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Ludgershall change for Tidworth


TheQ
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It was an interesting decision whether to put this thread in the indoor or outdoor, layout section. Most of the yardage of track will be outdoors but the main layout will be indoors. Anyway the decision was here...

Some years ago I decided I wanted a model railway in the garden. The problem was what size, OO, O , 1,2,3, 7.5 inch.

The final decision was that much of my modelling would be done in the winter as I have other summer interests (truth be told they are all year round at the moment), I wanted a layout, not to be a engineer.

So I Chose... EM.

Well I wanted the layout to be more accurate than OO, but to stay on the track outside (so not P4/S4).

The next decision was of where, I knew I wanted it to be of somewhere not an imaginary place. It quickly came down to 3 choices.

A planned and started, but not completed, line that would have run from Mundesley on the coast of North Norfolk to Great Yarmouth Beach station, This if it had been built would have run past my house..

The Scottish Railway Preservation Society (I'm I life member) Site at Bo'ness and it's line to Manual Junction, this Line has many attractions, starting from a harbour on the coast, running through an old mine (brother in law worked there) up a steep incline turning inland through a cutting, then across rolling countryside a viaduct then up to Manual junction. I helped build the station and was part of the early track laying gangs.

And Finally Ludgershall, For those who don't know this is the Ludgershall in Wiltshire on the Hampshire border.

If you're ex army you've probably been there or through it on the way to Tidworth, and pre 1958 By train to Tidworth.

Why?

My Grandfather (Mothers side) was the ganger there.

MY Grandfather (father side) Was in the Royal Tank Corp / Regiment (1919-1953) becoming an RSM, he loaded tanks there, he also.

Married My Grandmother there, She Was the Daughter of one of the local coal merchants, who had coal wagons on the rails and roads.

One of the sons (my great Uncle) of the original Coal merchant was a navi on the branch to Tidworth (1904 ish),( that branch of the family arrived with the railway in the early 1880s)

My uncle worked at the tank repair depot.

Another uncle was the village Bobby (police not signalman)

My father worked at the medical depot .

there are more connections but....

There are so many connections with Ludgershall there couldn't be any other place to model.

More about the railway itself soon....

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Negotiations

In order to get shed building higher up the list of to do items, I mentioned to SWMBO that She could use one end of the shed as her art studio and store some of her art stuff under the layout,. That end is a big semi-circle to return the track back down the other end which will be my workshop. The Suggestion worked!!

I had started accumulating EM/OO stock and making bits of station. Internal to the shed, the line is to be uncompressed model of Ludgershall, you just won’t get that huge windswept look if you compress it, this is where I had the first problem, Unfortunately when I calculated the station size it’s 34ft long and even with a slight bend to the Tidworth Branch 12ft wide!! Sometimes I wish I had chosen N Gauge or even T gauge!!

So having drawn up some plans the Shed comes out at 54ft long and 12ft wide,!!

Ludgershall station Map, http://www.swindonsotherrailway.co.uk/ds24a.jpg

The opposite side in the shed to Ludgershall will be Colllingbourne Ducis a much smaller long thin station, the next station to the north of Ludgershall, near where my mother was born.

Collingbourne Ducis Map: http://www.swindonsotherrailway.co.uk/ds23a.jpg

I had always planned to run the line outside, we have recently decided on the plans for that part of the garden which we are dividing into sections. So the track will run out of the shed at the curved end turn right on top of a wall and then describe a “P” shape running back to the shed on the same wall, total length around 200Ft. SWMBO does not know (yet) that in the area of the loop of the “P” I’m planning to model Weyhill, which is the next station south of Ludgershall.

Weyhill Map: http://www.swindonsotherrailway.co.uk/ds25a.jpg

Next to come, some photos of the shed, and the area for the line out side

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I Think T gauge would be lost in my garden, Nice series landrover yours? I've an early 110 but not ex fire service. The RAF sent me to be a fireman during the first firemans strike on Green goddesses... on the Edge of London, Very busy it was. At the Small RAF stations I was on we (electronic technicians) were also standby firemen with a Coventry climax fire pump on a trailer or built into the back of the landrover.

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Yep, the landy was mine - amongst other daft things Ive done in life, I part exchanged it for a Bedford TJ water tender, which was a wreck....

1973 series 3, ex Blandford, Dorset - lovely vehicle, if a bit quirky. Fire engines are another of my interests and, funnily enough, plenty of people who are into them, are into railways too! One day I will get another one.

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If you go on a landrover web site such as landyzone, some one will probably know what happened to the rangies if you know the reg number. 6wheel rangies and defenders are quiet sought after, and probable go very with out all the fire gear. Remember to introduce yourself in the newbies section first, get get quite stroppy about that.

Working inside the railway shed yesterday I had an idea about attaching track to base outside especially on thermallite block.

Clear fibreglass resin, it's UV safe provides a waterproof surface, you can put ballast into it. There is a "rubberising" additive which may make it more flexible if you need it.

Another possiblity is to use, roll fibreglass tape maybe 6 inches wide as a trackbed before ballast resin'd on top of your blocks/ decking providing a more unified waterproof surface. I'll do some experiments but it may take a month or two.

I've used fibre glass for years in boat building and repairs and use CFS fibreglass supplies as my supplier always prompt (from cornwall to norfolk!!) and cheap.

Ah well Hamilton didn't get pole at Japan after kviyat rolled his car, back to the railway.

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The Shed

In the foot of our ”L” shaped garden is a mobile home put there in the 1980s when the previous owners had the house reroofed and other major work carried out. To hide the large size of the shed, part of it is hidden behind the “blank” end of the of the Mobile home which faces east ish. This leaves 34ft sticking out. We are using the mobile home, railway shed, and some walls and hedging to form a courtyard area to sit out in and watch the trains go by on the walls.

10 years ago the initial shed was a 20ft By 10Ft commercial shed, this went up easily with all the windows facing roughly south- east and the doors facing south-west . I’ve assembled the two halves with a 3ft offset following the line of a hedge. The only problem we had was rats trying to eat their way through the floor, before the roof was on!! (They had just cut the cornfield that surrounds us).

The Initial shed became the workshop for assembling the rest of the shed. We recently had double glazing fitted to the main house and kept the old sash windows giving us 16 tops and bottoms. The fourteen best were used as windows in the new shed. I built 3 foot wide sections each containing a window (7ft tall) and insulation, and then some blank panels. These were assembled on top of a continuous breeze block wall (1 block above ground level on top of which was a continuous wooden beam to screw the panels into.

IMG_20150923_155739.jpg.b86f3bfaa1b21b7ec228c54f3a114bb4.jpg

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That's a shed?!!!... It's a shed and a half!

We love Norfolk, usually have at least week a year there, these days in a caravan at Bacton. In the past we've had many holidays on the Broads in hired motor cruisers, I'm even a member of the Broads Society.

Good luck with the railway, I'm going to enjoy following your progress.

Ian.

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I was posted to RAF Neatishead in 1977, and away in 1983, it took me until 1999 to afford to buy a house here (but I was still working abroad to pay for it then) I love the Broads too That's why we chose to live here, SWMBO is from Rotherham, So we've been up and down the A1, A17, A47 many, many times!

That photo is taken towards Hickling Broad, but Luckily I'm outside the park area or there would have been problems with planning!

When we first moved here I worked at one of the Bacton Gas sites.

You can see a few thermalite type blocks laying around where I've been using them before.

The Two pillars in front of the shed are to form supports for an added canopy, we've found rain pounding onto the door frame tend to get in round the edges, a wooden building moves, a Solid Glass door doesn't.

I'm working from just to the left of the door towards the right at ground level, with earth removed going into the raised patio area to be. Once I get to level with the first tree, then outdoor railway construction will commence.

The ladder against the wall is because I've been up cleaning the hidden gutters.

The Door is an old double glazed sliding patio door, fitted with two farm gate pivots to make it open conventionally, SWMBO Does some " stained glass effect" with a plastic paint on substance. The four corners of the door will get the GWR Roundel, with MSWJR horizontally between them. A small version of this http://www.swindonsotherrailway.co.uk/barth2.jpg will be painted across at handle level, and the rest of the door will be her interests. Sad to say I know who was responsible for some of the poor state of that sign....

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Thanks for the comments, having a lot of room means a lot of work!!

Here is a badly drawn map of the rough layout, the stations are not marked as I couldn't fit them in on this scale of map. The Shed was a distinct shade of orange when I drew it but the scanner couldn't cope!

(The previous picture was taken from the left hand side towards the right of the drawing, standing in in the loop of the railway.)

I knew I shouldn't have written on it in my scrawl, so here's a translation.

Each small square is approximately 2ft a side

Red box = mobile home

Yellow = decking /patio /paths

Blue = Pool (above ground plastic)

Orange = Railway Shed, I forgot to fill in the entrance way with orange, the white four squares above the entrance is SWMBOs sewing machine (it's a singer about 120Years old!) the white four squares below the entrance is the tea bar / beer fridge.

White = ground level,

Green = outside currently worked area,

Green Right hand side as viewed is hedge then farmers field,

Green Left hand side, hedge then grass

Green Bottom wall for railway then grass / jungle

Green Top grass / jungle then hedge to neighbour

dark blue line, track of railway including branch to Tidworth which crosses over Weird shaped oval.

Ludgershall freight yard will fill the Y formed by the branch and the mainline to with in 6ft of the top of the shed (3 squares), the main station is either side of the leg of the Y almost down to the exit of the track to the outside world.

Collingbourne Station will be a 2ft width running up the left hand side of the shed to the curve of the shed.

layout garden.jpg

 

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Phew! - The attached plan makes it appear a much less daunting task. It's a good idea to have the majority of the layout under cover (just have to look at the weather over the past 3 days) but it's also a great idea to have a long running section outdoors. You'll be able to have enjoyment with the indoor section all year round but there''ll be nothing like seeing the trains running freely outdoors.

Has the outside track been simplified on the plan or will it be just the one looping line out and back? Where do you propose building the viaduct?

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There will be a wall running from where it leave the shed to the yellow path (to cut down the wind from that side), then a bridge over the path, then a viaduct to the left hand start of the loop, the loop will be a mixture of wall and viaduct depending the exact position of Weyhill Station.

It will be twin track to the start of the loop. The return track may yet come in the other side of the semicircular end of the shed depending on some factors I haven't measured yet.

The area Mapped is about 1/5th of the garden, so when this lot is built, other lines and branches may yet be built, but I just want this bit to be up and running first. There is a good chance that an exit will be made to come out of the back of the shed, round the back of the Mobile home and to join the other outside track at the loop, with something in the white area between the pool and the green.

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Bad news ....... disapproving look from SWMBO!

Good news, the look of disapproval was for the newly fitted fridge in the tea bar area.......

I'd filled most of it with cider!!

Today's work more ceiling cladding, fitting the tea bar fridge and the two small others that we inherited with the mobile home. The two small fridges will hold paints and glues that would otherwise evaporate.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Today I had a day off work , so it was more work on the shed, more ceiling cladding. I've cut the pipes at the entrance to the correct height for the canopy. Unloaded from the landrover, 1/2 a ton of sand and the wood for the frame work of the entrance canopy.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well this Saturdays work on the railway shed was tileing the ceiling at the art end, making the roof on the entrance canopy and doing a bit of trim work here and there.

Also I had originally wanted to put a railway style canopy but thought SWMBO wouldn't approve so designed a pitched roof. However when the flat base was fitted to the shed, SWMBO suggested a flat ish roof.!!!. So that is fitted I showed her the traditional planking fascia to platform canopies and she approves!! So I'll be cutting lots of strips of upvc into points.

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You don't know how lucky you are, to actually have SHMBO who shows an interest in what you are doing! There always seems to be something vitally more important that needs my immediate attention or somewhere we have to go straight away as soon as I decide to anything to the layout :(

I often wonder how we have got as much done as we have, even though its taken the best part of 17yrs up to now!

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