Northroader

Thanks for the chat yesterday, I enjoyed seeing the layout up close. I was impressed with the fine scenic detail that had gone into it.

Thanks, Rob, for organising such a great show. The selection of layouts and modellers was excellent, and I really enjoyed taking it all in. The lunch time pasty was made in heaven, (Cornwall?)

April looks like the month to go gallivanting out. There was the local railway modellers club show near the start of the month, just a mile down the road, then a week or so later off to Newport (Gwent) for the South Wales Gauge 0 group meeting, which also hosted an 00 line I was keen to see. Then today down to Taunton, for the RMweb SWAG get together. Good to see keen, friendly individuals crafting some really excellent model layouts, mostly ones I had read about on this web, and wanted to have a long look at, and others I haven’t even heard about. This was very worth doing, seeing techniques, sizes, modes of operation, you name it. Not much of a haul from the traders, one second hand book to start to rebuild my old library, and some useful bits from the Squires stand at the Newport show. But then I have splashed out on a couple of points to speed things up. Perhaps just as well to keep spending down, as we haven’t yet succeeded in selling the old house, put on the market last July. We got near to completion on two occasions, once within less of a week of the agreed date, but it now seems as far off as ever. May? It will have to be the month I Pull My Finger Out, and get something running.

Thanks for that, James, really beautiful. The video could be vulnerable to being stolen and appearing elsewhere…

Hi, Salop Lad, good luck with your idea. There’s a most useful site for station colours, pregroup onwards to nationalisation. https://www.stationcolours.info/18-2/ if you click on “railways”, then click on “ Caledonian”, then scroll down, you’ll get to GNSR, including samples of the BR Scottish Region colours youre after.

here’s one one what I dun earlier. I was drawn to this one as I understand various GWR high ups were on the board. Then the loyal subjects in Traeth Mawr will happy in the knowledge that it was HRH Princess Beatrice wot dug it out.

one factor in favour of seagoing diesels is that the cooling system, drawing seawater in, through heat exchanger and out, is far more reliable than some of the fan air cooled locomotive setups, the Serck system in particular.

I think if I got ‘proper’ medium radius points, Jordan, they’d damn near fill the length of the board, but these do look as if they’re points as nature intended without being too toylike, and I thought doing a picture while they’re still in primer would help to pick them out. You’re right, Paul, I remember seeing somewhere that having the crossings opposite would lead to derailments. It would be a messy job if you tried to do it with these.

Well, I had this baseboard ready, and I had a plan prepared which I had thought out before the house move. Then I put a station building kit together, which was a smart move, because it showed me that the baseboard needed to be wider. I had brought a few plain track panels with me, and since then I’ve been trying out various setups for through track and a siding. My original idea was soon junked, just seeing how it looked laid out on the board, with a loco, rolling stock, and the station interacting. How to get some interest in operation, coupled with a good appearance, was the problem. I’ve now decided to go for what is pretty well the standard basic small layout, which you can find scattered in various places across this web, all looking good and working quite happily. Just having plain track is out, and I needed two short points to form a crossover. Recent posts on the Peco setrak points thread have demonstrated that this can be done, so I’ve bought a pair and had a go. it’s a matter of removing the sleepers from the diverging road, straightening the rails beyond the crossing, and refitting the sleepers. I’ve also added jumpers across the join at the heel of the point blades. Then trimming the two roads back to back to form a crossover. GOG standard for the width between straight double track is 45mm between the flangeways of the inner rails, but I’ve increased this to 62mm, mainly with an eye to the runoff on to the fiddle yard cassettes, which need the extra width when placed side to side, which they will need to be during a run round move. I also feel that trimming much more off the diverging tracks, bringing the crossings closer and narrowing the gap between the parallel tracks, could cause more problems. The points are now in grey primer, and placed roughly in position for this view. The fiddle yard is on the left, and the stop blocks will be on the right, at the end of the board. I’m much more confident of having a decent little line now.

ALPHABETISCHES VERZEICHNISS DER EIGENTHUMS-MERKMALE 1896 Andy, thanks for the link to that French book, which looks highly tasty. At present I’m trying to keep expenditure down, (although I have gone mad and bought a pair of points), because we haven’t yet succeeded in selling the house we moved out of last September, but if and when we do, that book does look irresistible. Having said that, I’m wondering about the OUEST wagon in bauxite brown. I fancy it might be for Regime Accelere, when a lot of bauxite wagons appeared. Originally I thought they were done umber brown, like the LSWR/ SR shade, because that’s how the Reseau Breton did theirs, the RB being the OUEST wearing a metre gauge hat. But then there’s this book I borrowed out of Dresden reference library, which categorically states “OUEST: grau fur guterwagen”. Most interesting reference for the European scene in 1896: https://digital.slub-dresden.de/werkansicht/dlf/113339/1 Now, modelling the open wagon, get a set of wheels with flower petal spokes from Slaters, and two drawings, one of which has appeared before on this thread, funnily enough, and the other is of a breakdown wagon using the same chassis, lifted out of Lammings article linked above. Time is the only thing holding me back, Don.

Here’s a “square on” picture of one of those 2-4-0s. The main difference with a Crewe Goods is the “long boiler” configuration. and here’s a OUEST wagon which has seen better days! (Wonder what colour they were painted?)

The storage of mines explosives was usually done in a small isolated building, quite secure, brick built and with an iron door. Your idea of a second building for storage of high grade mineral ores (in sacks), seems very likely.

IMHO the Iain Rice track plans can be improved by reducing the number of sidings.

REMEMBER THE OUEST. I came across this picture the other day, an old OEUST Buddicom 2-4-0, very much a French version of a LNWR “Crewe Goods”. It looks as if it’s waiting the scrap man, so probably 1900s, but a lovely prototype. I was pushing the OUEST system back on pages 18 - 19 of this thread, also a link to Clive Lammings pages back on page 4, so here’s an essay of his on this theme (including wagon drawings): https://trainconsultant.com/2023/10/30/la-compagnie-de-louest-et-son-histoire-ephemere/ and while I’m at it another one of his on “Bicyclettes”, “Boers”, and the OUEST suburban lines: https://trainconsultant.com/2022/01/10/il-etait-une-fois-dans-louest-la-bicyclette-mais-pas-le-velo/ There are still two OUEST tank engines waiting for their superstructures in the railway room, also for a layout to run on. Last year was a writeoff for such progress, maybe this year.

Now, self effacing modesty is all very well, but I think all the congregation of RMweb who ve met either of you would say different, so keep flying the flag! Mind, venturing that far down Corporation Road in Maindy……

Thanks for the photos, I enjoyed seeing Lockdown Fen in action, as well as the other jobs you highlight. This was a show well worth attending.

Up and Down was peculiar in South Wales, the Valley lines like the Taff Vale regarded them in accordance with the prevailing gradient, down through the valley towards the sea, but the lines absorbed into the GWR earlier on, such as the Llynfi and Ogmore, or the Monmouthshire, had the GWR thinking of down from London applied. The result was that up and down were opposite directions in adjacent valleys, and this stayed on into BR days. Then on the North to West line, the directions switched, a Plymouth to Manchester express was a down train as far as Hereford Barrs Court, then became an up train on to Shrewsbury.

Mon ami, Routier du Nord, il dit: “Les Signaux?? Pouff!!, tres simples…”

Sorry to hear you’re having a bad patch (also miss T) hope things are picking up. As to signal box kits, I came across one maker on RMweb, and jotted it down for reference. No knowledge or experience of them, so anyway: https://railmodel.co.uk/collections/frontpage

Now just a listed building, formerly the “Eye, Ear, Nose and Throat Hospital” (as a kid I used to think it was “Ioneer”) used to do all that sort of stuff for what it is now Hipposhire and Telfland. I got my glasses from there, plus they extracted my tonsils and adenoids, which used to be a fashionable medical stunt. Sic transit and all that…

There’s a little bit stirring on the scenic side of things, as I’ve been chopping up layers of 10mm foamboard to form a support for the ground shell. They’ve gone down rather like contours on a map, and it has been useful to show me what sort of shape and height the “hills” can be, without overly dramatic gradients. Rather less than I envisaged, of course, but I can still gain a bit more contrasting height with some trees and foliage.

I know, when was the last time we had a pre- Raphaelite?

RED/GREEN - COLOUR BLINDNESS. A snowy night in 1875, and I’m sorry to say two of the B.P. Singles were involved in a tragedy with the premier trains in Sweden. I thought I’d post this as a look into operating circumstances back then, and it’s not from a link you’d expect on RMweb, but most interesting. My first move when joining BR was a trip to the Crewe works, which was the nearest to where I lived, for a medical, including a colour blindness test, and the need for this ties into what happened back then. https://vision.psychol.cam.ac.uk/jdmollon/papers/MollonCavoniusOnLagerlundaCollision.pdf

The clocks went on and I go to bed early, and only just caught up (excuses, excuses) but happy birthday belated wishes.