The Garden Railway: Missing The Point.

Time management remains one of my least greatest skill's but with the new garden railway season here, the most important item to sort on my list is the missing point at so called Diss-Arster Station. The foundations of the railway cannot proceed further and I cant backtrack (no pun intended) to the upper station, until this is done.

The station cat has been busy with her claws and the Seagull's and Pigeon's have maximised their time when she's not around!

I also need to get this done as already there is an eager and impatient passenger waiting at the station for a train!

As already established, a vast amount of LGB track had set the standard for any future build, this was even after having lost an amount of 1 metre lengths during the move back to the UK from Portugal. The removal company answered in true Arsen Wenger style "I dont know, I didn't see it" so I needed to buy more. Prices of LGB were already high and still rising rapidly in the UK so it was time to look at alternative's and weighing foot for foot prices, Tenmille G Scale track came out best. Although of a slightly different profile, I have stuck with them but do have the odd interloper from Bachmann and GRS.

Rounding The Curve

About 2 years ago I bought an Aristocraft class 66, this does not use the flexible measurements of LGB so the turnouts I had were redundant and needed to be replaced with R3's minimum. At the time, stocks of these were dry here, LGB having gone bust so it was wait for Marklin and production to start in Poland.

The Class 66 as new.

As soon as new stocks arrived, I duly ordered a righthand R3 (I forget the price now), fitted it at the main station and within a week it was falling apart. The main issue was frog failure (moving rails) and the built in electrical jumpers coming away one by one. It was to late to return it because it had been drilled and screwed down so it was make do and mend, just re fitting the jumpers was a nightmare to say the least.

Clearly with LGB under new management and relocation, quality control had taken a dive worthy of a Stuka and I was not about to go down the brand new road again. Next stop, a well known garden railway supplier that also deals in secondhand products. I phoned them, I was assured the in stock LGB RH R3 point was in exceptional good order so I paid three quarters of the price of a new one and waited.

The Next day it arrived and I eagerly opened it up like a child at Christmas, only to find a heavily worn point with more holes in it than a secondhand dartboard and a well, sort of motor. Now at this point (no pun intended) I should have returned it but I was desperate to move on and put it on the to fix list.

A Point In The Making

Ok, Two bad buy's, one brand new, one secondhand, plus more price increases and I needed a LH R3. With the two bad buys, either way, it had seriously put me off buying more LGB and this is when I came across Paul Abrams in East Sussex.

Paul own's The Iden Coach House Bed & Breakfast in Iden near Rye, if your a Gauge one modeller, you are more than likely aware that he has a 375 foot Gauge One dog bone loop in his garden and holds regular meetings there. For those who are unaware or just want to see something so simple but just a great inspiration, Pauls Gauge One.Live Steam Railway

Apart from being most helpful when asked, tucked away on his website, under "Track Additions - W/Shop". Is a section called Making A Point. Its not a definitive guide (specially if you run electric from the rails) but shows you in sequential pictures with a short description of how he makes his own. Again, he runs 1/32 Gauge One live steam and battery operated locomotives but the information can be adapted and is applicable to most scales, which is exactly what I have done.

Ok, Paul quotes 15 hours approximately to build a turnout but for this idiot, it's been well over a year and a half and is still in construction.

Apart from the left hand check rail this is how it was left last year.

Dont let my timespan put you off considering making your own turnout's, it's just me in unknown territory, not sure of my ability and of course, the Spanish gene! If I actually sat down and worked out the time I have spent on making it, it would be something like about 9 - 10 hours so far and that includes cutting sleeper strips, then cutting them into individual sleepers and treating them before commencement of construction.

All the rail and chairs were bought from Tenmille under their G Scale range. Originally I was going to use their sleeper pack's but as this turnout is based on an R3, the curvature would not fit within the width, hence the use of wood.

With an LGB R3 sitting on the Tenmille sleepers the problem can be seen. This is the RH R3 from the main station, which I am using for continual reference and hence why I cant backtrack until I finish building mine!     

For the record, I do not have a workshop fitted out with all the tools to perform the witchcraft of an engineer, indeed, far from it. I hijack the kitchen work surfaces (Err indoors love's it, honestly!), I have a Dremel, pliers, a selection of files, a small vice, razor saws, a couple of square's, two track gauges, some small wire brushes and two cheap soldering irons, a 30W and an 80W.


So what magical ingredient's do you need?


2 three foot lengths of rail
1 pack of rail chairs
2 packs of point slide chairs
Sleepers of your choice
Some brass plate
Solder
Solder paint not paste
Fairy dust (Ok, I made that up)

Now the one thing Tenmille don't sell is bridge chairs, these are the chairs needed to hold the outer check rails in place. Why, I dont know and I have yet to find a source that will fit the profile of their rail. I am working on a solution and if it works you will be the first to know.


So that brings us up to date and I'm off to bodge (I think that is how you spell build!) a point.