Unklian's G3 workbench .

unklian

Western Thunderer
Thank you Mike, Simon, Steve, Geoff and all. I did not 'win' the competition as such, but given the way it was judged I was initially put out and then philosophical . Because the layout that won was so different, there was really and literally no competition . So here it is N gauge, DCC, locos with sound and lots of lights and activity .
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Boxfile Project

unklian

Western Thunderer
It is also very useful as a backdrop for progress photos for the 'My Workbench' thread. So here you have Le Boss casting a jaundiced eye over the latest job. While Henri plies the foreman with excuses for it taking all afternoon for the welder to relearn how to use low melt solder and put 8 axleboxes together.

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unklian

Western Thunderer
Thank you Jamie, the bogies will eventually go under a GWR autotrailer, there are springs and all sorts of bits still to add .
 

unklian

Western Thunderer
Consternation in the Works as a big pile of wood is dumped on the in road. Things calmed down a bit when it was pointed out to be solebar material in quantity and plenty of body framing too. Supplied by erictheteamonster ( c/o ebay ) at a price so reasonable even Le Boss looked less grumpy. The darker colour is oak which is possibly a bit too grainy. The lighter wood is ramin which looks much nicer. Both were cut and finished to size very quickly and very accurately by Eric , ( usual disclaimer ) he comes highly recommended by the works .

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unklian

Western Thunderer
I have been spending a bit of time doing post winter maintenance on my garden line. This has meant careful removal of various seedlings and other dead flora from the ballast. Followed by topping up the ballast with fresh. I was surprised at how relatively clean the ballast has stayed although there are patches of moss growing, which I am not sure wether to remove or not. Much of the original ballast has been washed out from around and under the ends of the sleepers, but enough has stayed under the middles of the sleepers to maintain the alignment and levels of the track.

Before
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After
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The extra ballast was supplied by my good friend John Butler as the left overs from his sieving ballast for his G1 line. What was too big for his sieve was just right for my track .

I then decided on a small experiment to see how well the stainless steel rail and fishplates had survived the winter. I tried running a loco with track pickup, and without cleaning the track or tightening any of the joints, it ran round the whole circle without stopping. This may very well change my mind about battery and radio control for the future, as I had assumed that track pickup was a non starter for long term use in the garden.

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geoff_nicholls

Western Thunderer
After my experience with cramming RC into the Simplex, any future layout of mine will be two rail power compatible. Roger Salisbury has at least one loco which can be switched to two rail from RC.
Your curves look very smooth, did you lay the track by eye, or use a template? And do I see proper bolted fishplates?
 

Simon

Flying Squad
I am using Cliff's stainless rail and find track power to work incredibly well, a minimum of wiping the rail head and off you go.

The oldest bit of my line has been outside for 6 years and works just as well as the day it was laid. It does involve quite a lot of wiring at the outset though:eek:

I suspect that the stainless rail is a big help in this regard, but am nonetheless tickled by the number of people who despite my experience in the garden still insist on assuring me that battery power is much more reliable:rolleyes:

Your line looks great, especially after the new ballast has been laid:thumbs:

Simon
 

unklian

Western Thunderer
I have noticed a few disadvantages with radio control recently. It can be quite expensive to set up, especially when you add sound. All the required clobber can be quite difficult to fit into small locos. The batteries are also reasonably expensive and you have to look after them, regularly running them down and recharging them for NiCad's, and keeping them regularly charged for LiPo's . I think I might just go back to my old LGB MTS DCC system !

Thanks chaps for the compliments regarding the track appearance . After various calculations and a bit of trial and error the rails were trimmed to length and the ends drilled for the fishplate bolts, using a jig. The curves were then made by carefully bending the rails by hand until they matched a template, they were then assembled onto the sleepers and further tweaked to match the template. I then had 6 foot long panels like "set track" to assemble into my circle. Using the bolted fishplates, whilst a real fiddle at ground level outside in amongst the plants, resulted in nice smooth joints.

Going back to the ballast it has been noticeable how much less washing out and settlement there has been on the earlier bits of the line, where there has been ballast down for a couple of seasons .
 
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unklian

Western Thunderer
Here's one that has been ' bubbling under ' as the DJ's used to say. A vintage Gloucester 5 plank Private Owner coal wagon, with inside diagonal bracing . Another of Mike Williams beauties , this time from a lovely pattern by Geoff Nicholls . Construction has been very straight forward and I got to today and put on the base coats with the rattle cans . Final colour will be brown with black ironwork .RIMG0114.JPG RIMG0115.JPG RIMG0141.JPG
 

unklian

Western Thunderer
Well the customer preferred the red oxide primer colour in the end, which was fine by me , one less coat of paint. Doing all the ironwork was still a bit of a fiddle, but now it is done. Once again Le Boss casts a disapproving eye "Chassis en bois ! Ils est fous ces anglais !" he's heard to mutter ....

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unklian

Western Thunderer
I have looked at one of those too JB a few times, but apart from the expense, it would need to be converted to 64mm gauge . They also have a bit of a rep for being unreliable . I found a pad of kitchen roll wrapped round the end of a stout stick and soaked in lighter fuel to be quite effective, if not as much fun. But some sort of track cleaning vehicle would be a very good idea as parts of even my simple line are not always that accessable .
 

Mike W

Western Thunderer
Wow - the price!

I'm intrigued by the description "track cleaning by counter-rotating wheels" First thought was that Mr.Webb is said to have invented something similar with his 3-cylinder compound engines. Second thought was how does it work? Any photos underneath?

Mike
 

unklian

Western Thunderer
The LGB track cleaner is basically a standard 4 wheel diesel with a large pony truck pivoted off one end. This is covered by an extra bonnet with two lights on top, the left hand end in the eBay picture. The wheels of the extra axle are made of abrasive rubber, much like a track rubber block, and they are powered by a second motor driving them in the opposite direction to the main loco wheels. The loco therefore pushes its extra wheel set around the track while they scream round in the opposite direction rubbing the dirt off with their abrasive wheels. Generally it works well, but they eat abrasive wheels at a rate, especially if driven over lots of points and rail joints, and the gears driving the abrasive wheels can have a short life too. They are better DCC fitted as the speed of the abrasive wheels can then be adjusted to a more reasonable rate.
 

Jon Nazareth

Western Thunderer
Ian
How did you go about painting the ironwork on the Gloucester? I have problems with the paint drying out on the brush too quickly together with an inconsistency in paint finish.

Jon
 
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