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OO in a New Zealand Garden.


markgd
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Good evening from Woodend just north of Christchurch in New Zealand. 

Like some of you it would seem I am coming into this after many years away from the hobby. family, job and so forth are the usual reasons that it has been a while. Growing up in the 60s, 70s and some of the 80s in the UK I had loft layouts and 6x4s in the garage and now it is time to tackle a garden layout. Mainly because I have no space indoors but plenty outside. None of my old stock remains. Goodness knows where it all went. 25 years ago my wife bought me the Lancashire Witch 4-6-0 LMS loco made by Wrenn. It has sat in its original box for all that time. We moved from Shaftesbury to New Zealand, back to Trowbridge after a nasty earthquake here and finally back to New Zealand. I now have space to play with. However I have the following initial challenges.

1. My wife thinks my idea of a garden railway is idiotic. Your'e 57 she said. It better not spoil the look of my garden she said. O.o

2. I work on a cruise ship so I am away for long spells. But then I am home for long spells too. I have downloaded youtube videos galore to see me through until I return to inspire me when I can't get internet. 

3. I need to get the Lancashire Witch up and running in the New Zealand sunshine. I also have my sons very old Thomas set somewhere in the loft and the old mainline Jinty in bits in a bag somewhere. Thats it. Oh, I also have a picture in my head. One of my sons is a dab hand at modelling those wargaming characters and is on my side!

I thought maybe I could post some pictures of my plot and you could pitch in with some ideas. The trackbed will need to be raised above the ground and I will need some removable sections for access but lets see.

Thank you for this amazing resource. 

Kia Ora

Mark

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Hi Mark and welcome to the forum. Its really good to see some new people on the forum.

As the saying goes, its a small World - I live in Trowbridge and have done so for most of my life. Its always changing - I was recently watching some YouTube videos of the construction of the inner relief road and the the new Tesco - hard to believe there has been so much change.

Anyway, back on topic, welcome again to the forum and keep us happy with lots of photos and updates :)

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Good morning, and thank you.

I guessed that you would have been close to us before we emigrated. Your postcode is the same, BA14. I lived up off the bypass near Hilperton. What a shame I did nothing when I was in the UK.

Anyway. I will get some photos of the intention for phase 1 before I leave for my ship and post them. Hoping that by the time I get home in February I will have construction details ready to start.

Cheers

 

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So here is the idea. Because the trackbed will be raised I am a bit concerned it will be a bit boring "in the air" so to speak. I can't do embankments or cuttings as such so any ideas you may have would be welcome. To give some idea of size the shed is 11 foot by 6 and the phase one track would be around 62 feet by 31 feet.

The bracketed section by the espaliers would be 13 feet long. My main concern is the large section that needs to be removable between the espalier and garden Its going to be about 11 feet long. Not only to be portable but where will I store it!

My thinking is to sink 100 x 100 mm tantalised posts into the ground and concrete them in. I intend using deckboard for the trackbed and will run a stiffener lengthwise beneath them. I will treat the lot with fencing waterproof paint so it blends in with the back fencing. I am going to try and use a laser leveller to get the levels right around the garden.

We don't have roofing felt here so I need to see what I can use to lay the track onto. Whether its direct onto the wood such as in the Dorkingian railway I am not sure yet.

Here is a video of the plot. Any suggestions would be most welcome.

Thanks everyone

Mark

 

Edited by markgd
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Mark,

Looks like a large garden.

 

Questions and ideas:

What about doing a 3 stage layout?

I see that raised garden bed area and it makes me think you could run an oval around that as a starter. I only say this because some of the larger mainline builds can lead to a long time of not running trains and doing smaller stages would lead to having somewhere to run things. 

Or, you could do sort of a dog bone layout with loops/balloons at the ends so that you could simply expand periodically as you go and just shift the loops farther down the lines.

Is your garden entirely level? 

Your building material issues are similar to mine. We don't have the exact same building materials available in the USA as Brits do, and many of the layouts on the forum are in in GB, so I tend to get stuck inventing some of my own processes based on that.

The off the fence cantilever approach seems like a plan for sure. 

Your comments in the video about a double track layout and the roundy roundy effect are worth considering. I've opted to do a fake double mainline on my future railway with two parallel single tracks running side by side , or one super oval. My life is very busy so railway time is limited lately and progress is slow.

Maybe you can bring a model or two with you on your traveling job and mail them to yourself when they are done? No reason not to build a station kit in the spare time. ;) 

I like seeing the old Wrenn loco. I keep eyeing those on the sales sites myself. As you mentioned older large flanges. The only thing to do is get a couple pieces of track and a point and test your oldest deep flange locos on that. I have the same problem. 

Look forward to seeing more of this project. 

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Good morning railway engineers. Its saturday morning here in New Zealand and it will be where you all are soon. The weekend is here. I do hope you all get to build and/or run trains.

Traingeekboy thank you. You make some very good points that I had not considered. 

I looked at a plan to go around the raised veggie bed area. However getting across the front of it where it meets the lawn would mean a removable section of around 17 feet in length for wheel barrow access and the like. Secondly, getting it into the shed without falling foul of laundry on the washing line would be an issue. So I have had to rule that out. There needs to be access to the beehive too. The permanent way tracklayers will need to wear a bee suit when working in the vicinity of that. 

Phase 1 in all honesty will probably end up as phase 1a, 1b and so on. The thought of having phases 1 to 8 was disheartening. I am only kidding myself I know but the art of kidology is amazing!

I like the idea of the dogbone. Brilliant! I will check that out. I need to look at the minimum radii in the garden where the loop would be and the space available to me. I have a formidable gardener to contend with! I have given her a track plan and challenged her to come up with a plant plan. Devious I know but it may work.

The garden is flat all around. I have done a quick survey at night with a laser level that you use on the house to put level lines for shelves and so on. I sat my drill clamped into a B+D workmate, levelled it, sat the laser on a piece of plywood with a screw though the centre and held it in the drill chuck and spun it slowly. Its an 18V cordless drill with a screwdriver setting so spun nice a slowly using an elastic band around the trigger to get a slow speed. Then ran around the garden with bamboo sticks and marked them where the laser shone on them. It works well and that light goes for ever. There is a gentle slope but nothing much. I had thought of a rockery but it would look silly. A pimple on a pancake unless it was a huge rockery. That is out. Refer to the point above.

I am hoping that planting will help 'hide' parts of the line so that the trains are never in view all the time from all the garden. I am hoping that as I progress ideas will pop into my head. Maybe a line of low buxus hedging in places to great natural barriers and so on. I will see what the gardener of the household comes up with. I know she wants more fruits trees in the back part of the garden. The layout will mainly be british outline. However it will run past pomegranate bushes and lime and lemon trees. With a fig too. Dont remember seeing too many of them when travelling on the uk network.

Never thought about taking a kit away to build. Will definitely look into that. I have left it a bit late for this trip as I am away on tuesday. But worth considering for the future. I remember on cargo ships spending a month at sea in the 80s and 90s many people built Revell and Airfix kits. Some were absolutely amazing only to go in the garbage. The end result was not what it was all about to them.

I have had Lancashire Witch for 25 years. She was bought as a birthday present from Hattons in Liverpool by my wife for our fifth wedding anniversary. She has sat in her box all that time. She has probably only ever run for an hour at the most. I think code 100 rail should be fine. Finescale....forget it. I will certainly try her out. She has to run. Even if it is only out and return on a long stretch. She is now sat on a table in the lounge. Every time I see her I get motivated to get out and do something. I have a little notebook full of stuff I have learned from this forum on construction, points, electrics and so on.

I plan to sort the shed out, build the fiddle yard and the back leg as far as the beehive to start with. That will give me something to operate and motivate me.

Roll on February. Cant wait to get back and get stuck in.

cheers

mark

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Now that is inspirational. Love the idea of the portable girder bridge. Noticed that one loco was Port Line. That is the steamship company I started my career with. Small world.

Also now thinking whether I need double track all the way round. Just have passing loops at a station instead. Now I am thinking! Is he on this forum at all? Would love to pick his brains.

cheers

mark

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  • 1 month later...

As I am away from home my posts in this area of the forum have stalled. I have seen some lovely shots of cab views on some mighty impressive layouts. I unfortunately do not have a layout yet. Hope springs eternal. I do however have my own equivalent of a cab view. Not from a train but from the bridge of a cruise ship. So, in the interests of keeping my own small corner of this forum alive here is a video of me taking my ship into Milford Sound in New Zealand. If you squint you could pretend its a cab view and is vaguely related to garden railways.

 

 

 

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  • 1 month later...

I am finally back home. But only until April 8th when I have to leave again to do a search and rescue course in Reykjavik then a week in the UK with family before joining the ship in Barcelona. It will mean that I can visit a good model shop in the UK to stock up on essentials and maybe a little treat for myself. Track and stock is so much cheaper in the UK than here in NZ. I will stock up whilst there. Any recommendations for a good model shop near west kirby on the Wirral? Thats where I will be staying for a week.

In the meantime the urge to get into the garden to start construction is put on hold as Cyclone Gita tracks across the south island of New Zealand. Just my luck. The rain is stonking down. Originally fromTrowbridge, I am used to rain. This is rain with attitude. New water features are appearing in the garden. Thats ok. I know where the puddles are forming so I can take that into account when track laying. Now I have to think of a name for the railway. Construction is imminent.

cheers

mark

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Hi Mark, good to hear you are home at last, sadly you have to ship out so soon,where is Reykjavik, and a holiday with your family while in England, Reykjavik mustn't be far form England then, Hutton's be a good start, not sure what city they are in.

Why not send Mick a message and you could arrange to visit his garden railway.

Did you see the message I sent you, couldn't find it, haven't got your email on  my lap top, is on the deck top computer, haven't being on it for a couple of days will tomorrow, being busy working on my ship 

which is coming along nicely, looking like a ship's bow  now , I be starting a new post in  Members work bench on scratch building Ro, Ro ships.

That is where we could be getting the rain form tomorrow on , wet for the rest of the week , which we need badly, it has being stinking hot here, 39 degrees under the pergola  was the worse day , most days 37 degrees , much better today 30 degrees, I had dental surgery yesterday, can't do anything for 24 hours, now it's my turn raining.

Look forward to what name you are going to call your layout, our coast has copped wild seas from  Cyclone Gita, we are off for a weeks holiday first week of March down the Gold Coast.

Tony from nice down under keeping on moving ahead

 

 

 

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4 hours ago, aussietmrail said:

Hi Mark, good to hear you are home at last, sadly you have to ship out so soon,where is Reykjavik, and a holiday with your family while in England, Reykjavik mustn't be far form England then, Hutton's be a good start, not sure what city they are in.

If you are thinking of Hattons, Google maps suggest that it is a 35 mile / 47 minute drive from West Kirby to their store at WA8 8FZ , via Runcorn. Your choice whether you go over or under (only 23 miles but 57 minutes) the River Mersey. A good resource is http://www.ukmodelshops.co.uk/  but Hattons would be my first choice despite what others might say.

I've never really thought of Iceland not being far from England but the last few weeks have certainly felt like it!

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7 hours ago, Riddles said:

If you are thinking of Hattons, Google maps suggest that it is a 35 mile / 47 minute drive from West Kirby to their store at WA8 8FZ , via Runcorn. Your choice whether you go over or under (only 23 miles but 57 minutes) the River Mersey. A good resource is http://www.ukmodelshops.co.uk/  but Hattons would be my first choice despite what others might say.

I've never really thought of Iceland not being far from England but the last few weeks have certainly felt like it!

Thanks Riddles. Hattons seems to be the nearest. In fact it is where my wife first bought my Lancashire Witch Wrenn Royal Scot 30 years ago. Itbwill be a trip down memory lane and a good excuse to take my wife to see Hattons again!

 

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I have spent the day getting the lay of the land. Using the trusted method of a bit of garden hose and two plastic bottles, duct tape and water the level of the intended track was marked around the place and also in the garden shed. This now gives me an idea of where to route the track and the height of the baseboard in the shed. It also allowed me to show my wife that her garden would not be 'ruined' by an ugly train track through her herbaceous borders. Construction is imminent. I hope. A short 10 day trip on a motorcycle to the North Island of New Zealand with a group of mates starts tomorrow. Then the first timber will be cut.

cheers

mark

Photo 28-02-18, 17 57 33.jpg

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Hi Mark, wow water level, a pity you didn't take a pic of actually using the water level , I was going to buy a laser level, ended up just buying a string line and line level , be looking forward to seeing pic progress pics of the first post being concreted in pace.

I saw you do a lot of bike touring  does your wife cone as well, New Zealand is the perfect for that, one day we will come for a holiday, probably to fly  to New Zealand than going to the Snowy mountains.

You said Captain on you web page, wow that is your rank then, saw a pic of you uniform , one time there I was thinking of joining the Navy reserve Brisbane the base is at Bulimba Brisbane river to far to travel, ended up joining the army reserve back in the mid 70's 

Have fun on your bike tour, we are going on a weeks holiday Friday week down the Gold Coast .

Tony from down under keeping on moving ahead.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The time has come.....the wood has been bought. Well some of it.image.thumb.png.7d217462199084bc5ab777d2cf29edf9.png

I have bought two 100x100 mm posts to be cut in half to make 4 uprights, some shelving brackets, 100mm wide tanalised decking boards, two sheets of 12mm ply one of which is tanalised and 50x25 battening. Finally two bags of quick set post cement for the uprights. That little lot should build the storage yard baseboards in the shed and the first part of the outside boards which will run along the back edge of the raised vege bed towards my beehive. I intend to use tanalised ply tops for the curves and decking boards for the straights. The decking boards are only 100mm wide. Not quite enough for double track which I am after. Therefore I may cut the boards into blocks 140mm long and mount them on top of a ladder construction linking the uprights. Hope that makes sense. 

Incidentally, here in New Zealand in a place called Taumaranui where you get to drive on a stretch of 145 kms of railway line taken out of service in 2009.

Actually an entrepreneur bought a railway line of our equivalent of network rail called Kiwirail . He bought golf carts, fitted them with railway wheels made out of hard plastic and a kawasaki 400cc motorcycle engine. The result is a guided self drive along sections of railway track complete with tunnels, bridges, the works. Its outstanding. If ever you are in NZ you must try this.image.pngimage.pngimage.thumb.png.cf9f98a8fd8cf4fe68286a70ec5c22e0.png do this.  

Hope the photos come out.

cheers

mark

 

Edited by markgd
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