Garden Railway Forum

philipy wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2024 2:59 pm As Rod says, that does look nice.

I'm a great one for adding interior detail to things, but with windows that small it does seem a wee bit pointless putting seats in this one!

Thanks Phil,

I know they are there and nicely varnished to boot!

In good light if you look closely you can see inside and that there's no-one in occupation.

Phil

gilfachphil wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2024 4:08 pm
I know they are there and nicely varnished to boot!

Yep, and that's all that matters.

What a little gem.

Rik

First running session of 2025.

I found that the tender link bar was slightly too short for the tightest curve so made appropriate adjustment.

I hope the speed here is acceptable!


Phil

Good to see something running despite the weather.

Rik

It's been a beautiful day here in West Wales, bright and sunny. Just back from walking on the beach.

Phil

gilfachphil wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 3:55 pm It's been a beautiful day here in West Wales, bright and sunny. Just back from walking on the beach.

Phil

Shadupayaface!!!

My mum and dad used to live in Pembrokeshire. I well remember walks on Broadhaven, Newgale and Marloes beaches.

Happy days!

Rik

By the way Phil, great video again looking at your brilliant line is always welcome for me.

ge_rik wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 5:28 pm Shadupayaface!!!

My mum and dad used to live in Pembrokeshire. I well remember walks on Broadhaven, Newgale and Marloes beaches.

Happy days!

Rik

Not going to try to pretend it's a beautiful day here everyday, but Marloes Sands at lunchtime today was not too shabby...





Sorry for the thread drift! Great seeing trains running in the winter sunshine Phil.

SimonWood wrote: ↑Wed Jan 15, 2025 3:33 pm

Not going to try to pretend it's a beautiful day here everyday, but Marloes Sands at lunchtime today was not too shabby...

Think you pinched the entire UK's quota of sunshine!

Yesterday I visited Trevor and Dinah for a splendid lunch, after which Trevor and I repaired to his workshop to give Anna a once over as I wanted his expert eye to check she was running correctly. Much re-assured I took advantage of another dry sunny day in West Wales to give her a run on my railway and to try to get some decent steam effect videos. Working solo it is difficult to drive and film but here are some bits that I was quite pleased with,

Phil

There was a heavy frost yesterday morning with very impressive ice crystals formed:-
I wondered whether a live steamer would be heavy enough to run over them but it was a bit too cold to stand around and find out!

Phil

Open the drain cocks and melt them!

Thanks for the helpful suggestion Simon!

I did not fancy standing around in the cold for long enough to get steam raised,

Phil

You might have struggled to get steam raised at all!
Plus, who would want to stand around when it's that cold!

A beautiful sunny day in west Wales. Just before Christmas 24 two new members joined the household. This afternoon was their first experience of trains running on their climbing frame!

Bella has lots of white, her brother, Gilmour, much less.






When they had had enough fun some more serious running occurred



Phil

In the running session yesterday there was a distinct wobble of the middle IOM coach coming across the lifting section and it looked as if the wooden trackbed was causing the camber of the track to alter from the fixed section to the bridge. I also looked under the coach which has the 32mm wheel sets in place of 45mm which it was designed for. The first two coaches I bought came with short lengths of plastic tube to slide onto the axles to reduce sideplay when changing wheelsets but the third one had nothing so there was a lot of slop.

This morning I inspected the line with spirit levels and it was really pretty near level, optical illusion rather than fault. I decided to try to fit sleeves to the axles using some brass tube I have where a 3mm i/d piece has got locked inside a 4mm one. The axle diameter, without taking the wheelset out appeared to be 3mm, and the total space between wheel face and axles boxes was around 16mm.

Using a copper pipe cutter and a 3mm drill inside the tube I cut two lengths as near to 7.5mm as I could and cleaned up a slight burr from the inside due to the cutting. Tried to place on the axles only to find they were in fact 3.1mm. Fiddled around to increase the hole so they would slide on but they were a little too long so the wheelset could not be put back into the axle boxes.

Method 2, tried a pair of M4 nuts either side of the wheel, that worked and took out some of the slop, adding a washer to each side did the trick:-
I then pushed the coach across the bridge and realised that the gauge was tight in the middle of the bridge. The track is by Cliff Barker and when you buy a point you get a slightly wider gauge sleeper pair included so I decided to replace the middle sets of the normal gauge sleepers with the wider ones. Eventually I got the coach to run freely on its own so brought out the other two and an engine:-




Much smoother. It may be that the back to back of the wheels is slightly wide. I had not noticed a problem with these coaches previously. It could also be a temperature effect. Anyway, problem solved (for now!)

Phil

Nuts and washers are a good solution for that, I've done it too.

For those of you who still believe it always rains in Wales:-

a link to a recent BBC news website article including complaints that it does not rain enough!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx208nj454ro

Phil