Gloucester Road

Thats a brilliant solution.

Echo the thoughts here..informative. Thanks

Pete The missus has been away all week so we (the 2 boy and I) are having a mad clean up before she comes home. As long as she doesn't look on here all evidence will be removed. Hopefully. Right back to cleaning Stephen

Ment to include this shot as it shows how well the Voyager sits on the curve. Stephen

My original intention had been to have the mainline emerge from behind the backscene, but having seen trains on plan and per suggestions have tinkered with it a bit. I couldnt get the flex track function to work on AnyRail so fudged it a bit and then set down some flex. Some imagination is needed to see the backdrop as it is temporaily being done by off cuts. Here we are with the original plan coming through the backscene Then moved the backscene back and opened up the curves radius. Then added the flex track. Trains were then added to see what the radius looked like. That looks much better to my eye. Now in my imagining so far,looking across the shed area you would see, first a road and entrance to the shed followed by the fueling point and locos, 2 a town area sepearted from the shed by a low wall and security fencing, 3 a 2.5 inch high retaining wall with some arches and business in said arches, 4 the mainline running above the retaining wall with low relief buildings/ warehouses behind and then 5 the backscene. As you move to the right the mainline curves toward you still riding on the reatining wall; in the apex of the curve i see an arched bridge passing under the mainline, this road comes toward you and into the town and away from you under the mainline possibly ending in a mirror. The mainline continues onto board 2 still sitting on the retaining wall. Thats my musings for tonight. Stephen

Not to late. My original plan would have had this line behind the backscene but I quite like the look of it coming around the shed area. So if its going to stay in front then I agree a larger radius would look good. As this entire mainline is going to be on a viaduct/embankment I am liking this idea even more of a gentle curve around here. Will work on this later. Kris thanks for the sugestions. Stephen

Quiet a lot done today as it was tipping it down with rain. Took out pen and paper and fiqured out cuts for building the base of Board 1. After dropping my 8 year old off for the school bus and with diagram in hand my four year old and I headed off to the local lumber shop. We found three pieces of 1 x 3 x 6 and had them cut to the right length. We headed home for a test fit. They seem to fit so now to test my glueing and drilling skills. Jordan was itching to get it built as he wanted to use the sander, but first things first. With tools in hand and Jordan ready to help we started. An hour of drilling and gluing and we came up with this. It was then allowed to dry and set, and then sanded with screw heads being filled in with wood filler. By this point my oldest boy was on his way home, he was a liitle upset that he had to be in school while his brother was playing with power tools. So he had a go with the sander and then we played with pages from AnyRail and taped down the plan. Next came the move up to the "train room" as our guest room is known and the board fit through all doors and hallways with no problem, a good sign if i plan on taking this to shows or outside for pics. Gloucester road was/is a pain in the neck to get out of the room so it never made it to local shows or outside. We then had the customery adding of stock to check on fit of locos and wagons. I rather like the look of the Voyager coming around the shed so might move the backscene behind the mainline so that it is visible. not a hidden entry point. Any way thats it for today. Next up buliding of legs for Board 1. Thanks for looking Stephen

Messed around with AnyRail track planning software today and came up with plans I am pretty happy with. Board 1 Engins shed and town scene with a cureved backscene (missing at the moment) The locos would arrive from the lower right and come to the first facing point. Here straight ahead would be to the fueling point or off to the right they would enter the shed area. Having made the right and pulling ahead they would reverse up the line taking the left. Having taken the left there are two parralel roads that would be the loco shed. Loco storage is at the top right . The curved siding at the bottom is for wagon storage and engineer stock that arrives in the shed area. Behind the engine shed area I envision an industrail/ street scene area. There will be a curved backscene behind that scene with the double main line track behind it. Passenger and freight stock running on the upper level will be set out / removed back here and enter the scenic area somewhere on the curves. Wherever the backscene ant track meet. Comments happily taken. Night all Stephen

Ben thanks for the concern. This is literally my board to make mistakes on. It will have no place on the new layout. I wanted a quick place to test the different brands of code 55, to practice my skills with a dremel and soldering iron and to test different techniques. It will probably be"sceniced" but only because I will test different scatter material and my home made static grass applicator here too. I would prefer to make mistakes here and learn here rather than on the final product. Case in point the concrete points. I must say I too like the sweeping curves and as this will be the first time I have used flex track almost exclusively I want to try and mimic those lines. Will keep that join problem in mind as planning continues. I have made some cuts and joins on this test board to see how easy making joints is. Certainly not as simple as set track but you sure can make some nice lines. Will try and ballast the point to see how it looks, but i am not conviced. Thanks for reading Stephen

Had a productive day today. One 4x8 sheet bought and cut into 4 as follows 1 at 24x42 1 at 24x34 2 at 51x20 Pictures tomorrow of how they will look. Finished up wiring and slodering track today and ran some trains on the peco track. Also painted one point to look like concrete, not good me thinks. Will stick with the concrete flex track and wooden points, There will only be six points on the mainline so it will be ok. dont think much of the painted points, but it was worth a try my shunter doing some work 66705 arrives light engine and departs with a short container train Thanks for looking Stephen

Thanks for the info, as this is a test board i mighht try and paint one point and see hoe it looks>

So on Saturday I returned from a week of flying to find a package containing Peco code 55 with concrete sleepers and two points had arrived . That was the good news; whilst away my missus had said the boys had been rather naughty. They had been messing around and had done some damage to Gloucester Road and New Street. Not enough that it could not be fixed and as Gloucester Road is probably moving on its not a huge deal, but the damaged locos, well.... All is fixed and forgiven now, with sorries all around. Today fixed down and trimmed off the Peco track alongside the Atlas stuff. Like the look of the concrete, it does raise a question that i cant find pictures to answer. Do the sleepers under the points need to be concrete or are they wood on the "big" railways? It still needs to wired up before the Peco track sees any action, that is a job for tomorrow. Here are the bits spread out on the floor Here we are glued down and trimmed Stephen

Has anyone used Micro Engineering weathering solution to weather/darken Peco track?

I like the look of the atlas track, but the points do need work to get them to work. It will be interesting to compare to the peco track; not sure about the sleeper spacing on the atlas track as it seems alot closer than that on the UK prototype, Used the dremmel to open up the space between the track and the guides on either side of the frog. Stephen

So here goes my first step away from the blog format and into a thread. As stated in my blog I have become somewhat unhappy with my current layout...Gloucester Road; so plans are a foot for my next layout. Real estate has been allocated, 151 inches by 42 inches and planninng is in the early stages. The current idea is for a point to point design, in a large u shape. Four seperate boards so that it can be moved easily, either outside or to some local shows. Some thoughts for the new design code 55 track large radius curves large radius points curved backscene do i paint or use photo backscene? like the photo ones concrete ties static grass an elevated two track mainline with an elevated station (along the line of the GRESBY topic) with a freight avoiding line a lower level and completly seperate freight line (with some shunting opportunities) leading to the obligatory fueling point/stabling point and engine shed I envision the right side of the u having a country scene gradually blending to an urban scene on the left side of the u with the fueling point. keeping in mind that i dont want things to get to "cramped" as i like the look of openess that can be achieved in n. Something missing on Gloucester road. So those are some initial thoughts. Have purchased some Atlas code 55 track for my test board peco 55 has been ordered and should be here next week. Love the look of code 55 and much to my relief, have heard stories of Farish and Dapol locos and wagons not running, all except for the short wheel base class 08/03 worked. Now i did have to open up the guides on the points with a Dremmel to get the Dapol locos to pass. Also once power was conected and the frogs on the points had power all locos including the 08/03 moved under their own power. So we have a small Atlas double mainline and awaiting the peco track to compare. The obvious advantage to the peco track is...it is correct for Dapol and Farish stock no dremmel needed and has concrete sleepers, except for the points. Here is the track loose on "the board" Track has been clued and dremmeled (is there such a word) to fit Points wired and soldered Dapol class 156440 makes a first tenative run So we wait for a delivery. Stephen

Spent yesterday laying code 55 track on the test track, but that wil appear in a thread later. Also spent some time adding ballast to YGA/YGH. Cardboard former was cut to shape, then PVA glue and ballast: This was repeated four times, once for each YGA/YGH. Here is the YGA which was weathered sometime ago, but it now has a load including some on the discharge chutes and on the decking. Here is the YGH with its load; looks very clean must get the weahering powders out. Then all four lined up as a rake. . Will get some shots in a new thread for the code 55 test track. Stephen

Have ordered peco 55 track and two points and see how it goes when compared to the atlas stuff.

Thanks for that, will investigate. Unfortuanlly my local does not carry peco code 55 flex track only the points. So in an effort to look at code 55 went with atlas; the only way to get peco 55 flex is online. So...

Knew this time had to come sooner or later; have become disgruntled with the current layout Gloucester Road. Though not finished i have begun to look else where and want the challenge of something new. The current layout is 7 years old and is starting to show its age, scenery is looking tired, track (points specifically) are starting to fail, not sure i still want a roundy roundy as the boys are getting older and into operating as opposed to watching, and i have a feeling my skills have moved on and i could do a better job. Not to mention some of the great N guage layout on here are providing insperation. So decisions to make. First one was made last night when i started playing around with some track planning software from Atlas. The property that was awarded to me for this potential adventure is 12ft by 3ft. Have been messing around with point to point plans with sweeping curves in the aloted space. Second decision was made today. Code 55.....what else is there, to say it looks amasing!!! Drove 90 minutes round trip to the "local" hobby shop and purchased two points and four pieces of flex track. There is one cautionary tale as the owner said some locos dont run well/derail on code 55, and for this reason atlas has stopped making code 55 but he has plenty of points and flex track, so i better come up with a plan. Once back home and having checked some things off the "honey do list" we started on a test track. Farish and Dapol locos and wagons run (powered by the mysterious hand) and look stunning on the track; first time through the atlas point and my heart sank, the wheels of the locos failed to go through the atlas frogs. oh @@@!!!. After some time thinging and studying out came the Dremmel and we opened up the frog and guide rail a bit and presto!!! So thats where we stand. Might also change to a thread format to, as that format seems to apply to discusion and interacting about potential issues. Anyway off we go. Stephen

Well the bike ride did not go as planned. 30 miles in had a puncture followed by a bent rim.... Oh well will try again. Came home to try and do some work on the layout and got fed up with a strectch of track that was not working, tried all i could to fix it in place and then just pulled it up. So some track laying will commence the next week i am home.

With the warmer days and nice weather my other hobby has taken over. During the spring, summer and fall seasons I try and get 200 miles in a month on the bike, it is a Jamis Ventura....a nice ride. Just got back from 47 miles in preporation for a planned 120 miles on Thursday. Here is the bike The railway has not been neglected as there has been much playing....errr operating of the trains, but no modelling to speak off so enjoy the bike picture. Will see how things go on Thusday. Im going south from New hampshire to Connecticut so it should be downhill right!!!!! The map doesnt seem to think so. Oh well