All stop on the indoor railway and time to move to the outdoors one.
The good weather is finally upon us, "Hooray" I hear you say but looking out the window, it's far from it, true April weather for a change! Not good for the outdoor model railway enthusiast come model maker, specially one that suffers from disaster followed by procrastination.
I have been in the process of building a G Scale come misty measured Gauge 1 line around the garden for the past 5 years. I kid ye not, 5 years and its far from complete.
As Kevin Bloody Wilson sung, "Two steps to the south and three to the north, doing the last lager waltz", only without the beer.
Not bad eh? Straight as a dye, the upper main station.
Even the cat likes it.
Ok, these two pictures were taken 5 years ago, so time and change can only be for the better, right!
Wrong.
No the line has not been abandoned, in fact none of the track was permanently laid here and the line has stretched itself a lot further round the garden, to a point that's now on the far side of the picture. It's just suffering from a lack of maintenance, a turnout making exercise (more on that later) and most of all, the shed sinking!
Let me elaborate a little. The property the good wife and I live in is rented, therefore everything has to be easily removable and without lasting damage. Plus there is no plan to this railway, other than watch it grow and as we already know, planning is not one of my strong points!
The garden is L shaped and off shot (in the above image) to the upper right, is the highest point or the datum point. The railway turns left at the end of these boards, smooths out, running sort of straight and level to the lowest part of the garden.
The lowest part of the garden lay's in the distant corner.
The top of the metal poll donates the of the highest point of the garden.
The line then bears right and starts a steady 1' in 4" (sorry, only James May style pre decimalisation measurements here, (Keep Calm and Convert It On Google) decent through reverse curves, to avoid a long established compost heap, to another station area, which as yet is unnamed (maybe Diss-Arster is a possible) and currently ends there. There is a small projection onward to and from the datum point and I intend to get that area finished and possibly a little more this season.
Diss-Arster in the making, other name suggestions are welcome.
Like British Rail "Were getting there".
I did and they didn't! The highest point of the garden is in the thorn bush, top right.
So what's taking so long? Apart from the rental factor, no serious groundwork, the not so earth is actually London Clay. Great for tunnelling through but a nightmare to temporarily build on, hence the shed sinking and taking the main station boards and a couple of others with it. By the way, I live in the Whitstable area, not London!
This was once level and straight but now suffers from a rise, a drop and bad alignment.
Once perfectly straight. The effects on London Clay of water logging in the rain and drying out and cracking in heat. The removable section is temporary pending an aluminium truss bridge to be made by me. Temporary that is, as in 4 years ago!
It does not help that last year I back tracked to the reverse curves, having not been satisfied their width, beefed them up by adding roofing felt and camber and I must say though, it was worth it.
Widening the track bed, the brown boards were the original width.
Widening completed, next the felt and camber.
All done at the end of last season, including soldered jumper wires and is just waiting for the addition of edging this year.
Also at the close of last season, roofing felt and track (minus a turnout) had been laid to the far end on the second station, cast concrete slabs were made and laid in place ready for this years track extension work.
The cat love's her scratching boards, more maintenance for me!
So there you are, a new season is here and to make further progress, that missing point has to be laid, which leads us nicely in to the next post.
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