Semi-scale BR: The Modernisation Plan

[philipy]

Depends. Was there a crock of gold at the end or a crock of something else?

Rik

Dunno,. The water was too cold to go diving down to find the end of the rainbow!

[BertieB]

trackboard_1673_600_3.jpg (460.73 KiB) Viewed 1840 times

Southern Region extension to Scotland underway

I’ve cleared a load of decking and anything that might get in the way and started on the trackbed, reusing some of the redundant decking, despite my previously stated commitment to avoid wood. It’s being supported on recycled plastic posts and not actually in contact with the ground. I think that’ll be OK for a few years. Height above ground will vary with the terrain.

I’ll cover it with cheapo, thin, roofing felt and screw painted UPVC window trim (it’s way cheaper than wood and doesn’t rot) along the edges to secure the felt and contain the 6mm chippings to be used as ballast, as before. It hardly represents realism, I just think it looks better than ‘bare track’. For curves I’ll use R5 and R3 recycled plastic boards, mainly from the previous garden (and no felt).

This will be stage 1. Future stages will be:
• a long, not at all photogenic incline to the other part of the garden
• figuring out what to do once we’ve got there
• planting loads of stuff to make it appear that the railway was a deliberate, integrated part of the garden plan — and not just arbitrarily plonked across it.

Cheers!

[LNR]

Good to hear you are off and building again Bertie

figuring out what to do once we’ve got there

I like that!
Grant.

[BertieB]

trackagain_1.gif (9.42 MiB) Viewed 504 times

Test runs with the smallest, most forgiving loco

Inevitably, things haven’t gone entirely to plan, though I’ve done much of the track laying in ‘stage 1’, the raised bed area of the garden. I now have to do some brick laying (not one of my core skills) to reinstate a step into the raised bed (for weeding and track access) and then knock up a simple lift-out bridge to run across it.

It was forcefully suggested to me, by a (relatively) younger member of the family, that the opportunity for continuous running had to be an absolute priority, even if it could only be achieved with small tank engines and short rolling stock. So return loops would be necessary at both ends of the (as yet far from complete) relocated, garden railway. I’d thought that within the limited space available at the raised bed end of things, it would just look too tight and too naff. I’ve had to concede however and include a R2/R3 return loop. I’ll have to attempt to camouflage it with judicious planting, which is desperately needed anyway.

An unexpected annoyance has been the volume of bird droppings ending up on the trackbed, which is messing with my planned ‘loose ballast’ notion. It would make cleaning it off unpleasant and difficult. Not yet sure what to do about that.

And let’s hope the weather forecasts are overly pessimistic and it isn’t actually going to rain daily till the end of time…

[philipy]

Looking pretty good so far.

[ge_rik]

I took have a problem with bird droppings under an apple tree which birds use as a staging post to and from the bird feeder. I've named that section Guano Junction ......

Rik

[Scrat]

I also had this problem.
Had a bird feeder at the corner of the shed.
Some birds only wanted the sunflower seeds and just threw the other stuff down...right into the blades of my 5" geuge point.
Out-of-scale seeds can jam 5" gauge point blades.
I had to move the feeder to the far corner of the garden.

[Preseli Chris]

I do like your representation of the little pannier tank locomotive, you have captured it so well .

Chris

[BertieB]

A short ‘trundle round the track laid so far’ video (a few more shots than the GIF above). And thanks, Chris — it’s my oldest surviving loco. Needs a spring clean!

[Preseli Chris]

HiBertie.

Nice video of 1378 running on your new line. I would like to see your take on a Riddles 9F.

Chris