Killybegs

Phil, you are a little wonder! I was going to have the crossing controlled by a flagman but semaphore signals on the road sounds like a much better idea and so prototypical.

 

Many thanks.

 

John

I guess the ground frames would be typical GWR with a single lever. I'm also going to have to put in a catch point and probably a ground signal at the shed end, they would be 'off stage' and out of sight at the other end. More research required!

John

Smashing John!

 

Now just a thought - had you considered signalling the road traffic on your crossing by the warehouses prototypically?

 

http://members.optusnet.com.au/~mercurytravel/notebook/232/notebook.htm#shrub

 

This page is also a mine of info on the area

 

http://www.miac.org.uk/vinegarmap.html

 

Cheers

 

Phil

Phil, you are a little wonder! I was going to have the crossing controlled by a flagman but semaphore signals on the road sounds like a much better idea and so prototypical.

Many thanks.

John

Wow that looks superb I recon with a outdoor background you wouldn't be able to tell it apart from the real thing

 

David

You mean something like this ..............

John 

Suspected something like that

 

Used to pass this way every day when I was at Worcester Grammar - we went straight up the hill to get our pie and chips in Laslett Street , ate it at Railway Walk and then back to school this way

 

Happy times

 

Phil

Oh what bliss, if we were caught off school premises at lunch time were were in serious trouble! So it was dreadful school lunches for us.

John

Fantastic!

 

Despite the inevitable relocation of some geographical features you are capturing the atmosphere of the canal basin in the prototype superbly

 

The rail over canal bridge is iconic - for those who may not have seen it heres a link to a prototype photo

 

http://www.miac.org.uk/canalbridge.html#gwr4113

 

Many thanks for sharing this super layout with us - are you local to 85A?

 

Phil

 

 

Afraid not, but I did live in Gloucestershire for 30 years! My inspiration for the bridge came, originally, from Colin Gifford's book 'Decline of Steam', supplemented by the shot below which I would have taken some time in the late sixties or early seventies. Eventually the layout will include warehouses based on some of those at Gloucester docks. The line passing between the factory buildings to access the shed is reminiscent of those to be found at Gloucester docks, so wonderfully illustrated in 'The Last days of Steam in Gloucestershire, So Worseter is a rather awful pun on Glos and Worcs!

I'm now living in Donegal, but do get back as often as I can!

John

Sunday Morning 1956.

Great composition, a lovely shot.

In between bouts of garden maintenance, when the weather has just been to good to stay inside, I have made more progress on the lock. The ground level has now been built up and the roadway  and tow path have been extended beyond the bridge. At the moment only basic ground cover has been applied, the undergrowth typical of a barely used canal has yet to be added and I still have to make the new brick edgings to the canal and redo the water. The whole lock and road structure beyond the bridge is still a removable unit and will continue that way until the last minute. Working on it in-situ would be a real pain!

I think I've caught the demolition bug off Coachman, so It's two steps forwards and one step back! Having completed the lock structure, I decided that the stone edgings to the rest of the canal didn't look right, so this morning they were chiselled out and will be replaced with blue bull-nosed bricks as per the prototype.

In addition to re-doing the edgings, I have to fill in the ground around the lock, weather the brickwork and do a spot of hard and soft landscaping.

You will see that both sets of paddle operating gear have now been completed. The second one took much less time, all the design work having been done and problems sorted. Fortunately I do make notes (see below) when I build things so there is no excuse for getting it wrong second time around! Incidentally, each set of gear (as modelled) comprises 27 parts!

I have finally got around to updating the track plan for Worseter.

Lovely weathering on that Grange Rob.

That spotter is not up to standard. He can not possibly have had suitable training.

One never underlined one's cops until one had reached a suitable resting place (usually a house with a table and chairs and suitable supply of decent pens + a good ruler). Anyone that ticked or drew a line through their numbers was deffo a weirdo! In later days anyone calling a Class 33 a Crompton was also weird......but then, it is only a hobby.

I am really ashamed to have to admit that I am too lazy to underline cops these days and just keep a short list of required loco's in my spotter's book. Then I put a pencil dot next to the loco number in the Comby if I actually cop anything. I'm sure the Finchings would be horrified by this despicable behaviour. Just to reassure you lot, I have never, repeat never collected bog cart numbers. However I did once get so desperate for entertainment that I started collecting parcels stock numbers; that fad lasted about a year ( sometime around 1982 I think?)

Arrrrr.

(P.S. I've only recently understood why a Class 47 was nicknamed a Duff..........sad.)

I think you're being unfair. If he was underlining his cops, wouldn't he need a ruler. I can't see one! I think he's noting the number in has little book, probably bought in Woolworths.

On a more serious not, a nice bit of weathering Rob.

John

A very fine example of T'Cut gates.

 

Glad to see you have modelled the overflow outfall as well, an often missed detail as I suspect very few people realise that canals actually have a flow to them.

 

Simon

Thanks Simon. I'm intrigued, what exactly are T'Cut gates?

John

I've just been taking a few photographs of the paddle gear for my web side and thought I might as well share one here. Ii's rather a cruel enlargement of something so small!

Getting geared up. The lock gates have received a coat of paint and one set of paddle operating gear has been made and installed. Thank goodness I only have one more set to make. They are scratch built from styrene and brass rod. Building the the first one was only about a day's work but producing the drawings on Autocad, using only photographs off the web as a guide, took a lot longer. At least I finally worked out exactly how they operate. Of course, had I known last year that I was going to be modelling them, I could have measured a set when I was checking out the canal on my bike last autumn! 

Now that I am back from my travels and have caught up with all the work that needed doing in the garden (it's amazing how much things grow in April and May!), it's back to the modelling. First job was the lock gates. These have been built from 4 x 4mm basswood, thinned down as necessary for the various cross sections, The planking is 0.5mm plywood to the full width of the gates but let into the back of the two uprights. This provided a good base to fit the other members.

The gates will be stained to replicate well weathered and poorly maintained timber. The gap around the base of walls and gates should disappear once the assembly is finally glued in place. As the canal is being modelled in a rather run down condition, there will also be a few weeds to disguise the joint. The next project is to built the operating gear for the paddles.

Having a few days to spare before disappearing off on my hols, I decided to make a start on the canal lock that, hopefully, will make a scenic break between the layout and the backscene (when I get around to that) in the area under the bridge. Elsewhere the break is provided by the embankment. The lock is based on a mirror image of this photo taken on the Worcester & Birmingham Canal last year.

I decided to assemble the lock on a base that will fit flat on the surface of the existing canal, much easier than trying to work on it in-situ. The first job was to remove the existing canal edgings as appropriate, together with the road formation to the left of the canal which will now be realigned. Only the right hand wall is attached to the base at the moment, the other will be fixed when both are painted. Then I can get on with the gates and the surrounding areas.

...siskins, redpolls, goldfinches, chaffinches, greenfinches, blue tits, great tits, coal tits, collared doves, jackdaws, pigeons, dunnocks, sparrows, robins and blackbirds are the continuous visitors to our Staffs Moorlands garden at the moment (sparrowhawk seems to be on holiday), topped up by a few rarities...feeders needing regular refills.

 

Dave 

No siskins or redpolls this year (normally regular spring arrivals) but we do have the greenfinches back (missing last year), otherwise pretty much the same except we do have rooks, magpies and hooded crows, song thrushes and the occasional pheasant or two. We've never had pheasants before this year but now there are a lot of them about so someone must have started up a shoot locally. Needless to say, living on the coast a couple of miles from the largest fishing port in Ireland, we do have an awful lot of gulls! It's not unusual to see a row of twitchers eagerly watching the roofs of the fish processing plants for a rare visitor! We also have a solitary great northern diver who arrives every year in the first week of November and leaves at the end of March. I'll miss him if he stops coming!

John

Thanks guys for making me feel like the stuff people accidentally tread in. Really, thanks...

 

Missy.

Ignore them Missy.

This little loco ran on the Castlederg and Victoria Bridge Tramway in Northern Ireland. Much of the tramway ran along the public road, hence the skirts.The model is built from a 4mm Branchlines kit, much modified. I imagine the cladding was removed for maintenance and never replaced. Similar locos can be found on the Isle of Man but without skirts.

Robin

 

Was I dreaming or were you looking for a goods shed crane?

 

If so there's pic no 42 in the Middleton Press Newton Abbot to Plymouth book that shows a partial view of the 30cwt crane - curved jib, not unlike the Ratio yard crane.

GWRJ No. 36 has drawings of 2,3,6 and 12 ton cranes. MRJ No. 0 has details of Ross-on-Wye goods shed complete with details of crane.

John

All this correspondence displaying such a wealth of obviously well informed local knowledge leads me to wonder just how many RMWebbers are lurking down there in the South Hams!

John

I agree and I'm currently interviewing this guy for the job. http://www.dartcastings.co.uk/montys/MSV58.php

 

Another candidate here http://www.dartcastings.co.uk/montys/MSV7.php

I'd be very dubious about employing this guy. He never did a stroke of work when he was up in the Forest of Dean!

John

Back from my trip to the UK, so more progress on the non corridor coach Diag C83. The ends have been painted and the sides have been weathered and glazed and door and grab handles have been fitted (only to one side so far!).