are a better representation. 

I have cut down the spare parts of the original point locks and glued them onto the double slips as these come from PECO with no obvious FPL's moulded on. Again using parts from the wills kit I cut down and extend the rodding out from the locking bar. 

Between using the book I mentioned previously, my copy of the signalling engineers standards on point rodding, the guidance given with the kits and reference photos.  I am not trying to get an exactly perfect representation of the rodding but close enough for me to be happy with it. 

There is still a lot more to do but as you can see it's starting to get there in the station throat. I've run my Dapol mogul over the rodding detail that is already complete and nothing is catching which is a good sign. 

Cheers 

Pete

2 hours ago, RailWest said:

Actually, I think you may be right :-) The only TC in BR days (unless any were added quite late and have not been recorded) extended from the Inner Home back as far as 250 yards in rear of the Outer Home.

 

However, from what I can deduce from the Electrical Locking table (without benefit of sighting any notes on the actual box diagram), there was electrical detection on some of the points and FPLs in the station throat , so it may well be for the associated cabling for those detectors.

That could be it as the conduits seem to run towards the points rather than signals. Especially the ones near the scissor like point work. And in some photos the concrete channelling seems to have been covered completely. 

Cheers 

Pete

11 minutes ago, RailWest said:

I would very much doubt that the trunking contained signal wires, and certainly not the point or FPL rodding, more likely IMHO to be cabling for the track-circuits.

Hmm that's a possibility but as far as I am aware the only track circuit provided was on approach to Ilfracombe between the distant and home signals. 

I'm happy to be proven wrong of course.

Pete

After mocking up the signal box in cardboard I've been trying to work out the rodding runs leading away from it. I've got all the locking table and signalling diagrams and am trying to compare with photos of where stuff went. 

What is throwing me is that there seems to be concrete trunking. Would it be safe to assume that the trunking most likely contained the signal wires and then the rodding which looks to be much thicker would no doubt run along the perimeter of the site which I think is what this photo that I've annotated shows. At first I thought the trunking contained some of the rodding but now I'm thinking differently just wanted to check others thoughts before committing?

Cheers 

Pete

My final Job I completed today was to paint the Dapol telegraph poles which I have had lying about for ages. I then drilled some pilot holes for the poles to go in and have used photos to get a rough idea where they stood in real life.

Overview of the station.

The embankment pretty much complete and dry. 

Looking towards the end of the line from the turntable. 

Cheers 

Pete

This morning I repeated the process on the last of the embankment and just had enough of my 2mm grass to finish everything.

I then used some woodland scenics clump foliage to add some bushes and glued them down with neat PVA. I then diluted some PVA and coated the bushes with this mixture then added various colour flocks to create variety and the impression of some flowers.

While I had everything out I have my previous efforts a spruce up and they look much better.

Now onto the unenviable task of ballasting and laying das in the yard. 

Cheers 

Pete

Next up was some cheap burnt umber paint to go down as a base layer.

Neat PVA was then put down all over the surface. 

I then used my mix of dried soil and coffee grains and applied it through my shaker to ensure that only the finer particles were to fall through.

This left me with a nice surface to add static grass onto. My next steps involved following some of the tips given when static grassing in one of the lastest topley dale videos from the Hornby magazine.

Neat PVA was put down again and then watered down with a pot of water and a brush in order to get everything covered. The first layer of 2mm fibres where then put down. 

Next up I gave the whole surface a blast of cheap and nasty hair spray as it's extra sticky you can also use Matt varnish spray but my can had given up the ghost.

I then added some longer straw fibres mixed with some of the original colours I had put down and layered them ontop. 

Finally I used some of my coloured foam/scatter material and sprinkled it in some places to create the look of flowers and give further variation. I'm pretty happy with how it's come out especially compared to my first attempt at the other end. I'll use some woodland scenics materials to add some bushes and some clumps of foliage to finish off. I've taken a few photos and am happy with the final results. I've purposely left the area where the box will sit just as dirt for now in case I need to further change things.  Now I've got to do the rest of the embankment further down. Hopefully I won't run out of static grass. And then maybe a little bit of ballasting to follow.

Cheers

Pete

Nice to see you getting back on track with some new ideas.

Cheers 

Pete