Birmingham New Street and Brettell Road in P4

[Jim S-W]

Hi All

Also under development is my design for a heavyweight portal - A flat etch just wont do so this ones a bit more complicated. The following picture shows construction in progress and gives an idea to how its put together.



And here is the finished leg.



For those who want a closer look I will be demoing model OLE at Scalefour North this coming weekend - hope to see some of you there.

Cheers

Jim

[0121modeller]

P4NewStreet will now be appearing at DEMU showcase as a work in progress demo. For more info on the show click here

Hi Jim,
Thats great news, & as i live in birmingham, Burton is not far to travel, so its a date for my fridge magnet notes.
I look forward to seeing this masterpiece.

Cheers

Dave.

[Jim S-W]

Hi All

The cross span for my heavyweight portal - this is a model of BB 00 81 which is just in front of the tunnel mouth at the Wolves end of New Street. For a single span its absolutely huge!



A glimpse of the real thing



The 3 main parts of the large portal assembled - told you it was a monster!



Cheers

Jim

[Jim S-W]

Hi All

Turning to simple masts for a moment. I have done a little etch for a bracket to hold the cantalevers to the post.



This is VERY close up - to give you an idea the pole is 0.6mm wide and the H section post 2mm across

following is my registration arm mounted in position



and finally an overall shot of the finished cantalever assembly



The insulators are Colin Craig's excellent castings

This brings me to the unusual point of thinking that there is probably no way to take this any further forward from here! Hmmm...

Cheers

Jim

[ste234]

Jim, thats absoloutley brilliant.



You must be mad

[BR125]

Excellent work!

Regards
Daz

[50035 Ark Royal]

HI jim that is absoloutely stunning as a Brummie myself i thought it was pictures of the real thing.Just a couple of points for your gate and litter scene outside one of the tunnels for realism you need some little tite relieving himself as that is what i frequently saw As regards youre 50;s why did you chose Howe when you could have had the flagship or Royal Oak,Furious o r Courageous with the oh so sexy blue nameplates.I do approve of Glorious though very nice.Will you be modelling the other end with the bay on Platform 12 as that brings back memories as right up until the 1990 a vac used to be stabled thier for the next Padd service.I worked thier for 2 years and although vacs had long gone we still had 37's47's86's/87's/90's and Hst.It looks exactly as i remebered it especially the signal box while training we were allowed up there one afternoon.It is massive and was fascinating.While working on the Platforms the man in charge of the box used to shout on the radio Box to chief can we put 1S71down 7.In fact the whole station was controlled by the box what they said you had to obey by. Happy memories and your model is awsome.
cheers
Ian

[0121modeller]

Will you be modelling the other end with the bay on Platform 12 as that brings back memories as right up until the 1990 a vac used to be stabled thier for the next Padd service.

Am I mis-understanding something here Ark Royal ? ,... I used to travel regular from B'ham New St to coventry 1986-1989, If I missed the class 86 or 87 (destination; london euston) I would either catch a Poole/portsmouth harbour/brighton Or a Paddington bound train which all these routes called at coventry then via leamington spa, always on a class 47, I can never recall seeing a 50 or traveling on a class 50 from B'ham New St...

I read somewhere in one of my books that the class 50's once served a service from Paddington to B'ham then onto as far north as Liverpool , the time period mentioned was the late 70's & early 80's..., Surely this is the time period you meant to say,.. I'm assuming ?

I always thought the class 50's were only used on routes from Londons Waterloo & Paddington stations to Bristol & other south west destinations from 1984 onwards, I may be mistaken though, but i honestly can never remember seeing a 50 at B'ham New st in the late 1980's...

Dave.

[Jim S-W]

Hiya

To give you an idea if you go to the RPA and put in diesel loco's New Street 1987 in the advanced search you get

1 x 08
2x31/4
3xHST
2x45/1
9x47/4
and 4x50

I would say that alone puts the 50s as very common. I have plenty of pics (not mine so I can post them) collected over the years of 50's departing platform 1 - these must be the Paddington trains.

NSE ones were new in my period hence 50023 - one of the first ones. Also on the 50 roster so far are 009, 031, 033 and 043 with 2 more large logo ones to do - I suspect one will be Tiger

Ark Royal, what you see here is the extreme left hand end of the layout - the complete layout will feature the entire station and Proof House Junction.

Cheers

Jim

[b308]

Unless they changed the platform numbers I thought that 1 took you down the Stour... but having said that they could send a Paddington bound train from there and either crossed it over at Proof House or sent it to Coventry (!) and diverted it to Leamington Spa from there...

I remember when in my teens having a London Midland weekly rover which allowed me to travel from Paddington to Brum... I can't remember which station it came into, though in those days (early 70s) it could well have been New Street (and was pretty likely to have been) and we were hauled by Westerns... D1027 is one one I have a photo of, but not in Brum... it used to drive the Guards on the Western region nuts that we could use an LM rover on "their" terratory... quite a common run for the spotters in those days...

Logic would say that as the 50s replaced the Westerns they would also have replaced them on this run.

[Jim S-W]

Thats correct

New Street - Cov - Leamington - south!

Before that I suspect your Western more likely went New Street - Camp Hill, Solihull - Leamington etc although a lot of the pics I ave seen of Westerns at New Street they are over in the platform 1 area too.

Cheers

Jim

[b308]

Yes, thats not a problem as we (XC) currently use platform 1 for our Man Picc to Bristol services... we go under the cross city lines just after Proof House and then cross over to the up and down Camphill which then takes us past St Andrews junction and can then either go up the Camphill to Bristol/cardiff or south to Tysely and Oxford/Reading...

[50035 Ark Royal]

Hi The vacs still had a daily diagram until May 1990 1M20 09.15 Paddiongton-Manchester Loco of at Coventry then used to work ld to Birmingham New St and later worked the 1V96 11.18 York-Paddington forward.Also there used to be a Sunday Diagram 1M01 15.13 Paddington-Wolverhampton 1M01 and return on 1V99 Wolverhampton-Paddington.Last one was end of July 1990 when Conqueror worked the diagram 1M20,1V96 vice 47 as there was ashortage of47's
cheers
Ian

[b308]

Loco off at Cov? That does surprise me as there's not much space for shunting at Cov... I know when I came on the railways all XC trains had their loco change at New Street... I thought that had alwys been the case?

[50035 Ark Royal]

No it was not the 1M20 09.15 Paddington -Manchester was a bokked vac NWRA tandc only intercity diagram that was booked.It ran from May 89-May 90 and was booked a vac Paddington to Coventry.However from NEW TIMETABLE May 1990 Inter city complete lost interest in the vacs so the only diagrammned one was on Saturdays 07.18 Paddington -Wolverhampton and 11.18 return.Although my beloved 35 worked on the 28/06 and Conqueror the last one as already mentioned.I have photos of Glorious and Ark Royal at coventry during the detatching process.Interestingly the 08.20 Liverpool -Padd 1V15 May 82 -May 83 was electric to Coventry and Vac from there so was not uncommon as you seem to think.Vacs wero common place on Padd - Brum trains .However the ones i think Jim is refering to from Platform 1 are 1M20 09.17 Padd -Brum,1V69 13.10 Birm -Padd, 1M17 11.17 Padd -Birm,1V75 14.41 Birm -Padd May 87 /May 88 with NSE stock.May 88 -May 89 used to be 09.40 Padd -Brum 1M20 with aircons go around the houses and back in time for 1v69 14.41 Birm -Padd, hellfire as usually only 6 coaches with a MK 1buffet in IC livery in the formation.Happy days for me in Aug 88 while i was on all line rover 35 worked it 3 days on the trot.The next turn was on the 17.47 Padd -Westbury, even better it did the Penzance on Saturday so 305 miles of Ark Royal thrash Another diagram that started at Coventry was the 08.58 Manc -poole1015 off 1E54 06.50 Paddington -Hull which was booked a vac Coventry-Reading.So detatching,attatching locos at Coventry was pretty common.
cheers
Ian