Flying Pig

My guess for the leading carriage was ex-GER; the last I thought was a standard LMS PIII type; the others look LMS below the solebar but not quite right above it. Like you I await expert opinion. The mineral that was the reason for the original post is an early build without top flaps. The signalling is quite interesting too - note the trailing crossover in rear of the down home which would raise most of us semi-informed enthusiasts' eyebrows (diagram here).

Apropos (fairly) recent references to the Cambridge - Oxford trains, I thought the Wright writes regulars might like to see this photo, captioned "D16/3 62618 heading away from Oxford towards Cambridge, 10/7/52.", which @Metr0Land found for the 16t Mineral thread. It's full of interest but doesn't seem to have spawned much discussion there. I'm particularly intrigued by the three flush panelled carriages which all seem to have different roof profiles. 62618_Oxford_10-7-52 by robertcwp, on Flickr

Nice simple improvement! Removing the coupling mount has left quite a lot of daylight behind the buffer beam, though it's no doubt less apparent from normal viewing angles. Is there any way you can fill in a bit of structure without unduly restricting bogie swing? Prototype photos don't seem to show much detail here but it looks dark.

Nothing really goes anywhere on your layout either: it just moves a couple of feet to hide behind a backscene. That's just one way of suspending disbelief: it isn't reality.

Ah - that's too long to fit a fiddle yard on just the bottom left board. You could just about fit a 36" sector plate or traverser there without changing the scenic part of the layout. Just about. Easier explained visually I hope - just a rough idea as I think the general curve would need to be eased to give space in front of the siding. Your latest musings seem similar.

I think the answer is in @The Stationmaster's post: Also, I know I'm wasting my time bringing up the goods loop again, but it really would be better with the right hand crossover reversed so everything could be shunted from the platform end. In that case, you could also ditch the Y in the runround which looks very model railway. Also also, how long are your trains going to be? It looks as though you could reduce the plan to an L and save a board.

The goods loop at Fairford was a functionally quite different from what we have here - it was a long siding that could be accessed at both ends and via an intermediate crossover. The goods shed and cattle pen were sited on different parts of it. As far as I can tell from the s-r-s site it didn't even always form a complete loop. Adding a separate kickback yard completely changes the balance of the layout anyway. Retaining a loop simply for the sake of having one even though it doesn't really reflect the prototype or add anything to the operation of the model makes no sense to me. If you want to model the yard at Fairford, model the yard at Fairford. If not then the layout needs to work in its own terms.

I think the yard looks better with the extra siding. The goods loop still doesn't achieve anything except having a loop for a loop's sake - it would work as well without the right hand point as a plain headshunt.

Put a telephone wire over the tracks with a pantograph at each end of the train and a receiver in each cab.

The advantage of the prototype arrangement, which admittedly does appear strange at first sight, is that it can be shunted conveniently from the main line. The goods loop in your plan doesn't appear to have any purpose - it has to be kept clear for use as a headshunt for the siding, but the siding could equally well come directly off the main line.

I can't see how that would be workable, given that wagons need to stand on the goods loop (or what is it for?). Come to that, while I understand the desire to use the space in the corner, I think a closer representation of the goods yard at Fairford would (with one exception) be easier to work. That was basically a long siding, divided in the middle by a crossover,so each part could be shunted separately from the platform end. The short kickback to a loading dock is the exception to easy working and either was not loco shunted or required a loco to enter the goods shed. As the runround on Phil's latest plan is significantly longer than the trains that will be run, I think that the points at the station end could be swapped to increase the length of the goods sidings somewhat without it becoming cramped. I also don't see why the loco facilities shouldn't reflect the prototype more closely, giving something like the very hasty sketch below (swapped points arrowed):

In which case, could you not just replace the boiler with a big motor/generator and flywheel for energy storage and do away with the steam altogether? That would give regenerative braking too. For starting off the wire, the flywheel could be spun up from a shore supply. You could probably fit all the equipment on the loco frames and scrap the tender.

Obviously, just driving the wheels with electric motors is an absurd notion, so how many more stages of complication can we devise between the wires and the rails? I'm thinking perhaps an electrically powered coal gasification plant in the tender?

The gasometers rising and falling on the tender would make for an interesting model.

I'm sure I should have known that and it makes more sense than a third route to Bradford. The service itself was long established - presumably back to GNR days as it used their lines throughout.

Thanks. Does Peel give any further information about "The Yorkshireman"? It doesn't sound likely that it ran via Huddersfield and Penistone. Wikipedia also mentions The White Rose as a BR train running from Bradford Exchange to St Pancras via Leeds in the BR era, but this would have had to use former LNER lines to Leeds.

My father's family moved to Penistone in 1945 and he recalls travelling on the South Yorkshireman some time in the late 1940s. Wikipedia tells me that as a named train it dates from 1948, but it seems to have its ultimate origin as a joint enterprise between the L&YR and the GCR (as mentioned in this article). Does anyone know if a similar through train or carriages ran during the grouping period? It competed of course with through carriages to Kings Cross from the GN side of Bradford Exchange via Wakefield, which would make less commercial sense after 1923.

I think you've misunderstood me - by small, I only meant branch line rather than main or secondary line types. The same restrictions apply to Fairford and more so to Hemyock, so I dont think this particular layout is special in that respect. We're not talking Highworth here. Really, the chief distinguishing feature of this plan is the conventional arrangement of the loop, the main advantage of which is that it places the platform, runround and sidings in parallel and hence economises on length.

Would a similar design based on the Prototype Deltic also work?

I was thinking of the poor bl***y corpuscles going up in the morning bright eyed and fully oxygenated (ha!) and returning depleted in the evening.

The diagrams of Reading on this ebay listing look identical to those in the 1989 Quail.

Surely only up trains should be Arterio, with down trains formed of Veino units and perhaps Lympho for empty stock workings?

HillsideDepot's layout Westonmouth Central is very similar to what you're proposing. Nigel Burkin made a model of platforms 4a and 4b at the other end of the station which was covered on the old forum.

Nope. I think the universal BLT fits the bill perfectly

A possible drawback of Fairford is that it puts the platform on a sharp curve. Uxbridge Vine St (signal diagram) is a good basis for a busier sort of layout (it could easily represent a small country town), sacrificing open country for more railway. A bitsa runround completed in the fiddle yard is a possibility if length is tight if you can't fit in both crossovers (was this how the 0 gauge exhibition layout was set up?). I would compress by taking the down side sidings off a slip on the inner crossover.