Ruston

Slowly, everything is coming together. Nothing drastic has happened but the conveyor between the crusher and the feed bunker is done (except it may yet get a cover), the rollers and belt are in place, as is a walkway and handrail. There is an access door from the crusher house to the conveyor and the crusher house now has some heavy duty cabling around the outside and gutters (made from umbrella spokes with Giles' brackets. The cable hangers are also by Giles. The mine car tippler and Peake Patent Turntable is in place next to the crusher house. The workshop/store alongside the engine shed now has a door handle and a light above the door. On the side of that building is a bell for the shed telephone and on the shed itself is a junction box for electrical cabling. The feed bunker has been repainted and weathered again as I didn't like the blue colour I had originall used. All the buildings have been given a light blow-over of dirt, using the airbrush. Things yet to do on this collection of buildings include downpipes from the gutters, cabling into the engine shed, more filth on the concrete in front of the engine shed and probably a few other things that I haven't even thought of yet.

Thanks, Dava. This evening's project is to make something to fill the gap at the end of the layout.I thought about having some tall trees behind the loco shed and crusher house. I may still have some low-relief trees but a large part of the space will now be filled with another structure. It will be open with just a roof and will be on a framework attached to the side of the crusher house and over the workshop that is alongside the loco shed. If we imagine the adit to be off somewhere behind the collection of buildings, there would be a slope, constructed of steel girders, that rises up to the level of the crusher house where the mine cars would be run through a tippler to be emptied. A chain creeper would haul the mine cars up the slope and another would lower them down another track after being emptied. At first I thought about buying a second hand OO gauge point as the end of a run round loop as this is an easy option but this would have meant extending the gantry over the loco shed and that didn't seem at all plausible. So I decided to put in a Peake Patent Turntable. This device, invented by Cecil Vowe Peak and patented by the National Coal Board in the early 1950s, was designed to turn mine cars and tubs around in a short space and was used in exactly the situation I am wanting to fill. The table did not have rails and was powered by an electric motor and turned constantly. Wagons pushed onto it, or fed onto it by a creeper, would be taken round and re-engage with the rails at the other end where they would be manhandled or picked up by another chain creeper. Hudsons could also provide tables with an pneumatic arm that acted like a switch rail and could direct cars onto one of two tracks. I have made the simple one way off version. Table under construction. Table with rails in place and tippler under construction.

The miners' "paddy train" at Royd Hall. Summer 1964.

The miners' paddy train. In NCB years the paddy train was reduced to a single pre-WW1 coach and brake van. No one is quite sure where the coach originated but the vacuum brake and gas lighting had been decomissioned before it passed to the NCB from the previous colliery owners. The coach is a Slaters GWR composite. I picked it up, second hand, as an unbuilt kit at Kettering. The only bargain I've ever had from the GOG! I haven't finished it as a GWR coach because I fancied having something in varnished wood. You may also notice that I've been planting a few wild flowers and long grass. The coach isn't bent - it's the camera lens that makes it look that way!

As a trial I once lifted one of my locos off the track and placed it on a bare baseboard. It ran for 4 feet before running out of juice. The loco is fitted with with one of these - http://digitrains.co.uk/ecommerce/search/ka2-keep-alive.aspx

This is the craziest thing I've ever seen on this site. Full marks for effort and entetainment value! I know you said you want to use DC but how about DCC, using ordinary plain proprietary rail? Place short dead sections between alternating + and - sections, just long ehough so the loco doesn't short the + and - and a keep alive to carry the loco over the dead sections?

They are all 1/72 scale, both are kits. The Martynside is from AZ Model and Bristol is from MAC.

A few more of my WW1 aricraft models. Martynside Buzzard. A flight of Sopwith Pups. Bristol Scout. Scratchbuilt F.E2b. S.E5a flight and pilots. S.E5a.

Thanks for posting. I like the way you filmed the machines and men up close. Please let us know when you've done the complete film.

How can I have not seen this before? (the original title probably put me off - I thought it was a garden railway). I've just read the whole lot through and I think it's great. Industry, industrial locos, large brick buildings... And your work with the stationary engines is brilliant! I'll be watching this from now on.

The aged Manning Wardle Jervis shunting a single internal use wagon at Royd Hall, July 1965.

Yes, that's an Allen coupler. My information comes from the 1957 Robert Hudson Light Railway Materials catalogue.

Elsecar Steam Railway 3rd July.

Today I completed the ground cover! There is now no bare baseboard to be seen. I also added some clutter around the bridge end, which consists, mostly, of sleepers and chairs. The sleepers are balsa that has been painted and the chairs are... I can't remember the manufacturer but they are sold for making hand-built track. I had to cut out the moulded keys and, for the loose ones, also cut off the screw heads and drill them out. The oil drum is from Skytrex and the dragline bucket was scratchbuilt by myself for my old O-14 layout Whitaker's Tramway. It has been lying around for years so I decided to use it here. The "fiddle yard" at the other side of the shed. This has been relaid and is finally all wired up. The reason for the new track layout is so that it can, eventually, be made part of the scenic railway. The plan is to have a working tippler and visitors can shunt the sidings and operate the tippler. It should also mean that wagons don't need the Great Hand From The Sky to empty them.

The surface narrow gauge shunter has been fitted with couplers suited to the modern rolling stock. The couplers on the loco are modified from some spare parts that were originally for a WDLR Simplex. I have made them into a representation of Allen couplers. The Robert Hudson 82 cu. ft. mine car is completely scratched from plasticard, save for the wheels. The Allen couplers on this, and the other two cars (not shown) are from plasticard and brass wire. The other two cars stand under the bunker as view blockers. There will be a bogie flat wagon and maybe a man-riding car to complete the narrow gauge stock. I may also build a few old style mine tubs and have them lying around as junk. Manning Wardle Jervis, of 1918, moves off with drain cocks open. This is the latest of the fleet to be sound-fitted.

Weigh cabin interior. Most if it is scratched from bits and pieces - paper, plasticard, plastic rod/bar and milliput. The wagon checker and his dog, and the coal bucket are bought items. The coal is real coal.The newspaper, wagon labels, tiled floor and weighing machine face are printed on the computer printer.

Hi Arthur, They are resin casts. I bought them from Invertrain at a show, last year. They were originally going to be used in the loco shed but I decided that they weren't right for it so I've been cutting them up to use in the colliery buildings instead. The one across the front of the weigh cabin is full size and hasn't been cut.

It goes to show how much working for a living eats into modelling time... Today's timefiller is a weigh cabin. I plan to model the interior and have the door propped open to show it off.

Well, I never expected much at all. All the planning just goes out of the window once I start. I envy modellers who can come up with a plan and stick to it because I just seem to make it up as I go along. As for detailing - it's not really that detailed. Impressionistic, I think... I'm off work at the moment, and was yesterday too. So I spent some time making insulators.It was tedious cutting circles of plasticard, drilling them, sliding them onto plastic rod then making eyes from wire, but I think it was worth it. The cable is elastic and is anchored to a similar pole arrangement at the shed wall (backscene). I have put hooks on the wall end of the cables so they can be taken off for future maintenance and whilst I'm still in the process of adding more scenics and buildings.

Fowler diesel and brake van.

I have built the old Roy Link Ruston LAT kit to be the surface shunter on the narrow gauge. Overall view. More work on the transformer and associated bits. Pipes added to the slurry tank, low-relief stores building and concreted area walkway and ladder added to washery buillding. Ixion Fowler 0-4-0DM now fitted with sound. The brake van is a second hand bargain from ebay, repainted and lettered to suit. Mobile compressor. Out of use and with an old paint can over the exhaust.

Chasewater Railway Coal Trains Day, 19th June. The next outing will probably be to the Foxfield gala. Does anyone know what, if any, visiting engines will be there?

I have a small General Arrangement drawing of 177530 in one of my Ruston sales leaflets. I'll scan it and post it here when I have the time.

You probably won't need as much weight as you may think. As an example, my plasticard scratchbuilt Ruston 44/48HP can pull 6 wagons of 120g each with no problems and the loco itself weighs a mere 190g.

There does appear to be quite some interest in the 48DS so here's a rivet-counter's guide to the type. All photos are from my collection and are Ruston & Hornsby official photos, taken by their photographer in Lincoln works and on site at customers' premises. Before locos were given the classification of DS (diesel shunter - standard gauge) and DL (diesel locomotive - narrow gauge), all Ruston locos were classified by horsepower. The progenitor of the 48DS was the 44/48HP type. The first was w/n 177530, built in 1936 and supplied to H.J. Heinz for their Willesden works. How many millions of baked beans would have been hauled by this loco? The frames, running gear and brake gear were the same as subsequent locos but the engine covers and fuel tank were based on narrow gauge practice. The first production 44/48HP loco was w/n 182148, built in 1937 and supplied to H. Newsum, Sons & Co. Ltd, joinery and moulding manfrs. of Lincoln. It is seen here in the Boultham works yard before final finishing and delivery. The cab is similar to the previous loco but the new engine covers are an all-new design. Note how thin the buffer shanks and their tapered housings are when compared to later locos with their parallel buffers. Another 44/48HP loco, w/n 186309, built in 1937 and delivered to British Electro-Metalurgical Co. Ltd. for their Wincobank (Sheffield) works. Seen here at Wincobank. in 1941 the new classification system was introduced and these locos became 48DS. The engines were Rustons' own 4VRO unit and the cab was redesigned. The wheel diameter was previously 2ft. 3in. although 2ft. 6in. could be specified but from now on 2ft. 6in. would be the standard. Here we have w/n 235514, built in 1945 and delivered to The Anderston Foundry at Port Clarence. The block buffers were a special fitting and most had sprung buffers. Note the lining of black and cream. In 1946 the VRO engine was replaced by the VRH, which had redesigned cylinder heads, aluminium alloy pistons and a higher running speed. Externally the cab was redesigned to be enclosed. The lining was also changed to cream and light green. Here we have an unidentified 48DS of the late 1940s, pictured in the works yard at Lincoln. Note that the sign-written RUSTON on the front has been replaced by a cast aluminium plate. w/n 402808, built 1956 and delivered to Harrison Bros. Atlas Foundry in Middlesborough. Slight visual changes are the replacement of the Ruston crests (transfers) on the cabsides by cast RH plates. Also, the windows fore and aft have a rubber beading to hold them in instead of a metal frame. The cab side windows are now of the drop variety. Note the deeper buffer beam and how the pattern of lining has changed. w/n 411318, built in 1957 for Middlesborough Estates Ltd. Cargofleet timber yard. Internally, the VRH engines had been replaced by the all-new 4YCL units. The buffers are a special fitting. If people are interested I could do something similar for the 88Ds type...