Scribblings and scratchings on the paper…

Planning a true micro layout in such a large scale really is the proverbial “quart into a pint pot” challenge. It would be easy to go over the four square feet limit and and produce something micro in spirit. But it is the four square feet micro layout limit that is the true challenge. Let’s see how things work out. The first thing is put together a couple of “inspiration sheets” something to draw on for ideas.

Inspiration sheet 1.

Sheet 1 has a couple of my holiday snaps from the foundry at Llanberis, which are the real inspiration for the layout. The others are Google Earth screen shots of the DeWinton Works in Caernarfon. The foundry was in the square building. There is even a plaque on the wall outside that marks its historic status. As a brick building, to me it doesn’t have the character of the stone built foundry at Llanberis.

What really grabbed me though was the arrangement of the single storey buildings along the road. Fitted tightly between the road and the riverside. I was told that these buildings were also part of the DeWinton works. But that could just have been a story told to me by a local taking my money for parking there, as we took a trip on the Welsh Highland Railway. In my minds eye, I can see an interesting layout based around these buildings with cutaway walls around the outside so you see into the buildings and watch the train pass through various store rooms etc; much like a dolls house. At 7/8ths inch to the foot scale we are in dolls house modelling territory. It would be an interesting crossover between the modelling spheres.

Inspiration sheet 2

Sheet 2 shows some interesting scenes at Horwich and Crewe works. Having the railway run between buildings, inside and out appeals to me. This would be an avenue I’d like to explore. The tiny wagons in the images makes me wonder if the wagons I have aren’t too big. Smaller wagons would have a positive effect on my T.L.U. Making them shorter.  

Toying with the idea of Chris Mears overlap concept. Indoor foundry and outdoor scene.

Now I just start scribbling, putting bits together. It’s so very difficult with no idea of sizes of things. It’s almost like I need to build the loco and wagons and some structures to get a feel for things. Making little tools is fun. But it doesn’t contribute much to knowing the size of the layout. 

Do I run the track around a corner?

I think I have an idea of what I want to do. It’s just getting the elements into a coherent whole now.

Sprouting ideas

That was a lot of information to process in that stream of consciousness that holds the key to this next layout. So let’s break it down.

A minimum gauge railway. So we are talking 7/8ths inch to the foot and 32mm gauge to represent an 18” gauge line.

The purpose of this railway is to transport materials and finished items around a smaller sized foundry. Items like signs, gear wheels, and window frames. 

The trains would be short, one or two wagons, Wagons would carry materials such as casting sand, patterns, perhaps coal and iron ore for the furnace as well.

A particular project I’m interesting in for scratch building is one of the foundry waste wagons/tippers like those built by Sir Arthur Heywood for his Duffield Banks works. One is preserved in the narrow gauge museum at Tywyn on the Talyllyn Railway. There are drawings by Mike Decker in Volume 1 of James Waterfield’s excellent study of the work of Sir Arthur. There was even a similar sort of wagon at on display at Llanberis.

Waste tipper wagon of some description at the National Slate Museum.

One absolute must for the rolling stock on the layout is that the wagons must run on curly spoke wheels, I find them very relaxing to watch as a wagon passes.

Even at rest, I find curly spoke wheels calming

With the concept solidifying, it’s time to start to take a look at what I’m getting myself into.

What have I got myself into?

Just what have I got myself into? This is an extremely sobering image. What you see here is my LocoRemote kit of “Pet”, driver Alf, and a couple of wagons that I made back when I first dabbled in 7/8ths. They’re all big. Alf himself is about 6” (150mm) tall. My standard T.L.U. (Train length unit) that I plan my layouts around will be 18” inches (450mm). I like trains to be able to travel several times their own length on a layout, three times is the minimum, four is better. At three TLU’s the baseboard should be four feet (1220mm) long. I’m getting my first inkling of the size involved. My visions of what I can fit in a micro layout space need to be re-evaluated as I start proper planning.

Germination.

To refresh. I have seen these two things. Yet at the moment they are nothing more than unrelated holiday snaps.

Disparate scenes with no link

You are probably thinking to yourself. “I know what it is! I know his next project!” But I don’t. I am enjoying trips on the Ffestiniog Railway on holiday, and fighting the urge to buy a Kato/Peco “Prince” in 009 from the Harbour Station shop. Then when I get home, I’m preparing Bontoft’s for exhibition. I’m not thinking about the next project. 

Having got Bontoft’s ready in plenty of time, my idle hands needed something to do and so I tried making tools in 7/8ths inch scale. The work I’ve done with Bontoft’s made me ridiculously confident in my abilities. The tools were described earlier in the blog. You can refresh your memory here.

Tool time

Still, there’s no link forming between these tools and the other two images. 

Yet. 

Fast forward a week and I’ve now completed the Randolph show and I’m brimming with enthusiasm and confidence. I’ve got to do something. 

I have to create. I laid out some O gauge track on a board based on an old Neil Rushby boxfile layout from years back. I rued not buying Prince in 009 a few weeks earlier. I stared at a blank baseboard. I looked at nearly every piece of rolling stock I have hoping that something would leap out at me. I have to build something. That I can’t get a spark of inspiration to build something is so frustrating. It’s “writers block”. But for model railways.

Thanks Neil Rushby

Eventually my brain stopped working. I had to sit down and relax. I turned to YouTube and one of my favourite TV shows of all time. Time Team.

If you’re not familiar with the show. A group of Archaeologists have three days to conduct an exploratory dig on a site somewhere. The show ran for 20 years. For 20 years families would spend Sunday evenings watching a group of people digging in a field. Items of national importance have been found. History books have been rewritten, and some unforgettable television moments have been broadcast. It’s a show I can lose myself in.

On this particular day, I re-watched the episode from the Blaenafon in South Wales. Their task was to find the World’s first Railway Viaduct built in 1790. It carried a horse worked line that moved coal to the first Blast Furnaces. Twenty-five years later, the viaduct had disappeared. The show is a remarkable exploration of what the Industrial Revolution did to the landscape.

As a part of the show, they set up a small blast furnace inside one of the original buildings to recreate the iron making process. It was a small furnace, only a few feet high, not more than two feet in diameter yet they produced enough iron to make a railway wagon wheel.

The penny dropped.

This small portable furnace had produced enough iron to make a wagon wheel. I remembered the furnace at the museum. It was, what 12 feet tall? It too was only a few feet in diameter. How much iron would that produce? There were patterns of all sizes around the foundry walls. Window frames, gear wheels, even signs. 

Within seconds an entire concept flowed out of my brain.

“AminimumgaugerailwayservingasmallfoundryMakingthingslikewindowframesgearwheelssignsandwagonwheelsTherailwaywoulddelivermaterialslikesandcoalandironoreCouldbetransportingfinisheditemsbetweenthefoundryandtheblacksmithsTrainswouldbeshortoneortwosmallwagonsHowaboutoneofthoseHeywoodfoundrywagonsliketheoneinthemuseumatTywynIalreadyhaveaflatwagonbuiltCurlyspokewheelsDammitifyouwantedtobecleveryoucouldputredLEDsinthemodelfurnacetorepresenttheglowfromtheironmaking.”

It’s a good starting point…

 

The planting of seeds

For me, after a successful show, there’s an incredible high. As sure as night follows day. After positive interactions with people at a show and a well running layout, I come away full of enthusiasm and positive ideas. I’m ready for the next great model railway adventure to begin.

Except I have no idea where that adventure will lead me. Bontoft’s is essentially complete. There’s no need for an extension. It was never designed for one. I have a hankering for a couple of other loco’s. There’s plans for a Hudson and a Simplex. But I’m in no hurry. But I’m so full of enthusiasm, I need to do something to channel the energy. 

While on vacation in the UK recently, I saw a couple of unrelated things that may lead to something.

The first was at the National Railway Museum in York. A place I’ve been many, many times. I first went within a week or two of its opening back in 1975, (I was I only 12 at the time). Many of the exhibits I’ve seen before. Some things I’d forgotten, some things never registered with me on previous visits.

This time I paid attention to “Pet”. The John Ramsbottom designed, 18” gauge 0-4-0T. This loco and its brothers shuttled around LNWR Crewe works, doing what modern fork lift trucks would do. Transporting tools, supplies, and items around the workshops. 

The delightful, diminutive, PET

“Pet” is one of those locomotives that never really registered with me back in my earlier visits. It was just a black blob. However, I do recall that when Springside Models brought out their 09 model of “Wren” from the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway’s Horwich Works, I was intrigued enough by the space saving qualities of a layout using minuscule prototypes that I bought the kit. But I never developed the idea further. 

In the intervening 50 years, I learned all about minimum gauge railways. The work of Sir Arthur Heywood. The Sand Hutton Light Railway. The Vitacress railway in Dorset. Subjects that fascinated me and led to a very creative period of layout building in Gn15 with Whinny Lane and Purespring Watercress.

I posted the picture of Pet on my model railway Facebook page saying how I was reminded of Chris Rennie’s LocoRemote kit of Pet when he had released it earlier in the year. 

Wouldn’t you know it? The first person to comment on the post was Chris, saying that he still had a last one, and did I want it. I couldn’t back out after that. So I arranged to buy it and a driver “Alf” from David Clavey. 

At this point, I just want to say a huge thanks to Chris (and David) for working together to send things to me in the USA. There are many cottage industry model railway suppliers who won’t ship abroad, what with Brexit and the poor quality of shipping to the USA. (I’ve lost many packages in transit post Covid from different sources). Chris will send things to me tracked and signed for, so there is a trail to follow. David happily sends his items to Chris who then puts everything in one package. To them I am eternally grateful. There would not have been a Bontoft’s Sand Quarry layout without their help.

Anyway, in the middle of the night when I was jet-lag stricken. I’d surf the web looking at pictures of Horwich and Crewe Works internal rail systems, seeing if I could get inspired. I was inspired, but these huge railway workshops didn’t seem to offer much for a micro layout builder.

Look Ian, you’re supposed to be enjoying yourself on holiday. Get back to that.

So to North Wales, a place I have great fondness for. I have adored the Ffestiniog Railway since childhood, and the majestic Snowdonian vistas fill me with awe every time I see them. 

One day, we decided to check out the National Slate Museum in Llanberis. Somewhere I’d never been. I really wanted to see the wagon on a Blondin cable hanging above the flooded Vivian Quarry nearby. The museum is free, it’s a no brainer to visit.

That wagon perched over the Vivian Quarry

The Slate Museum is a fascinating place, full of inspiration for a slate quarry based model railway if you so desire. I was fighting the urge all the time while there, I can tell you. 

As we toured this fascinating place, we entered the foundry, with its furnace and display of patterns, workshop tools and equipment.

The foundry.

The seeds had been planted. I just hadn’t realized it yet.

Ready for showtime

 

Ready for the show in Randolph, MN

The layout sets up quickly and very easily. A test run showed everything worked OK

Tool Time

You will see the new name and web address for the blog and wonder what’s going on. 

Those with long memories, may remember that my first steps in large scale modelling were in 7/8ths inch to the foot scale. But I was overwhelmed by the size and details, and stopped working in the scale long before this blog even started. 

Now that my 16mm scale layout is ready to go to shows, and I’ve absorbed what I can do in 16mm scale. I felt the need to try my hand at some 7/8ths details. I don’t know why, I just felt the need to do this. 

I found some dimensions, and made a large screwdriver, using a couple of thicknesses of styrene rod. The handle was shaped with a file from 1.6mm rod, and the shaft from .75mm rod with the flat tip sliced off with a sharp blade. The end of the handle was drilled out with a tiny drill bit, the shaft inserted, and fixed with styrene cement. All this was done under the view from an Optivisor.

A scale 18” long large screwdriver

I had made a screw driver. I had made a flipping screwdriver! A pretty good looking screwdriver at that. Bolstered by this success, I tried a spanner, (wrench to my American friends). With just as acceptable results. This was cut and shaped from a 2 x 6mm strip. The camera eye is unforgiving in the image. But to me it looks great.

A big old spanner. One for about 3” nuts and bolts.

I’m making tools! I’m starting to feel pretty good, so I carried on. Another smaller screwdriver. The screwdrivers were actually easier than I thought. I followed this with a smaller spanner. Then a couple of crowbars (pry bars) followed. These were actually quite challenging, as the styrene strip was being heat bent almost as far as it would go. Then to finish it off, a Sledgehammer, which was an absolute piece of cake considering what I’d already made. 

A 7/8ths inch scale tool wagon?

After a break for the weekend visiting friends and running in a 5K (1st in my age group, thanks for asking) I added a wood clamp and a tool box. The wood clamp was measured from one that the friends we were visiting had weathering away in their front garden. The tool box is rather more conjectural being made to a size I thought appropriate of about 18” long. Eighteen inches in 7/8th’s is about 33mm. Sizes of items are difficult to get used to.

It was a conscious decision to make the jaws of the clamp open and offset

The tool wagon, it contains full size tools I don’t even own,

There we go, a selection of 7/8ths inch to the foot tools. Made just to see if I could do it. It certainly gives me a sense of achievement. The wagon the tools rest on is the first wagons made for my abandoned 7/8ths inch layout.

I'm ready for my close up Mr DeMille

As a "Thank You" for following the layout blog from the start. Here's a video of the layout running.

I hope you enjoy this look at it.

Chute!

The chute is a great feature. I’m proud of the overall effect of it. However, the pouring of the sand needs slowing down. It’s gravity and mass, you can’t scale it down. 

I’m using Woodland Scenics” fine ballast for my sand and it just falls straight into the skips, and the “sand” can bounce out. I needed something to slow things down. A baffle, a filter. I knew I had some  3.5mm scale wire mesh fence that I thought would be perfect. But I couldn’t find it. (I bet it’s with the track spikes I can’t find). Then as I was doing the grocery shopping with my wife. I saw one of these.

A sink strainer

It was only a couple of dollars. I thought it was worth the experiment. I cut a section of mesh out of the strainer, and placed it in the chute and tried it. It slowed the flow down a great deal, but the material was clogging up the strainer. I guess that’s what the strainer is supposed to do. But not what I wanted it to. So I decided to make the holes larger. I kept poking at the mesh, making the holes larger, until I got a flow I was happy with. 

The filter in place

Tipping into the skip, thinned out and slowed down

A slower tip seems to result in a more rounded pile of sand

A new bucket

At the other end of the chute I added a new bucket. The original one was small and I had to fill it with a teaspoon. One spoon at a time. A pretty slow process. It was simple to make one large enough to take a skip loads worth of  “sand”. Having made one it seemed a sensible idea to make two of them. The second one would be used to fill the first. That way I’d get pretty much the same amount in the skip every time. That sounds like a winning idea to me.

Consistent filling

The skips are filled with a consistent amount, and the rounded pile of material is pleasing to the eye. This has really worked well. What do I work on next?

Taking (my) Stock

Now I’ve got a layout ready to go to an exhibition, I need a box to carry and protect the locomotives and rolling stock that I’ve accumulated. But what to make it from and how to make it? My woodworking skills are certainly not good enough to make anything.

But I run, I ski, I wear boots and shoes. I could make a stock box from a shoe box. They aren’t just for building micro layouts in. 

I have lots of shoe boxes around

All the boxes were different sizes. I just tried a few for size to see how the stock would fit best.

Not quite right.

This looks pretty good.

It only took to the second box for me to find a comfortable arrangement that would be easy to make.

I just cut some dividers to size and glued them in place. Easy peasey.

I’m quite happy with this fit.

A little padding in there might not go amiss, but things are in there pretty snugly, with a handy dandy spare pocket that for now will take coupler tools, couplings and other loose bits and bobs.

Clearing up the list

Let’s go through the list, tick off the things to do, then add some more, and then do them too.

Rusted rails on the deck and the tipper activator.

The legs look good. They create the impression that something is there,
but are not too noticeable

The legs that support the delivery chute were a task that took quite some time. As this is a last minute addition and not really planned, it had to fit the space available, and the stock had to stay clear of the legs. My LocoRemote “Amberley” Brush electric is the widest of my locos, and has given me some issues with the location of the “return bumper” that rights the skip buckets. So everything was measured against this.

My stock of Evergreen styrene yielded enough girder, tube and rod to construct it. Though as I say, the measuring, cutting and gluing took a lot of time to get everything to clear the stock and work smoothly. But it’s there now. A spray of a dark green colour hides it in the shadows. It creates the impression that something is there, but doesn’t overpower things and draw attention to the offstage area.

Yesterday I mentioned how I would add more weeds and the like to add to the overgrown feel. I also said I’d use grass tufts to help in the accurate locating of the bin. I’ve made a good start on that. But, it’s no exaggeration to say that weeds grow everywhere of course. 

Weeds help position the bin in the same place every time. 
More weeds needed yet, but you get the idea.

Things are starting to feel anti-climactic hereabouts. Thoughts have turned towards another layout project…

What to do next?

Three weeks to the layouts debut. The layout is essentially done. Now it’s just looking and finding things to do. Things like:

The rails here should be rusted.

After the euphoria of getting the chute to work had settled in. I began to think that it needed support legs so it didn’t hang in the sky so much. That needs some thought.

How to get the trains around the legs though?

Weeds and grass. I have lots of tufts. I could add a plenty more here and there to get the overgrown effect. Some places do need it.

There’s room for a lot of weeds on these bare patches

Weeds around this bin would help locate it in the right place after every emptying

Loads and loads

 With the end in sight, it was time to turn my attention to the last working feature. The loading of the skips. This was the one that I had the least concerns about. I’ve worked on so many layouts where I have loaded wagons and had so many problems and successes with the process that I had a pretty good idea what I was going to do. The basic idea was outlined in this post on my Cuddle blog. 

My plan was to have a chute appear from offstage and the sand (or whatever) would be tipped from the chute, into the hopper and then into the skip. Much thought has also been given to using a farm toy conveyor belt to transport the material. But as the conveyors I have found are overscale and will need some kind of converting, this chute idea will have to do for the moment.

The first task was to work out the shape of the chute to allow it to swing into and out of view.

First mock up of the chute.

For me, the only way to do this is cut away at pieces of card or add bits until what I want to happen, happens. It can definitely induce frustration when it doesn’t work as planned but I’m no engineer. I’m sure and engineer would be able to calculate the angle of swing of the chute and its size in a CAD program and very likely  produce something in a 3D printer. Alas, I have to work with my hands to get things to function. Most rewarding when it goes as planned. My first mock up seen above worked pretty well, and I decided I could go ahead with it with minimal modifications. 

The card version was reworked in styrene. The pictures below should give you an idea how it works.

The bucket carries enough material to 1/3 fill the skip, so the action has to be repeated for viewers

The angle of slope of the chute was steep enough that all the material in the bucket at the top was tipped into the skip bucket. I felt pretty pleased when that first load was tipped into the skip I can tell you.

Definitely a feel good occurrence

The chute was dressed with rusty corrugated styrene to make it less conspicuous

That’s it really. Job’s a good ‘un. The cord that raises and lowers the chute is just pinned out of the way when not needed.

Perhaps some will find the appearance of the chute from upon high jarring. But I think that will be overcome when people see the wagons being filled auto-magically. It also suggests that the action spreads beyond the confines of this blue grey box.

There’s a little fine tuning to be done, mainly to stop the overspill. I think a baffle inside the hopper would help direct the material into the skip, as well. Some kind of guide line to help operators position the skip directly under the hopper. That will come with practice.

Honestly, that’s it. For now anyway. 

I can spend the the time between now and it’s first showing at Randolph Railroad Days October 20th and 21st practicing operation. This is a situation I’ve never been in before. I have a layout ready three weeks before a show. I always used to pull all nighters in the week before a ships getting ready. This feels most odd.