A Layout Makes Work For Idle Hands

I spent a very agreeable couple of hours yesterday afternoon indulging in a little test running with Himself on Minffordd.

I'd arranged to stop by and inspect the completed fiddle yard extensions, and get some images of the newly-fettled Wickham Trolley which I posted yesterday.

It's already clear the auxiliary fiddle yards for the OO Cambrian section are going to have a transformative effect on how we can run the layout at exhibitions.

We'll be able to run a better variety of trains and keep almost all the rolling stock in circulation, rather than swapping about what is on the tracks and what is kept aside.

The other big impact is that it potentially creates a job for another operator - a fifth!

Because of the layout of the existing yard, and the way the new terminal sidings branch off only the outer of the loops, one operator could be running a DMU or a short freight, or shunting the yard, while their colleague is busying themselves moving around locos which have been released by departing trains and moving them onto empty stock in the lines at the other side, for example.

Meanwhile there's capacity for another three operators to be engaged in running the FR half of the layout, one at each of the fiddle yards at either end, and another positioned at the front keeping something shunting about on the narrow gauge tracks in the yard.

Let's just hope we can find enough skilled and enthusiastic operators who are willing to come along and run it with us.

More Wickham Trolley Testing

 Our little standard gauge curiosity has been undergoing some test running on Minffordd.

It's coming up to two weeks since our sound-fitted Wickham trolley broke cover with a little video I posted on our other social media feeds of it having an initial test run on one of the club layouts.

It's certainly attracted a lot of attention with the clip having been played more than 50 thousand times on one site alone as I type this!

Although the chip and speaker were as effective as we'd hoped it was clear there were some mechanical tweaks needed.

Traction troubles

These ingenious Bachmann models have the drive hidden in the truck behind, but only one axle - the front - is powered.

On this first test we could see it was struggling to cope with anything beyond billiard-table level track, and on rising grade, on a curve, would slow to a halt with the wheel spinning, and indeed lifting itself up off the track.

Something that tiny is never going to be very heavy so the wheels on the geared axle are fitted with traction tyres, but Himself suspected perhaps this had lost some elasticity - and grip - over time.

The excellent Bachmann Spares website doesn't list traction tyres as an item, but you can buy replacements for the complete front axle, which we did, but replacing them is quite a tricky job because the drive train is packed in there like a watch mechanism!

The other thing we've done, taking a tip from discussion on a forum about these models, is use some lead sheet to make a 'tarpaulin cover' for the ballast load which adds a precious few grammes of mass but enough to keep that powered axle in contact with the rail.

The trolley has now run successfully around the layout, coping with the grades on the main line and also the ramp up into the exchange yard.

It's also had a Modelu crew fitted which will hopefully draw the eye and disguise where the speaker, chip and stay-alive have been hidden.

Here's a clip of it having a test run on Minffordd earlier today.

Cambrian Coast Icons - DMUs

It's well known that nostalgia is in the eye of the beholder.  

In whatever subject we are interested in there will be a period which dominates our memories, and I suspect for most of us that will have coincided with childhood, or when we first experienced whatever this thing is.

So for me, and the Cambrian Coast Line, it's the early to mid 1980s.

I don't think anyone could ever claim it was a golden age - far from it - but if you looked closely it was possible to see the relics of it, such as the last knockings of mechanical signalling.

It was, however, definitely a time when the Cambrian was on its uppers, with Barmouth Bridge closed to all except DMUs - and even then I can remember seeing them absolutely crawling across because of the severe speed restriction, probably moving not much faster than the marine worms were burrowing into the timbers!

I believe before this I can remember seeing a loco-hauled train once, or maybe twice.  A clear memory of a Class 25 with - I think - a breakdown crane at Barmouth station.

So, a young enthusiast on their summer holidays existed on a diet of DMUs, and bread and butter was definitely the Met-Cam class 101.

I always found them the most pleasing of the 1st generation designs on the eye. 

The nicely proportioned front windows in the driving cabs, no great lump of a headcode box above, the chrome window frames, and not being festooned with doors like the high-density suburban units.

So a 101 was always going to be one of the 'anchors' in our Cambrian stock list for Minffordd, and we've gone with the Bachmann version as opposed to the Lima / Hornby offering on account of their very smooth drive, although I am aware that a few proportions were overlooked when the body tooling was designed, but I can't say that I've ever really noticed.

One day I would like to find - or if I'm forced to, repaint - and example sporting the brand-new Rail Blue livery to illustrate the changing scene of our 1960s period, but they seem to be like hen's teeth to get hold of.

I do believe it is important to have variety on a layout, so much as I like the 101's I'm reluctant to run only them.

Our other DMU, then, is a Bachmann Class 108, which were less frequent on the Cambrian, although I have seen plenty of photo evidence.

Were we modelling the era of my childhood, in the 1980s, we could get away with a kaleidoscope of different units.

I can recall on summer Saturdays seeing a wide variety of units from Tyseley and Chester strung, quite often running horrendously late on account of having to pull up many times at the short halt platforms on the coast line.

The one design of unit I would really love to have for Minffordd would be the other one which really sticks in my mind from my younger years when I witnessed the last days of the Park Royal 103s.

Tim Green on Flickr

I would dearly love to see one of the manufacturers add this to their range, it's definitely top of my OO wish list!

Finishing Touches

It's a very FR trait to leave a construction project ever-so-slightly unfinished and we like to keep up the tradition in model form!

It is only now, four months after the first exhibition appearances, that the Cambrian station buildings have gained their decorative finials.

These buildings, of which no trace remains today, were a interesting challenge to research and scratch build for the layout and something I think I may return to in fuller post sometime.

I must say, that bench in front of the ground frame cabin (not a signal box) does look a very inviting place to while away some time on a summer afternoon.

What it must have been to have rested here at this summit and heard the sharp bark of GWR engines forging their way up the banks on either side!

It’s something I’m too young to have experienced but if  you still have those memories clear in your mind it would be lovely for you to share them with us in the comments below.

The Most Important Building

For small layout Minffordd has quite a lot of buildings on it.

Some of them are large, some are very small. 

For some of them their purpose is quite obvious (the Cambrian station building for example) while others may can be a touch misleading - such as the 'signal box' which is not, because it doesn't control any signals!  (It's technically a ground frame.)

The one I'm going to write about in this post is probably the most likely to be overlooked when the layout is being watched at exhibitions because it is tucked away at rear of the scene with it's back to the viewer.

But the Minffordd Weigh House is probably the most important building in the scene.

When the FR was in its heydey, making enormous profits carrying slate down from the mountain quarries, every waggon was to be weighed whether it was heading for the port or down into the exchange yard here at Minffordd.

This elegant stone building contained two weigh machines and the waggons were checked on the move as they passed over the tables on the 'Mineral Line' in front.

Along with virtually all the buildings on Minffordd this one was scratch built in styrene.

It's actually the second model of the building I've made.

The first was done as a gratis commission as a presentation gift to P-Way boss Fred Howes for his retirement a number of years ago, because in the modern era the building found a new use as his office.

On Fred's model I scribed the detail of all the dressed stone on the front and sides, and the rough blocks which make up the rear wall.

For the Minffordd example, where the front is normally only seen by the operators and the model is at least six feet away from the nearest paying eyes, I decided I could probably get away with embossed styerne sheet with a rough approximation of the pattern.

And some rough stone sheet for the rear elevation.

Something common to both models is that the distinctive pointed slates had to be cut by hand, row by row, in this case using thick paper card with the pattern printed on to be cut with the tip of a blade.

The finishing touch is some saw-tooth barge boards which I cast in resin from a styrene master.

In case you wondered, the Weigh House can longer weigh waggons - the tables were removed in 1976  - but they were never thrown away, and the FR Heritage Group has an appeal running to raise funds to use them in a recreation of the railway's original weigh house at the back of the old Boston Lodge Engine Shed, which was superseded by the Minffordd building.

It will make a fascinating exhibit as part of the official tours of Boston Lodge Works you can book to join and it help contextualise the very reason the works, and the railway was built.

If you would like to help make this happen you can donate here.

Fiddle Yard Expansion

With more than a month to spare before our appearance at Model Rail Scotland the great news is that Himself has completed the project to expand the capacity of our OO Cambrian line fiddle yards on Minffordd.

During our first test exhibitions at the end of 2025 we discovered the limitations of the original design which showed how you can sometimes get 'railroaded' by sticking to your first concept and not seeing new opportunities as a project develops.

Initially I had imagined the Cambrian part of the layout would have a very limited range of rolling stock, perhaps just a couple of DMUs and a Class 24 with some goods wagons, in which case three or four short storage loops behind the backscene would be sufficient, because space was definitely at a premium.

As so often happens there was 'mission creep' during the build and we found ourselves acquiring more OO stock.  A Collett Goods here, a Standard Class 2 there, and, ooh, a Manor would be very Cambrian!

Soon enough we found ourselves wanting to run loco-hauled passenger trains and exhibitions became an exercise in juggling space and very careful parking of trains so they didn't foul the points at either end of the loops.

Over a few pints at night while were were away exhibiting Bron Hebog in Manchester just before Christmas one of our operating crew floated an idea of simple genius, inspired by the way he uses sidings on his layout as a surrogate fiddle yard to run trains effectively end-to-end on a loop-the-loop transit.

It dawned on us it was maybe possible to do something similar on Minffordd and more than double our capacity to store longer, loco-hauled trains.

I dubbed this project the 'Thompson Undertaking' in his honour!

As ever, it was up to Himself to work out how to turn these alcohol-induced brainwaves into practical solutions.

He identified there was space in front of the existing narrow gauge fiddle yards to add a thinner shelf below, and support it on a bracket fixed on the existing legs.

The big question was whether we were going to need to relay a lot of the existing fiddle yard loops in order to add some junction points.

We were in luck!  There was just enough space to squeeze in a Y-point, and the radius of the curves were a perfect match.

One compromise is that these extra points are hand-operated by switches and brass connecting rods, rather than being added into the rotary switch diode matrix which routes trains into the four main loops - that would just be too much extra work and head-scratching!

Something very similar was done at the other side and each line divides into two sidings which can each hold a loco and four carriages, or perhaps a long freight train, as you can see in the photo at the top of this post.

We can have three long trains on the layout with a spare road for one to terminate in after a trip around the circle.

We've also added an extra dead end storage road behind the loops which will give us even more options and hopefully mean we can keep nearly all our rolling stock on track and not have to keep lifting stuff on and off the rails to switch up the train formations.

Glasgow, next month, will be the big test!  Details in the Exhibition Diary.

Model Train Movies

As part of the process of reawakening this blog from its recent slumber I've updated the page featuring videos of our layouts filmed over the years.

There's some cracking footage which has been lovingly filmed, edited and posted online.

Some of the films are fifteen minutes long, and you could certainly lose a happy hour watching all of these films in their entirity.

You'll find them all on the Layout Videos page.