Regularity

One thought about not having the gantry, is that the home signal could, feasibly, be a single post with 4 (or even 3, if loop arrivals must be first brought to a stand before moving forward - assuming that there is a need for arrivals and not just shunting moves in the first place) arms and a single disc. The latter would still probably have 4 separate levers, one for each route. Similarly, the shunting manoeuvres from the up (departure) main might be a single disc with 5 levers. But that might not be LBSCR practice:might be a route indicator, might be multiple discs, etc. You need to review signal box diagrams of your prototype railway company in that area, in that era, as much as possible, to get a feel for these conventions and practices.

Must have been an error, and I obviously intended to click another icon… ;) (A lesser known variation on the “Did I say that out loud?” ploy.)

Yes, I wondered about that, too, but as the railways were common carriers, then for a load ready to be dispatched, the railway company was obliged to provide a wagon. But given that a lot of domestic coal was mined at the same level throughout the year, but with varying demand, a lot of coal ended up being stored in wagons in the colliery company’s (and companies’) own sidings, for which a charge would have been levied by the railway companies. On the other hand, if there was a peak demand, then the railway companies had to provide wagons, and hence there was an over-supply in their own stocks. The biggest problem with pooling and then nationalisation was that this practice was continued by the collieries into the 1960s at no cost to themselves (I presume that their existing working practices were maintained after they surrender the ownership of their wagons), hence the quarter million or so 16T mineral wagons, and the drive for MGR trains was not just about increasing wagon capacity (a big issue for the GWR who wanted the pit-to-dock South Wales traffic to be handled in larger capacity stock, but it required new, raised, loading screens and hence capital investment in the mines) but also about shifting the coal directly from pit to power station concentration points for stockpiling, rather than standing around in wagons, with rain and coal dust providing an acidic mix attacking the steel.

It has suddenly become less interesting! As that is dated 1914: I wonder if it reflects some alterations/additions made during joint committee ownership?

Nope. No conclusion to be made at all. They did it mostly to get a load of out of date wagons off the system: taken into stock and used short-term, whilst providing some capital to the owners for investment in new wagons. This is well documented. Owning your own wagons meant that whilst you still had to pay demurrage charges, you didn’t have to pay for the use of the wagon as a storage facility.

Not all coal merchants could afford the cost of hiring/buying their own wagons, and would have three other options available, two of which have been mentioned in some detail (coal factors and railway company wagons) but one of which has received less mention: colliery owned wagons. About once a month a New Radnor, a local trader received a wagonload of coal from Tredegar colliery, in competition with the Old Radnor Trading Company. As with all these things, reading about the local lines/area opens up a lot of knowledge: wagons advertising particular types of coal, such as anthracite, might turn up amidst private owners in a merchant’s siding space, if most of their regular coal came from a more local colliery. It is possible for coals to be carried to Newcastle, just not to the staithes on the Tyne!

The arrivals side could also be used for departures, in fact 4 trains could be ready to take day trippers home. The photo below shows what appear to be facing point locks in the 4 foot on the arrivals side of the station. (Also, the centre road - note the open carriage door and the wider track spacing - and arrival bay are being used for stock storage. Not sure what is standing in the up bay: appears to be a single carriage, but there are only a couple of vents/lamps on the roof, it could be NPCS - perhaps a “Grand Vitesse” van?) I believe the station was a bit of a nightmare on the prototype: the need to shunt using the tunnel, plus the approach being on a steep gradient down to station and damp on the rails caused lots of problems. See also the September 2000 Railway Modeller for Peter Smith’s (kirtleypete of this parish) 7mm scale model.

You might think that. I couldn’t possibly comment…

You’ve gone to seed..,

We seem to be winding our way down there…

45mm gauge at circa 20mm/ ¾” scale covers 2’ gauge to 2’6” gauge quite nicely, with g3 (63mm) for the bigger stuff, but it’s not what happened. With bigger boilers and cylinders, etc, then steam engines would be more controllable. People vary a lot in real life, although that height is perhaps further away from the average than we might expect to… I think there is as much a place for whimsical narrow (or any!) gauge modelling as for finescale in the hobby. Personally, I enjoy the charm, and a working steam loco particularly is a real steam engine in its own right as much as a model of a real one. I don’t like the “shove an Airfix pug body onto an N gauge chassis” school of modelling, and track gauge apart, I find Talyllyn and Ffestiniog stock on the same railway odd: the former is too tall for the latter's loading gauge, and the latter’s is too wide for the former’s, but a layout based on a specific prototype, or real freelancing such as DLT’s “Bridport” terminus are just d@mn fine modelling. ⅞” scale is daft (I have been dipping a toe into that particular puddle for nearly a quarter century): whoever wanted to model to a ratio of 1:13.7? I understand the pseudo logic of working backwards from the scale of the track, but to me the logical thing is to start with an easy to use scale, and work out what the track gauge would be, and either build it all oneself using components such as rail, chairs (if appropriate) and wheels, or use the nearest commercial equivalent and not get too worried about it. Anyway, whilst I might not care for, say, a pug on a Grafar chassis*, if someone else enjoys that, I am not going to stop them, I just ask that they accept that it’s not for me. * In my mid teens, I “converted” an H0 US outline 4w switcher into something vaguely 0-16.5, plus a couple of wagons and even built a small (2’x3’) non-working layout, but realised that this did not float my boat, mire’s the pity. See, I have tried this and found it not for me. I just prefer (a) a logical scale, (b) standard gauge, and (c) off-beat subjects, but not freelance companies. (Tried that, too: didn’t work for me.) But what you are doing? I love it.

Schools generally focus on the academic exam-passing kind of intelligence: the advent of “league tables” only exacerbates this, sadly. Yet there are so many different forms of “intelligence”, including the practical.

Autocorrect auto error, I am afraid. Plus a slug of inattention (which autocorrect made “in attention”) which meant I didn’t trap it myself.

Thanks. That’s my (pardon the pun!) point: it is essential to be well versed in one’s chosen prototype. What I know about how the Brighton differed from “general” practice would fit into a matchbox. Without emptying it first.

Nice. Mind you, 45mm gauge would be perfect for 20mm scale for Talyllyn and Corris Railways, and ¾” scale (1:16 vs 1:15 - easier maths if rescaling imperial drawings) is also pretty close. What a shame that the original larger scale narrow gauge was for 2’ gauge prototypes on 0 gauge track! A slightly larger scale and better ratio (1:19.05?) would have provided for bigger boilers and cylinders, etc…

Wot he sed. Arriving trains would not be accepted unless the turntable was aligned and locked with the down road. Most movements off the turntable used the central road, and the departure (up) road also had a short safety siding, so that shunting movements into the platform would not end up in the pit. My guess is that the safety point may have been released by a locking bar when the turntable was aligned to the up platform road, but that might be a local (ground frame) arrangement, worked from the box, a weighted hand lever to keep the turnout on the “normal” (safety) route, or I could - not for the first time - be talking out of my elbow…

Is it me, or is the R1 on the up platform road, but the turntable aligned to the centre release road?

Need to know where the box is going, and which way it is facing. Every road has a name. (“Turntable road” - my name/suggestion - could lead to a small servicing depot on phase 2 of the layout, or just a turntable…) I have no idea if this is how the LBSCR would have signalled such a station, nor the numbering of levers, which often had local quirks for companies. Note that this ignores a lot of the track curvature, on purpose. Enjoy this rather full example! Also done on an iPad, but using ProCreate.

Also, where is the signal cabin going, and which way is the frame facing? Both of these affect the way the frame is numbered and how they are applied to the points and signals. Usual notation is to draw a bar to represent where the frame is, and a dot (or dots, if more than 1 person pulling levers) to show where the signalman stands. (At this time, almost certainly going to be a signalman.)

Agreed: that is the other option for the loco release: two lever ground frame, with a locking lever (pulled to release the points) and a point lever. There may or may not be a plunger for ringing a bell in the cabin, to request permission from the Bobby for the ground frame to be released by him via a lever in the box. Shunt ahead is used for shunting into the next section (I.e. the track between this and the next signals cabin). A calling-on arm would be used for a shunting movement with the section, but to a route which may be occupied for something before the next fixed stop signal is reached, so not necessary here.

Some of the shunt signals aren’t needed at all, such as one of 17 or 18: a single disc could apply to both routes, when running onto the main. I take it that this is a double slip, otherwise there would be a catch point on the carriage siding, and you would need both signals. 21 is probably superfluous, as there may not be many movements requiring it, but it would be facing the other way for run around moves going from loop to the stop blocks on P3. It would also be red (as would 18) not yellow - when the points are set straight, it can be passed safely. Yellow ground signals for yard exits are, I think, a later thing than pre-group, and are post-nationalisation on some regions - and then begrudgingly. You also might need an outer home, so that you can shunt on the down main, too, without shunting back. A distant in this era (which was painted red, with white > and operated by a green lever) would also be present, but might have become fixed by the early twentieth century.

The signals appear to be the wrong way round: arm goes to the left of the post.

There is also the question of who is going to pay for it. If the railway was there first - more often the case in North America than in Europe - then they own the right of way, and the road is infringing upon it, so it comes down to the local government, county government, State/Province government or national government, depending on the funding for that road. This can then be compounded by funding schedules. I know of three UK instances in 2 different locations where the railways were undertaking substantial work (both places, overhead electrification and in one, widening from 2 to 4 tracks some decades earlier) where the railways have offered to build a bridge instead of a level crossing or a new bridge in place of an old one, all at their own expense as it would make life simpler for them, only for the local authority to decline the offer as they didn’t have the budget allocation for that particular road in their immediate planning horizons. Road users then complain about the holdups, but it’s nothing to do with the railways!

Again, why are people talking about their mother’s in such disrespectful ways?

The Time Littertray Supplement? (After all, is the cat’s slave reads the TLS on the loo, then why not the cat whilst using the litter tray?)