First stage of developing the new layout

G'day all,

It has taken some research, but slowly momentum is gathering for my new layout based on the Callington Branch. I had anticipated that this now long gone branch would have been easy to model and info on the branch easy to collect… Not as easy as I thought. I'm still scouring websites, books, multiple forums, Record Departments etc, for the simple things like station building design/measurements. Regardless, I will still press on.

Below is a sketch of the original Callington track plan, simple with plenty of the usual railway ammenities, signal boxes, goods shed, engine shed, covered station/platform, associated railway customers.


Next pic shows what I have removed in 'red' to fit the boards I will model on. The 'blue' shows where I have extended to allow for more flexibility. For example, the cattle dock siding will be moved from the original position to the 'blue' extension just below.


Here is a split pic of the layout template. This is laid out on cardboard, slightly smaller than the actual size of the real baseboards. The baseboards will measure 510 x 3020mm.  I should be able to capture all the necessary items from the original track plan. As can be seen, Callington has a nice curved platform. It will be long enough so that an N, Q, Schools or T9 plus three coaches can occupy it. The siding beside it will comfortably hold 3 coaches, or a three car DMU. I have a 3 way point shown below the platform road & siding, which will may be changed or perhaps slew the two current sidings downwards to allow more modelling room. This will be figured out when placing the real track. All points are contained on each board and will be powered using Peco motors as I have 10 or 12 lying around.




The red line idicates where the boards join. The top half being the station end and the lower half the entrance to the associated sidings/loop line. I think I will swap the 3 way point entering yard with the point leading to the engine shed, which means moving the point at the very top slightly left.   

I have approximately 30+ points left over (medium, curved & small Ys etc) from a previous layout, all insulfrog. I'm still tossing up whether I go DCC or keep it the old tried and tested way, analogue. Maybe you can help me decide ! Is 'insulfrog' ok to use on DCC ? Most DCC layouts I see use electrfrog, hmmm ??

At the moment, I will build a fiddle yard at the end of the layout that will be 'universal'. I intend to build another section of the branch, either Gunnislake or Calstock (minus the viaduct), in good time. This will be stage two and I would want to use the fiddle yard off the end of that extension.

Scratchbuilding the ground frames, goods shed, station and canopy will be started soon. Currently I have slightly oversized cardboard mock-ups to guage space and placement.

Cheers,

Gary.

Gary re your question …. Is 'insulfrog' ok to use on DCC ?

the answer is yes, IanSA & I think Max, uses them extensively & I use Insulfrog slip.

An updated track plan of Callington using Anyrail (freebie download).




You can probably guess what the initials are, but I'll go through them..

GS - Goods Shed        CD - Cattle Dock       GF - Ground Frame      PP - Private Providor     ES - Engine Shed

CS - Coaling Stage       W - Water      PS1, 2, & 3 - Private Sidings      Ref - Refuge Siding

Ofcourse going off my hand drawn version above, this just gives a better view of project. Just a pity the station platform doesn't conform with the track… But it does give a clearer picture and it is to scale. Note that not all of the station platform will be modelled, as long as I can have the building and overall roof, I'll be happy. The goods shed/cattle dock siding may slew towards the top a little more to allow some more modelling room between the engine shed and private providors store.

Cheers, Gary.

Gary, I have scoured my book collection and have found references to Callington, with some photos, in the following books:

Railways of Arcadia by John Scott-Morgan; All Change by Paul Atterbury; Southern Sheds by Hawkins & Reeve; The Colonel Stephens Railways by John Scott-Morgan.

Let me know if you want further details as to what these books contain.

I suppose you know that Colonel Stephens was the engineer for this branch and that the station buildings appear to follow his standard design for his light railways (although I haven't come across a photo of the front of Callington).

Terry

The layout plan looks good Gary. I was looking at the set up for the station and was wondering how your trains would operate? It would be OK for DMUs, which just reverse out, but loco pulled trains would either need to reverse out of the station too, or uncouple and a second loco is then used for the outgoing train. One option would be another pair of points at the terminus end of the station to create a run around (or even shift the existing cross over (by GF on your plan) much closer to the end of the track), although you may not have space for that in the station.

On your much earlier question on insulfrog points, they are fine with DCC, however, if you have a DCC loco in a spur and the point is change against the spur, power is cut and the DCC loco loses lights, sound etc and of course cannot move. So to solve this you need to power up every spur, which is done by putting dropper wires on each area that will lose power when the points are changed, connect this to the main DCC power bus and then the whole layout remains live all the time.

Bob

Hi Bob,

One of the interesting operations at Callington was to pull the train out of the platform road, release the loco, run around the loop and push the train back into the platform. This just adds another dimension to the shunting duties involved.  Initially I was looking for a small BLT to model and after watching videos on Youtube, Callington grabbed my attention. One good thing about modelling Callington is that there is no need for a turntable ! This layout plan will be stage 1 of the layout with modules to be built in the future, which include either Calstock or Gunnislake.

Cheers, Gary.

G'day all,

Just a short update on Callington. I am now ready to construct my base boards, now I have my frraming timbers. I have cork (thanks Sol), track- points & flexi, point motors, wire, solder and now only waiting on alignment dowels from the UK, an NCE Powercab and bus suppressors from DCC Concepts. I'm almost ready to roll, (no pun intended ), So, not long now before it all gets underway !

                                                                      :Happy:Happy:Happy

Cheers, Gary.

G'day again,

Well all my bit's n pieces have arrived this week.  Have all my track,  point motors, wiring, cork, controller, solder etc. So, once I get some time to spare, I guess I'll have to make a start. Once it all starts to take shape, I'll start another thread in 'personel layouts'.




Cheers, Gary.

Looking good Gary, now the fun part begins.

Look forward to following you progress

Kim