holywell junction

Third rail and a massive electric motor plus realistic chuffing sound? Worked on mines (coal, gold, uranium) and been down loads (lead, potash, salt, copper etc). Nasty, horrible places to work in. But if you are up for it, also amazing. Personally would never fight so my kids could work down one....... One idea - reworking and extracting coal from old tips? Has been done commercially previously in the UK but I'm pretty confident that there is still coal left in old tips about the place. Gets rid of the old mine waste, keeps your steam loco going.....just a thought......need a mining engineers thoughts.

I won't show where I am going, can't decide where to put the railway........ Next time it will all be collapsible sections......30 year old boards are off on a holiday to skip land...

Morning! We are moving house and I have had to break up my model railway. Just thought I'd share one thing that I've done to recycle my track, points etc. Apologies if you already know this but if you ballast your track using the diluted pva/fairy liquid approach, soak the track and leave for 20mins or so before lifting it. I use setrack so the ballast softens and you can just run a chisel under it to lift it. Heres the fun bit though. The track will have all bits of ballast stuck to it.....take outside and hose it down with as powerful hose setting as you have (not a jetwash). The ballast flies off, dry on an old towel and leave to air dry overnight. Once dry, pack, ready to use again! Cheers

Thank you Ian. It was quite sad breaking up the old model!

evening all Having just packed up my not inconsiderable model railway built up over 20 years ready for a house move. I can some authority nominate modrn Dapol wagon packaging for the much coveted easy packaging award. Obviously based on the old Airfix rtr packaging, if only all my wagons went away so easily! No fiddly bits, no locking bits, no inserts to mess with and a good tight fit! Well done (do I get a free wagon now?)!

Never had a problem with local ast shop pva and original fairy. I do add fairy to the pva/water mix. Is Wilko PVA the problem? Ask a chemist!

During lockdown, i built some wagons. I am going to be furloughed until October so, would people like to help me to build a virtual mixed freight train using images of any freight wagons you have built during lockdown? Here's a picture of three I have built to kick the process off...any era, any type......just a bit of fun. Can we get to 80 wagons? Obviously mixed freight! All regions/eras/scales...... Cheers MARTIN

Thank you! You are very kind!! I feel quite silly!! Heyho! Live and learn!

Dear All ....I owe all an apology! I removed the point and checked underneath and at some point in the past year or so, I have not only cut the wires but tried to re-solder new wires on the underside and completely botched it!! See photo below! The points were bought new and I don't even remember doing this! Rookie error - lesson learned, moral is ALWAYS check the underside!! What on earth was I doing!! Photo of my botched point and another brand new one on the left (a Right Hand Point as opposed to my botched left hand point!!:

Dear All Thank you for the many helpful replies, really appreciate it. I was pretty sure that the small wires beneath the point have not been cut but now I am getting concerned! I'll unsolder the lot and pull the point clear just to check that everything is still intact. It should be and the points are literally a year or so old (SL-E95). Basically, via a meter I have ascertained that the area between the two red lines is dead, everything else is live. Hope this helps? Anyway, hold for now on any further comments until I undo everything and check the underside of the point. I'll get back once I know....... Cheers M

Thanks Gordon. Unfortunately, the point is manually operated at the moment. I should have made that clear at the outset! I am a newbie to electrofrog so I don't even know if you can even use electrofrog manually?

I decided to add a head shunt to my model railway and decided to use a spare electrofrog point as the turnout. I have wired it up as per instructions, adding suitable insulated joiners to the frog 'V' rails and adding power feeds to ensure continuity of current across the frog. All good so far. I then tested the point using a large Standard Class 5 loco and the engine passed across the point without problem in both directions. However, when a run any small 0-6-0 loco e.g. Jinty or Midland 1F, the engine stalls at the frog. Puzzled, I tested across the point for electrical continuity and have found that the frog area seems to be dead (between the red lines on the image below). The wing rails and closure rails beyond the red line appear to be the problem. The closure rails are dead from the gap where small wires run on the underside of the point. Note these wires have not been cut. All other rails are live and seem to be ok. Does anyone have any ideas what the problem might be? I've never tried to use electrofrog before! Note - my layout is DC. Many Thanks for any help!

Hi and Happy New Year to you all for 2020! I was bought the 'new' release Hornby PUG recently for Christmas but tested it out before I handed it back for wrapping and found that it was incredibly noisy when running backwards (sounds like gears not meshing correctly) . I returned this to the retailer who sent me a replacement very quickly without quibble. But guess what, the replacement also does not run well, it is very stuttering and this time, incredibly noisy when running backwards! I've tried lubricating sparingly as per instructions to no avail. Am I the only one who is having these troubles? My old £14 Hornby L&Y runs infinitely better and quieter around my track........looks like it going back again. Next time, I'll build one.

Hiya been following slowly. Love the use of silicon sealant for water! What a good idea! Bridge looking great too....