Garden Railway Forum

I have a friend (strange but true!) who is interested in building a short length of funicular (cog) railway alongside his SM32. I have discovered two you-tube videos showing LGB systems but can't trace any track etc. on the 'net. Has anyone any experience of rack railways in 16mm, and if so, who makes suitable equipment?

The simple solution would be to use roller chain as the rack and mount a sprocket on one of the axles.

Alternatively I could laser cut some rack in steel.

This 12":1' version at Leas Lift looks like it would lend itself to modelling, Normal track canted at whatever angle is required and then a water tank with a coach in the top! All connected up with a cable. cable is much easier (and widespread in real-life) than a cog system. I've no idea how the Leas Lift works in detail - never heard of it until I had a look on Google for simple systems - but I guess that you have a mass of water in the tank that is greater than the mass of the passengers. Fill it up at the top, empty it. at the bottom. You could even pump it back up again!

It's a neat, self contained period piece that looks to lend itself to modelling.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGAr6EY00JE

I think I have this right, as I understand it Peter, the LGB system uses LGB standard track and the rack part is available
separately to be applied to it where necessary. Rack lengths appear on Ebay every so often. Someone will correct me if I'm wrong!
Grant.

The LGB Rack can be purchased here:
https://www.wonderlandmodels.com/produc ... k-12-pack/

The matching cog can be found here:
https://gardenrailoutlet.co.uk/rack-cog

I can see one motor block that sold on eBay. The LGB engine is 2046.

It still think that the gravity and water is more fun!

Wonderful.... thank you all. Really helpful information which I have now sent on to Keith. If he makes a decision I will keep you informed.

We used to have member on here who was based somewhere in Eastern France ( if my memory serves). He had a large indoor dual gauge 32/45mm layout and which had a rack railway section. His user name was "kandnwlr".
Some pics of the rack section at https://gardenrails.org/forum/viewtopic ... 4&start=75 but actually the whole thread is worth flicking through. Some superb work although money seemed to be no object for him, which also helps!

Thanks Philip, I remember following that thread with envious eyes, it was all magnificent and clearly sourced from a bottomless pit of cash! Where is he now???
In his own words, he has the locomotive now just needs the rack, so not much information available there.
Keith is following up the LGB lead kindly offered by Dasher (thank you Dasher) and I will report on progress.

Peter Butler wrote: ↑Mon Mar 02, 2020 10:44 am Where is he now???

I've often wondered about that. He suddenly stopped posting one day in June 2015, for no obvious reason, although he did mention something about his Facebook group. His final video on Youtube is no longer available, it says "This video is private"

I've often wondered the same thing. He was a regular poster when I first joined. His railway was fantastic and he seemed like a nice bloke. I remember the cats on the quayside!

Andrew

I enjoyed the video of Leas lift in Folkestone. Sadly not operational at present. Will it be resurrected?
We travelled on it( in the upwards direction) one day about 25 years ago. The car was fairly full and as we waited to go up there was silence and an air of nervous tension in the car. My 5 year old daughter, eyeing the cable, said 'Daddy, are we going up on that string?' It caused some mirth and broke the tension.

Soar Valley Light wrote: ↑Fri Mar 13, 2020 7:50 pm I've often wondered the same thing. He was a regular poster when I first joined. His railway was fantastic and he seemed like a nice bloke. I remember the cats on the quayside!

Andrew

He was still active 32 minutes ago - https://www.facebook.com/kandnwlr/ . You don't need to be a Facebook user to view it - I'm not.

It's a shame he's no longer on here, I enjoyed his posts...

Cheers,

Andrew.

He’s definitely still active on FB. He has a number of Colonial locos that are right up my street.