Evening All,

 Well after about 4 weeks working away in Yorkshire, Herefordshire and Shropshire I have finally managed to get a Thursday night to pop down and do a bit with the guys at Ramsbottom Model Railway Club. I can’t complain about working away as you get to see some really beautiful places and meet some very nice people.

A nice warm welcome to our new member Philip, he is a South African. He has interests in South African railways, modeling scenes and also hopes to model Summerseat Station sometime in the near future. Unfortunately I have not had the pleasure of meeting him yet but I’m sure the time will come as he was at Bolton this week. Welcome to the club mate.

Well here is the update thanks to Keith and Alan.

• Only three tonight, these being me, Keith and Alan. No Peter, Alex or Philip due to other commitments.
• The Bacup Shed building has finally had its roof added and glued down. This has also included the wooden air vents that run the length of the shed and give it some character. The original plan was to have the shed roof to come off so people can see inside but this wasn’t to be as it would have been a bit difficult with the delicate vents.
• Dark grey fine ballast has been laid inside the shed roads to represent concrete walkways. Some of this has even been put in the pits to show concrete pits. We may well weather this to be a bit dirtier as we know that sheds were never clean.
• 12x peco point motors have been wired up. This is done by using a green wire with a loop over to a tab on the same side, this is then the common. Then a blue wire on one of the other tabs and a white on the other. These are to be used for the Bacup layout.
• 2x peco point motors have now been fitted to an insulfrog point. This has also had a supply for dcc by soldering two wires to the underside of the point.
• 2x gas lamps have also been fitted on Bolton Road North in Stubbins opposite the station. These have been cut out, glued together, wired up using a grain of rice 12v dc lamps and then painted green. These are then fitted into location and wired up underneath the layout.
• Keith has been beavering away on the Bacup layout installing more cork strips for the laying of track in the next coming weeks.
• We have found in recent weeks that the turntable we have which is a peco model seems to bounce a bit. We hopefully have solved this by gluing some lead weights in place.
• Alan has made a few water cranes out of a silicone lid, a pen and what looks like some wire.
• Alan this week decided to take a break from modeling and run a few trains. The chairman has had a day off and has new teeth!

We also sold some unwanted and unusable books, wagons, carriages, trains, controllers, old bits and bats. This managed to raised a total of £70 which will go towards Bacup as we need more points.

Cheers for reading,

Dan

Evening People,

Well after performing a full day of electrical testing on a primary school in Hyde, I decided to make a visit to Ramsbottom Model Railway Club.  For anyone that does not known we are a local friendly model railway club based in Ramsbottom. We have currently have one full layout (Ramsbottom 1950) and another being built as we speak (Bacup Shed 1950). We meet on a Thursday evening from around 7.30-8.00pm. We are always looking for new members who have interest in model railways, real railways or even just history. We currently have 6 members with 1 ex pat currently running the Spanish branch of the club over in Spain.

Well after a hard day at work it is only right to kick the evening off with a large mug of coffee and a biscuit. This is also joined with a chippy tea from Kans Chippy in Ramsbottom, comes highly recommended.

 After this it is then time to sort out the essentials this includes the water from our friendly neighbors, a bit of heating into the building via our 2x calour gas fires, open all the taps to release any air bubbles and empty all the bin bags as its bin day tomorrow.

Here is an update from the past 2 weeks.

• Keith has now laid a course of dark grey ballast on the 4x roads that lead out of the rear of the shed. The box says dark grey but it is more like black which is good for us as the original shed would have been had waste ash and clinker used as ballast. This is done by first wetting the track, sprinkling the ballast on and finally pouring diluted pva glue over the mixture. Carefully avoiding getting it on the track rails. The shoulders of the ballast are also built up the same way. The effect does actually look very good.
• Two gas light type lights needed replacing on Bolton Road North in Stubbins opposite the Railway Hotel. These are two grain of rice bulbs that are glued down the side of the lamps with the bulbs placed inside of the shade. These are then painted to match the rest of lamp post.
• There is a small building in the Ramsbottom (Trinity) Paper Mill that has also had a blown lamp that needed replacing. This was replaced with a new grain of wheat which was glued in placed and resoldered. The building was there glued down and weighted.
• Bacup Shed has now had inserts fitted along each side of the pits. This will represent the concrete base of the shed but also give a flat surface for the shed building.

Next week it will be a year since one of our members and dear friend Roger Wilson passed away. He is still greatly missed every week when we are attending the club house. Roger was one of these members who could turn a blank scene into a real life scene with his keen eye for detail. He was also good with repairing engines and his joinery skills were second to none. R.I.P Roger from all your friends at the club.

Dan

Hello People

ELR General Manager Andy Coward’s Book “The Decline of British Railways in Bury & Rossendale

Having had a free Thursday evening and not been in London for the first time in about 7 weeks, thought I would pop down to the club, show my face and do a bit.

Tonight in attendance was Dan (me), Keith, Alan and Peter. No Alex or David tonight. Alex was on his jollies with his Mrs. Up in the North East of County Durham. Not sure on David.

Here is a list of things that have been done tonight and over the past week or two.

• Cleaned up the brew area as this seems to suffer at times from damp and dirt, so a good wipe down, carefully restocking the coffee, tea, sugar and of course biscuits. Cannot live without the essentials.
• Tidied up electrical area. This area contains items such as sockets, back boxes, low voltage cables in all sorts of sizes, data cables including cat 5 cables and soldering equipment.
• Tidied up hard ware area. This area includes areas such as drill bits, glue, fixings, drills etc.
• Tidied up Sink Area. It’s always a rarity to see a shiny sink so tonight was its turn. Nothing like a bit of elbow grease to bring it up looking like new.
• I have recently made a purchase from the East Lancashire Railways book shop as you enter the Bury Bolton Street Station on the right hand side as you enter. The book is written by the ELRs Andy Cowards and is called “The Decline of British Railways in Bury and Rossendale” We worth a read and has come highly recommended.
• A new 6ft light fitting has been fitted above the rear board. The previous 8ft fitting had gone in the previous weeks but you can’t get hold of the lamps or the innards. So a nice new fresh one has been fitted. Keith informed me that it took 3 of them 2 hours to fit one light…just a shame they didn’t wait for the electrician (me).
• 3x buffers have been replaced. These are fitted with red l.e.d.s to represent buffer stop lights. They have been replaced in the wagon works roads 1 and 2 and also on road 15 of Ramsbottom sidings.
• Last week Keith made an order to Frizzing Hall Model Railways located in Bradford in Yorkshire. He ordered some nice dark grey chunky ballast. This looks just right compared to some of the previous ballast which has turned up white or blue!
• Alan has been placing more doves around the layout with around 6 down Kenyon Street alone. These give a nice feel to the layout having them on chimney pots and roofs.
• I made a purchase awhile ago of a MGB in a nice shade of red. But in true fashion I kept forgetting to bring it down to the club.
• Also tonight an old friend has donated his old railway items to the club including a Flying Scotsman Train set, A Class 46 Diesel, A little saddle tank locomotive, Wagons, Coaches and Track. Some of the items will be moving on as they are a little too modern for us. Maybe for private sale or to the ELRs shop.
• Keith has been working with Peter to lay more isolation track and sections joining between the baseboards.

More pictures can be seen by clicking the link for the 2013 Gallery

Cheers

Dan

 Hello Guys,

It has been a while since I have updated this site and I am truly sorry for not keeping up to date with what has been happening at the club.

Well the main reason for the lake up updates is due to my mrs Amanda being pregnant over the last 9 months and on December the 29^th at 11.55pm our little baby boy Harry Evan Jones was born in Arrow Park Hospital on the Wirral. He weighed 8lbs7. He is now 11 weeks.

Potential New Member Harry Evan Jones

Having popped down a few times roughly once a month to check up on progress of Bacup Shed and Ramsbottom Layouts, I can now give you an update.

The biggest update I can give is that Bacup Shed layout will be DCC! A first for Ramsbottom Model Railway Club. We have now acquired a Gauge Master controller and 5 decoders for 5 DCC ready engines.

Bacup

• The Bacup Shed layout was dismantled and given an upder coat of paint to hopefully stop any damp that had started .
• All the pits have been dug out within the mdf top board. This includes cutting into the cross bracing of the layout frame.
• We have now acquired a Gauge Master controller and 5 decoders for 5 DCC ready engines
• The 12 pits for Bacup Shed have been sized, rail cut and are now being painted in a concrete looking grey colour.
• We have managed to aquire some suitable sized cable to hold the current as the power travels between 4 sections. This being 2.5mm pvc singles multi stranded.
• Keith is currently progressing with putting in isolation joints on small sections of track. This was already started before we went DCC so he has said he may as well carry on.
• Keith has now been looking through Hatton’s website to decide on what shade of ballast he would like for Bacup.

Ramsbottom

• 2x Gas Lamp and  1x Swan Neck Gas Lamp (Electric Street Lights) have been replaced on Bridge Street. 2x after the police station heading towards the paper mill and one at the total opposite end towards adj the William Decon Bank. These lamps are grain of rice 12v lamps.
• The curve point and track on the Accrington Up Line has been taken up and the level smoothed out as engines were derailing.
• There are around 3 L.E.Ds buffer lights that have been replaced in Ramsbottom Sidings..
• Alan has bought, painted and stuck in position on top of roofs on the junction of Kenyon Street and Bridge Street.
• The cross over point by Stubbins Signal Box was replaced by Alex in a night.
• A point in the sidings on road 10 has been replaced by Alex.
• The signals on top of the foot bridge had a loose connection and had to be rejointed which was solved by me (Danny) and Keith.
• The crossing gates have had to be realigned as they have not been right for awhile proberbly as Alex has gone through them….again :p
• The 8ft light fitting above the rear board has also stopped working. As 8ft tubes are now no longer available, this will now be replaced by a 6ft. The 8ft has now been stripped of all useful parts.

Last Thursday 21^st February 2013 our old friend Adrian come over for a flying visit from spain and was impressed with Ramsbottom. He has of course not seen Bacup yet and was shocked that we had started another layout…..but could not get his head around DCC.

Hopefully I should be able to attend now on a regular monthly basis but recently I have had to work away down in London so have not been able to attend. So I might just get a monthly update in one hit like this one.

For those of you who are asking about open evenings or days. At the moment we are concentrating on making the Bacup Shed layout so haven’t really had any time to plan anything. Maybe some time in the near future when we have a good clear out of the train club we will organize something special. But in the mean time if anyone is wishing to visit our club then please contact me Eagle1711@hotmail.com for details.

Cheers

Daniel Jones – Club Secretary and Webmaster

Hello People,

Here is this Thursday’s update for Ramsbottom Model Railway Club, Sorry its late but ive had to work away and only just had chance to update now.

• Tonight saw 5 members attend with Dan (me), Alex, Alan, Peter and David. No Keith tonight.
• Me and Peter have made another section to the Bacup Shed Layout which now makes the layout almost half the size of Ramsbottom!! This section has the frame measured and cut, glued and screwed together then a mdf top glued and panel pinned on top.

• Alex and David decided to have a night of running trains from Bury to Rawtenstall and Accrington via Ramsbottom. After David had to go early Alan decided he couldnt resist and went and join Alex running trains….cant blame him.

Dan