Exeter St Davids OO

[bootneckbob]

Thanks.
I've been having a think and would appreciate any thoughts if anybody reads this?? At the moment the viaduct on the incline exists in real life to cross Bonhay road which then follows the river for quite a while. I can't do that so forced a road bridge in to cross the river, go up a steep incline, negotiate a sharp turn on a road over rail bridge (none of which exists in the real world). The bridge is there as a scenic break, but also the reason for the viaduct crossing a road.
Now I'm thinking as I'm not being true to life anyway at this point, why not have the river meander under the viaduct and then I could make the road bridge another tunnel portal (yawn boring) but could make the scenery more of a gentle slope between the tunnels??

[alan_r]

Great layout - good to see a more modern image and with the most colourful of liveries (1990s)
In answer to your question, I would agree with the deviation. Most of your layout is relatively flat, so an area that suddenly gets very steep may look odd. A landscape 'design' that was still relatively gentle I would say would probably look more natural. Otherwise it could start to look like a train set with a flat board and some mountains right on the edge!
Whatever you decide though, I'm sure it will look fantastic and I'm looking forward to watching it develop

[markS&D]

Another idea, you could remove the bridge over the railway, and have a level crossing instead, that would get rid of some of the incline in your road, but could still act as a kind of scenic break. Just a thought?

[bootneckbob]

Alan I'm inclined to agree with you. There will be more landscaping to come on the rest of the layout but I agree it is relatively flat being mainly station and sidings. The far end has a rise which has quite a bit of baseboard to use (and isn't covered in track!) Plus there's another gentle slope at Cowley Bridge which is the other scenic break.
Mark I did think about a level crossing but there's already (or will be) the actual crossing (Red Cow) at the north end of the station. Plus I would still have to have the river splitting the two mainlines as it does now.

Thanks for your thoughts though; really appreciate it. Helps to bounce some ideas off someone who hasn't been planning it for years!

[bootneckbob]

Okay, time for a history lesson for those that care. ESD was originally a station terminus for the Bristol-Exeter line around 1844 (ish without checking). For my layout that means the highground I've created (top right on the plan) was never intended to take the railway. ESD was the outer station in Exeter, with Exeter Queen St (now Exeter Central) being the central station.
A few years after the station was opened the line was extended to Plymouth. This makes sense scenically as now it has to cross the River Exe and the canal. For my layout it will also need to go through the hill. The other line to Exeter Central was opened nearly 20 years later (around 1860) and involved making the real viaduct to take the line up the 1/37 incline and through the tunnel to appear at Exeter Central. For those that have not actually made this journey for real the stations are just a couple of minutes apart.
So this means I could if I use my artistic licence have a much more realistic slope down to where the road over the river bridge was and have the river take a left turn and under the viaduct. The brickwork for the viaduct is the same as the tunnel portal I've already made as they were built at the same time. After a little research this morning, the same design was in use 20 years earlier, so I could do much the same for the lower tunnel portal. A stone one might be nice to add some variety so I'll have a think on that. ESD station is stone not brick, so stone makes sense to me but they obviously used brick in the day so what do I know!

[bootneckbob]

Carnage!
Actually wasn't too bad. Only mocked up for now but I'll try and glue and bandage it tomorrow evening if I can.

[alan_r]

Looking good - considering this is OO-gauge, you have managed to get some very convincing scenery and nice long spaces to view proper formation trains. Normally this would have to be a club layout or at an exhibition at this scale, so you have got something very special here
I can't wait to see some nice long 90s livery trains in a finished landscape.
Do you have any photographs of the actual location you are modelling (or at least that has 'inspired' the layout where you are adapting it to work better)? We can then really appreciate the effort you have put into your design

[bootneckbob]

Thanks for those comments Alan.
Photographs; LOADS!
There are also a lot of good videos on youtube which have helped no end. Everytime I'm in the shed I either have them playing in the background or the likes of Everard Junction/Dean Park etc.
At the moment I don't think it's worth comparing what I have done scenically with the real thing, but the rest of the layout follows pretty closely.
There'a a chap on Facebook and youtube (I think) called "Modeling Exeter St Davids & Plymouth Laira." His is very good and he is just doing the same section I'm on but he has the real feel of it with the incline sweeping away whilst the Plymouth bound line crosses the river. Well worth a look if you've not seen it.
As I think I've said earlier, I had it that way in the Mk2 layout, this being Mk3. By not having the incline sweeping away means I can have the TMD. To me the TMD was more important.
I'll see if there's anything relevant at the mo picture wise though.

[bootneckbob]

Here's are a couple of pictures which can relate to the aerial view I've attached which is the main part of the layout and shows the TMD which I've yet to add properly. The aerial picture is basically one half of the shed. The bit which is going out of shot in the aerial photo is where my curve really starts to kick in.
The large building in the foreground of the aerial picture (with the green roof) is Exeter Panel Box which was opened in '85 when the 4 or 5 signal boxes which covered the area of my layout were demolished; the semiphore signals removed and the track work was simplified (to what I have done). The main things being the middle road of platforms 1 & 3 being removed and the lines to the incline moved so only platforms 1 & 3 had access to them.
I currently have my Ecos controller where the Panel Box will be. In time I'll set the controller lower and the Panel Box will cover it. I had to get remote handset for the Ecos so I can operate other areas of the layout and see what's going on. Being able to look at it from different angles really opens it up and I can't wait to be able to really appreciate that when the scenery is done.

[alan_r]

You have captured it well and I can see why you chose it as a location to model - plenty of interest. Good to see a crossover in the flesh in a real railway with the two diverging tracks in the foreground.
Having the TMD on the operator side also gives you the chance to get a good look at your loco collection.
Well done and keep the updates coming

[bootneckbob]

Okay so I've been itching to lay the track in the TMD/Stabling point and managed to get it down today although I need to lift the points again individually to wire them and make the holes for the point motors. Main thing is it's pinned down now and it fits.
Also got some plaster onto the new landscape.

Must admit I'm a bit all over the place with this, perhaps I should concentrate on one thing at a time but I think its so big I need to just keep bouncing around. I'm thinking I'll do the different areas scenically rather than trying to do the whole thing at the same time. There are 5/6 different areas and I've started on quite a challenging area but it's all part of the fun.

[bootneckbob]

Finally, the last bit of the track has been laid. Finished off the stabling point and sidings north and south of Red Cow crossing. Now I just have a shed load of wiring of track, points and decoders plus the joy of fitting the motors themselves.

Sculptamold hasn't quite gone off on the new scenic look, but should be ready for painting tomorrow I recon. I will have to have a concerted effort at making the other tunnel portal, and finishing off the viaduct; another job for the to do list!

[glencairn]

Looking really good bnb. Well done.

Glencairn

[bootneckbob]

Not much happened on the top today as all the work was under the baseboard. Added the extra supports to the new Stabling point and made the center board hinged so I can drop it down to access the station area; more so for the build than running hopefully.

[Mountain]

Your layout is looking excellent. I especially love the DMU's and the HST's! One very minor little hint I would like to make. If they are the same B.R. 7 car Western Region HST's that also ran down to South Wales, the buffet coach needs turning round the other way so the passenger half of it is standard class. After privatisation when the Western Region HST's were extended to become 8 car sets under First Great Western (Virgin Trains HST's ended up with six coaches... Did the FGW have the extra coach from what became the Virgin HST sets?), the buffet cars were turned round so in the 8 car formation they had in effect five cars if standard class seats and two and a half cars of first class seating.

Your formation may have been correct if they were different units that ran here compared to there? Also, there was the rare case where a buffet car may have been taken out and another put in to mend a fault so anything is possible! But I do know that the normal proceedure if yours are Western Region formations as a 7 car (7+2) set, then you will normally have the buffet car with the seating side of it pointed towards the standard class coaches. I hope this may help. I go from memory as I used to see them like this as a child in the 1980's, but photographs will help.
Another small point of interest, unless a bulb has gone, HST's had two brighter main white lights with two duller marker lights at the front and two red lights at the rear. The two main brighter front lights will be on at the same time. A rule came in that for staff walking the rails to quickly identify if the train is capeable of high speed (100mph or over) that they had to have two equally spaced bright lights. You may notice that todays locos or units that have a top speed below 100mph only show one bright light. This single bright light (One on each side) is switchable and one side is for day running so it points directly forward (To be seen) and the other points slightly downward so the driver can see the track in the dark (Not really that effective... Your car lights in dipped beam actually work better!) I am not sure when this new lightling rule came in but HST's always had two bright front lights from new. From around the latter half of the 1980's when the large logo livery was in one started to see locos like class 47's and 37's (And others) with the extra single brighter front light as an extra to the old domino ex.headcode lights which were only for the loco to be seen. They were useless for the driver to see anything! At least the new added brighter lamp gave some vision! Prior to this date the only locos (Apart from the HST) that carried brighter front lights on the Western Region were either works trains (Lots of bright lights!) or locos or DMU's used on the Heart of Wales line (Known as Central Wales) as it was a requirement for that line for all locos working on it to have them. These were mounted high up as a single bright light. The Swindon DMU's that regularaly worked up there had them, as did the odd cut down BPGV class 03 which occasionally made its way up there for works trains. Western Region history is fascinating!
I tended to prefer modelling the very early 1980 period around 1979 to 1983 as it was just before the large logo livery made an appearance and just after the headcode boxes no longer displayed the headcodes. (They displayed headcodes up to 1976. Around 1977 to about 1978 they displayed 0O00 (Note the second character is the letter 'O'), and from about 1978 onwards they displayed two white dots on the black blind background. As glass was used for these headcode boxes and was vunerable to smashing by birds hitting, or kids throwing stones, the started welding plates over any broken glass headcode boxes and we had the yellow metal plated boxes with the two marker lights displayed which came in around 1982 in the Western Region onwards. 1985 saw the blackened out window surrounds to the DMU's and in the Western Region (In Wales anyway) the large logo started to take over, and the firstsightings of maybe a singlw power car of a HST to have the new grey livery but keeping the full yellow side colours as the old Blue/grey HST's had. I never saw a complete HST in these colours until around 1987! Took them ages to paint all the coaches! For some reason, they painted one power car first. Then the other power car... Then later the first coach seen in the new livery would be the buffet. Only then would one see the other coaches. They would all run in mixes formations like this for years. Was only the other regions where they had new stock or seemed to have more money to spend, that they had all the matching livery seen in a formation).

I love the space you have for your layout. It is something I was never able to do in 00 gauge. I still have lots of B.R. blue/grey era stock which I am slowly selling. I need to get organized and advertize them. I am only selling as one only has so much space and time, and my 7mm narrow gauge collection is taking up my time. I never would have guess such a small narrow gauge layout would be taking me so long! Haha!

Your section that is dropped to gain access is a great idea. I like what you are doing and what you have done.