A narrow gauge railway between the mines, the sawmill and the explosives factory

Petermac said

Thats nice clean white card Claus - I thought it was styrene when I first saw it.  Is it mount-board ?  I use greyboard for my carcasses but someone gave me a piece of mount board recently and it's a much better product than the grey.

What glue do you use to stick styrene to the card ?

From “Post #288,999”, 16th November 2023, 11:01 PM

Hi Petermac,

It is mount-board and I use 'Boyle Craft Glue' ( 30-60% vinyl acetate polymer, 35-45% ethyl alcohol and 20-30% acetone) for the plastic sidings. It takes a while to dry but eventually it sticks.

Cheers,
Claus

Presumably that's what we'd call "PVA" (polyvinyl acetate) north of the equator plus some odd solvents ……………..

Petermac said

Presumably that's what we'd call "PVA" (polyvinyl acetate) north of the equator plus some odd solvents ……………..

From “Post #289,015”, 18th November 2023, 6:34 PM

Could be, but the glue is colourless. I use white PVA for paper and cardboard.

Cheers,
Claus

Hmm - obviously not the same stuff although PVA does dry clear .....................

I wonder what it would be up here ................presumably it's good stuff otherwise you'd just use PVA or "Tacky Glue".

The walls are up



The corrugated walls are all up. The task took longer than expected, but now the painter can get on with his job.

 

Getting there


With the walls painted, the doors hung and the roof up, the out-buildings at the Big Nugget Mine are almost ready to use. Still to come are barge boards, gutter and downpipes. The blacksmith also needs doors and a window shutter before I can focus on the interior.

Finally finished


The out-buildings at the Big Nugget Mine are all ready to be used. From left to right you will find the door into the dirty change room. After a shift underground the miners will go here and strip off their dirty clothes and hand them over to the caretaker, who resides behind the second door from the left. The caretakers job is to examine the miners' clothes for any hidden gold nugget in the pockets or seams. Hence the nickname 'nit-picker'. After a shower the miners will step over a foot high doorstep into the clean change room behind the third door. Here the miners will put on their clean clothes and get ready to board the train back home.

The building in the middle houses the first aid room and the carbide light room. In the light room the miners' headlamps are refuelled and maintained.

The blacksmith's shop is situated in the building to the right. The blacksmith plays a crucial role by repairing drill steel tips, picks and shovels. The interior of the blacksmith's shop hasn't been done yet, but will consist of a forge, an anvil, trough, tools and of course the blacksmith himself.

How did I come up with this 'story' about the buildings? Well, it is not pure fantasy. The photo below shows similar buildings at the Central Deborah Gold Mine in Bendigo.

Interesting Claus, don't tend to associate Australia with gold mining.


Ed

What happened?

From this:


To this:


in 30 minutes!

I hope the chief engineer has a plan!

 


Ed

Is the Chief Engineer stil thinking about his plan or what ?  They need to put some hazard tape around that sink-hole before someone falls in …………

Petermac said

Is the Chief Engineer stil thinking about his plan or what ?  They need to put some hazard tape around that sink-hole before someone falls in …………

From “Post #289,724”, 21st February 2024, 10:58 PM

Just spoken with the chief engineer. He confirmed he has a plan. First step is to enlarge the sink hole!

Cheers,
Claus

New turntable


The chief engineer has purchased a new turntable for the mining railway. The previous home-build turntable was the right size for the railway but never worked as intended. It couldn't do a full turn, the rails were not centred and the drive was unreliable. After 18 months of trial and error the time has come to scrap the little turntable. Instead a larger turntable of the brand 'Peco' has been installed. The new turntable appears too big for such a small mining railway, but the size is also an improvement. As seen, the small shunter and a wagon fit the turntable, which gives more opportunities for sidings and shunting. The tracks to and from the turntable still have to be fixed. The old turntable will still be a feature. With the high number of hours spent on it, I can't throw it in the bin.

It's certainly bigger.


Ed

there are some modifications you can do to the PECO turntable to improve it's operation.
There was an article in the N Gauge Journal that I have paraphrased in my layout thread. Trevor (Chinahand) pointed it out to me on his layout thread.
If you need me to find exactly where it is…. let me know.

 

Marty said

there are some modifications you can do to the PECO turntable to improve it's operation.
There was an article in the N Gauge Journal that I have paraphrased in my layout thread. Trevor (Chinahand) pointed it out to me on his layout thread.
If you need me to find exactly where it is…. let me know.

 

From “Post #289,766”, 26th February 2024, 2:40 PM

Thank you, Marty. The Peco turntable seems to work fine. The drive is a hand operated worm gear, which just needs some fine tuning. I will operate the narrow gauge railway in an old-fashioned mode with points switched by wire-in-tube. The points at the tramways are all electric eventually.

PS: I have to modify the handrails on the bridge of the turntable. They are too close to the rails.

Tracks down



The tracks surrounding the turntable are down with a few adjustment still to come. The longer turntable allows for two extra lengths of track with can be used to store one wagon each. The old turntable are stored for future scrapping, which of course will not really take place.

PS: I may need some help and advice from Marty. The turntable is not turning as free as expected.

Labor Day







Living up to the name of the day and staying out of the heat (high 30's) I have be labouring on a new shed for the narrow gauge railway. The photos show the result of today's effort.

Hi Claus,

Have read from here… N Gauge - Newcastle Emlyn**** - Your Model Railway

I do have the N gauge society magazine article somewhere…. but I have just moved house…. it will surface eventually… but you should solve the problem with the photos in the page above before I find the magazine.

Note that there is a photo of the underside of my turntable a couple of posts below the linked post above.

Let me know if you need more.