jamespetts

I approve of the Scrubs Lane megathread! There are some definite sectorisation joys here. The lit class 90 in the depot looks particularly splendid, and I do like a good class 313 of an afternoon (as long as I don't have to travel in one for more than 5 minutes at a time).

It will be splendid to see this progress - I shall look forward to all the little station details, such as the NSE bins, NSE clocks, NSE benches, litter and all manner of other joys!

An interesting conversion! I shall be interested to see this when it is fully incorporated into its intended German body.

12 minutes ago, BenWeiner said:

Intriguing. I could probably do you decals for the bulkhead stripes - do you think you could produce the artwork?

Aha, yes, possibly! What format and scaling do you need? That would be very helpful.

1 hour ago, BenWeiner said:

What will the platform canopies look like? A portmanteau of Oxford and Didcot could work, just about. The last riveted iron canopy was taken away from Oxford, on the bay platform, only in the last decade, though the south ends of the main platforms (then 1 and 2) were and still are covered by welded flat roof canopies dating from the 1970s. Didcot's canopies, where they still exist, are riveted and have decorative valences. As for the ticket hall, both stations have a 1980s building but they differ considerably. On the platforms there is plenty of Didcot's Great Western heritage evident in the buildings; nothing whatsoever at Oxford.

A portmanteau of canopies is indeed intended! I have unfortunately had some problems with the canopy and platform designs. I had originally contracted with a 3d printing company that produced some very innovative looking inductively coupled LED lamps (which could be removed without unplugging anything and were completely wireless) to produce lamps, platforms, canopies and buildings as a 3d print. The renders of these looked very impressive, with a mix of old and new canopies and buildings (the new building being a Farish building, the old ones being 3d printed):

Sadly, when printed, they turned out to be subject to irremediable and severe warping and light bleed issues that led me to cancel the contract entirely:

I am now looking into getting John Jesson to laser cut kits for the platforms and canopies using very thin wooden board for me to assemble, and using commercial products (e.g. Kytes' Lights) for the lamps, having the entire platforms removable in the event of needing to access the 00 gauge layout that will sit above rather than trying to remove individual lamps and canopies.

***

Incidentally, I have been spending some time recently working on my HST sets for this layout, having started the renumbering at the club open day the week before last and realising that I need to finish this now before I forget where I am in the process. I have taken the opportunity not just to renumber, but to make a number of other improvements, such as adding the carriage letters (I am still not 100% sure that these are the correct type, but other types are difficult to find and the types used seem to have varied over the years), correcting the colour of the end vestibule doors on some carriages, correcting the colour of the seats on some carriages, correcting the colour of the footboards using the Phoenix Precision Paints "weathered wood" colour" and, experimentally on one carriage, painting the vestibule interiors and adding and painting bulkheads, as well as adding passengers:

Contrast a carriage with an unmodified interior:

The stripes on the bulkhead were added by hand, but they would be neater with transfers. I do not think that anyone produces transfers for this, however. The trouble now is that the carriage with the bulkheads looks so much better that I feel compelled to do all of them, but I have two 7 car rakes and one 8 car rake, and it will take a considerable amount of time to fit a further 21 carriages with hand painted bulkheads! Likewise, in correcting the incorrectly blue colour of the seats on the TGS, I find that what I have produced looks much better than the factory colour (shown in the picture of coach B above - not shown is that the seats themselves, as opposed to the seat backs, are grey rather than the correct red) that I likewise want to paint all of them, but I cannot spend too long on this as I need to get on with the 00 gauge layout as half the baseboards for it are still in storage.

6 hours ago, BenWeiner said:

All interesting to read, thank you for this comprehensive overview.

Passengers definitely improve the look of the train. I think the people need to be cut at the waist to overcome the fact that the seats are broadly speaking at table height. It's a shame there will be nothing for their legs to do, as no known mode of transport exposes only the legs of its passengers to external scrutiny.

Ben

Ahh, thank you. An interesting thought. Photographs do seem to show the seating height of the 319s to be consistent with your suggestion. The trouble is that, without laps, the seats of the chairs will show through and it will all look very odd. This will require further thought, I think

Some work this evening and yesterday painting the interior of a class 319 and filling one of its carriages with an appropriate number of passengers for peak hours:

I am not sure whether this was entirely successful, however. The passengers seem to get in the way of the interior lighting, making the carriage seem unevenly lit, and the floor is so high that the passengers all seem to be too high up:

Also, doing this takes a *huge* number of seated passengers, which is expensive and time consuming. Trains in the peak times would be working full in one direction and near empty in the other, so leaving it empty would be as accurate as having it full to the rafters for much less effort and a more pleasing result overall:

(Note that I have painted the floor and interior panels on this model, which looks better than everything being the default blue).

I shall have to contemplate what to do about the other trains for this layout. Some, such as the kit-built 2-EPBs will not even take passengers or have interior lighting, so leaving them empty may be better, but I now have this one carriage filled with people which looks silly on its own. Whether I should take them out or fill the rest of this train and no more I am not sure yet.

I have been researching the historical timetables for the various routes (excluding for now the hypothetical Broadgate to North Woolwich and Broadgate to Tottenham Hale routes) that comprise the basis of the services to this imagined station. I have obtained a working timetable from 1971, and passenger timetables from 1974, 1981 and 1987 to add to my previous 1989 and 2007 timetables. The 1971 timetable, however, is missing timings for the City Widened Lines (GN and Midland services), so only some of the services at that date can be represented.

Omitting the 2007 timetable as being too late for my purposes, I have compared the hourly departures and arrivals on each of the various routes in each of the years for which I have timetables and have produced the following graphs.

North London Line, Richmond to Broad St. (later North Woolwich)






Watford DC, Watford to Broad St. (later Liverpool St.)






Midland/City route, Luton/Bedford/etc. to Moorgate






GN suburban, Moorgate/Broad St. to Stevenage/Hertford N./etc






Total arrivals/departures






Some observations

• The overall greatest number of services is in the 1987 timetable
• The introduction of Thameslink in 1988 significantly reduces the trains terminating in the City from the Midland lines and removes the off peak services all together (the 1987 timetable having half hourly Luton to Moorgate services)
• The pre-electrification Midland and GN services were much sparser than the post-electrification services, were confined to the peaks and were peak direction only, running empty in the opposite direction. This is likely to mean that I will only need, e.g., two class 116 sets (albeit 4 car sets, so made from three 3 car sets with a spare trailer)
• Surprisingly, the GN suburban services seem to have had a higher frequency in 1981 than they did in 1987 or 1989 - I am not sure what a 1984 timetable would show
• The Watford Junction services were more frequent in the 1970s, but declined in later years and were always peak hours only
• Unlike the other services, the Richmond/NLL services appear to have had an almost constant frequency of 3 trains per hour throughout this period with little, if any, variation in the peaks (save for one extra train in the morning peak)
• The maximum number of arrivals per hour is 28. If we add a further two trains per hour for a North Woolwich service and another two trains per hour for a Tottenham Hale service, that gets us to 32 trains per hour.
• The maximum number of arrivals per hour on the GN suburban (Moorgate, GN & City platforms) is 13. This station has only two platforms, giving an implicit minimum turnaround time for these services of 9.2 minutes. The maximum total hourly arrivals of 32 with 5 platforms gives us an implicit minimum turnaround time for these services of 9.375 minutes, suggesting that I have not under-specified the number of platforms as I was concerned about at one point.

I thought that I had better acquire one of these for backdating purposes before all stocks run out:

I installed the first ashpit this evening:

This is built from a KS Laser Designs kit. Cutting the hole for it was very challenging: woodwork is not my forte. I bought a small jigsaw for the task, but it was very difficult to keep it straight and the blades kept snapping. Worse, the foot made it very difficult to get close enough to the track. I ended up with large gaps around the edge that I have had to fill with wood glue and sawdust.

There are many others to install, mainly as inspection pits in the engine sheds. Fortunately, these should in principle be easier, as they are distant from already laid track, but I may need to buy more jigsaw blades to cut them all out.

23 minutes ago, BenWeiner said:

Thank you for showing your plans (in words and image!). It would be nice to see some trial trackwork. I've never been to Morden station but it looks as though the station throat is quite stark -- track, ballast, cable, concrete retaining walls and brick enclosing walls and that is all there is. No space for anything else. In which case the track will get quite closely examined by the layout's audience.

Thank you!

Being still in the planning stages, there is no trackwork to show yet, but I am planning on using British Finescale code 40 track, which does look much better than the Peco code 55.

At the time of writing, this layout is in the planning stages. I am not entirely sure whether I will build this one. It is designed as part of a suite of three portable layouts all intended to share the same fiddle yard and other components, the others being Broadgate and Finchley Town.

Unlike the others, this is intended to be a faithful reproduction of a real life location, Morden, at the southernmost tip of the Northern Line, set in the late 1960s or early 1970s. Here is a track plan of just the station, excluding most of the fiddle yards:

The numbers represent the real signal and point numbers that Morden in fact had during the period.

Here is a picture from Flickr of Morden in the 1950s (the 1960s/1970s being hard to find in picture form):

Here is a plan showing how the layout would fit in my shed (with Morden assembled):

The other coloured boards show boards of other layouts in the suite, the red being Finchley Town, the pink being fiddle yard elements not used for Morden and the yellow being Broadgate. The fuchsia colour is for a board for a layout representing South Wimbledon (the next station along from Morden, which is wholly underground) that I probably will not build on account of lack of space. Even without South Wimbledon, the layout may take more space than I can accommodate, although fiddle yard boards can probably be stored side on and stacked, taking less space.

Like Finchley Town, the layout is intended to make heavy use of the forthcoming RevolutioN Trains 1938 stock:

It could also be used with 1959 and/or 1972 stock should RevolutioN in the future release either or both of those.

As with my other home layouts, it is intended to be computer automated, with trains driven automatically, but the operator able to take over signalling manually (with the the trains continuing to operate automatically). It is also intended to operate to a real timetable (I have copies of working timetables from 1969 and about 1974) and in real time, accurately recreating train movements from a bygone era in miniature form.

As with the other layouts in this suite of three, it is intended to be portable and possibly to be taken to exhibitions. One advantage of this particular layout is its more compact size compared to Finchley Town or Broadgate, being 4m long by 1.07m wide, compared to 5.56m long for Broadgate and Finchley Town, which might be useful if it were to be taken to smaller exhibitions.

Here are some photographs of the club's Putnam layout taken at the London Festival of Railway Modelling in 2024.

And here are some other photographs of Putnam:

Here are some pictures of Ingatestone that I have taken at various times, mainly at exhibitions.

At the time of writing, this layout is still in the planning stage. It is intended to share a fiddle yard with the other layout currently in the planning stages, Broadgate. It is set on the Northern Line in the late 1960s or early 1970s. Here is a track plan:

It is closely based on Finchley Central station on the Northern Line, but imagined as it would have been had the Northern Heights scheme been completed. It uses the actual planned track layout of Finchley Central that would have been built had the scheme been finished, complete with the accurate signal identification numbers:

I do not quite have the space to make it 100% dimensionally accurate, and in any event, it is fictionalised, so I have changed the name from "Finchley Central" to "Finchley Town" to reflect this. Note that the layout is intended to be set in a period when all the freight sidings had been lifted and turned into a car park.

Here is a photograph of the real Finchley Central on Flickr of the era in which I intend to depict it:

The layout is intended to make full use of the forthcoming RevolutioN Trains 1938 stock, of which I have a number on order:

It is intended to be suitable either for operating with 1938 stock alone in the event that no other N gauge London Underground stock should be made, or together with either 1959 or (preferably) 1972 stock if these types should ever be made available.

Operation will be computer controlled (as with my other home layouts) with automated driving, but the option to take over the signalling manually with the trains continuing to run automatically, so that the operator takes the role of signaller rather than driver. It is intended to make use of the Absolute Aspects pig's ear signals, which are suitable for the London Underground.

At the time of writing, this layout is still in the planning stages. It is intended be part of a suite of layouts that share a fiddle yard (perhaps inspired by the Putnam/Ingatestone club layouts which also share a fiddle yard), the other layouts in the suite (also still in the planning stages) being specifically designed for the Revolution Trains 1938 stock.

Here is the latest track plan and signalling schematic:

The layout is a take on London Broad Street station, which in reality closed in 1986 after having been significantly run down in the postwar period.

As recently as the mid-1970s, Broad Street handled suburban traffic to the Great Northern mainline (Stevenage/Hertford/Welwyn), the LNWR mainline (Watford Junction) and the North London Line (Richmond). However, the 1976 electrification of the Great Northern suburban service and its diversion to Moorgate on the Great Northern and City line (previously a stub branch of the Northen Line following the cancellation of the Northern Heights scheme) resulted in Great Northern services being lost. Then, the North Woolwich line was electrified in 1985, the Richmond services being diverted to it instead of Broad Street, and the Watford trains were all that were left until they, too, were diverted, this time to Liverpool Street, in 1986 and the station closed and was demolished to allow the construction of the Broadgate Centre, which is now itself being redeveloped, and which inspired the name for this layout.

The starting point for the departure of this layout from reality is the premise that the Northern Heights scheme was in fact completed and that the Great Northern & City line was therefore not available for the King's Cross suburban services. Instead, I envisage the electrified services running into Broadgate (and ceasing to use the City Widened Lines). I also imagine that the Midland Main Line suburban services had also used Broadgate instead of the City Widened Lines to reach the City of London, diverging near West Hampstead, where there was in reality a link to the North London Line. I then imagine that the North Woolwich DMU service also ran into Broadgate rather than terminating at Stratford, and that there was also a peak hours only DMU service to Tottenham Hale via Lea Bridge. The service diagram would thus look like this:

The next premise is that the track had been resignalled and rationalised in 1969 (when most of the GN suburban services went over to DMU haulage using class 125s, albeit with some class 31/mk. 1 services remaining), resulting in a modern(ish) track plan, devoid of slips and crossings, and with an abandoned platform in much the same place as an abandoned platform in the real Broad Street:

The layout is intended to be able, in principle, to represent a range of eras. Initially, it will represent either 1986 or 1988. In 1988, the rolling stock will be as follows:

Richmond services:

2-EPB (BH Enterprises kit - I have built one and have 1-2 more to build):

The 2-EPBs replaced the class 501 EMUs in 1985 on the North London Line workings:

Watford services:

Class 313, 3 car sets (RevolutioN Trains - due later this quarter):

These replaced the class 501s on the Watford Junction to Euston and Broad Street services in 1986:

Great Northern services:

Class 313, 6 car sets (RevolutioN Trains - due later this quarter):

These were introduced on this route for the 1976 electrification:

Midland services:

Class 319 (Graham Farish)

These were introduced for the Thameslink services at around the beginning of 1988, replacing the class 317s that ran to St. Pancras and Moorgate on the City Widened Lines:

North Woolwich and Tottenham Hale services:

Class 108 (Graham Farish):

These DMUs were not, in fact, used on these lines, but, since these lines were electrified in 1985 and the DMUs that had been running on them hitherto, the class 105s, were withdrawn on electrification (and contaminated with asbestos, I believe), it is not unreasonable to imagine that, in my world in which the lines were not electrified until the late 1990s at the earliest, these class 108 DMUs, many of which would have been made surplus in around 1985 by the introduction of the class 150 "Sprinters" could have been moved south to replace the 105s in the London area. In fact, class 108s were occasionally used on the Gospel Oak to Barking line, so it is not implausible that they might have been used on the North Woolwich branch had it not been electrified until later:

Red Star services

Class 128 (RevolutioN Trains)

In reality, Broad Street did not have a Red Star parcels service. However, in my imagined world, Broadgate did have such a service, as it would have been very useful to have had a Red Star point in the City for destinations on the Midland and West Coast Main Lines. Another similarly small London terminus, Marylebone, did have a Red Star parcels point in the 1980s.

These units did travel quite broadly, so it is not implausible to imagine a daily service working to Wolverton or Derby. Indeed, here is this very unit, 55994, pictured at Watford Junction in 1986:

***

For 1986, the class 319s did not exist. Since Broadgate will be third rail electrified only (and since class 317s are not available in N gauge, even in kit form), the 317s that ran on the Midland from 1983-1988 could not run into Broadgate, so we have to imagine that 313s were used in six car formations. In fact, class 313s did see some limited service on the Midland Main Line in the early 1980s, so this is not a wholly implausible scenario:

The other difference is that, in 1986, the only class 313 painted in Network SouthEast livery was 313001, whereas, by 1988, other units were so painted, so I may have to adjust which class 313s run.

***

To go back before 1986 requires the class 501, which was ubiquitous at Broad Street from the 1950s until 1985:

There are no ready to run class 501s, and, the class being fairly narrowly confined, there may never be any. I have petitioned RevolutioN Trains to produce some of these, but I do not hold my breath. Worsley Works produce them in kit form, but their kits are more basic than those of BH Enterprises. Nonetheless, having had success with the 2-EPB, I may give these a go in kit form one day. The trouble is that I would need a lot of these for a decent service, as they would have run both the Richmond and the Watford services before 1985.

Going back before 1985 also requires the class 105, which was used on the North Woolwich branch at the time:

These are also not available ready to run in N gauge (Bachmann produce a nice model in 00, one of which I have converted to EM gauge for Orchard Wharf), but kits are available from BH Enterprises. Such kits may well be readily achievable given that they should work nicely with a Graham Farish class 108 or 101 chassis and that fewer of these will be needed than 501s.

Also, before 1985, the class 128 pictured above would not be in Red Star livery, so I have ordered an all-over blue class 128, one or two of which are still left in stock at some retailers:

The unit depicted, 55990, was actually withdrawn in 1982, leaving a gap should I wish to model 1984/1985 - but it is not implausible to imagine that, if there had been one more duty for the class to perform, one of its members may have been withdrawn 2-3 years later than it was in reality.

Just these two additional types of unit (plus the all over blue 128) would allow me to go back as far as 1983. Before 1983, I would also need diesel units instead of the 313s on the Midland Main Line services. The services into St. Pancras were run by class 127s, which are not available ready to run, but are available from Worsley Works as kits. However, the Midland Main Line DMU services into Moorgate on the City Widened Lines actually used class 116s, formed into four car trains with three power cars and one trailer, and it is this class that I think would make most sense on the Broadgate services, the class 127s being too few in number to run other than on the St. Pancras services:

There is no class 116 available ready to run (although I am sure that there would be a large market for one, and also a 117), but BH Enterprises produce kits. These should be fairly easy to motorise with Dapol class 121 chassis, although quite a few would be needed to run the services.

This would then suffice for years back to 1976. For earlier than 1976, the class 313s would be replaced by class 125 DMUs (which are not available as kits even from Worsley Works) and class 31s and hauled mk. 1 suburban carriages, which are both available from Farish. The class 125 might plausibly (but boringly) be replaced by class 105s, as these did run on the City Widened Lines, whereas the class 125s did not:

I will not be able to start in earnest on this layout until there has been much more progress on the large 00 gauge layout (see here):

but I am sure that this will be revisited once the RevolutioN Trains class 313s, which were the original inspiration for this layout, arrive.

Progress so far this year has been hampered somewhat by house rennovations. However, I have managed to make some progress at least on the trackwork as shown below.

I have also started work on renumbering/renaming/DCC fitting/detailing the stock of locomotives and carriages for the layout, using a large batch of custom transfers made for me by Fox and which arrived at the end of last year.

First of all, we have V "Schools" class 930 "Radley":

(I have since fixed the missing "N" on the tender).

Next is Lord Nelson class no. 850 "Lord Nelson", which needed more work than expected as I had to cut back the Hornby nameplate so that it would not show through this shorter nameplate, and it turns out that the Hornby nameplate is made of brass(!):

Here are some carriages to which I have affixed custom headboards that were part of the Fox Transfers order:

Here is Lord Nelson class no. 864, "Sir Martin Frobisher":

Both Lord Nelsons have custom 3d printed smoke deflectors added, as the model as supplied by Hornby is in its 1920s state, devoid of deflectors.

For reference, the latest draft of the standard is attached.

LU-MOD Standard 0.5.pdf

And here are some lovely Heljan Metropolitan-Vickers Bo-Bo locomotives that hopefully one day will run on this modular setup:

I thought that I should perhaps introduce the layout for which this rolling stock is destined. This is intended for Oxcott, set in 1989: a portmanteau in name and setting of Didcot and Oxford on the former Great Western Railway. Below is the track plan:

This layout's track and wiring are complete (a great amount of the work being done during the pandemic), but the scenery has not yet been started. A video of it in its current form, showing some aspects of its automated running, can be seen here:

https://diode.zone/w/vAfg9xU5UftQ6m93CSY4xB

Work on this layout has largely been put on hold for the present, as I am in the process of working on the 00 gauge layout that is to go above it in the same shed: see this thread in the forum for details of that layout. I cannot put scenic items or signals on the layout until the upper layout has been put in to protect it from damage, and I need to prioritise working on the upper layout in any event.

However, I have been giving some thought to the platforms, including making the currently straight rear platforms for the relief lines curved, which is more realistic and allows for a more sensible width of the middle platform. The track plan shown above shows them in their planned curved state (the purplish blue track representing that track which will need to be re-laid in order to achieve this). I had contracted a 3d printing company to produce the platforms, complete with integrated working lights, canopies and buildings, but, unfortunately, they could not produce anything not excessively warped and prone to light bleed, so I have had to cancel that. I am currently talking to fellow club member John Jesson about laser cutting the platforms, which might be a better solution: John has a laser cutter and offers a laser cutting (and bespoke laser cutting design) service which might be ideal for this application.

In the meantime, here are some locomotives that I have renumbered for this layout on display at the Alexandra Palace 2024 exhibition:

Here are some multiple units, also renumbered:

And here is a buffet car that I converted into a BR Mk. 1 RBR from the Graham Farish Mk. 1 RU:

The Minories layout is always photogenic - here are a few pictures that I have taken of it over the years:

A somewhat belated update on how this went at the exhibition: we fixed some faults, and managed to run trains fairly successfully all week-end, albeit with some recurring derailments fixing which is top of our priorities list. Some other faults we could not fix at the exhibition and require more work.

Exhibition goers reacted positively to having a work in progress layout on display: many commented that it showed that a completed layout is achievable by showing an intermediate stage in the process from idea to fully formed and scenic layout. The exhibition also proved the concept of the layout, which, subject to derailments and electrical flaws, all fixable with some work, worked well, and there was much interest in the layout's postwar dockside setting.

Here are some pictures from during the exhibition:

Also, here are some photographs that I took of York Road during the Alexandra Palace Exhibition - there is some delightfully dinky detail on the platform!

On 3/3/2024 at 10:23 PM, Tim Watson said:

As can be seen in this YR photo the bench along the platform has a lady sitting on it. 

The bench was made a few weeks ago from modified Shire Scenes etches. I thought that the lady would best be served by this figure from Modelu:

On arrival I was most impressed with the quality of the printing, especially the magazine. Unfortunately, once all the supports were removed I found that the lady had a rather extensive protuberance below her derrière.
Trimming this away wrote off the magazine and, I’m afraid, the poor girl’s right arm. Even then she would not fit on the bench that I’d made with her coy Princess Diana posture, and would look more like a child perching on the edge of a wall. Serious surgery was therefore contemplated. Those of a squeamish disposition should look away now. 
 

She was electively fractured just below the knees and placed on a thick sticky tape operating table for distraction therapy.

As this was judged to be about the correct length, a small amount of light cured adhesive was introduced into the fracture site and polymerised.

 

After checking her against the bench the void was made up with more light curling resin added with a pin in small increments.

During the same operation, a new light cured prosthetic right arm was made.  After a rapid recovery and following a bit more minor plastic surgery the lady was sprayed dark brown as a base colour and then painted with suitable acrylic wash colours. She is now reading the Daily Sketch, marvelling at the Flying Scotsman’s non-stop run to Edinburgh. Her newspaper was made from cigarette paper and held in place with varnish.

 

The end result is one step closer to reproducing the B&W York Road photograph and, unlike many figures on model railways, she is sitting properly on the bench with her feet daintily touching the ground. 

For all that I think I must be mad to have spent virtually a whole day working on this figure.
 

Tim

In a mad world, only the mad are sane.

7 minutes ago, BenWeiner said:

I bought a Klein Modellbahn open wagon with one end board demounted, intended by the manufacturer as a runner under the overhanging load of the next wagon. It came in a set with the other wagon and some overhanging steel beams as a load.

Peversely I actually saw this as a way to buy two wagons rather than as a way to get a runner wagon. So the existing end became a template

And a new end was made from 0.5 mm plastic card and 1.5 mm U channels with one side cut off to make L sections. The top bar was a 2 mm channel.

This fit nicely once the channels were trimmed

And is now mostly painted

Will this be making an appearance in West Hothley any time soon...?

Some good progress yesterday: trains (locomotives, at least) were running under DCC power for the first time, controlled by the control panel. Some DCC wiring issues and some track issues still need to be rectified, but this is definitely progress.

Looking impressive so far!