Ox Mountain Railway

[trammayo]

Don't normally get much chance to use the garden line but, since the reorganisation of my shed, I can now test trains whenever the occassion befits.

The Leeds Steam tram and trailer hasn't had an airing for years and the assorted LGB maintenance stock has never run on this line before...

 

[yb281]

That Leeds steam tram and trailer is very special Mick - love it.

 

[trammayo]

Cheers Mel. It needed a little TLC - steps and brake staff on trailer needed regluing and the engine is unfinished (after six years!). Needs condenser pipes on roof. One day .... ?

 

[Gizzy]

Like the Leeds tram Mick....

 

[beavercreek]

Nice...very nice. Like your line Mick

 

[Shawn]

Awsome. Lets see more of the RR. Layout looks great.

 

[trammayo]

Thanks for your comments guys. I took loads of pics as I built it, then rebuilt, then extended it etc, etc. Some might be boring as I thought of starting at the beginning.

The site for the line is in front of the old cow shed (now workshop). The small yard was a real mess to start with and the pics show the remnants of a 20 ton sand pile ..



And some of the first phase. The line is built from old concrete blocks, rubble and shuttered concrete ..

 

[trammayo]

Tons of unwanted stones from the veg patch went into it as well as part of an old oil drum to form the mountain ...

The line as built, was single track with a long passing loop on the viaduct and the oval was bisected by a line allowing locos and stock to be turned. The controls are in the "freight depot" - the roof lifts off and the back slides out pf the way. The triangular junction was the downfall of the 5amp controller when I forgot to change the polarity. In my defence (honest) it was intended to be a tramway with positive overhead and negative track but the plans changed before the first stage was completed!

 

[beavercreek]

That is not going to blow away in a hurry!

Good set of piccies Mick.
I have not used any concrete anywhere but have had moments where I wished that I had as the clay ground under my layout swells and contracts. Even with posts driven deep into the ground the movement affects the lie of the track.
I do tell a little lie though....the quarry section is actually on a concrete base that I had already 'landscaped' with slate rocks, small stones and scree. The track is just 'laid' on top of slate scree and then ballasted with more scree with only track ties keeping it all together...funnily it has been the best behaved part of the layout!

Before the layout was even a gleam in my eye the, what was to be, quarry section was 'landscaped' on top of a concreted slab area between the wall

Track was just laid on top of the scree and some buildings added

More buildings and detailing added

Because of the concrete everything is very stable...unlike the rest of the layout. Your layout will be around for a long time Mick....maybe it will be an archaelogical site hundreds of years in the future

 

[trammayo]

Hi Mike - your buildings (and, indeed, your whole line) are something to envy - I really need to get on with things. Trouble is, getting the blue styrofoam is virtually impossible, lightweight blocks are as rare as the proverbial rocking horse ****, so its either wood, plastic or comcrete. Now concrete out here has a certain ubiquity - 99.9999999% of all structures are concrete! "A better house is concrete built" is the slogan - don't you believe it!

My line is not screwed down apart from on the trestles so is free to expand or contract.

When I get time I'll post Phase 2 (doubling the line) and then Phase 3.

 

[trammayo]

So, Phase Two. There were several limitations to a single track layout so I decided to double the track. This required more concrete and a little bit of realignment. It also meant no more polarity problems as the triangular junction fed the "up" and "down" lines. Also, at the opposite end of this connecting line I effected another triangular junction.

A second tunnel (slightly longer put parallel to the original) was made using polystyrene (ex-packing on fridge) to support the concrete "roof. The mountain was also slowly growing as more stone was gleaned from around and about. Mayo is not short of stone!

 

[trammayo]

Final three pics of Phase 2 ...

The Y points and the crossing are homemade.

 

[trammayo]

Phase Three came about from a desire to Cram more line into the given space. The crude trestles are made from treated scrap (pallet) wood knocked into the ground and nailed up as it progressed. The incline is aprox 1 in 30: .... The pics are in no particular order (can't tell what they are when posting since I moved from drive C to another partition)..

 

[mbiff]

like it - very nice

 

[trammayo]

and some more...

 

[beavercreek]

Excellent Mick
An Interesting layout design and execution!

 

[Andy Worsfold]

Wow! Realy love your trestles.

 

[trammayo]

Thanks for your comments eveybody. Personally, if I was starting now, I'd do it differently after seeing other people's lines. However, hindsight isn't half as good as foresight. The line is landlocked and I need to escape! I have plans to extend and, a few weeks ago I experimented with how I'd get out! I've been collecting track for a year or two and have had some bargains. So I photographed my messing about (so I wouldn't forget) using what I had to hand ..

 

[trammayo]

The drive is 10ft wide so, ideally, the bridge will need to be around 11ft long. Then there would have to be a 2ft lift out section across the path. The only permanent section would be between the two bridges! Once across the front of the garage I would have a 50ft straight run with a run-round loop giving about 100ft on the straight and around 30 ft on the bridges etc.

Looking towards the tunnels (previous posting), the 2nd track from the left would go and the curve on tp the trestle would be eased.

So, I've a lot of R1's to straighten out!

 

[trammayo]

I haven't been able to make a start on the new bridges yet (the Builders Supplier didn't have the angle in stock) but I recently acquired a Aristo Switcher to join the roster. I had a spare slope-back tender to marry up to it but loco had the Santa Fe road name whilst the tender was "Rio Grande". Anyway a bit of messing around and I printed some new names for the loco. They look worse in the pic than what they really are (says he!).

It also suffered some transit damage - for which the ebay vendor compensated me for - but I found additional (pre-sale) damage to the crankpin for the valvegear. It had one face of the "square" chipped off which made the crank rather loose. After a little head scratching (no splinters) I shimmed it. After several hours of testing it is still OK.

I found the loco a bit of a galloper and, with power turned down, the tender sound was poor or non-existant. I was impressed with the smoke - came out in sharp puffs blowing it several inches vertically.

So heres a few pics..