Blacker Lane Disposal Point NCBOE (4mm/OO)
- Thread starter Dave
- Start date
Dave
Western Thunderer
It's not quite so cold now.
I was going to have the bit between the rails as old sleepers but when I cut and scribed some thin plywood it didn't look right, so I went for concrete instead. It's one of my modelling pet hates when people do concrete inset track and you can still see all the chairs and sleepers in the flangeways, so I put Milliput into the gap between the edge of the already laid concrete (cork sheet) and the rails. Once that had hardened I was able to cut out all the sleepers and chairs and insert a strip of styrene. Another cork strip was glued to the styrene to bring the "concrete" up to rail top level. There are no sleepers, chairs or gaps and the between the gauge strip is as close as OO gauge back-to-backs will allow.
I was going to have the bit between the rails as old sleepers but when I cut and scribed some thin plywood it didn't look right, so I went for concrete instead. It's one of my modelling pet hates when people do concrete inset track and you can still see all the chairs and sleepers in the flangeways, so I put Milliput into the gap between the edge of the already laid concrete (cork sheet) and the rails. Once that had hardened I was able to cut out all the sleepers and chairs and insert a strip of styrene. Another cork strip was glued to the styrene to bring the "concrete" up to rail top level. There are no sleepers, chairs or gaps and the between the gauge strip is as close as OO gauge back-to-backs will allow.
steve50
Western Thunderer
That concrete does look effective. So what you have done is cut away everything in between the rails after the rails were secured, did you have any problems with the rails moving? I've tried many things to hide the chairs and sleepers but that seems a pretty good method.
Dave
Western Thunderer
The rails haven't moved yet but I only did this a couple of days ago, so there's still plenty of time for it to all end in tears.
Dave
Western Thunderer
It's survived a few more days without falling out, so I guess there's no reason why it shouldn't stay permanently...
There has been a small change of plan regarding the loader/screens. I was going to have a working loader - i.e. fill wagons with real loose coal, but this idea has now been dropped. It was going to be far too much trouble. I did it in O gauge and it worked well, if a little messy due to spillage. The spillage was mostly down to operator error but there was always a small about caused when the first coals hit the floors of empty wagons and bounced out and onto the tracks. This would accumulate and required periodic vacuuming out from under the building.
The O gauge used relatively large pieces of coal, maybe 3-4mm across being the smallest size, but not only would that need to be scaled down but the sort of coal coming out of the real Disposal Point was small stuff, for use in power stations and the like. If I crushed it to anything near scale I think it would end up causing a lot of mess and dust. There's also the trouble of building a working loader, so now I will use fixed coal loads that can be dropped in and taken out of the wagons by the hand of god.
I already load scrap loads on my scrapyard layout in the same way and it's not an exhibition layout. The only people to please are myself and friends who come over to operate the layouts, so this is the way it will go.
Rough idea of how the buildings will be set up, based on British Oak.
I have started to ballast the tracks and to fill the yard with cover. There will be a loader for lorries on the low-relief building at the rear. Lorries would come in a the far side of the rail loader, cross the tracks and run back along the near side of the loader.
The crossing.
Black Milliput smoothed and die cast lorries have been pushed along to leave tyre tracks. The flangeways were then cleared by pushing an ancient Triang wagon and a Lima stone hopper through them. Their pizza cutter flanges ought to push the Milliput further down than the depth of the flanges on anything that will run on here for real. I'll find out, tomorrow, when it's all hardened and I attempt to run a loco and wagons up the sidings.
Looking at how things are facing the other way, toward Blacker Lane.
There has been a small change of plan regarding the loader/screens. I was going to have a working loader - i.e. fill wagons with real loose coal, but this idea has now been dropped. It was going to be far too much trouble. I did it in O gauge and it worked well, if a little messy due to spillage. The spillage was mostly down to operator error but there was always a small about caused when the first coals hit the floors of empty wagons and bounced out and onto the tracks. This would accumulate and required periodic vacuuming out from under the building.
The O gauge used relatively large pieces of coal, maybe 3-4mm across being the smallest size, but not only would that need to be scaled down but the sort of coal coming out of the real Disposal Point was small stuff, for use in power stations and the like. If I crushed it to anything near scale I think it would end up causing a lot of mess and dust. There's also the trouble of building a working loader, so now I will use fixed coal loads that can be dropped in and taken out of the wagons by the hand of god.
I already load scrap loads on my scrapyard layout in the same way and it's not an exhibition layout. The only people to please are myself and friends who come over to operate the layouts, so this is the way it will go.
Rough idea of how the buildings will be set up, based on British Oak.
I have started to ballast the tracks and to fill the yard with cover. There will be a loader for lorries on the low-relief building at the rear. Lorries would come in a the far side of the rail loader, cross the tracks and run back along the near side of the loader.
The crossing.
Black Milliput smoothed and die cast lorries have been pushed along to leave tyre tracks. The flangeways were then cleared by pushing an ancient Triang wagon and a Lima stone hopper through them. Their pizza cutter flanges ought to push the Milliput further down than the depth of the flanges on anything that will run on here for real. I'll find out, tomorrow, when it's all hardened and I attempt to run a loco and wagons up the sidings.
Looking at how things are facing the other way, toward Blacker Lane.
Dave
Western Thunderer
Lots done over the weekend and today.
I made a ladder and safety cage to go on the side of the building. The ladder is a slimmed-down Plastruct item and the safety loops were made from Plastikard, on the pantograph.
At that point I just had to add some uprights between the horizontal rails on the landing.
All done, windows masked off and the entire thing was given a blast of etch primer.
And then I made a start on the final building.
That's going to be half-relief and will act as a backscene. The opening on the right is for lorries that come in from the outlying opencast sites to tip their loads. There will be a conveyor connecting the two buildings.
I made a ladder and safety cage to go on the side of the building. The ladder is a slimmed-down Plastruct item and the safety loops were made from Plastikard, on the pantograph.
At that point I just had to add some uprights between the horizontal rails on the landing.
All done, windows masked off and the entire thing was given a blast of etch primer.
And then I made a start on the final building.
That's going to be half-relief and will act as a backscene. The opening on the right is for lorries that come in from the outlying opencast sites to tip their loads. There will be a conveyor connecting the two buildings.
Dave
Western Thunderer
It's mirrored plasticard, so is much easier to cut to fit than a proper glass mirror. The opening on the right, which is supposed to be where lorries coming in from outlying opencast sites tip their loads, also has it but I gave a light spray of matt varnish just to reflect the light and give the impression of it being a through route. There will be a small transport office to the right of the screens.
I also need to make a conveyor to connect the screens to the loader. Once these buildings are done the only major build remaining is one of Hargreaves' coal barges for the canal staithe.
Then it will be the planting of lots of trees. The roughly painted trees in the screens area will have model trees in front and are an attempt to give some background to the model trees. I want it to look like the edge of a wood and not a row of trees on a ridge.
That really does look entirely convincing. Fantastic.
cmax
Western Thunderer
That’s a brilliant photograph, I had to look twice, thought it was real.
Rob R
Western Thunderer
Again, another cracking little 4mm layout where the actual 'gauge' matters not one jot.
50002 (Superb)
David Waite
Western Thunderer
Absolutely wonderful
It looks like it’s the start of a real working day.
David.
It looks like it’s the start of a real working day.
David.
Dave
Western Thunderer
This week I have been mostly making coal loads.
Rectangles of card, supported on smaller rectangles of card. Scrunched up kitchen roll that I had used for wiping brushes. Crushed coal and superglue.
There was a towed vibratory roller at British Oak that was parked up near the screens, along with a towed air compressor. I bought this old Corgi diecast from my local model shop for just £2. I was going to use just the roller and its frame but decided to do something with the complete model.
The pivot point was moved to bring the roller nearer the body and the wheels were swapped for some nicer ones. The half relief cast exhaust was filed off, too.
A repaint later and it looks OK but I haven't got around to making a new exhaust yet.
And now that I've got loads to put in the wagons, I've been playing with the trainset.
Rectangles of card, supported on smaller rectangles of card. Scrunched up kitchen roll that I had used for wiping brushes. Crushed coal and superglue.
There was a towed vibratory roller at British Oak that was parked up near the screens, along with a towed air compressor. I bought this old Corgi diecast from my local model shop for just £2. I was going to use just the roller and its frame but decided to do something with the complete model.
The pivot point was moved to bring the roller nearer the body and the wheels were swapped for some nicer ones. The half relief cast exhaust was filed off, too.
A repaint later and it looks OK but I haven't got around to making a new exhaust yet.
And now that I've got loads to put in the wagons, I've been playing with the trainset.
Dave
Western Thunderer
The weekend's project was to re-weather an Oxford diecast AEC dump truck. It was bought back in June, in Wimpey orange livery, and I gave it a little weathering but it's bugged me that the orange doesn't match the Pepper/Hargreaves orange and also that it was way too clean for something hauling pit waste, so I had another go at it.
Before.
After.
Before.
After.
I really had to look twice at the photo of the lorry under the bridge. Obviously, that’s a photo of the real thing you have put in for comparison.
A really impressive and interesting layout.