Dairy tweaking and other April meeting news

Richard was away in Italy, so the next version of the backscene will have to wait for next month's meeting.

The layout has been invited back to the Wilmington Exhibition this October, so there won't be much time for rest and recuperation after Chatham in June. There's also a couple of outings already planned at 2mm Association events in the next two years.

Pete T announced that his departure to Wellington (Somerset) is now scheduled for sometime in June. Planning for his "model railway hut" is proceeding apace.


The scenery is stored off-site, and not much was brought in for this meeting, so there isn't much scope for interesting pictures this month.

The dairy building which Pete T had added last month is worth a closer look. It is designed to fit across the join between the two main trackboards, to help hide the join. It relies on two pegs to position it correctly, but these were a little too tight and were opened up.

Pete K has added the buffer stops - previously omitted as the siding had originally been intended to be occupied by some type of lift mechanism

The break at the end is deliberate (prototypical).

The recent ballasting of that siding had been a little over-enthusiastic, with some encroaching under the building and needing to be removed so it could sit flush on the ground. Also the slightly pink/purple colour of the ballast needs investigation and/or justification.

Clearance was checked using a Dapol milk tanker - though overscale in height it crept under the roof without further damage.

A boarded crossing was later added at the right end, but probably needs reshaping (and gluing down).

This month's implausible visitor is providing overflow dining accommodation for the mess van!

In the absence of the lower entrance to the dairy/bottling plant, Pete T's recently-finished milkfloats are positioned here here too. They are heavily hacked versions of standard models from P&D Marsh and Lytchett Manor (ex Gem/Fleetline).

I suppose they could be restocking the dining facilities after too many cuppas, but I'm not how to justify the iconic red London bus there (except that there was nowhere better to put it this month).

Keith gave the trackwork a thorough testing with his Terrier. It was fitted with skids, giving it improved pickup at the cost of even less weight on the track via the wheels, hence rather limited traction. At this point it wasn't being too heavily taxed.

Keith also demonstrated a turntable as a work-in-progress. It is likely to finish on his own layout rather than Lighterman's Yard. After a few initial teething problems it powered up and rotated impressively slowly, thanks to its extensive gear train.

Auto-stopping in alignment with the exit roads is planned, probably based on some form of adjustable stop-switches on the disc below the mechanism.

March Meeting

The March meeting concentrated on getting the scenic boards and track bed in place and positioning a new version of the back scene to check for height and scale.

Richard has reworked the London back scene to show greater depth by adding a more focused and lightly coloured middle distance against the more distant hazy background. This works well behind Pete T's low relief buildings at the rear of the track bed.

Pete T also provided a solution for holding the back scene in place. Four 18" upright supports fixed to the white base units with a nylon bolt and wing nut, and a locating pin. A spacer was added to provide a small separation from the low relief buildings and background and look more natural. The back scene is held in place with clear plastic clips.

The back scene will be printed digitally onto a thicker material and backed if necessary to prevent any back light effecting the image.

Pete K drilling the fixing holes while Pete T prepares an upright support. We decided four uprights is sufficient to support and hold the back scene in place.

Three images of the back scene in place.

The left hand end of the background image (to be completed) will curve round the end of the shunting yard, probably attached to a thin ply sheet in front of which there will be a low relief warehouse frontage. Shunting crew's hut and shed shown in place.
The middle section shows the Express Dairy unloading dock.
The right hand end awaits the completion of a large warehouse. 

Pete T produced the Express Dairy unloading dock and the stairway down to the archway entrance for milk floats.

Following a discussion at the February meeting, Richard photographed the large curved warehouse at Queens Road Battersea and made a scale drawing. Each section is identical and suggests a resin casting of multiple sections would be a way of modeling the large building and maintaining the curved frontage required for low relief building beyond the wall at the left hand end of the layout.

Based on the drawing, Pete T has made a mould master for the repeat section.

February Meeting

As usual, the meeting focused on Lighterman's Yard, continuing to prepare for the next outing - Chatham Exhibition in June.



After assembling the layout, the bolts holding it together were painted, with same a dot of paint of the same colour added nearby, thus indicating which bolts go where.

So far as possible, same colour paint was used for all interchangeable bolts, but with a rather
restricted palette of colours available there were a few inconsistencies.

Continuing the painting theme, locations of all the uncoupling magnets were identified and marked with blobs of white paint.

All uncouplers were checked (successfully), and further operator training took place, with most shunting moves completing as intended...

Alan's warehouse had acquired a lot more windows (and a slightly warped roof). Further amendments were proposed, to keep him busy for the next month or two





Discussions drifted away to Keith and Alan's plans for a Somerset and Dorset layout.

Further measurements were taken to ensure that Pete T's latest buildings and Richard's backscene will fit together when the two are both added to the layout.

 Alan's latest 2FS conversion, a standard 5. Valve gear had come adrift on the far side of the loco, and a tendency to jump over point checkrails suggested that back-to-back adjustments would probably be needed.



 With Pete Townsend's retirement and exodus to Somerset drawing ever-closer, Pete King was appointed to succeed him as Group Co-ordinator.

January Meeting

Most of the meeting was spent preparing for the next outing of Lighterman's Yard - Chatham in June.

As usual, Pete Townsend arrived with a few new buildings to add to the layout.







Richard had completed the first draft of the backscene, which was temporarily propped in place to see how well it fitted the rest of the layout. Keith had lowered the top of the viewing window.





A closer view of part of the the backscene. The intention in the final version is to have a little more colour, but fading and blurring in the distance. The mechanism for curving it around each end of the layout is still under discussion.

Pete Townsend had torn down one of the blocks of flats at the end of the layout, replacing it with a viaduct carrying a disused railway , together with an unspecified building. This change is intended to provide a better scenic break in front of the fiddle yard/traverser.

Unfortunately the two alternative bridges he provided were both too low, blocking access... Back to the drawing board!

A couple of the smaller buildings being built for the trackbed - a mess hut and a generic Southern concrete hut. The bicycle is apparently brand new, its bright yellow paint still clean...

David Smith is building a water tank and coaling stage, but was absent today (apparently driving 305mm:foot trains).

 
Next extension to the buildings will probably be a small dairy. One of the arches in the viaduct has been opened up, providing access for milk floats. Pipework will be added to transfer milk from tankers on the railway siding above.

One of Keith's locos bringing in a mixed freight train, to allow other operators to practice shunting (and to check the track for faults - none found). The backscene had been removed again, as few of the operators are tall enough to see over it!

Festive Season Meeting

It was announced that the long-running battle of the apostrophe had been resolved - at Warley, where the "pro" camp acquired a new nameboard for the layout including the apostrophe, whilst the attention of the "anti" camp was otherwise engaged. So the layout is officially "Lighterman's Yard" (until the "anti" camp find a suitable response).

 Apart from consumption of suitable festive refreshments, kindly provided by Pete Townsend, most of the meeting was spent discussing the backscene. Richard brought two mockups, combining photos of the layout with a silhouette-style backscene - one in colour and one in black and white. These met with universal approval, though it wasn't clear which of the skyscrapers will need to be removed for the 1960s.

There was much discussion of the right viewing angle, and the consequent adjustments needed (depth of viewing window, depth of backscene), but until heights of operators and spectators are standardised it will be difficult to satisfy all involved. Provisional suggestion is that the top of the viewing window needs to be lowered by 4.5 inches, and the backscene needs to be about 15 inches high.

A couple of pictures from Richard, showing the ongoing track maintenance during earlier meetings:

Exhibition Debrief

All the regular members turned up for the meeting, including two who had missed the Exhibition (with feeble excuses about holidays), as well as three visitors.

The main running boards were assembled for a troubleshooting session, tracing the cause of a dead section that had appeared towards the rear of the layout on the final afternoon of the Exhibition. Poor contact with part of a point frog was the diagnosis, and was fixed.

We were assured by David Smith that real railwaymen (i.e. drivers) never used the term turnout, always point - though lesser mortals like civil engineers sometimes got it wrong. So we will try to get it right in future.

The fixed area was successfully tested, with the Jinties that did the shunting for the Exhibition. Also Keith's converted Dapol Western diesel tested the track, suggesting a little more work might be needed, though on the loco rather than the track. One bogie used home converted 2FS tender wheels, and worked well, the other used the original Dapol wheels with adjusted back-to-backs, but it appeared the flanges were still a little too coarse.

The rest of the layout was tested, showing no further problems, then it was dismantled and put away to avoid distracting the group during the debriefing session.

I think the main conclusion was that there had been too little operator experience on the layout (the planned pre-Exhibition operating session having morphed into a bug-finding session). So more intensive operator training (aka "playing with trains") is planned before the next Exhibition.

Incompatibility of coupling heights was discussed - Alan Smith, having rather less vehicles, agreed to adjust his to match Keith's.

Invitations to Chatham Exhibition (June 2016) and Bournmoor and Farnham (2017, both 2FS-related) were accepted.

Pete Townsend brought along a newly-acquired Farish Merchant Navy, converted using Association wheels, Jinty conversion kit for the loco and frame bushes for the tender. Wheel-quartering seemed slightly off, otherwise it ran well on Alan Smith's test and demo track. As it hasn't yet been converted to DCC it couldn't have a run on Lightermans Yard as this month's implausible visitor.

Alan Smith brought along the latest iteration of the goods shed/warehouse, with suggested windows and brickwork, together with pictures of a selection of real-world prototypes for comparison.





Richard was conscripted to work on a backscene - having suggested digital printing on vinyl-like material. Keith volunteered to set up a list of "things to do" to try to ensure the most important improvements were finished and installed and tested in time for the next outing to Chatham in June 2016.

Peter Townsend distributed some model cars, expecting them back assembled, painted, glazed and weathered for installation on the layout. He also revealed that he had demolished one of the two recently built blocks of flats, replacing it with a viaduct to produce a better scenic break in front of the fiddle yard.

The Exhibition

Six of us arrived bright and early on Saturday morning to set up the layout - to find that the other two stands in the room hadn't left enough space. After some delicate negotiations, one of the stands was moved far enough to allow us to squeeze Lightermans Yard into place.

To the left can be seen a second-hand stall (almost exclusively OO), whilst the N gauge layout which normally shares the room with us is seen in its usual position on the right

Alan Smith and Keith provided rolling stock - a couple of Jinties for shunting, and a variety of locos to transfer wagons between layout and fiddle yard. The first day saw rather too much rolling stock in use - at times it was difficult to find a spare siding into which to shunt the latest arrivals.

Running was generally very good, apart from the occasional operator error (usually driving into wrongly set turnouts). There were a few serious electrical problems with the layout, but we became fairly proficient at tracking these down and either fixing them or finding workarounds.

Coupling and uncoupling wasn't as reliable as we would have wished - I think the two contributors of rolling stock used slightly different height standards, and operators often found it difficult to locate the uncouplers on the layout.


Comparison of slow-running of the two Jinties suggested the greater cost of CT decoder chip against Bachmann chip was justified.

The second DCC controller showed a frequent tendency to misbehave, but this usually seemed to be the after-effect of shorts on the layout, and it recovered eventually.

 Spectators were highly complimentary about the layout, particularly the buildings. Children were generally challenged to "Find the pigeons", and rarely succeeded. A small colony of 3-d printed pigeons has started to inhabit the area around one of the bridges, and is expected to spread further (particularly to the carpet).

One unhappy young spectator hurled his dummy at the layout, scoring a direct hit to derail one of the Jinties from a distance of about six feet. Perhaps a future English cricketer?

  

The first tree made its appearance on the layout.











Particular attention has been paid to grouping figures in such so that it seems natural for them to stay in the same place for ages: 

a couple staring into the jeweller's shop window

a sunbather,

a policeman chatting to somebody, 

and some window cleaners hard at work (though one does seem to be very slow emptying his bucket).








And a selection of vehicles loading and unloading...

 

There were a few expressions of interest from Exhibition Managers, so perhaps the layout will be appearing in public again sometime soon.

We were all exhausted at the end of the two days, but pleased with a successful performance as very little time had been spent operating before the Exhibition, and we were all "learning on the job".