A new circular layout by the creator of Glen Ogle in 009.

To all the very kind members who have responded to my station cockup, with commiserations and helpful remedy suggestions, I offer my sincere thanks.

The windows do not respond to a Methylated  Spirit wash or any solvent I have to hand, and it is practically impossible to replace them, so we will have to assume that the glazing is a lost cause.

I was quite pleased that the Varnish and Methylated Spirit treatment has improved the overall looks of the model, but the more I look at the finished model in its place on my layout, even if I remove the outside waiting room, which is a relatively easy thing to do, I realise that the concept was wrong in the first place.

Fitted with its back to the backscene, it left far too much platform between the building and the platform edge to look likely, so reluctantly, I have decided to scrap it.

I am investigating a LCUT laser cut model which with the cooperation of the supplier will fit in the curve of the platform and fit in with the LCUT supplied signal box that is already made for the location of the old signal box, which has moved to the other side of the layout, along with the small waiting room.

The new building requires a small corner triangular piece removing at its left hand side, where it meets the back scene, and will lay across the large area of platform, with its right hand back corner finishing near to the signal box, this will create a small courtyard, accessible from the level crossing road for the locals to access it, and look more likely to be the creation of the time the railway was laid down.

I made a paper template of the footprint of the proposed new model as shown below.



This shows the position and the part of the model that requires removing where it impinges onto the back scene , I have sent this picture to Jakub at LCUT and asked if it was possible and I await his email reply.

So that's the state of play for the moment at Knottworthy Magna.
Regards,

BrianT

Is anyone interested in taking the station off my hands?



It will have to be collected, any offer, just email me.



Regards,



BrianT.

I have just been browsing the various forums, as you do when you've nowt better to do,  and I was looking at the exhibition calendar on the 009 website and got a real shock:oops:.



Some where in the back of my mind I thought that the East Midlands Groups exhibition was jangling warning bells.  I normally visit this exhibition because it is reasonably near where I live, and Roger Budd the co-organiser, visits our 009 Yorkshire group meetings near Doncaster occasionally, usually looking for willing modellers prepared to travel to Mansfield with there layout, my last visit was to exhibit Knottworthy, although of course this is an 0/16.5, 7mm narrow gauge layout.



Any way, I must have promised Roger that I would bring my 009 Rabbit layout to the show, now as you all know, I have been engrossed in the Knottworthy alterations since its visit to the Pudsey show with a friend from the 009 group who came along to help me on the day, he jokingly pointed out several disparities in the running of the Knottworthy layout, ie. it had very little operator interest really, hence my acceptance of his critiscm prompting the ongoing alterations now underway to the layout.



I once promised Roger that I would take a layout to the Mansfield show some time ago with Glen Ogle, and had to cry off because of one of my many visits to hospital for something or other, and I subsequently gave the layout away in the, so no one ever did see it in the flesh so to speak.  When I read that Brian Twigg was going to show his UNAMED 009 layout in the pre show blurb on the 009 events page, I was in a real panic.



The layout has languished in my garage for the last four or five years as I worked on Glen Ogle and then Knottworthy, and as such, has suffered from building damage, which I knew about, but I thought I had only to connect the electrics back up so it ran, then sort out the building's and scenery to be able to take it to Mansfield Portland College.

The Rabbit layout was built to please my at the time, very young Grandson, and over a period of time, had many electrical additions to the simple concept of a train bobbing in and out of tunnels as it perambulated around, with many little electrical gimmicks to keep him amused, as you do, if you can, so powering it back up, especially as I have not operated it for a considerable period of time, I suppose was never going to be as simple as I thought.

So I ambled into my garage to do the electrical work in powering it up, and oh boy, did I get a shock:shock:.

Unlike my present work, the rabbit layout is all analogue controlled, with electric points, a working wind mill. working lock gates on the canal, automatic train stop and start from a hidden siding, as one came off scene it released a stored one to replace it, there is also a double auto train stop start from off scene into the station, which when activated, changed the points from the two hidden sidings onto the main circuit and then off the main circuit and into the station bay platform, and automatic colour light signals everywhere.:roll:

The control panel is a pull out slide drawer on the front of the layout with lots of LED's, outlining the track diagram, point switches, section switches and gismo control switches, all connected with multicore cables to allow the drawer to slide in and out of its hidey hole.

The electric for all this was fed to the base board via an eight way Din plug and socket, from a home made power source with triple transformers, rectifiers and CDU capacitors, for the various voltages, and AC or DC as required at various voltages.

This power source has been altered, probably for Glen Ogle in its early build days, when that too was going to be analogue, and is no longer exactly as required for the rabbit layout, and I am puzzled why I used an eight way DIN plug, as potentially, only six wires would have been required from the triple power source enclosed.

So I have to check the wiring to find out what does what, and as usual, most of the  the wiring is under the base board except for the relays, timing module and some other bits which are accessible as they are mounted on the layouts back scene board, the base board is only 4' x 2' (1220 x 600mm) so is not particularly heavy, I had a quick peak underneath to see what's what, shuddered and lowered it to its trestle stand.

There is a lot of work involved in wire tracing and power supply modifications required before the first train is able to run on the layout, and that is without all the scenery repairs to do.:hmm  WHOOPEE, I've got four weeks to the show, any help would be appreciated.

Onward and upwards as they say.

Regards

BrianT.

  

Clear sheeting for Windows that has been given a coat of matt or semi varnish can usually be brought back to almost transparent with a coat of gloss.

I rather liked the grey weathering, must be a cement works close by.

Nigel

As you can appreciate now, Knottworthy Magna is on the back burner while I try to sort out the newly named "Burrowby Underhill" for the 009 show at Mansfield in July.

If you want to follow my agonies with Burrowby, I will start a new thread so named.

Regards,

BrianT.