bickybtrains

The kids had a bunch of fun. some have seen the layout before others it was the first time. I always let the kids operate the trains, they get the hang of it pretty quick. The nice thing about an open house is I get to talk to the parents about how much fun the hobby is. the good thing about these kids is they are not stuck on video games all day. Two of the boys love Lego and have made some amazing creations with the stuff.

The open house was a success. I had about thirty attend and all had fun I even allowed people to run the trains. Before the mayhem Kids having fun

In a few hours I am hosting an open house for the Bickley Central. I am expecting a decent number of people that I have invited. I will update you all on how the open house went.

Looking good. I always love seeing your layout at the Great British Train Show. William

I have on open house on Feb 21, sSo I am busy cleaning track, cleaning the layout room and making sure everything works like clockwork. William

Wish I could say the same about being sunny on this side of the country, its a bit dull and yesterday was quite bitter cold. So cold we stopped work and went to the coffee shop. -17 in the Morning and windy as heck. I am busy downstairs working on the layout. I have an open house on Feb 21. I dont know how many will turn up. I have been busy fixing up a few odds and bobs. My Latest project was converting a Hornby Steam Crane to Look like a proper steam crane. A good couple of evenings with a saw and knife, a couple coats of paint and vola. William From Snowy, Cold southern Ontario

Look at that real trains LMS my favorite company. The layout looks fantastic. William

A new addition to the BIckley Central Railway. I had an old Hornby Breakdown Crane sitting in a box for a while. I knew it was'nt a very good representation of a typical steam crane, but by extending the jib, adding a few details here and there,( using a few reference photos on the web) I think I now have a decent model to show off. Enjoy William

Thanks Tony, your right about many on-layout destinations on North American Systems. I look at my layout as a one man operation so many destinations are not a priority for me, I just thought it would make the layout a little more interesting than just watching the trains go by. The layout is entertaining in its own way, I enjoy showing it off, and many visitors are non modelers so they get the awe factor. William

A typical shunting session on the Bickley Central " Beta Version" The one thing I do enjoy, besides having trains just run on the layout, is to do a bit of shunting. I designed the BIckley Central with ths in mind. Although, I have not run a full time table sequence yet., I have set up a shunting system to use on the branch line. This system is similar to the waybill system used on North American Layouts. I will try and show a typical operation session with some pictures. The branch line from Maryford to the Brewery, Engineering Firm, and the coal drops has been set up so that I can shunt around a few wagons with removable loads While mainline trains run on the mainline. These wagons are recorded onto a wagon label that has been printed on both sides. (One side full and one side empty ) So here goes a typical pick up branch goods train: A typical branch goods train entering the industrial area; Put the brake van in siding The wagon labels are placed into little card holders on the fascia of the layout The identity of wagons for Maryford Siding or beyond is written on the waon labels. All the wagon labels are then attached to a small clip with the info of the loco, remaining wagons, and brake van. This will be the consist of the train to Maryford Sidings. At Maryford there is a set of sidings that the Branch Wagons are placed to be picked up by the Up or Down Main LIne Goods train. Once the main line goods train has done a few rounds around the main line I usually drop of these wagon at Maryford Sidings as empties ready to be picked up by the Branch Goods train at a leter time. As I said this is a Beta Version and will change over time. William

This is the wagon label I am using on the layout. I have printed it double sided

I am starting to work on my timetable and operation procedures on the layout. This is a modified waybill system as used on North American Layouts. I was wondering if any one has a system that has worked well for them. For my "waybills" I am using wagon labels that BR use to use. Most of my goods traffic is to a few industries on the branch. William

Another picture, showing the Brewery in the distance. Enjoy William

I forgot about this, I started this project in 2005. I joked with the wife it was time to rip it all up and start again. I got that stare from her that put that idea to rest pronto.

The hidden sidings make life easier, I can store full sized trains in them. I have sensors on the track to tell me they are occupied. All the track was salvaged from my old layouts so it is code 100. The rest of the layout is code 75. I like the look of the code 75 stuff. This layout has been a fun project and since it is easy to get to most stuff it make working on it for a 1/2 hour or 5 hours a pleasure. I have no duck under, my guest have a lot of room to mingle, it always runs well. My only sour point is the peco points. William

A visit is always welcome by anyone, just message me and we can figure out a good time. When I say finished I mean all the track is ballasted, all the scenic work has been done, and all the electrics have been done. The only thing left is to do is all the small stuff like little cameos etc.... I am now working on a way to run the lot on a timetable. I have set up a preliminary time table and waybill system. I have not run the system yet to see it work, but it will be a future project for me on one of the snowy days we seem to be getting. I think we now have 45 cm of the white stuff on the ground. Cheers from snowy Ontario William

Happy New Year From Canada. I sorry that have not posted for a while so I thought I should participate a bit more on RM Web. What I can say that The Bickley Central is close to being 100% finished. Over the years this layout has been a project that has provided me with many hours of fun. Hopefully I will have many more hours of fun in the future. A view down the lane on the right is the Brewery. This area is served by a branch line from Maryford. This corner of the layout has been Ballasted and the Factory in the background placed. The factory was a Christmas Pressy A view over the station looking toward the Station Hotel.

r.i.p. Dave you were an inspiration to me. William bickybtrains

Our club the BUFFERS mrc ofLondon Ontario have a model loosely based on Bitton. We call the layout Ardleigh Bitton. A former club member did a fantastic job of reproducing the buildings of Bitton We have a facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/ThebuffersMRC?ref=bookmarks William

Nice to hear from you Rick, Part of the quick clean up was Im entertaining some family from Australia. William

I have not done much on the Bickley Central for a couple of weeks, so I gave it a good clean up and a quick run of a few trains. Just cleaned the track, fixed a few solder joints that were loose and everything went well. Now I got to get working on finishing last months project. William

Thanks for the comment, I am always trying to expropriate more space to add to the layout, however my wife seems to be able to stop such plans. I hope she goes on vacation of visits the mother in law so I can pinch a couple extra square feet. I have been doing some updating on the layout, and I managed to sqeeze a return loop from the warehouse area of the layout back down to the branch. Involved some hacking away of some scenic parts of the layout. William

Glad to see your post, I have been busy as well on both RM web and Your Model Railway forums. Usually while watching TV waiting for paint to dry. Here in Ontaro we have been getting your kind of weather wet and mild, so today I spent most of the time outside. Very rare to have temps of 15 degree C. Keep the photos coming I enjoy your layout and your work.

The Construction of The BIckley Central Part 2 OF 2 One thing I like are viaducts, and I wanted a impressive one. So I was going to build one that would go down to the floor,However, I thought it would not look right hence I made it a little shorter. I built it using hardbpoard, wills course stone plastic sheets and expanding foam. I am from the school if you dont see it don't model it, so the inside arches are actually just foam with a plaster coating. A view of the viaduct from ground level showing the underside of the arches. A view that requires you to be on your knees to see. A bit of a philosophy of mine,while building this layout, was to build cameos and finish them while the rest of the layout was still under construction. So some areas of the layout would be fully finished with scenery before others even had track down. Originally the viaduct was going to have a back scene right behind it. This changed later when I decided to put a canal in with a flight of locks. The second level going up to the station from the viaduct. I had some fun with this because of the gradient and curves. The advantage of L girder construction is a could raise and lower the track bed. I could therefore manipulate the track bed to attain the best gradient possible. Hence the gradient on the curve is slight, where as the gradient on the straight is steeper. Believe it or not it works. As I went along I would usually electrically connect a section to see how the trains would move on that section. At this stage I was in the process of adding the second level but I could run trains in and out of the strorage siding. Another area I had completed before the rest of the layout was the Brewery and Warehouses. This originally was going to be a removable stand alone layout. That idea was later scrapped. In the distance you can see a junction to the Brewery, this was later removed and the connection to the brewery was via a small branch line coming from the main station. The above view shows where the station ended up, below this is the storage sidings. The bottom left corner of this photo is where the MPD ended up.

The Construction of The BIckley Central Part 1 I thought I should show you some construction photos of the Bickley Central. The original layout was a typical tail chaiser, with a center isle where the control panel was. I was fed up of crawling under the layout to get to the center of it, also it had become too boring to operate. I built upper cabinets for storage and started to demolish the old layout. Demolition in process, with the old backscene from the original layout still in place,. Once the old layout was removed I proceded with the construction of the new layout. This layout was going to be a folded dogbone style with large storage sidings hidden from view. A view of the viaduct under construction. Showing the L girder style of baseboard. The storage sidings prior to the second level being installed. The old Backscene still showing. Once the storage sidings were working I added the second level and procedded to glue a new hardboard backscene onto the wall. Part two coming sometime soon .