Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

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CSL
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Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by CSL » Sun Jun 24, 2018 6:02 pm

So I've had requests (OK, just the one - thanks Tom the Blacksmith!) to show some images of my little garden railway and have finally got around to it.

It is genuinely small but it gives enjoyment to me - and sometimes to family and friends too. And yes, I know there is a lack of accomplishment in some of the building (especially the concreting) but please be gentle with me...

I'm sure we all have our own list of requirements when designing a garden railway and these were mine:
- continuous loop for manual steam operation
- as flat and level as possible (as when I started my only loco was a c.30-year-old Mamod!)
- no crossing of access to other parts of the garden
- blend in with the landscape in a (hopefully) prototypical way
- not too ambitious; I did actually want to complete it!

And here it is in all its glory...
P1030116.JPG
P1030116.JPG (166.5 KiB) Viewed 9090 times
My own mini Glenfinnan (five arch, mass-concrete, horseshoe viaduct):
P1030110.JPG
P1030110.JPG (168.5 KiB) Viewed 9090 times
The one and only station:
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P1030106.JPG (163 KiB) Viewed 9090 times
The reverse curve on the "garden" side that produces pleasant visual effects as a train makes its way along it:
P1030111.JPG
P1030111.JPG (170 KiB) Viewed 9090 times
There is of course a lot more to say if anyone is interested but I'm running out of time now, but hope that's of interest to some of you.

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tom_tom_go
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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by tom_tom_go » Sun Jun 24, 2018 6:18 pm

A great little line is a quiet corner of the garden.

I like the raised curve section. I bet that makes a nice viewing area sitting on the grass as the sun goes down.

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by daan » Sun Jun 24, 2018 7:02 pm

Nice little garden railway. Also a nice touch with the railway bridge in the back. For a manuial live steam locomotive these sort of railway's are the best, since you can reach every point of the track and since it's flat, it keeps a steady pace..
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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by Dwayne » Sun Jun 24, 2018 7:59 pm

Looks good. Any plans for expanding?

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by Soar Valley Light » Sun Jun 24, 2018 8:11 pm

Wow CSL, you certainly seem to have achieved your objectives in a most effective way! Your line may be small but your careful planning or the alignment to give the best views of the trains works very well indeed and makes it look much larger. I love your viaduct and your station is very well situated, it is out of the way but provides a very nice feature. It's a good example of maximising the space available by making the landscape work for you. :thumbup:

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by Tom the blacksmith » Sun Jun 24, 2018 10:11 pm

:wav:
Brilliant CSL, so glad you decided to post some pictures up after hearing so much about it. Love the railway, I think I mentioned before but I'm a sucker for a good viaduct and love the curves coming off it. I think thats where I would sit with a wee dram to watch the world and trains run by, I bet you could get some excellent videos from those convex curves ;) . Would like to hear about the build, like how you formed the viaduct and what the rest of the track is laid on.

Your Bertie is a stunner, I was very tempted by that blue, and seeing how well it suits your loco I kinda wish I had gone for it, stands out so well against the plantings.

Like you I've got my list of requirements. I've got to raise it for starters to get it away from the dogs, that and I've got to have a go at building a viaduct. I think your idea of not being to ambitious is a very important point. I fell into that trap with my first 00 layout.

Looking forward to more info!!

Tom

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by invicta280 » Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:04 pm

Looks Great. I like the way you have melded the station platform into the paving area.

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by ge_rik » Mon Jun 25, 2018 7:29 am

Great looking railway. I wonder if potential for expansion was included in the planning? :) These projects have a habit of growing when other family members realise how well they blend into the garden.

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by CSL » Mon Jun 25, 2018 7:32 am

Many thanks for the complimentary comments, all.

Work and a young family are often not conducive to composing long posts so bear with me and I'll cover everything eventually!

Firstly, I'll pick up on references to a "quiet corner" and "out of the way" station. My photographic tricks must have worked because that's not quite how it is!

The station is adjacent to a rather small patio area at the back of the house. The effect of this is that it is rather vulnerable, and all the station furniture - including the buiding and buffer stop - is taken indoors between operating sessions (and of course if I just want a train to run I may not put anything out).

The various elements can therefore be in different places each time - as it happens the location of the back-to-back benches and station nameboard in the pictures is the whim of a five-year-old rather than my preference.

The platform is concrete which was shuttered with random bits of wood and flexible plastic strips which were lying around. Of course it acquired some cat footprints while drying, and some of the surface is suffering from the elements, but it adds to the charm!

I spent some time puzzling over platform height and compatibility with (unknown) future rolling stock before I looked at a few online photos of Porthmadog Harbour and other locations and realised that provided I kept the surface at approximately railhead level it would be both prototypical and totally practical!

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by IanC » Mon Jun 25, 2018 4:23 pm

Size doesn't matter. You have a railway. It can always be extended later.

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by CSL » Mon Jun 25, 2018 4:52 pm

Right, so next up: the ground-level track formation.

The whole railway was largely built from materials that were available at no additional cost. We had some bags of cement, sand and gravel left over from things that had been done on the property, plus the bits of wood, chipboard, etc. that always accumulate somehow.

You may have worked out from the fact that I own a Mamod that's about three decades old that I had built a garden railway in my youth at my parents' old house (it was actually bigger than the CVLR). The garden sloped - not much, but enough that the first iteration didn't really work because the brieze blocks used at the bottom weren't high enough to match the top. (They were also horrifically ugly). The second iteration had the raised sections of 6x1 (I think) timber, dowelled together and trapezium-shaped for curves, supported on 2×2 posts, with fencing (dowels with two holes for wire) on each side of the track. It looked better, but I still didn't get the levels right.

Anyway, scroll forward a quarter of a century...

This time I wanted track at ground level, so concrete seemed the way forward. But how to secure the track? Well, lying around the garden was a length of seemingly very well-preserved timber - a fence post or similar. While I realise it may not be the most durable method, I decided to set wooden sections into the concrete such that each yard of Peco track would be nailed in at least twice - placing bits of wood for the single point was a bit tricky but a way was found. I figured that if the timber does rot it can be replaced.

Where track was to be below or at ground level, a trench a few inches deep was filled with concrete around pre-placed transverse wood bits. The embankment was built up and where necessary scrap wood used as shuttering to a few inches above ground.

Unlike my youthful endeavours - and no doubt helped by a smaller loop - we pretty much succeeded in keeping the trackbed level all around the line (this was before viaduct construction - we'll come to that!).

Where my execution rather failed me is on the top surface, which in places is rough and lower than the wooden fixing locations. The aforementioned gravel came to the rescue in the form of genuinely acting as ballast underneath the sleepers.

Could it have been made better? Yes. Does it basically work as it is? Yes. So every now and then I have to repack small bits of ballast...

A question for you out there now. I'd really like to ballast the whole railway (and indeed did so once, but it was mostly washed off by the following spring). I am not really convinced that sticking the track permanently in place is a good idea, and I want to maintain drainage off the track. Any suggestions for how to retain loose stones on a roughly flat surface?!

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by bazzer42 » Mon Jun 25, 2018 9:32 pm

In answer to your ballast question Peter Butler and others swear by SBR which is some sort of builders adhesive/glue (?) And appears very effective. I'm sure Peter will pick up that point.

I like the railway, the viaduct is lovely and that siding at the station is a real eye pleaser to me.

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by Peter Butler » Mon Jun 25, 2018 10:39 pm

I didn't follow up the question of ballast fixing immediately because of the individual requirements listed which vary somewhat to my own experience. However, to explain my process I use a fine building crushed stone which I put down as required along the track, ensure all areas are clear of material around point blades and inside rails, then smother with SBR dripped carefully, but completely, over all loose ballast. Cover to protect from rain for several days until set solid.
The reason I hesitated is because the stipulation was for loose ballast as the track might be lifted for changes in the future and the SBR would become a problem.
If the railway is to be permanent then the SBR is a most satisfactory solution as it is a bonding agent which remains flexible under changing temperature conditions.
For the type of installation here it might be possible to attach strips of suitable material parallel with the track on either side to contain the ballast and prevent it being washed away if is loose.
Never tried it though!
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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by jim@NAL » Mon Jun 25, 2018 10:51 pm

Looks great fun

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by CSL » Tue Jun 26, 2018 7:45 am

Peter Butler, bazzer42: Thanks for your thoughts on ballasting.

I had wondered whether an adhesive could be used to stick down relatively large stone chips in a rough line each side of the track (with gaps between them for drainage), so the loose chippings would be retained between them...

Of course, I may yet decide that my opposition to fixing the track down isn't rational! It just feels slightly wrong to me - probably because I suspect my alignment isn't great so I don't want it fixed in perpetuity.

(Will respond to other comments shortly.)

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by tom_tom_go » Tue Jun 26, 2018 7:50 am

I don't screw my track down and use ballast that isn't bonded.

Search RWLR on the forum to see what I did.

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by Andrew » Tue Jun 26, 2018 1:19 pm

Great little railway! I'm really taken with the way the station sits on the edge of the patio too, just right...

Re ballasting, you could consider a "Rowlands Mix" of some sort - that's kind of semi permanent, but looks pretty good, aids smooth running, is easy to do, and it's not difficult to chip the track out again if necessary. With a line so small you'll be able to balance a little spirit level across the rails at every sleeper to make sure you've got it right before watering the dry mix. I used a grit, ready-mix and seived earth mix - I don't remember what proportion but I'm going to have to remind myself soon because there's not much of my ballast left after several years of neglect...

Looking forward to more updates - although I know from experience that young children don't make for much free time!

All the best,

Andrew.

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by CSL » Tue Jun 26, 2018 4:59 pm

Many thanks for the comments and suggestions, everyone.

On the subject of extending the line - well, it's possible (and my wife has a plan*!) but I'm not so sure... Basically, it's virtually impossible without compromising the original specification requirements, and for my part I've now got the attractive railway for running manual steam that I wanted.

One possibility, however, is a raised steam-raising track, which could just about be squeezed in branching off the circuit on the "hedge" side right before the viaduct. In theory this would allow running round the circuit and then into the bay platform to finish, although I suspect I'd want to squeeze every bit of movement out of each steaming until expiry on the "main" line.

(I don't think I've ever run a steam train into or out of the siding but as some of you have kindly observed it is a very attractive scenic feature in its own right, while my concern about facing points has been proven to be unfounded - probably because ready-to-lay Peco pointwork is more robust than the Tenmille/Brandbright type that I idealistically adopted when I was much younger.)

*Although nobody will believe it, it was all really her idea: when I found that the Mamod still worked after ... years in various lofts it was she who said "You've got to have a garden railway now!".

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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by Peter Butler » Tue Jun 26, 2018 7:46 pm

CSL wrote: Tue Jun 26, 2018 4:59 pm it was she who said "You've got to have a garden railway now!".
One of a rare breed you have there! Good luck with whatever you decide, it seems you both get equal satisfaction from it.
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Re: Clatterbach Valley Light Railway

Post by invicta280 » Tue Jun 26, 2018 7:53 pm

Like you, I too am blessed with an other half who 'gets it' where garden railways are concerned.

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