DCB

"Frog Juicer" sounds like one of those people who run migratory toads over in their Rage Rovers. Turning Live Frogs into Dead Frogs.

Come to think of it my ideal layout would be a copy of an existing layout, the Sea wall scene at Pendon, with nose to tail summer Saturday passenger services

I don't think running these Mainline type chassis without traction tyres is a good idea. The Mainline / early Bachmann mechanism is truly awful but compared to contemporary Hornby mechs it made a lot of sense, like being a fraction of the cost. The concept seems to be the drive and traction were all on the rear axle which allowed the axles and rods to wobble around and still get round 1st radius curves. They will happily haul 4 Mk1s with no coupling rods fitted, which is one more than most ever hauled. Without the tyres it drives on the other axles and that causes the flop in the axles and valve gear and the nickname of "Limping Lulu" Likewise when loads exceed 4 Mk1s and my standard rakes are 7 Mk1s even with tyres there is drive through the coupling rods making the wheels rock in the axle slots and wear the baseplates, and work themselves loose on the axles. Running without the tyres speeds up this wear which ends with tangled valve gear and wheels falling off. I am going to fit a 1960s Triang Chassis to mine, re drilled to take 1990s B17 rods. It won't look as good in the display cabinet but will hopefully pull trains

The On Track and H&M are both variable voltage, not sure about the other. They might run more happily albeit not as controllably. Incidentally We used to put a 1N400 (?) diode in circuit for forward direction (cab first) and two for reverse (Blunt end) with HST Power cars to ensure the back one didn't surge against the front. Obviously this would only work with fixed sets and only two power units, but the 0.7 ish / 1.4 ish volt drop made a difference. It really sounds like worm drives winding up, as one pushes or pulls the other.

My Lima / Triang DMU combo runs just fine on my On Track controller and a H+M Power master very like the OP has as well as an H+M Safety Minor. However I do get surging with my Triang Halls when descending my 1 in 30 gradient with a heavy train. It's the worm drive binding up, being non reversible, if the motor runs rough it does not happen so as a work round I drive down on half wave on a H+M Safety Minor which is a Variable Transformer like the Powermaster. So having checked the YouTube video carefully I see your Powermaster has half wave so run it on half wave, probably need max power and see what happens Does it surge on half wave? Worth a try.

Just to confirm these do not have DCC decoders? If so removing them and fitting blankers might be a first step.

As no one else seems to have a theory, I wonder if it is traction tyres gripping and amplifying slight variations in the speed change. I used to have Manor and KIng classes (Now out of use) with Hornby Tender drives which did something similar when double heading Last year I had to fit non traction tyre wheels to a new Hornby (?) 156 sprinter to stop it de railing when starting and stopping as the grip was so harsh. My 1960s Triang DMU with brass wheels and a Lima DMU from the 1990s run at very different speeds but happily runs a 6 car set because the Triang slips and the Lima has spur gears so does not stop or start abruptly, so I suspect Traction Tyres.

It's sort of OK, Tens of thousands of simple layouts with 8 X 1st radius curves and a couple of straights have been built hundreds of "Minories" style terminusses, and Ashburton clones probably many thousands of "Paddingtons" and especially "Box Tunnel" but there is only one "Madder Valley," one "Garsdale Road" or "Heckmondwyke(?)" or "Craig" I think it's a bit disrespectful to replicate someone else's layout and keep the name they invented for it if that name is fictitious, like "Haddenhoe" my branch terminus, "Goat of Barton" my Scottish station and not in common use Hogwarts from Hairy Potter and Ffarquar from Thomas the Tank are ok by me. However there is only room for one "Ugleigh" layout, The Ugleigh Branch meanders down the Valley past Ugleigh St Mary and Ugleigh St Anne through Stanton on Ug. A mythical land where the Ugliegh Carnival is held annually and they crown the Ugleigh Carnival Queen,, the Ugleigh Womens Institute have an annual outing by train, the Ugleigh Dogs show is equally famous.

Father in Law's railway shed is 23 ft 6" X 7ft 6" usable size, It is OO and about 16ft X 2 ft is hidden sidings under a station board most of the upper surface has tracks and there are windows at the ends and in the side door adjacent to the lifting section. Generally the blinds are down but its not entirely dark and the lifting section is generally in daylight from the gap between blind and wall. The lifting section track often needs cleaning with a track rubber,to stop trains stuttering. the main top surface occasionally gets cleaned with a track rubber to stop trains stuttering and the underneath section never gets cleaned from one decade to the next apart from an occasional towed track cleaning rubber on the main lines. My loft layout with no windows seldom needed the track cleaned, It just seems there is a link between sunlight/ daylight and track getting dirty,

That narrows down the options, If it was to become a "Habitable Room" it would be different. Common sense suggests that you would need decent ventilation if you store a working car in a building, ( Building regulation probably disagree ) What you do need is a walk in door rather than open the whole Vehicle door to limit the heat loss entering and leaving. Shutters to block the window would be good, or a really good black out blind, keeping the layout dark helps keep the track clean. I personally feel cavity wall insulation is a waste of effort, it's fine when new but long term at least air does not get waterlogged and it is a good insulator. With hopefully a brick or block inner skin and concrete floor you have something solid to attach the layout to, my purpose built wooden shed needs jacking up every now and again and flexes which means adjusting baseboard heights to stop coaches rolling away on the "Level" bits. But don't assume the floor is level, it probably is, within 1% 1 in 100 but that 1% changes a 1 in 50 grade to 1 in 33 or 1 in 66. Carpets and cars don't really mix so make sure you can roll it up when you garage the car, Laminate flooring does not take the weight of a car well either. I am working on plans for putting a test track in my garage so we can run out 2010 era 00 Scottish stock. Awkward bit to plan is the lifting sections to allow a car in without extensive dismantling and where to move the tools etc to..

The guy needs actual physical help not armchair advice. He wants someone to FIT the point motors, Its line 3 of the original post. There must be someone in Birmingham who can give him a hand surely.

The problem as I see it is that in the 1950s when Hornby Dublo were going strong modellers bought OO locos to pull trains. They were expensive, nearly £5 so few could afford many locos, many had only two, an 0-6-2 tank and a Pacific and only a tiny number (if any) were displayed by the new owners in display cabinets. Now perhaps 30% are kept pristine in their original packages, 30% displayed in display cabinets many 30% spend time on shed on permanent layouts yet seldom or never haul trains (like mine) and the rest are used for hauling trains. Which they are not much good at if my Un -rebuilt Merchant Navy is anything to go by. So it doesn't make sense to check every loco before dispatch when maybe 60% never get run and 50% are probably fine and 50% of owners will fix the fault themselves so fixing maybe 10% when returned is a better business proposition than checking 100% and fixing half of them. Hornby is there to make money, the trains are incidental

Is there any back scene or similar hiding the storage loops. It looks like someone has drawn the storage and is fitting everything else around it and trying to fill every square inch with track. The radius of the return loops would fit a smaller board see doodle For me this iteration does notwork at all there is no way from the station to the storage loops anticlockwise The station could use an overall roof to hide the curve. There doesn't look to be much room for a backscene and it would hide a big chunk of the layout. see doodle I was going to add a drawing of my 6ft 4" X 4ft 6" "Bed" layout which has a terminus, continuous run storage and return loop, albeit with 1st radius and 3 levels, but is just about impossible to draw in Anyrail. We built it on the spare bed to stop relatives deciding to spend the night at our place! Still not finished after almost 20 years. Portable it is not.

I have my doubts whether this plan can be built. The tracks are too close to the edge for sensible operation especially at the top and left hand end. It sort of needs a siding deleted and the whole shoved up and sideways. All these software programs have uses for checking curves and point work fit the available space, but that is the second phase after imagineering the plan in your mind and possibly on a note pad, table cloth , back of your hand, in a beach what ever to get a broad impression. Final stage track laying will again vary from the software as you shift tracks to get the best "Look"

By the time you sort out the bits, photograph them, list them, pack them and take them to the post office it's about 20/30 minutes per item, Economic madness based on minimum wage but when you get that magic £10 inc postage job lot and get £50 plus postage for some of the items it's a nice warm feeling. But you won't get rich any time soon.

The Playcraft motor is very powerful and smooth running, they came with 9volt battery powered power units. It should spin very easily, but it is very high geared . The gear train is very crude and odd with crown wheels on vertical shafts through bogie pivots and pinions engaging crown wheels with spur gear trains to the axles. They can run very stiffly, especially the middle cross shaft on the bogies. They also wear like fury. I would check the bogies for free movement and lubricate as required Properly set up the Playcraft runs as well as any Hornby flywheel fitted loco, in fact the flywheel effect is a bit excessive if you want to stop in a precise place. Its a shame the loco looks nothing like a class 21 or anything else really.

Its amazing a Mainline chassis has lasted long enough to burn out as mine all slipped their wheels out of quarter 25 years ago. I think there are several variations of the Bachmann 56XX chassis, probably made in different factories. Is yours NEM pocket style with the wedge fitting. I am pretty sure mine have ordinary Mainline screw fitting couplings. Do you have a picture from underneath? It might help with the query

Quite a challenge to model that livery. Better than the boring green IMHO

The A1A plastic axle with moulded gear fits the NON Insulated Triang wheels There is a larger axle used on cheap 0-4-0 chassis which fit the insulated wheels if you bash out the bushes. Definitely does not look right. Might need MTK sideframes mounted higher up the bogie to get it right. Axles out of line with axle boxes is common. See Mainline /Hornby Collett tenders up to 2010 approx

The H/D crane gets round 15" radius curves with its non flanged centre wheels. I have 2 neither to hand at present but I'm pretty sure the wheel holder is rivetted to the cast chassis so removing and more awkwardly refitting the wheels is not easy. You can grip the axle force it hard left and force off the left hand wheel and change it and vice versa but I think changing to metal rim flanged wheels will require drilling out the rivets as will shortening the axles so they limit side play and stop the wheels touching and shorting on the outside frame and on the metal inside frame, you coule use washers but I wouldn't. It's so much hassle that I have neve changed either of mine despite changing the handles for gears etc.

@RobinofLoxley You are down to 1st radius on the lower return loop if the O P is correct and the loops are limited to 450 mill which is 18" in American. The square 15 from left 3 from bottom is critical , if you can build over it you can build it albeit with 1st radius or delete the 2nd track if not the plan is a non starter. I'm struggling to understand the shape of the available space

I don't see room for a double track oval. To be honest a double track oval is a lot more prototypical than a figure eight, you can do most real train things on a double track oval with two crossovers and a siding. Even Minories is a bit far fetched. It was a portable showcase for Hornby Dublo and Triang Tank engines and suburban coaches dating form about 1958. Its never been bettered but the operation with a different loco taking trains back out is a bit niche, Liverpool street (Broad Street?) and Moorgate are the only places I know of where this happened. It would be useful to have the sizes of the available area as it looks ideal for pair of helixes.

The biggest issue I have with model turntables apart from they are generally far too big , is they move too stiffly I keep plotting how to make a decent motorised table but then again my hand operated cut down Dapol table is a model of a hand operated table so maybe a powered one would be less realistic. Current plan revolves (Pun intended) around some Ford Escort wheel bearings I acquired, Present terminus one is a 75 or 80 ft Triang and as I don't have anything bigger than a Duchess to turn another 65 ft like the middle station will suffice

I can see Beet etc being moved in railway company owned i5 and 7 plank "Coal" wagons but how would the wagon hire have worked using P.O wagons which were privately owned, and maintained. prior to pooling in Sept 1939. In the absence of photos I would stick to Company owned wagons, these were pooled earlier than P.O wagons and often strayed far from home. I understand the Great Eastern area retained quite a lot of old wagons including wooden frame wagons for seasonal traffic. I have always worked on the basis of the only legitimate load for PO coal wagons is pit props.

Looks like the speed model turntables revolve, Like someone used a speeded up clock.