The EWR.

[captrees]

Are you going to paint the snow on and take it off on an annual cycle?
That's altogether lovely. Great portrait of Pen-y-ghent, or as it is known to my wife's Yorkshire family, the Sunday stroll.

Thanks Bigmet. It's difficult to imagine the area on a bright sunny summer's day. I could have them playing rugby instead of cricket, and paint snow on the hills, and perhaps sprinkle talcum powder over the lot. As it is, that cricket game has lasted 3 years. Has anyone ever simulated rain on a layout? The original hill was Ingleborough, but since Pen-y-Ghent is closer to Westmorland and viaduct country it got changed. I've never climbed it.

Lovely photographs captrees. 'Plodded' up Shap a few times myself both as a driver and passenger. Not doe the Sunday stroll, as Bigmet mentions.
Glencairn

Thanks Glencairn. Back in the day, that road was a commute. I worked as a chain man on the M6 construction from the top of Shap Fell down to the Lune Valley, Tebay and Grayrigg. Recently I was given a Bachmann Scenecraft Goathland Station which got sequestered as "Huck's Cottage" right on the road.



That photo was taken before the railway went through, of course. But hey, we can change the geography a bit, but the seasons are harder.

[Bufferstop]

Has anyone ever simulated rain on a layout?

There is/was a very atmospheric tram layout on the theme of "a wet week-end in Leeds." The road surface was levelled up to the track with a pour on resin filler which left to it's own to harden gave the reflective finish of rain soaked tarmac.

[glencairn]

Bufferstop. That may be 'Grime Street' Leeds trams 1948 - 1954


Puddles and wet ground on Clarence Dock. I used clear varnish. Pieces of thin plastic over the varnish to represent puddles. Coal debris on top.





Glencairn

[captrees]

Not much time being spent on the East Westmorland railway at present.. But what has surprised me is that the railway continues to look as good as the day I started it. It is in a 'studio' or wooden shed in the garden.No rust on the rails, no dust anywhere, and particularly no rodent or insect activity. But Charley the terrier visits the room every time I go up there just to inspect, and mice know better than to mess with Charley or Henry. Plus I have one of those anti-rodent devices plugged into a power point. I saw ants once, and sprinkled ant powder around strategically. Never seen one since. I am lucky to live in this climate. No need for dust sheets, dehumidifiers or heating. We have just had the wettest winter on record, and the EWR has not suffered at all. But now that I write this, I expect a plague of killer possums at any time.

While any actual modelling seems to have stalled, there is a need to have it all so that it runs perfectly as soon as switched on, in case of visitors. Now the EWR was designed to have 2 continuous tracks. The inner was for goods, and the sidings and branch line come off this. The outer track, with its gentler curves is for passenger and express trains. I had pretty much sorted what locos/carriages/wagons combination was optimum for all these, in single and double headed format, or with and without banking locos. Anyway, I decided to switch the goods trains to the outer, and passenger trains to the inner, which of course reversed the clockwise/anticlockwise scenario too.



So here we have Elwood, my trusty 3F, pulling 19 partially laden trucks through Tebay and commencing the incline up Shap Fell. Now Elwood is a remarkably powerful little loco, but towards the top of the gradient he is struggling. He makes it, but only just. And when he goes down Grayrigg Bank, he's going too fast for the bend at the bottom, pushed by 19 trucks. So here is the solution....



The 0-6-0 that came with the original trainset has been relieved from its mostly static duties at the Shap Lime quarries and pressed into service as a banker. And they didn't even wash the lime off her. Now this little loco has a starring role. Not only does he/she (it deserves a name) just give Elwood's trucks that slight extra shove that they need to get to the top, but it is very slow and acts as a brake on the big downhill stretch.

I have 3 bigger tank engines that I can use as bankers, but on longer trains I get a few derailments. The tank engines work best as double headers for a big train.

[Chops]

Interesting layout and interesting nostalgia, behind it. You have captured the essence of the thing.

[Daniel]

... and beautiful colour work everywhere!

Chapeau!

Daniel

[captrees]

... and beautiful colour work everywhere! Chapeau!

Daniel

Thank you Daniel. That is praise from the Master Modeller.

Interesting layout and interesting nostalgia, behind it. You have captured the essence of the thing.

Thank you Chops.

But back to the trucks.

The makeup of the goods train has changed over the past months. I don't remember trucks with all that writing on the side in the 50's and early 60's, and if they were all like that, I'm sure there would be whole trains of perhaps 2 or 3 types of trucks, and not random individual trucks. Someone gave me a John Delaney lime truck from Horton-in-Ribblesdale, since it was a match for the Pen-y-Ghent backdrop. Now I've no interest in buying 'new' trucks if I can help it (read "afford") so the lime truck stood out on its own. Then the chance came to get 3 Shap Tarred Granite trucks.



They are suitably loaded and weathered. Then 3 more Westmorland trucks appeared at a fair. I had no idea who Roberts Davy were when I loaded them with coconut matting. This vaguely represents something a cow might eat. I hope the trucks were cleaned before they do eat it, since I've found out that RD were coal and coke merchants.



And then from the same source I found a coal truck from a Richard Thomas of Lancaster. The train is plying between Penrith and Lancaster.

[captrees]

Meanwhile, on the inner track, we are running a 4 carriage local all stops between Preston and Carlisle. A Black 5 is pulling 4 Stanier 57' carriages out of Oxenholme, and passing the newly refurbished Burneside Mill.



The outer track will sometimes run the Caledonian, with the "City of Sheffield" and a rake of posh long blood and custard carriages. However this won't run on the tighter inner track. Frankly I find the shorter Hornby Railroad 57' carriages are perfect for this layout, inner or outer. I run up to eight of them, all converted to steel wheels and some loaded with passengers. Derailments are very rare with these.
The two trains pass on Grayrigg Bank.

[Daniel]

Captrees:

... "... Master Modeller... " ...???!!!

You shouldn't be so self-indulgent with alcohol!

Daniel

[glencairn]

Good to see trains on the E.W.R. Brings back many memories.
Thanks for posting, Captrees.

Glencairn.

[captrees]

Captrees:

... "... Master Modeller... " ...???!!!

You shouldn't be so self-indulgent with alcohol!

Daniel

You may observe the advertising in the last photo. The last billboard on the right is from my main sponsor, (?), Gordon's Gin.

[Bufferstop]

I don't remember trucks with all that writing on the side in the 50's and early 60's, and if they were all like that, I'm sure there would be whole trains of perhaps 2 or 3 types of trucks

Your memory is spot on. One of BRs first moves after nationalisation was to scrap the old private owner wagons, that all been drafted into one big common user pool in WW2. Any maintenance work had been restricted to essential fixes to get them back in traffic. They were replaced as fast as possible with new railway owned wagons, in grey(hand braked) or bauxite(continuous braked). I think many that were standing on private sidings at collieries and the like were left where they were and they would get used internally, broken up for scrap or simply derailed and left to rot. I can remember long lines of decaying wagons alongside the colliery lines on Cannock Chase well into the fifties. The timber from scrapped PO wagons would be used to patch up any railway owned wooden bodied ones that were being worked until they fell apart. As they didn't get repainted you'd have bits of the PO markings on individual planks, not matching up and often upside down.
Dai Woodhams scrap yard in South Wales had so many scrapped wagons to cut up, that he quoted them as being the reason that he never started cutting up the steam locos that were sent there in the late 50s and sixties. So we have the old wooden wagons, and Dai's preference for the easy cutting, for there being so many rescued Barry locos on our heritage lines.

[Bigmet]

....So here we have Elwood, my trusty 3F, pulling 19 partially laden trucks through Tebay and commencing the incline up Shap Fell. Now Elwood is a remarkably powerful little loco, but towards the top of the gradient he is struggling. He makes it, but only just. And when he goes down Grayrigg Bank, he's going too fast for the bend at the bottom, pushed by 19 trucks. So here is the solution....
...Now this little loco has a starring role. Not only does he/she (it deserves a name) just give Elwood's trucks that slight extra shove that they need to get to the top, but it is very slow and acts as a brake on the big downhill stretch...

Your little loco is named 'Big Bertha'. This was the rule with Midland design goods locos like your 3F. They weren't to be made to struggle going up hill on freight trains, but would always have Big Bertha provided to push at the rear.

[captrees]

The Caledonian was a British express passenger train of the 1950s and 1960s running between Glasgow Central and London Euston, up in the morning, due into London in mid-afternoon, and down in the afternoon, with a Glasgow arrival in the late evening. It was operated by the London Midland Region of British Railways and was non-stop between Carlisle and London. The service was introduced on 17 June 1957 and ran as a named express until 4 September 1964. It ran daily, although for the Summer of 1958 there was a trial of running it twice daily, with morning and afternoon services in each direction. The Caledonian ran on the West Coast Main Line, for a journey time of 7 hours 15 minutes, identical with the other two daytime named trains of the period between the two cities, the Royal Scot and the Mid-Day Scot. All three trains were restricted to eight coaches to save weight, and the number of passengers carried was limited to the seating capacity of the train, standing passengers not being permitted.

The Caledonian was the glamour train that passed through Oxenholme, and if we knew it was coming we'd wait on the bridge.




I don't want anyone to point out that the Oxenholme bridge was not a foot bridge. I'll just get you to imagine yourself on the road bridge here. And that drone photography was around in 1960. Oxenholme was on a curve, and you'd hear the train before you saw it, and could probably feel the earth move too. Those ladies were probably hoping they wouldn't get any soot on their washing again.



Once the train had gone under the bridge, you'd run over to the other side to watch it going through the station. It didn't slow down, of course. (This is where you need some real steam)

Now I'm sorry about the man with the red flag. The Caledonian driver didn't take any notice of him. He's only there because he's glued on with UHU. I should have used Tacky Wax.




It's a very quick drone, isn't it? The Caledonian has raced through the station, rattling all the fittings, and is out the other side. Tom Brownlee, the Netherfield bowler, was a bit put out by the sudden appearance of the City of Sheffield at full tilt, and the umpire is about to signal a wide.



That ballast looks a bit white in the photo. Its not white at all. It just looks like that in the Australian sun. Everyone knows the sun rarely shines at Oxenholme. Its all illusion, isn't it?

[glencairn]

Lovely scenes, captrees. If I was at the cricket match I would be watching the trains as well.
As for white ballast. I saw newly laid ballast between Gilsland and Low Row that was white. It wasn't white for long.

Keep the pictures coming.

Glencairn