Lower Thames Yard

[Walkingthedog]

I said he was faffing around.

[Walkingthedog]

I’m a great believer in getting some track down. Quite amazing what doesn’t work on the board that worked on paper and vice versa.

[Tallpaul70]

Hi All,
Today I've made a start on Lower Thames Goods Shed.
I have cleared all the boxed and unboxed locos that had accumulated in the middle of the board from running tests. Tomorrow I need to move the desk and board out from the corner it is currently in so that I can get to all sides.

Just realized that I didn't actually say what the size of the board is in yesterdays post!
Anyway, it is 5ft 6ins by 3ft.
Might see if I can add a strip down the side to make it nearer 3ft 3ins which will work better.

Not sure how I can maximize the fiddle yard area at the back to try to have six trains there, so the sketch pad will have to come out to see what is possible. If I can house six trains at the length I talked ablut yesterday plus a couple of LEs, should be able to work a reasonable likeness to the branch timetable!
I will try either tomorrow or Wednesday to put up a sketch of what I am trying to do.

I hope everyone is well, keeping safe, and making progress with their models.
Best regards
Paul

[Tallpaul70]

Good Afternoon one and all,

Yesterday, while clearing the accumulations from the middle of the "Lower Thames Goods Shed" board I came across a box of part built Coopercraft kits.
Last night I sorted these out and found that there were 5 Cattles and 4 Minks. One cattle was actually an Airfix.
All the parts were there, although a bit muddles up, except for one cattle roof and one mink roof.

So instead of just putting the whole box onto the "when I get round tuit" pile, I extracted the two roofless wonders and their bags of bits, which I transferred to a "awaiting parts" box. They could be there some time as usually I beg, "borrow" or if I must "buy" such missing bits, or donors for them, at exhibitions.
No idea when I 'll get the chance to do that again!
Might have to think about some form of conversion for them, no idea to what??

Meanwhile, my morning exercise was to move the desk and board so I can get all round the board. This took a while as even after I had shifted the accumulation of magazines etc. from under the desk, and with the desk drawers out, it was extremely heavy (They don't make desks like that any more -thank goodness do I hear you say?)

Now I have started to play track pieces jigsaws for the fiddle yard side of the layout. This needs more work, but I now know some thinks not to sketch out on the drawing pad!

Hope all your modelling is proving productive,
Stay safe, keep smiling.
Best regards
Paul

[Walkingthedog]

Well done Paul. I have used part made wagon kits as grounded wagons.

[Tallpaul70]

Afternoon All,
I don't think I am not going to try to make any progress today on the modelling front, unless I decide to take my frustrations out on one of my old gash models?

The reason for saying this is that I spent the morning trying to sort two problems indirectly related to modelling, and not really cured either, and things tend to go wrong in threes!

Firstly, I found overnight that a shelf on one of the Ikea Billy units full of magazines had collapsed. On taking everything off that shelf and the shelf above found that the pins supporting the shelves had worn their mounting holes too large so needed to change the shelf spacing and also reduce the weight on the shelf.
Trouble is while there are plenty of never used holes for the pins, the shelf spacing is not right. So need to think this one through. Did spend some time taking the pages I really wanted to keep out of some of the mgazines, so at least the weight problem is cured. Unfortunately , as the fortnightly recycle bin collection was Monday, we will be tight for space in that bin until the next collection!

Other problem that occupied wasted(!) my time was that the battery wall clock in the railway room has stopped working. Thought it was just that the battery had packed up after the winter, but no such luck! New battery, no movement! After a lot of fiddling around concluded it is another thing to replace when things get back to normal!

On a positive front I think I have sketched out a solution to the Fiddle Yard track puzzle. I'll try it with track tomorrow and if it works I'll try to post either a sketch or a pic on Thursday.

Hope you are all keeping safe and well?
Cheers
Paul

[Walkingthedog]

You can buy electric clock motors on eBay for pennies.


I fix a piece of half inch square batten to the sides of the cabinet to support the shelves. Much stronger.

[Tallpaul70]

Good Afternoon everyone,
A number of house and family things got in the way of modelling yesterday, but I have managed to sketch out a plan for Lower Thames Goods Shed, which is attached.
Sorry, unfortunately the site doesn't seem to like .PDF files, so I will post the sketch when I have it in a format the site accepts!!

I should remind readers that the idea of this small 5ft6in x 3ft 00 DCC layout is to allow me to run a few trains testing some of the High Wycombe Branch elements of the timetable for my 00 Lower Thames Yard 12ft x8ft layout set in 1960/2, the building of which is delayed by the dreaded virus which prevents the people due to do the baseboards, track and electrics for this from working, and of course the installation of their efforts in our self isolated home.

Other things to bear in mind:-

I want to have this up and running with materials (such as the baseboard). that I have to hand in as quick a time as I am able, bearing in mind other calls on my time for home and family etc.

The trains will only be short - engine + 2 coach or 6/7 trucks long, there will not be any signals and only the fiddle yard points will be electric with surface mounted point motors.

The layout will not be ballasted, or have the "ground" covered or dealt with, only in so far as I need to "test" alternatives for the main layout.

Similarly only the buildings will be more than skeletons where they can be used in the main layout. So only the houses (see A and B on sketch), the goods shed and the train shed overall roof (F on sketch) will be fully built.

I am currently looking at ways to extend the baseboard to 6ft x 4ft allowing increased track radius but the track plan will stay the same.

Hope you are all safe and well and making good progress with your modelling?
Cheers
Paul

[RogerB]

Sorry, unfortunately, the site doesn't seem to like PDF files, so I will post the sketch when I have it in a format the site accepts!!

PDF's are normally fine Paul and in fact, I have just test posted one. Are you seeing any sort of error message? R-

[Tallpaul70]

Good Afternoon everyone,
A number of house and family things got in the way of modelling yesterday, but I have managed to sketch out a plan for Lower Thames Goods Shed, which is attached.
Sorry, unfortunately the site doesn't seem to like .PDF files, so I will post the sketch when I have it in a format the site accepts!!

I should remind readers that the idea of this small 5ft6in x 3ft 00 DCC layout is to allow me to run a few trains testing some of the High Wycombe Branch elements of the timetable for my 00 Lower Thames Yard 12ft x8ft layout set in 1960/2, the building of which is delayed by the dreaded virus which prevents the people due to do the baseboards, track and electrics for this from working, and of course the installation of their efforts in our self isolated home.

Other things to bear in mind:-

I want to have this up and running with materials (such as the baseboard). that I have to hand in as quick a time as I am able, bearing in mind other calls on my time for home and family etc.

The trains will only be short - engine + 2 coach or 6/7 trucks long, there will not be any signals and only the fiddle yard points will be electric with surface mounted point motors.

The layout will not be ballasted, or have the "ground" covered or dealt with, only in so far as I need to "test" alternatives for the main layout.

Similarly only the buildings will be more than skeletons where they can be used in the main layout. So only the houses (see A and B on sketch), the goods shed and the train shed overall roof (F on sketch) will be fully built.

I am currently looking at ways to extend the baseboard to 6ft x 4ft allowing increased track radius but the track plan will stay the same.

Hope you are all safe and well and making good progress with your modelling?
Cheers
Paul

Hi All,
This time the pdf seems to have uploaded ok!!
Cheers
Paul