7mm The Derby Line: Basford North

[dibateg]

A rainy weekend facilitated the installation of the extra sidings. Its in and wired except for the point motors. The straight section is hinged so that I can get into that corner for maintenance. It's not wired as trains will only be backing in. There will be a foam pad at the end to protect from rough shunts. I'll mount a mirror on the ceiling ( oooer ) so that operators can see what is going on.


It's not my finest bit of joinery, but as an afterthought and made from left overs, it will serve adequately. I think I've already got enough stock to fill it. The inner siding conforms to 6' radius, the outer two begin with 6' then go down to about 5' 9". I will have to test what will work in there.

 

[dibateg]

I've spent a couple of rainy mornings working on a mock up for one of the council houses. Usual thing - counting bricks to try and work out the size. I'll try it in situ and see how it looks. This is No 1&2 Saxondale Drive, this is the back.

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

You'll have fun with the 1950's Crittal windows.....

 

[dibateg]

Yes - I'm curious about that Dave, as I thought that the building would have Crittal windows, but looking at this photo, I'm not sure as they seem to be small square panes rather than the typical oblong shape:-

 

[dibateg]

I've been on outside duties in the good weather, but I have had time to run test trains and check the trackwork. There have been one or two areas that have needed minor attention.
On the indoor days I have been tinkering away with the abutments for the Park Lane bridge. Kindly designed and laser cut for me by Geoff Taylor. This is my first foray ( for a long time ) in to structural modelling.

 

[dibateg]

I'm now starting to make up the Park Lane approach to the railway bridge. The Dapol boxes on the other side represent the continuing road embankment with the Brooklyn Road bridge mock up on the left. The whole approach section is removable to allow maintenance access to the middle of the boards here, as this is the layout's widest point. I've just got to work out the best way of getting Park Lane offscene, a possible bend to the right and some trees maybe..

 

[dibateg]

I've been laying out the Brooklyn Road and Park Lane intersection and have curved Park Lane to avoid the straight road to infinity...

 

[dibateg]

I've not had much time for modelling recently, but I have made further progress on the Park Lane bridge abutments. The next step is to make up the girder section and wing walls.

 

[3 LINK]

Hi Tony,

Ahh yes the roads to infinity, no matter what size of layout this particular problem is always difficult to look convincing. I have used some hedges to help the cover up, but I suppose some walling could help with the more industrial areas.





Martyn.

 

[paulc]

Hi Martyn , is your other job as a magician? Thats an excellent job of making a road dissapear.
Cheers Paul

 

[dibateg]

Thanks Martyn -

hedges and trees I think! Even though there weren't that many in the era that I am modelling, it will look better rather than absolutely right. It's all compromised anyway.

Cheers
Tony

 

[dibateg]

I've been away from the railway for a bit as we opened up the garden under the NGS scheme for charity.

I was just doing odd jobs here and there. There was a warm day where I could open up all the windows and dig out the Sparmax spray gun and spray the track. That went pretty well, once I started using the right thinners... I tried using a piece of hardboard to get the wet paint off the rail tops, but it made an awful mess. So I made up a scraper from some scrap N/S rail to do it after it had dried. That took a few days... well nearly a week... A steel scraper did too much damage to the rail head.

 

[dibateg]

I've been exploiting the good weather while it lasted - garden, outside jobs and out on the mountain bike for some great rides exploring the remoter parts of mid Wales. Now the weather has turned, it is back to the railway and I'm concentrating on the Park Lane bridge. This was a wrought iron structure with a wooden parapet that was declared weak during the war and blocked off for road traffic. It was not replaced until the mid '60s shortly before the line closed. They did a good job, its about the only structure still in place in that location.

The main beams are made from sheet brass with 3mm brass 'T' section obtained from Barry at Metalsmith. Yes, I didn't have any sheet quite long enough.. It should be covered in rivets really, but it is set back on the layout and there is only so much time available.


Here they are temporarily in place, I just need to decide on the deck structure. It will look better with the parapets and pilaster caps.




90437 passes underneath with empty minerals. I run trains from time to time, and it does show up the odd dry joint or unconnected section of rail. But they are gradually being eliminated.

 

[dibateg]

I've now added the wooden ( brass ) parapet, the bass colour to the brickwork will need toning down.


The original brick colour is quite light, it looks like there have been a lot of repairs and the original arches were bricked up a few years ago. The deck was replaced around 1964.

 

[Dave Holt]

The brick work may well have been much darker back in steam days. It's probably been partially washed clean since the clean air act.
Dave.

 

[dibateg]

Yes - over 50 years ( my goodness - that's half a century - frightening! ) since a steam engine went under that bridge. I thought it would be easier to darken it over the original colour. Things always looked grubbier in the late 50s, early '60s. I remember mum saying that after travelling to London and back from Chesham in steam days that their clothes would be dirty from all the smoke...

Thanks Dave
Tony

 

[dibateg]

Well, by happy accident, I got closer to the appearance I wanted with the Park Lane bridge abutment. I plastered on too much dark brick colour and they looked awful. So I tried some fine sandpaper to rectify the situation, and it is actually getting towards the look I want. It now needs toning down with some dark grime... Work in progress...

 

[dibateg]

With some weathering on the abutments the bridge is now starting to look the part, the next stage will be interesting as the wooden parapet appears to have been painted white... I'm working on the pilaster caps, experimenting with DAS clay at the moment.


In the meantime I've been working on the platform faces ( York Modelmaking ), they came from a design by Paul Scott. The main platforms should be in stone, but I wanted to do them in brick.


I've also been working on the topography around the Vernon Road bridge. The area is temporarily functioning as my painting station. It feels like there is a long way to go...

 

[Brian McKenzie]

Stud contact?

 

[dibateg]

Good spot Brian! The plan is, if I ever get that far, is to pull 'em out once its all ballasted...