Simon's workbench

Simon

Flying Squad
In a fit of distraction that has at times approached motivation, I have made up two of the four pairs of windows required for my 1/32 signalbox for the as yet un-named thing in the garden.

It is an LSWR type but will have a pitched roof, very much based upon Moorewood on the S&D line. I started it all some years ago, needless to say:rolleyes:

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I am going to try and plod on with the next pair, pretty much identical to these two for the side wall windows, time for a tea first though....

Using up lots of bits of Plastikard offcuts from the past....
 

michael mott

Western Thunderer
Looks great Simon, I'm glad I'm not the only one who eventually gets round to old projects. I have a question regarding the windows, did you cut out the section with the curved top rails from a sheet or are they fabricated from 6 strips? and what thickness are they?

Michael
 

Simon

Flying Squad
They are cut out of a single sheet of 20 thou, I have a "master" I laboriously out out of something much thicker ages ago, and I mark lines on the 20 thou from that, then score along the lines, cut diagonals across each pane and then bend them out, cleaning up with knife and files. They are actually quite rough, especially the top curves, but seem to work. The trick is to make them all the same size.

It's a bit tedious to say the least!

I have just marked another one out....
 

Simon

Flying Squad
Well out of character here, doing more or less methodical, nearly killing me....

Cutting out marked up window, "pattern" above

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Four of the blighters cut out, hour and a half including cleaning up...

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This is where they are going.

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Making up the paired frames, in reality one window slides behind the other.

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Looks like I might get there.....
 

David B

Western Thunderer
Never mind the gorgeous signal box - there’s that lovely GRCW single unit DMU cab again. I hope it’s pushing its raspy-exhausted way to the front of the workbench at last. ( The signal box looks superb though!).
 

Simon

Flying Squad
The side windows are happily what I was doing Chris (it confused me too) so today I have had a bash at putting the window assemblies into the main structure.

Not helped by my inexplicably having made both of the "side openings" too wide by some margin, so quite some while first had to be spent extending the wall on each end of the main structure - how did I manage to get that wrong?!

One end is better than the other, but I'm fairly confident that more filler and bodgery will sort it out in due course.

I then put the window assemblies in, which was a much more rewarding and even satisfying activity, it all now looks quite signal box like!

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Maybe I'll make a door next, the window in the rear wall ought to come out really, I "added" it as on the previous garden railway the "Bude Branch" approached the box from behind. I can't immediately think of a reason for the box in its new setting having such a window, I'll try and cook one up as I quite like it as it is.
 

Simon

Flying Squad
Thank you Giles!

I have plodded on a bit more, the locking room now has its window,

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and a door.

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This is more or less what I am aiming to create, Moorewood box on the S&D, which I have always thought a very attractive structure. The picture was taken by Colin Caddy and appears on page 130 of "Signal Boxes of the London & South Western Railway A Study of Architectural Style" by the late George Pryer. Oakwood Press, 2000. One of my favourite books!

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I still haven't got a name for the place where "my" box is yet.
 

Neil

Western Thunderer
... the window in the rear wall ought to come out really, I "added" it as on the previous garden railway the "Bude Branch" approached the box from behind. I can't immediately think of a reason for the box in its new setting having such a window, I'll try and cook one up as I quite like it as it is.

A bit far from one of the S&Ds, but Whitby's Bog Hall Box sports a rear window to give a good view of the road approach to the crossing.
 

Pencarrow

Western Thunderer
Excellent work Simon, looks just the part. Iirc the lever frame and associated equipment are located on the rear wall of these type of boxes. Would there be space for a window?
 

Simon

Flying Squad
Excellent work Simon, looks just the part. Iirc the lever frame and associated equipment are located on the rear wall of these type of boxes. Would there be space for a window?

Thank you very much Chris, and you're quite right, the frame is set "back to traffic".

Of course, if they fitted a smaller frame into a bigger box them they could leave space for a window alongside, but there would need to have been a compelling reason for them to have done that, hmmm.

I would like a level crossing, but don't think I can work one in next to the box.

Ironically, I made my model bigger than Moorewood as the setting on the old line was a "moderately complicated" junction, as opposed to my current "very simple" junction.

All of which goes to prove that you can think about this stuff too much, or possibly not.

To which end I currently fall asleep imaging spurious connections from the Central Cornwall Railway to the Redruth and Chacewater, my conceit being that the Central Cornwall got built early enough (1840s) to retain the packet traffic at Falmouth, and was broadly and thereafter in the "Southern Camp".

On which basis my garden thing is set on the line north of the terminus at Greenbank, most likely in and around Devoran. It is not quite inconceivably daft that it represents a north facing junction connecting the Central Cornwall main line to the erstwhile "Broad Gauge Camp" in the region around Redruth via a linking line which was built along the route of the Redruth and Chacewater.

The reason for this link is that some bloke called Brunel thereafter built a line westwards to Penzance from a hick place called Plymouth, but it never really "caught on", whereas Falmouth became quite the place.

My quay line is therefore at Devoran. All of which is moderately plausible, although the topography around Devoran isn't much like my garden!!

However, it means that I can still run the "Atlantic Packet Express". I dream of a Spam Can on three coaches heading out of the shed, picking up extra portions at Truro, Bodmin and Okehampton before racing East to Waterloo, all hail the mighty APE!

Which raises the question of what do I name the box and call the whole ghastly confection? "Devoran Junction" or possibly "Redruth Junction" for the box and the small station being "Devoran", or "Devoran Quay"? Or something completely different?

In the meantime I'm still pondering the rear window situation......

Phew!

Simon
 

simond

Western Thunderer
Happy memories of family holidays in Feock as a pre-teen, and subsequently across the river in Trewince when my kids were a similar age…
 
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