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Bury St. Edmunds Model Railway Club
The ad hoc BSEMRC Newsletter
Issue Two
Here we are again in the third week of Lockdown and I've now got myself a bit of space to set my iMac up temporarily in the kitchen as my wife who's now working from home has taken over the dining room / my computer room with all her computer stuff, files, folders, post it notes etc. and my garden office (ex computer room) has my layout in it and you can't swing a cat in it.
I hope you liked Issue One of The Anorak? I've not heard anything from anybody, so I imagine that no news is good news,.
If you did enjoy Issue One, then here's Issue Two for your amusement, delectation and perusal.
If you didn't enjoy Issue One, no apologies, but this one isn't going to be any different.
Cheers for now,
Mike
I hope you liked Issue One of The Anorak? I've not heard anything from anybody, so I imagine that no news is good news,.
If you did enjoy Issue One, then here's Issue Two for your amusement, delectation and perusal.
If you didn't enjoy Issue One, no apologies, but this one isn't going to be any different.
Cheers for now,
Mike
News
On a more serious note, you should now have received an email from Tony explaining that the Committee have unanimously decided to cancel this years exhibition because of the pandemic and the unknown length it will hold over us.
Ian Norman our Exhibition Manager will be contacting the exhibitors and traders explaining the situation and asking them for their commitment for next years show, which will hopefully be on Saturday 25th September.
Ian Norman our Exhibition Manager will be contacting the exhibitors and traders explaining the situation and asking them for their commitment for next years show, which will hopefully be on Saturday 25th September.
KWVR Spring Gala 2020 - Phil Basham
Here are some pics taken on my phone of the above Gala.
They include several pictures of the Steam Crane demo in Oakworth yard, several of the Black 5 that is normally on the Jacobite express, LMS Jubilee Bahamas (not the best picture), Taff Vale Railway 0-6-2T no 85.
Also the boring shots of me and the L&YR 1st Class Gentlemen’s Club Carriage.
They include several pictures of the Steam Crane demo in Oakworth yard, several of the Black 5 that is normally on the Jacobite express, LMS Jubilee Bahamas (not the best picture), Taff Vale Railway 0-6-2T no 85.
Also the boring shots of me and the L&YR 1st Class Gentlemen’s Club Carriage.
Information sheet about the above carriage
BoB (Burton Old Bridge) - Episode 2 - What we had “agreed” and first steps - Chris Day
The first part of this feature can be found in Issue One of The Anorak
When we all got back, and reality hit home we knew that Latelee Town was history and we were either going to do something positive or we were just going to operate other people’s layouts as infinitum. The truth of the matter was that the Club didn’t have a comparable layout nor at that stage the will to go down that particular path and that just left a void.
Baseboards
Basic requirement was of course a set of baseboards. I had purchased some while before (and probably had at the back of my mind during our “conversations” at Burton) the defunct Ambleforth layout which was a tail chaser layout which had done a good number of shows but for reasons that I never fully got to grips with had been retired and stored in a barn for about five years. Again, this layout originated from the brains and undoubted skills of Gary and Ian but had been purchase by a third party and never progressed with. Whilst it was in a reasonable state the fact that it, a) needed a rewire and b) relied on relays and other strange wiring assemblies to operate. However, the core asset: 16 baseboards had been well made and above all kept dry. On inspection that was good but the 2ft wide public display area and 2ft 6in wide fiddle wards were too narrow for what we deemed appropriate for the new layout. The die was cast however, and the 16 boards would be the start but the 2ft 6 wides would become the new front and new 3ft wide boards would be manufactured to hold the fiddle yard. That made the overall size of the layout 24ft x 11ft 6: just doable if the centre boars on front and back were designed to have straight track and no pointwork and became removable when not at exhibition. This would then just fit in my den. Whoopee!
Design
Much chewing occurred over the design although to be fair most of this was done with the combined input of Ian, John and Chris. Other Members by this time had got involved: Peter Boyt, Alan Chilestone, Mark Winchester, Denis Crack, Paul Austin, Bill Dulieu, Mike Chester, Gordon Lynch and maybe others who don’t come directly to mind although I know they will tell me! It was decided that the main feature was to be a bridge. A big bridge – a feature that would stand out… and Gordon erroneously suggested that he had the plans in N scale for Ballochmyle Viaduct on the Glasgow and South Western line. What a mistake to suggest that he had the plans in N scale and N is half OO and even greater mistake to admit to having it AND the ability to build it (and to allow oneself to get talked into it! have the skills to build the darned thing. Much like the S7 layout and Grahams warehouse Gordon came up trumps and a few months later produced a 4ft long three arch viaduct which holds very close reference to the real thing. Shame was the viaduct has four more smaller arches which for the purpose of the layout had to be omitted but wow what a bridge! I have already alluded to Ian making kit built TPO vans and during the 1990 with the effort to reduce postal costs and introduce mechanical handling new postal platforms were manufactured which were close to rail vehicles and at the same height as the vehicle floor allowing forklifts to lift in palletised mail. As Ian was financially struggling, we designed one of these to be a shunting feature at the front of the layout where his products could be readily seen. A 14-road fiddle ward was designed in although at a later date the error of three-way points made a slight redesign! To the right the scenic break would be a tunnel and to the left an underground station: like Birmingham New Street: was to feature with a typical bus interchange on top. Well in simple terms that’s it and it just needed building.
Control
As agreed, it was to be DCC – it’s easy and only needs a few wires BUT we took the option of DCC traction control and analogue route setting. Three control panels would be required – one for each of the up and down fiddle yards and one for the front operating area. Designed to be push button controlled for ease of use.
Track
In order to keep costs sensible we decided not to go fine scale nor indeed code 70 but to use code 100 of which I had quite an amount especially having stripped Ambleforth which was in surprisingly good condition: a testament to the way it was put together in the first place and the decent storage in the barn latterly. Much track was required and 49 sets of points with associated motors or at least that’s what we ended up with. It started off slightly more but three ways – baahh humbug!
Overheads
Having stripped the overheads from Ambleforth I thought that I could convince Ian to make more of the same. His skills are amazing, and I have the Ambleforth OHL carefully put to one side. Indeed, the tunnel had a overhead bar pick up feed ready for use. Frankly this is the area which has most technology challenges and as this is proposed as a portable exhibition layout overhead are FRAGILE. I will come back to that later!
Signals
Electric colour light signally was decided upon although at conception this was the idea, and no one had really thought it through properly – again more later: it gets interesting somewhat!
Name
Well that’s easy – the amount of Burton Bridge Brewery that was consumed at the exhibition given that we were there on Friday evening as well left the name Burton in our heads and having a bridge involved left little to be discussed. Burton Old Bridge was born!
Well that’s where we are in terms of decisions. Build comes next in Episode 3!
When we all got back, and reality hit home we knew that Latelee Town was history and we were either going to do something positive or we were just going to operate other people’s layouts as infinitum. The truth of the matter was that the Club didn’t have a comparable layout nor at that stage the will to go down that particular path and that just left a void.
Baseboards
Basic requirement was of course a set of baseboards. I had purchased some while before (and probably had at the back of my mind during our “conversations” at Burton) the defunct Ambleforth layout which was a tail chaser layout which had done a good number of shows but for reasons that I never fully got to grips with had been retired and stored in a barn for about five years. Again, this layout originated from the brains and undoubted skills of Gary and Ian but had been purchase by a third party and never progressed with. Whilst it was in a reasonable state the fact that it, a) needed a rewire and b) relied on relays and other strange wiring assemblies to operate. However, the core asset: 16 baseboards had been well made and above all kept dry. On inspection that was good but the 2ft wide public display area and 2ft 6in wide fiddle wards were too narrow for what we deemed appropriate for the new layout. The die was cast however, and the 16 boards would be the start but the 2ft 6 wides would become the new front and new 3ft wide boards would be manufactured to hold the fiddle yard. That made the overall size of the layout 24ft x 11ft 6: just doable if the centre boars on front and back were designed to have straight track and no pointwork and became removable when not at exhibition. This would then just fit in my den. Whoopee!
Design
Much chewing occurred over the design although to be fair most of this was done with the combined input of Ian, John and Chris. Other Members by this time had got involved: Peter Boyt, Alan Chilestone, Mark Winchester, Denis Crack, Paul Austin, Bill Dulieu, Mike Chester, Gordon Lynch and maybe others who don’t come directly to mind although I know they will tell me! It was decided that the main feature was to be a bridge. A big bridge – a feature that would stand out… and Gordon erroneously suggested that he had the plans in N scale for Ballochmyle Viaduct on the Glasgow and South Western line. What a mistake to suggest that he had the plans in N scale and N is half OO and even greater mistake to admit to having it AND the ability to build it (and to allow oneself to get talked into it! have the skills to build the darned thing. Much like the S7 layout and Grahams warehouse Gordon came up trumps and a few months later produced a 4ft long three arch viaduct which holds very close reference to the real thing. Shame was the viaduct has four more smaller arches which for the purpose of the layout had to be omitted but wow what a bridge! I have already alluded to Ian making kit built TPO vans and during the 1990 with the effort to reduce postal costs and introduce mechanical handling new postal platforms were manufactured which were close to rail vehicles and at the same height as the vehicle floor allowing forklifts to lift in palletised mail. As Ian was financially struggling, we designed one of these to be a shunting feature at the front of the layout where his products could be readily seen. A 14-road fiddle ward was designed in although at a later date the error of three-way points made a slight redesign! To the right the scenic break would be a tunnel and to the left an underground station: like Birmingham New Street: was to feature with a typical bus interchange on top. Well in simple terms that’s it and it just needed building.
Control
As agreed, it was to be DCC – it’s easy and only needs a few wires BUT we took the option of DCC traction control and analogue route setting. Three control panels would be required – one for each of the up and down fiddle yards and one for the front operating area. Designed to be push button controlled for ease of use.
Track
In order to keep costs sensible we decided not to go fine scale nor indeed code 70 but to use code 100 of which I had quite an amount especially having stripped Ambleforth which was in surprisingly good condition: a testament to the way it was put together in the first place and the decent storage in the barn latterly. Much track was required and 49 sets of points with associated motors or at least that’s what we ended up with. It started off slightly more but three ways – baahh humbug!
Overheads
Having stripped the overheads from Ambleforth I thought that I could convince Ian to make more of the same. His skills are amazing, and I have the Ambleforth OHL carefully put to one side. Indeed, the tunnel had a overhead bar pick up feed ready for use. Frankly this is the area which has most technology challenges and as this is proposed as a portable exhibition layout overhead are FRAGILE. I will come back to that later!
Signals
Electric colour light signally was decided upon although at conception this was the idea, and no one had really thought it through properly – again more later: it gets interesting somewhat!
Name
Well that’s easy – the amount of Burton Bridge Brewery that was consumed at the exhibition given that we were there on Friday evening as well left the name Burton in our heads and having a bridge involved left little to be discussed. Burton Old Bridge was born!
Well that’s where we are in terms of decisions. Build comes next in Episode 3!
Making Buildings - An Alternative Approach - Ian Bilbey
My Layout isn't in any way realistic - a mixture of scales and periods etc.
So when it came to finding some buildings I felt the Metcalfe one's were too realistic, and the wooden kits involved too much painting.
So - with old tinplate buildings as a vague model - I drew out various railway sheds and other buildings on my Mac. The big art shop in Bury will print up to A0 size - which at £30 is very reasonable. You can get a lot of buildings on a sheet.
There is no folding involved. By making all parts either white 'edged' or black, I can eitherspray mount them onto white or black card. Those on the black still need their edges panting black.
Small pieces of wood are used to glue the walls together, and the whole inside is painted black.
The roofs have two pieces of card with about a 5mm gap between them, so they 'flop' over the edges of the building.
I have not been especially ambitious with cutting out windows - not really the look I am going for, but they could be a lot more elaborate, and of course the original artwork could be drawn more realistically.
I hope this is of some interest and are all keeping well.
Ian
So when it came to finding some buildings I felt the Metcalfe one's were too realistic, and the wooden kits involved too much painting.
So - with old tinplate buildings as a vague model - I drew out various railway sheds and other buildings on my Mac. The big art shop in Bury will print up to A0 size - which at £30 is very reasonable. You can get a lot of buildings on a sheet.
There is no folding involved. By making all parts either white 'edged' or black, I can eitherspray mount them onto white or black card. Those on the black still need their edges panting black.
Small pieces of wood are used to glue the walls together, and the whole inside is painted black.
The roofs have two pieces of card with about a 5mm gap between them, so they 'flop' over the edges of the building.
I have not been especially ambitious with cutting out windows - not really the look I am going for, but they could be a lot more elaborate, and of course the original artwork could be drawn more realistically.
I hope this is of some interest and are all keeping well.
Ian
My Layout isn't in any way realistic - a mixture of scales and periods etc.
So when it came to finding some buildings I felt the Metcalfe one's were too realistic, and the wooden kits involved too much painting.
So - with old tinplate buildings as a vague model - I drew out various railway sheds and other buildings on my Mac. The big art shop in Bury will print up to A0 size - which at £30 is very reasonable. You can get a lot of buildings on a sheet.
There is no folding involved. By making all parts either white 'edged' or black, I can eitherspray mount them onto white or black card. Those on the black still need their edges panting black.
Small pieces of wood are used to glue the walls together, and the whole inside is painted black.
The roofs have two pieces of card with about a 5mm gap between them, so they 'flop' over the edges of the building.
I have not been especially ambitious with cutting out windows - not really the look I am going for, but they could be a lot more elaborate, and of course the original artwork could be drawn more realistically.
I hope this is of some interest and are all keeping well.
Ian
So when it came to finding some buildings I felt the Metcalfe one's were too realistic, and the wooden kits involved too much painting.
So - with old tinplate buildings as a vague model - I drew out various railway sheds and other buildings on my Mac. The big art shop in Bury will print up to A0 size - which at £30 is very reasonable. You can get a lot of buildings on a sheet.
There is no folding involved. By making all parts either white 'edged' or black, I can eitherspray mount them onto white or black card. Those on the black still need their edges panting black.
Small pieces of wood are used to glue the walls together, and the whole inside is painted black.
The roofs have two pieces of card with about a 5mm gap between them, so they 'flop' over the edges of the building.
I have not been especially ambitious with cutting out windows - not really the look I am going for, but they could be a lot more elaborate, and of course the original artwork could be drawn more realistically.
I hope this is of some interest and are all keeping well.
Ian
Puzzle Corner
From our illustrious Chairman
A Dementia Quiz
No surprise there :-) - Mike
First question:
You are a participant in a race. You overtake the second person. what position are you in?
————————————————————————
Answer: If you answered that you are first, then you are absolutely wrong! if you overtake the second person and you take his place, you are in second place!
Try to do better next time.
Now answer the second question, but don't take as much time as you took for the first question, ok?
Second question:
If you overtake the last person, then you are....?
————————————————————————
Answer: If you answered that you are second to last, then you are.....
Wrong again. tell me sunshine, how can you overtake the last person??
You're not very good at this, are you?
Third question:
Very tricky arithmetic! note:
This must be done in your head only.
Do not use paper and pencil or a calculator.
Try it..
Take 1000 and add 40 to it. Now add another 1000 and now add 30.
Add another 1000. Now add 20. Now add another 1000.
Now add 10. What is the total?
————————————————————————
Answer: Did you get 5000?
The correct answer is actually 4100....
If you don't believe it, check it with a calculator!
Today is definitely not your day, is it?
Maybe you'll get the last question right..... maybe...
Fourth question:
Mary's father has five daughters:
1. Nana
2. Nene
3. Nini
4. Nono, and ???
What is the name of the fifth daughter?
————————————————————————
Answer: Did you answer Nunu? No of course it isn't Nunu
Her name is Mary! Read the question again!
Okay, now the bonus round, a final chance to redeem yourself:
Fifth Question: A mute person goes into a shop and wants to buy a toothbrush.
By imitating the action of brushing his teeth he successfully expresses himself to the shopkeeper and the purchase is done.
Next, a blind man comes into the shop who wants to buy a pair of sunglasses; how does he indicate what he wants?
————————————————————————
Answer:It's really very simple. He opens his mouth and asks for it...
Does your employer actually pay you to think??
If so do not let them see your answers for this test!
————————————————————————
Pass this on to frustrate the smart people in your life!
Have a nice day, one and all.
A Dementia Quiz
No surprise there :-) - Mike
First question:
You are a participant in a race. You overtake the second person. what position are you in?
————————————————————————
Answer: If you answered that you are first, then you are absolutely wrong! if you overtake the second person and you take his place, you are in second place!
Try to do better next time.
Now answer the second question, but don't take as much time as you took for the first question, ok?
Second question:
If you overtake the last person, then you are....?
————————————————————————
Answer: If you answered that you are second to last, then you are.....
Wrong again. tell me sunshine, how can you overtake the last person??
You're not very good at this, are you?
Third question:
Very tricky arithmetic! note:
This must be done in your head only.
Do not use paper and pencil or a calculator.
Try it..
Take 1000 and add 40 to it. Now add another 1000 and now add 30.
Add another 1000. Now add 20. Now add another 1000.
Now add 10. What is the total?
————————————————————————
Answer: Did you get 5000?
The correct answer is actually 4100....
If you don't believe it, check it with a calculator!
Today is definitely not your day, is it?
Maybe you'll get the last question right..... maybe...
Fourth question:
Mary's father has five daughters:
1. Nana
2. Nene
3. Nini
4. Nono, and ???
What is the name of the fifth daughter?
————————————————————————
Answer: Did you answer Nunu? No of course it isn't Nunu
Her name is Mary! Read the question again!
Okay, now the bonus round, a final chance to redeem yourself:
Fifth Question: A mute person goes into a shop and wants to buy a toothbrush.
By imitating the action of brushing his teeth he successfully expresses himself to the shopkeeper and the purchase is done.
Next, a blind man comes into the shop who wants to buy a pair of sunglasses; how does he indicate what he wants?
————————————————————————
Answer:It's really very simple. He opens his mouth and asks for it...
Does your employer actually pay you to think??
If so do not let them see your answers for this test!
————————————————————————
Pass this on to frustrate the smart people in your life!
Have a nice day, one and all.
Endpiece
Well that just about wraps up Issue Two.
Any comments, articles, hints and tips etc. would be much appreciated as I have now run out of material.
Please email me at web@burystedmundsmrc.com
In the meantime keep well and keep safe.
Cheers for now,
Mike
Any comments, articles, hints and tips etc. would be much appreciated as I have now run out of material.
Please email me at web@burystedmundsmrc.com
In the meantime keep well and keep safe.
Cheers for now,
Mike