Lacathedrale

I have recieved my IRSE green book - will review and reply to the thread - thank you all for the recommendations. The gent who runs the Plumpton Green channel also recommended it!

Ah yes, could be right! Your point about the double-slip being a pinch-point did highlight the benefit of using a prototypical track plan - there's no need to second guess it (drunken surveyors aside). I think we can safely assume the people who designed stations as their day job knew exactly how to lay things out properly. It IS a large increase in track plan scope however. Side by side, the additional complexity is quite evident. Holborn Viaduct Stylised (left) vs 1896-1916 (right) It's quite evident how P1 and P6 are fairly simple 'bolt on' components to the stylised plan, as are the pilot siding and additional sidings by the engine shed. If you take a 10,000' view, the one thing the prototype plan brings to the table that's objectively superior to the stylised plan is the additional lane in the throat, the rest is just window dressing. I've done some calculations of source/destination in a matrix format to determine how important that is. The 1896-1916 plan's extra lane allows simultaneous departures and arrivals from all non mutually-exclusive destinations, as well as allowing a pilot loco to shunt P1-4 without affecting P3-6 or vice versa. The only movement which is simultaneous on the stylised plan is an arrival to P4, which can occur while other platforms are shunted or there are departures. How important this is, is up for debate. In the meantime, here's a few photos with my lone star stalwarts: Across the bows I didn't know it would be possible for an A4 to look swamped An eight carriage express rolls in

I decided I wasn't going to let it beat me, so I laid out the track plan more precisely - same length: The plan above is now exactly as per the prototype albeit with more reasonable curvature than the OS map suggests, with a minimum radius of 22" on some of the curved turnouts. It looks quite hellish to build at first glance, even though it is more eased than the prototype appeared to be (!!!). Broken down however, the pointwork consists of: A Regular crossover A Crossover into a diamond Three Crossovers into a single slips Two Tandem turnouts One regular turnout As before, I think it requires some mulling before any further decisions are made.

Thanks Bill, I've no memory of HV, but certainly trains around Catford After finding the 1896-1916 plan above, I was unable to stop myself from interpreting it in a plan...

@bbishop hello there! That is actually a loco spur and and engine shed, as pictured at the right of this photo: The plan has been heavily simplified from the original HV layout - the 1916 edition of a 50" to 1mi shows a much more complicated arrangement that I have broadly outlined in green on my plan below. There is an additional spur for coal wagons, as well as an outside single slip to access the loco shed, as well as a pilot siding at the end of Platform 3/4 (pretty much where the photographer is standing in the above shot). To facilitate better simultaneous movements there's another layer of crosovers for P3-6 from the up main, too. Here's a scan that was infront of me the whole time, that I never stumbled across before now - which shows the station at its maximum extent: The fact that there is what looks like Brio-level turnout right by the throat does make me question the geometry, but it does hopefully show the correct connections, and some of the most complicated pointwork I think any of us would ever wish to see. I've tried tracing this out with Templot and it's almost impossible! It seems that the LCDR really did want to get their moneys worth on land purchase - no less than three tandem turnouts, all of which are connected to either half-scissors or outside single slips! My very limited ability to decode this trackplan has resulted in this, just out of interest: To clear it up in my own mind, here are my amendments effected on the plan: The obvious change is the removal of the second route through the throat to allow simultaneous departures and arrives, to be replaced with a double slip on the entrance. Another other change is that around platform 1 and the engine shed area - by shifting the shed across one road, it drastically simplifies a hellish combination of double-sided tandem turnouts and a slip with no operational impact. Similarly, the omission of (what was originally) P5 is driven more by trying to understand what value it adds. I'll give it a quick bash to see what the 'restored' throat looks like - but I won't be slavishly copying the 50" OS grid map - it's too far out there even for me!

I'm still seeing the original Photon for £270 on Amaon - where should I be looking? It may seem that a photon plus the upgrade with the twin rails is a good choice at this point?

Thank you Mike @The Stationmaster - I've tried to put up a locking table based on what you said: It seems strange to have such emptiness in the table, i.e. 1 doesn't do anything, it is rather just impacted by other levers. Same for 23 - it is released by A, and it is A which locks 1, 21, and B. The fact that B is locked means that 3 is also locked. I don't know how I could come up with the logical flow to end up with the same result (in this case, the dependence on A doing much of the locking)

@Phil Bullock - found the guide - thank you. For anyone else curious, it's here: https://blockpostsoftware.co.uk/files/4_Bar_VT_Locking_Assy_Guide.pdf

Thanks Martin, i will check out the curviform v-crossing settings now. @KeithHC you really should give it a shot - there is no magic bullet or time when you will feel ready. I still feel very unready, but it's just another skill to learn and with the help of Templot and @martin_wynne alot of the hard work is done for you. @justin1985 suggested I simulate some stock movements, so I dug out my lone star models - bought pointlessly (ha!) a few months ago - and hopefully give you a taste of the layout with some stock to scale it: Queenboro' boat train pulls out of P2, after the arrival of the Dover Mail in P3. A suburban tank trundles into P4 The Up Cathedrals Express draws into P4 while a clapped out tank pulls a stopping service to Central Croydon What I thought most interesting however, was taking a picture from the loco-shed side (i.e. what was meant to be the back of the plan) and I think it might end up being more pleasing overall: Queenboro' boat train pulls out of P2, after the arrival of the Dover Mail in P3. A suburban tank trundles into P4 (seen from the north) The Up Cathedrals Express draws into P4 while a clapped out tank pulls a stopping service to Central Croydon (seen from the north) Without the widened lines delving below, the layout does seem more naturally viewed from the north. Any thoughts?

Printed out, it's quite hard to distinguish the plans - which do you prefer, left or right? The plan with primarily C10 turnouts is on the left - but other than turnouts shifting around a little bit on P1 and P4 and he centre pair of turnouts being smoothed out - I do think that there's really not much in it at all, and so am erring on the side of the left plan just for the simplicity of straight or curved turnouts rather than contraflexed (love it).

Ah, that's helpful, thank you. That said, I think part of the reason the flow was broken was the use of perfectly straight turnouts to replace the wyes (to avoid, contraflexure (lovely word!)). By gently curving them I feel that the flow has been restored I think that on balance the use of 1:10 turnouts that are curved normally is more appealing to me than the use of 1:7 wyes.

Going through my layout plan, I realised that although the track flowed nicely, I had inadvertently ended up with a number of wye turnouts of a low crossing angle, 1:6 and 1:7. The resultant radius was still large, but is not a true reflection of prototype practise. The reason for this was that when setting the plan out, I created the entrance and exit points, then created links between them. I inserted turnouts as neccesary using straight branch tracks and more links to join it all together. I had not paid real attention to the curvature insofar that as long as it was at a reasonable minimum radius and crossing angle - I was satisfied. Checking the plain to ensure I had the right jigs and materials, I discovered the issue - and happily it only took about 10 minutes to fix. The solution was to keep my datum points in place, i.e. the entrance of the throat, and the platform roads, and delete the track and turnouts between. I then inserted plain track and re-created simple links in the directions required for the 'main' roads, and then turned those into turnouts and used the branch track > geometry - straight > create simple link with the new formations. A picture may better illustrate the difference: Before: After: I realise this probably doesn't look like much from the outside, but essentially everything left of the double slip has been re-drawn and re-aligned, now all running lines are using C10 turnouts that are straight or curved - no bloody wyes - and I think it flows even more nicely. Thoughts on a postcard?

The plumpton interlocking shows round pegs with round holes - presumably so if there's space, any lever can displace a lock. In contrast, other designs I've seen have square or 45-degree corners to provide locking. Is there a meaningful difference? (video above) GWR lock/tappets

Thank you Phil, but I'm not sure how? I was thinking primarily of the actual mechanical interlocking plungers and bars, rather than the principle of things being interlocked?

Which one? There's no link in your post @Phil Bullock

I don't wan't to digress further from the conversation about leverframes elsewhere in this subforum, where @micknich2003 has posted a wonderful mechanical interlocking setup: I was wondering if there was a resource for us mere mortals to get to learn this? Certainly the heady heights of manual point actuation with manual interlocking is something I'd wished for as soon as I started to grasp the operational interest in proper signal obeyance on model layouts - but the prospect of translating a simple locks/releases table into a mechanical format completely eludes me. I don't think I can be the only one who feels this way - nobody is born with an innate understanding of this stuff - but I don't really seem to know where to start to find out. Any pointers for books, articles, etc. most gratefully taken!

I love everything about the idea but my brain just refuses to compute it. Any time I feel like I start to understand, it all falls apart. For a lever to move, the block that is holding it must have a 45 degree corner, rather than a 90 degree one (such that the block is forced across by pulling it), and that block must have room to be displaced. I.e. 1 and 16 both have a single block with a 45 degree corner. This means, they are able to displace that block - however there is no room for it unless 2 and 15 are also pulled. That's about as far as I get before I end up in a spiral of questions - if block 1 engages with lever 2 with a square edge and lever 3 with a point. So, the distant can only be reversed if both 3 and 2 are also reversed. Makes lots of sense - but straight after that it gets into a right tangle. How do you mentally arrange the locking and releasing of each lever to get from your second picture/table to the actual levers?

Interesting you felt it was too long and narrow - I think many people would assume that was ideal!

Well, as per some posts in the 2mmFS thread, some vees have been filed: and some timbers laid: One more around the sun....

@t-b-g do you have a thread or gallery? I saw some pictures of your minories variant a while back but I've since lost them.

Presumably anyone looking to get into DLP 3D printing is hanging on for the Photon Mono 2K at this point?

To be taken as light hearted fun, I did smile when I saw @Dr Gerbil-Fritters in a thread about EM gauge peco points...

I think it's also important to not lose sight that real stations weren't always perfect - I come back to the old nugget of Holborn Viaduct - built on spindly arches that couldn't support modern (i.e. post-grouping) locos, recieving only 1/2 train lengths of the boat and mail trains traffic (Which were split further up the line), only one platform with a runaround and only two outermost platforms long enough for eight carriage trains, which were they so engaged would block access to the inner platforms, which were almost the exclusive domain of newspaper and mail traffic. All of these idiosyncrasies might be designed out on paper in a layout planning thread!

I made the same mistake with one of my DC-braked chassis - the instructions state that you can file away some of the wheel tread to re-gain clearance. That's what I'm going to try to do, at least !

@micknich2003 - that's a lovely interlocking frame. I've always wanted to do something similar, but how the heck do you go about planning something like that?! I mean, I can get to the point where I have levers that lock/release others written down - but converting it into an actual interlocking mechanism seems a gigantic leap!