Martin S-C

Phone call from the builder today, he will be sending someone on Tuesday to remove the electrical sockets, add insulation behind, board over the holes and replace them with wall mounted ones. On Wednesday Pete the humidity/damp/heating/air-con expert is coming round to have a look at things.

Ooh, nice. I always relax and feel so at home the moment a photo has a CANNOP wagon in it Mind you, I'm not convinced about the colour of ANY of those wagons in that artist's rendition!

...and just to show that pedantry is alive and well in military modelling as well as in railway modelling - no regiment of the 1815 Armee du Nord had battle honours on its colours. All the flags were produced in a huge hurry and were the most boring and basic tricoleurs ever carried by any of Napoleon's armies.

Hummm, lots to think about. Well, some weeks ago Kevin sowed the seeds in my mind of some very, VERY basic light railway prior-to-turn-of-the-century signalling with stop boards and bobbies waving trains into stations. This is fantastically basic and also lots of fun and will probably be how the branch will be signalled. The branch will be most often be one engine in steam however on some occasions while a passenger or pick up goods train goes all the way to Witts End, a second freight working will go down as far as the quarry or wood distillation works and back, this service returning first. The main line will probably be signalled with a variety of primitive systems such as disc and crossbar or slotted posts, with a train staff to allow entry into sections. I don't plan on having distants because the model stations are physically too close, merely homes and starters and a few shunt signals. So, yes, single track between stations will involve a train returning back along the single line section before a second train follows the first outbound one. If a need arises for an unbalanced working I envisage a ticket being issued to the second train. I also see, at an ideal operating session, one signalman/driver per station and adjacent pairs of operators will shuttle trains between them. Every train stops at every station (unless three adjacent operators get very efficient and allow a train to roll through unimpeded, which would be super slick and look good, though this is not necessary). The Crown Timber Siding as you'll see on the main layout plan is very close to NM and therefore falls within the signalling limits of that block section. I intend it to be shunted from the NM yard with wagons being propelled from the station. Or a wagon could be collected by a train coming up the grade from Snarling. In such cases though I will need functional miniature scotch blocks to hold the train on the 1 in 33 grade - this in view of the fact that I am NOT going to model working brakes on my brake vans. Ian, sorry if I wasn't clear - yes your webpages do give lots of info on making up a time vs distance graph. I am just scratching my head a bit over how to do this since my stations are packed quite close together and running times between them will be very short. I suppose, though, that my chosen layout plan is what it is ad any time/distance graph will have to be constructed around the very short transit times. Given that various vans and such will be attached to many passenger trains, most trains will do some shunting at most stations so that time will be consumed quickly in most cases. An alternative is to run mixed trains to cater for all the general freight and the only goods trains I run would be for specific traffics such as coal, milk, quarried stone, cordwood, etc. Andy - I think a sequence needs to be balanced, or at least pretty much so. Not every vehicle needs to end where it begins but if I inadvertently build in an imbalance, there may be problems. Yes, I could fix these by running an empties freight to rectify the vehicles missing where they are needed but planning in advance to ensure this isn't necessary is preferable. Kevin - Ian's AFK website covers these mechanics. I just need a quiet day or two sat down with pencil ruler graph paper and eraser to begin plotting it all out. The scale drawing of the layout plan with estimated speeds/timings of trains between stations is also needed. This means I need to decide train speed limits and work out 4mm/ft scale speeds. I have this formula somewhere on my PC. I'm currently thinking that unfitted freight will be 15 mph, fitted freight (e.g. milk, bloodstock, some livestock, mail) 20 mph and passenger rated trains 25 mph. I shall probably run th ebranch at 15 mph for all freights and 20 mph for passenger/everything else on the basis of lighter rail and lesser engineered permanent way.

Absolutely. In both cases Britain (and atwaterloo, her Allies) simply had to stay around and not lose. Winning was optional, or rather, by not losing the other side could not win, and both Napoleon and the Luftwaffe NEEDED to win. This is often the logic of a defensive position, e.g. Rorke's Drift. Just sitting there doing as little as possible means the opponent loses.

Hi Markus, yes a screen about that size or even smaller is needed. I was actually thinking of a screen about the size of an iPhone that could slot into a plastic holder mounted beside the station lever frame. If compromised eyesight demands it, a signalman can just slip the screen out from its holder for a closer read. Having now read through Ian's AFK railway timetable system I do like what he's done, though freight generation is a lot of what his system appears to be about. My problem is fitting everything into a sequence so most things end up where they started. I expect I might have to do this via testing once the trackwork and electrics are working. I do like Ian's idea of a cardboard model with push pins to pre-plan possible train moves and make sure things mesh.

I saw what you did there Bob. EDIT: Aha, no wonder you didn't find any. They only show up when wearing the wrong boots. EDIT No.2: Corrected deeply embarrassing wrong name!

What? There's different types of pannier? You learn something new every day

There have always been petits guerre, its just that you often don't see it mentioned much in the Big Histories. Small forces of irregular troops such as the Austrian Empire's Croats, Pandours and Hussars; the Russians with the Cossacks and a number of other 18th C states with their Freikorps all conducted small actions against weak targets. In our English Civil Wars small forces of dragoons, commanded foot and such were used to enforce security or to threaten communities. The key to the Ancien regime system of conflict was that kings fought kings and the prize was land. You would capture a fortress or other significant place and hold it so that when the war was over you had a bargaining chip for the peace discussions. You cannot achieve such goals by means of guerilla style tactics, a formal army and formal battle or siege are required. And, yes, a formal battle required both parties to want to participate although many battles were forced on unwilling opponents who were either aware of the threat and trying to avoid it, or were caught by surprise, unaware an enemy was close. Wars in Europe have always been about the increse in influence of the royal houses and the slow growth of states (which is the same thing) and formal warfare was required for such claims to be effective. There were other forms of warfare - in the medieval period where sudden territorial expansion from an external threat (e.g. Mongol Horde) or genocidal cleansing (e.g. Teutonic Knights vs various Slavic peoples) were the criteria for waging war, the different objectives led to diferent forms of warfare and significantly more severe levels of suffering and misery for the general populace but on the whole these events were not usual. Religion played its part as well. The Muslim presence west of the Bosporus was always a problem for the Christian states of Austria and Russia and warfare waged to secure lands and peoples for God would require very formal combats and the destruction of the enemy's army or at least forcing him to accept a defeat without immense military loss. The Thirty Years War was fought on religious pretexts - Catholic and Protestant usually being willing to show their faith in a loving God by killing heretical beleivers! With the arrival of Napoleon military force became a political tool on a whole new level - the army was used to crush an enemy's ability to resist. An army was an immemnsely expensive thing to maintain and to build in the first place so that maintaining an army as a threat and as a toll to defend ones self was paramount. Thus Napoleon sought to physically destroy large parts of his enemies forces as a means to make a peace favourable to him - this was a new concept and was one of the major changes he brought to western warfare.

All this talk of fences and hedges reminds me that my autumn field trip to the Forest planned for last year never happened due to a bout of illness but I will be going that way as spring approaches for a week of walking, note-taking and photographing anything that doesn't move. I'd rather go before the trees get into full leaf so that views are less obstructed but walling, fencing and the like are now on my list of things to make note of.

Those pretty dangly pom-poms may have been removed or covered with a waterproof "condom" on campaign. Most military art of 18th-19th C is of parade ground dress because that is what the public saw 9and was intended to see). The mess, mud, improvisation and reduced clutter of an army on a campaign often presented a very different sight. As a military modeller its a source of mild irritation to me to see wargame army figures painted wearing uniforms in a battle that the troops would have left in their barracks. What, not "Noe-Hope"?

"Pletching" would make a good name for a micro-layout.

Phil, thanks. I had forgotten about Raspberry Pi's. A friend of mine has Pi computers all around his layout and drivers can log in remotely and drive trains via webcams while he acts as dispatcher and shunter. The idea certainly appeals, though in my case not so much for remote running but for the sequence information at each signal box. Pretty sure I can set up bell codes as well via Raspberry Pi's. Headsets with one earpiece and a mic are dirt cheap now too. It would save lots of shouting across the room (which I hate). This is 2019 after all, I suppose I need to drag myself kicking and screaming into the digital age and embrace the good stuff technology now offers. Its funny, I was quite blase about using DCC, digital sound and digital interlocking of points and signals but the opportunities offered for a timetable and communications system had completely gone under my radar.

Andy - thanks. I have been given links to the AFK site before, maybe by you(!) but put them aside "for later reading". I clearly need to go do that now. Chuffing - it is the final destination for all travellers after all.

Hello Joe. Understood - good points. It seems like I need the track and electrics working so I can drive trains and time them (or at least move them about with realistic gaps) before I can build a proper structure. How much siding space and how many passenger sets I need also kicks in. I was thinking of 2 main line passenger sets with a third one spare (in NM carriage sidings). The two NM-GS sets will pass at either SJ or PJ, or one will go down to MVR EX and be "held" there a while. For the branch I am building two sets which will be swapped about, with the spare one kept at NM carriage sidings and the in-use branch set stabled overnight at WE. I probably have enough milk vans to attach them to early morning passenger workings to be dropped at each station en-route to be filled with churns during the day and returned to NM in the evening with a late evening milk train from NM to SJ dairy (the last branch passenger of the day will also collect milk vans from each station). An empties milk from SJ dairy to NM will happen probably at dawn, or near the early morning workmen's train. So I can just enjoy swapping stock sets about, the miners/workmen's trains will probably use older stock. I have initially thought of 8 return workings a day for main line passenger, with 6 on the branch 2 of which (early and late) will run through to NM and GS. I do see this as a typical Dean Forest line however where freight is king and passenger workings are inserted around the needs of the coal and other goods workings - but coal especially which will be the big money-making freight of the system. I may end up designing the freight needs first, then squeeze passenger workings in around those. BTW passenger trains will be no more than 2 x 50' bogie vehicles or 2 x 4-wheelers + a van/horsebox/CCT or two. Freight is limited to 8 wagons plus brake on the main line and 6 + brake on the branch. The branch will mostly be about trains to and from Catspaw, where quarry and wood distillation traffic should easily be enough for 6 vehicles, probably twice a day. Coming up the grade from Catspaw with a loaded quarry train might mean limiting these stone workings to 4 + brake. I could allocate a more powerful engine but I assume the branch is more lightly laid so I will limit which locos can use it. On a busy day therefore the quarry might require 2 or 3 workings. With the wood distillation works also churning out products the upper end of the branch may well turn out to be one of the busiest sections of the system. To snarl things up I have 1 x 6 wheeled brake van rated at 20 tons which must be used with loaded coal trains going downhill to the MVR EX. I have an Oxford Rail 6w GW TOAD model which I plan to convert into another 20 ton brake for these duties following Niles inspiring kit bash (starting at post #718). Witts End I envisage as quite a sleepy place except in season when bloodstock or hunt trains and shooting party specials to the local estate (name to be decided) will be run. Other than that the branch passenger (x6 a day) and one short freight per day will be enough. The other busy section for freight will probably be GS to MVR EX (reversing at PJ) for all the brewery, tinplate and lubricants products from that town. Other products from these industries should be okay added to general freight workings from GS to NM.

Another issue I need to address soonish, though fortunately a much happier dilemma to have to face, is how I am going to operate the layout. I want a timetable or a sequence and have rummaged through my collection of model railway magazines seeking information on the subject but it seems almost every such article addresses a terminus to fiddle yard set up and for those arrangements a sequence seems relatively easy to create. I have a whole system to get to work properly involving nine stations/locations and I am desperately hoping some people here have a few ideas I can steal. I think a sequence would be enough, at least a basic one so that a team of operators know what to do next, or what should happen next. I don't need the extra pressure of a real clock at the moment. I am thinking of the old tried and tested flip-card system. I know its a throwback to the 1960s and I would like to use computer screens but with so many operator positions (six small screens would be needed) and such a long room (one big screen might not be easily seen by all - though its a possible option) this could not be done without a large expenditure. I am sure a timetable app can be downloaded for an iPhone but I don't use an iPhone and am a bit of a technophobe. I wouldn't want a sequence system that requires every operator to have an iPhone either. I am still trying to organise how many types of train there will be: 1 & 2) Main line passenger from NM to GS (plus return working). 3 & 4) Main line passenger from NM to MVR EX (plus return working). 5 & 6) Main line passenger from GS to MVR EX (plus return working) (reversing at PJ). 7 & 8) Stopping Goods from NM to GS (plus return working). 9) Through goods from MVR EX to NM (where it is shunted for trips to the branch or GS). 10) Through goods from NM to MVR EX (return working for above). Freight dispatched to GS and return - see 7 & 8. 11) Coal empties from MVR EX to DSC (reversing at PJ). 12) Coal loaded from DSC to MVR EX (reversing at PJ) (return working for above). 13) Coal loaded from DSC to NM where they are shunted for trips to all stations. 14) Coal empties from NM to DSC (return working for above). 15 & 16) Branch passenger from WE to SJ and return. 17 & 18) Branch passenger from WE to SJ and onwards to GS and return (reversing at SJ). 19 & 20) Branch passenger from WE to SJ and onwards to NM and return. 21 & 22) Branch pick up goods originating from NM to WE and return. 23) Quarry empties from NM to CP. 24) Quarry loaded from CP to NM (return working for above). 25) Quarry loaded from NM to PJ or MVR EX. 26) Quarry empties from PJ or MVR EX to NM (return working for above). 27 & 28) MVR passenger working from MVR EX to NM with return to GS and reverse at PJ. 29 & 30) MR passenger working from MVR EX to NM with return to GS and reverse at PJ. 31 & 32) LNWR passenger working from MVR EX to NM with return to GS and reverse at PJ. 33 & 34) GWR passenger working from MVR EX to NM with return to GS and reverse at PJ. 35) Milk train loaded from PJ to MVR EX. 36) Milk train empties from MVR EX to NM (where shunted to be attached to passenger services) (return working for above). 37, 38, 39, 40) Morning and evening workmen's trains (colliery) to/from NM and GS calling at all stations. Plus various traffics - bloodstock and livestock; timber; cordwood; quarried stone, dressed stone and roadstone; grain and flour; tars and wood distillation chemicals; beers and empty casks; greases, oils and tars; tinplate products; milk and dairy products; motor and horse drawn vehicles; agricultural machinery. Specials - perishables in season (fruit & veg); hunt specials; light engine movements; engineers trains. I need a loco roster as well, with spares. I think I should address a train sequence before I try and work out where the freight will originate and go to. KEY: Main Line: NM = Nether Madder (main station where freight is shunted and stock stored)(crown timber siding is adjacent) SJ = Snarling Junction (junction with Witts End branch)(dairy and mill are adjacent) PJ = Puddlebrook Junction (junction with line to Madder Valley Railway Exchange sidings)(stone masons yard is adjacent) GS = Green Soudley (brewery, greaseworks, tinplate works and canal wharf are adjacent) Branch: SJ = Snarling Junction (junction to main line) CG = Coggles Causeway CP = Catspaw Halt (quarry and wood distillation works are adjacent) WE = Witts End (destination for hunt specials, some bloodstock movements) Colliery: PJ = Puddlebrook Junction (trains reverse here for the MVR EX line) DSC = Dean Sollers Colliery Connection to the Rest of the World: PJ = Puddlebrook Junction (junction with line to Madder Valley Railway exchange sidings) MVR EX = Madder Valley Railway exchange sidings Wow. I definitely need a spreadsheet for this. EDIT: Fixed a typo and updated schematic with gradients.

This is why I love railway modelling - it draws you into so many different subjects and disciplines. For the outsider who might think it is just about carpentry, electronics and looking up the colours of engines, how much more is there? It stretches your brain, your intellect and your experience. It entices you to travel. It rewards your curiosity. Wonderful.

Empty cassettes are great things. It means you need to fill them

Hi Phil - and Happy New Year! I went for Great Soudley first of all but then the word Green jumped into my head and I liked it because it sounded rather odd. The Green Man. Pagan fertility cults, and what have you. Dense summer hedgerows. Trees, woodland, living and growing things. The Forest is an odd place; I've visited several times and twice have had odd moments when, if I were one of those more fanciful people, I might be tempted to believe in ghosts or the supernatural. It is just a very strange region, it feels like you pass through a barrier when you enter it and even the 21st century has failed to dissolve that barrier. Green Soudley does sound wrong, I agree - and that's why I chose it. There are odd place names around - Howle Hill, Pontshill and Bromsash are all near Ross. Sollers Hope, Old Gore, Phocle Green, Mordiford, Much Birch, Hole-in-the-Wall. So many curious names. England is full of place names that seem to be from another, mythical realm. I find it hard to explain or even get straight within my own head, but the wrongness of the name makes it right, somehow, if that makes any sense. I think it jars a little in the mind and to me that's a good thing. Ironically enough Green Soudley is going to be the most industrialised location on the layout and I like that contrariness too. Thank you for the photo of the blossom Kevin, a really cheery picture. Last May I took a video of bumble bees around the blossom of the giant Hebe in our back garden. I tried counting them but gave up when I got past 70. https://www.facebook.com/plugins/video.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fmartin.soilleuxcardwell%2Fvideos%2F1406670589434376

I thought at once of Fulton Mackay in "Local Hero"

This is my intended plan. It remains to be seen how effective I can make it.

I find that modern hedgerows, brutally trimmed by giant clippers hefted up on high by a tractor are the wrong shape as they are severely cut back about twice a year and are far too neat. I am sure there's an agricultural term for partly chopping through the trunks of the main hedge timbers and folding them over and interlacing them with smaller branches but for the moment I can't track it down. I do see it though more and more these days and its a delight to see. Some of the almost-dead rural practices are returning with a younger generation of more ecologically-minded land owners and farmers. I do feel though that not all hedges would not have been dealt with in this manner and while those around pasture may have been kept in good order as a barrier to livestock, or those along public highways, those around arable land were left to grow as they might, and so very bushy irregular hedges are okay in the pre-grouping British rural scene. Photos here suggest a wide range of hedges, from thin emaciated ones to extremely overgrown. http://www.archive-images.co.uk/index.search.php

Thank you James, its been a delight and a source of learning to participate in your thread this year. I wish you and your family joy in the finalising of the house sale and all the very best of all kinds of other things for 2019.

End of the year. Fin de siecle. Time to take stock. Things are at a fairly low ebb here, both in terms of my mood and in actual progress. At January 1st 2018 there was nothing... except a very nice pension windfall. During the spring and summer I collected a lot of rolling stock and models (road vehicles, building kits, all that jazz) and drew up a plan for the kind of model I wanted. I moved house in April to a location that granted me the potential to finally have the railway I'd always dreamed of. Prior to that it was all small shelf layouts - BLTs and fiddle yards, some of execrable standard, some worth exhibiting (and which were, a few times, at small local club events which taught me a lot about weight, design, operating teams and such). As autumn arrived the garage conversion happened and I saw progress at last. Hopes soared; excitement was high. The building was ready at the end of November but while painting the interior I happened upon a moisture/condensation problem that just would not go away. After a talk with the boss of the building company he agreed there were issues and as of now I'm waiting for his lads to return "in early January" and correct the problems. In the meantime Neil from the Little Layout Company has begun construction off-site of the baseboard frames. We're going for all open framework with boards where the level areas are (which as it happens, is just the stations and the colliery). I now have a well established plan to work to and an unexpected Christmas present of a second small pension fund I had entirely forgotten about has matured and covered the entire cost of the garage conversion and about half the layout build cost, so that's nice. At the moment I am still not in a modelling mood but I am sure as 2019 begins to happen and the garage moisture problem gets fixed (I am certain it will be) then we can look forward to some real progress on layout construction. I'm hoping trains will be running by the end of March. That's my target. On that note I want to extend some very warm thank yous to everyone who has made me feel welcome here on RMWeb during my first few months and who has offered all kinds of useful criticism and advice. Its really very much appreciated. Onwards and upwards into 2019 and I wish all of you a magnificent New Year in all that you do.

What's your technique for painting panels into recesses between the raised beading? Very thin paint and use surface tension/flow? If so, how many coats do you use? Thanks.