Belle End Garden Railway

[Mike Storey]

Next, my newly completed canal basin building. Not fully incorporated into the surroundings yet, and still needing some detailing.

 

 

[Mike Storey]

Another view of the canal building.

 

 

[Mike Storey]

This time,  a pic of the first house in a row of three plus a shop. The remaining buildings are near completion.

 

 

[Mike Storey]

And finally, a slightly hidden view of my newest loco, basking in the new engine shed....

 

 

[Nearholmer]

Looking very good indeed.

 

(although the loco does look a tiny bit grumpy to me)

[jamie92208]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

Looking very good indeed.

 

(although the loco does look a tiny bit grumpy to me)

I'm not sure it would be very good at obeying signals or guards  whistles.  Perhaps you need something like an electric mouse in front of it like on a greyhound track.

 

Jamie

[F-UnitMad]

Dunno how I've missed it before, but I had to have a look at this Thread when I saw the Title. I've read of a couple of layouts named "Bow Locks" which I thought was near the knuckle, but a layout named after an insult I regularly used to hear at one particular place of Employment - NOT always aimed at me, I hasten to add - this Thread needed further investigation!!

Great stuff!! I always like the 'Freelance' air of a lot of garden lines like this; it ties in with my main interest, the real life 'Freelance' world of American Short Lines. or as I like to think of it, "K.T.R.C"  - Knickers To Rivet Counting.

[Mike Storey]

23 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

I'm not sure it would be very good at obeying signals or guards  whistles.  Perhaps you need something like an electric mouse in front of it like on a greyhound track.

 

Jamie

 

Electric???!! No, the nearest I could get to that would be clockwork or battery. By the time I had wound it up, or re-charged it, he would have lost interest. Not that he is very interested in many things I do, that aren't connected to food in some way...... apart from destroying anything that is either not nailed down, or seems affable for scratching. I would appear to have "lost" a number of my sailors and fishing folk to the depths of the canal basin - there be dragons, or at least, an awful lot of stinky weed. Who knows when they might re-appear.... you are welcome any time of course......

[Mike Storey]

22 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

Dunno how I've missed it before, but I had to have a look at this Thread when I saw the Title. I've read of a couple of layouts named "Bow Locks" which I thought was near the knuckle, but a layout named after an insult I regularly used to hear at one particular place of Employment - NOT always aimed at me, I hasten to add - this Thread needed further investigation!!

Great stuff!! I always like the 'Freelance' air of a lot of garden lines like this; it ties in with my main interest, the real life 'Freelance' world of American Short Lines. or as I like to think of it, "K.T.R.C"  - Knickers To Rivet Counting.

 

I do not have the slightest idea as to what you are referring??

 

But you are, obviously, very welcome, despite your clearly abberationist views....

 

[Mike Storey]

I should have pointed out, in the engine shed view, two of Old Bob's (of this Manor) exquisite items "rescued" from his vastly lamented old garden layout - the partially restored Signal Box, and the, completely unrestored WC!!

 

[Owd Bob]

You have done a cracking job with those buildings Mike, the engine shed is  looking great, really nice to see some progress. Did you make or buy those buildings?  I left the spiders in the WC for you and half a loo roll. 

[Mike Storey]

On 26/06/2020 at 11:43, Owd Bob said:

You have done a cracking job with those buildings Mike, the engine shed is  looking great, really nice to see some progress. Did you make or buy those buildings?  I left the spiders in the WC for you and half a loo roll. 

 

I have to confess that they were resin kits, but they needed an awful lot of work and extras to look right! Especially the painting and weathering, which I am still struggling with. I still need to add more, but this will do for now.

 

Regrettably, the spider has died. I have buried it appropriately, with full honours, next to the canal basin. The loo roll was stolen at the beginning of the pandemic. I have my suspicions - someone with a very small bottom, and a penchant for crosswords, I believe.

 

You may have noted, although it is not clear from these photos, that, rather than replace the broken glazing in the signal box, I have instead boarded up a couple of windows, in the style of a rundown railway, or at least, a very cheapskate one......

 

Many thanks again for these!!

[Metropolitan H]

On 24/06/2020 at 21:37, F-UnitMad said:

Dunno how I've missed it before, but I had to have a look at this Thread when I saw the Title. I've read of a couple of layouts named "Bow Locks" which I thought was near the knuckle, but a layout named after an insult I regularly used to hear at one particular place of Employment - NOT always aimed at me, I hasten to add - this Thread needed further investigation!!

Great stuff!! I always like the 'Freelance' air of a lot of garden lines like this; it ties in with my main interest, the real life 'Freelance' world of American Short Lines. or as I like to think of it, "K.T.R.C"  - Knickers To Rivet Counting.

"Bow Locks marks the end of tidal Bow Creek and the start of the River Lea Navigation" - from the website of "canalrivertrust.org.uk".

 

There are also London bus routes that terminate by Bow Locks - but the destination blinds show them as going to "Bow Church",

 

It is a fascinating area - not far from the "Gin Mills" (Actually known as the House Mill - see housemill.org.uk) - but also worth seeing, could be a great feature / basis for a model layout.

 

Regards

Chris H

[Mike Storey]

Don't know if this will reach anyone, after all this time, but here goes.....

 

Things have been slow at Belle End over the winter, but several new buildings have appeared, or are about to. Some further track laying took place and some more ballasting. But, mostly, it has been repeated weed-clearance, concreting and a bit of tarmaccing. With the weather having been like it is, plus Covid, it has been a small wonder that anything got done outside.

 

Firstly, that row of relief houses and a shop finally finished and cemented in position last March.

 

 

[Mike Storey]

Next, a view of the finished garage and pub in their approximate positions (awaiting the concrete surface to be refined and further detailing).

 

 

[Mike Storey]

Now for another shop and two of four terraced houses, recently built from kits and just primed, whilst I decide where to eventually place them. For anyone that has not constructed these buildings in 16mm/ft, they do not go together like an Airfix kit! Each one of these has taken about 6 man hours so far, with another two or three to go with painting, glazing and detailing. They are big, need a lot of fettling, and a lot of cursing.

 

 

Edited May 24, 2021 by Mike Storey

[Mike Storey]

Finally, for now, the reason I cannot install anything delicate, such as lights, fencing, seats etc...... until she grows up a bit.

 

 

[Mike Storey]

Weather starting to look up over the next few weeks, so much more will be done and posted on here!

 

One thing I have had trouble sourcing is white transfer lettering for my rolling stock and building constructions. I have viewed the usual sources and only one has various size lettering and numbering, but nothing in lower case!! Does anyone have any suggestions?

[F-UnitMad]

On 22/05/2021 at 15:35, Mike Storey said:

Next, a view of the finished garage and pub in their approximate positions (awaiting the concrete surface to be refined and further detailing).

 

 

I see the pun names are alive & well. Not one of Terry Wogan's Radio 2 T.O.G.s were you? There were some excruciating pun names there. Took me a while to work out one, because he always read the letter as coming from "Mr Hucker; Rudolph".  

[St Enodoc]

5 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

I see the pun names are alive & well. Not one of Terry Wogan's Radio 2 T.O.G.s were you? There were some excruciating pun names there. Took me a while to work out one, because he always read the letter as coming from "Mr Hucker; Rudolph".  

I'm sure that @Mike Storey will remember that a certain terminus on the left bank of the River Arun was (is) universally referred to on the Southern as Little D!ck.

[Nearholmer]

This corner of a foreign field is really coming along now!

 

For the resin buildings, I recommend a 12” flat mill file for getting the edges right prior to making the joints.

[Donw]

On 22/02/2019 at 20:54, Nearholmer said:

Sounds like good progress. 

 

We are having weirdly unseasonal weather in England too - seems to be mid-April currently, so I expect it will be December come March, like it was last year!

 

If you really have to joint cables/wires "in the run", it being very best avoided, I would suggest a "jointing bay/chamber", as is done with real power cables. This is a place where all the joints, in all the cores, are made, and is kept deliberately accessible, because even with the immense care that goes into jointing full-sized cables, the joints are still the parts most vulnerable to failure.

 

You could use buried tube/pipe for the main parts of the route, and make a little joint bay/chamber, using a paving slab as a base, a single course of bricks, then a further paving slab as a lid. Or, if that is OTT, something similar but less OTT.

 

You can make the joints less vulnerable to moisture ingress by "potting" them - make the joint inside a little box, which is then filled with a compound that makes more intimate contact than heat-shrink. You can buy the compound from RS Components. Again, maybe a bit OTT.

 

If you do use heat-shrink, buy decent-quality, and don't be tempted to use an excessive diameter, because if you do it will create creases as it shrinks, which act as capillaries for moisture.

 

 

Working on telephones were were in a small village the plans showed a buried coupling near the pole so we were trying to find it started digging a few holes. A dog from one of the nearby houses joined in. There where hole all around but no luck anywhere . Stopped for a brew and the gaffer suddenly went to the pole which was ringed with ivy. There under the Ivy was the joint. The cable must have been replaced at some point and extended onto the pole. 

Water can get through cable sheath by Intermolecular penetration.  For Telephone cables they were either filled with petroleum jelly or air was pumped into them to keep the moisture out.

Don

[Mike Storey]

On 24/05/2021 at 22:46, F-UnitMad said:

I see the pun names are alive & well. Not one of Terry Wogan's Radio 2 T.O.G.s were you? There were some excruciating pun names there. Took me a while to work out one, because he always read the letter as coming from "Mr Hucker; Rudolph".  

 

Indeed I was. The names were brilliant, but for the life of me, I can recall only a very few!

[Mike Storey]

On 25/05/2021 at 04:34, St Enodoc said:

I'm sure that @Mike Storey will remember that a certain terminus on the left bank of the River Arun was (is) universally referred to on the Southern as Little D!ck.

 

I can see why, but no, I have never heard that before. They guy who ran it, when I was at Brighton, was certainly one however.  He managed to get sacked for fiddling.

[Mike Storey]

On 25/05/2021 at 08:46, Nearholmer said:

This corner of a foreign field is really coming along now!

 

For the resin buildings, I recommend a 12” flat mill file for getting the edges right prior to making the joints.

 

Thanks, but that isn't my main problem - many of the parts were bowed and trying to straighten them out does not always work very well! Also, some of the moulds were well past their sell-by when I bought the kits several years ago (one lot from a company that has since shut down), and any amount of fettling the windows and doors has proven to be time well wasted.....

 

However, I have found that, after a few months in the great outdoors, such issues matter little, as you can hardly see the joints or windows for life's great weathering and dirtying.