CoastalRev's Jamberoo Railway in N Scale

That's right, work has been suspended on the Jamberoo [Model] Railway.

The last piece of work done was to cut the track where the two baseboards join, to enable the baseboards to separate.
That occurred on 20 November.

Then on 23 December the Archbishop of Sydney invited me to become the Rector of Lithgow... so now it's time to pack up and go. Good thing I'd already put the 'break' into the baseboard join!

Labels: progress

Well, despite our best intentions, we missed showing Jamberoo at the church fete here in Jamberoo. 4 days in hospital and several weeks in bed following that put paid to any hopes of displaying something... anything!

Labels: display, progress

When 'starting out' in N-scale some 12 months ago, I already owned one piece of N-scale equipment, albeit 1:150 rather than 1:160: the Ibertren 'World Series' Alco, painted locally by someone as 4421. I bought it second hand years ago on the off chance I might some day become an N-scaler and it was a 'grab it when you can' type of deal. I think in the mid 1990s it cost me about $119. I also had a second-hand N-scale US-outline Minitrix caboose... I had dabbled in HOn2 1/2 many moons ago and its chassis was to have been the basis of something for the narrow gauge.

I was aware from my days working part-time at Northside Model Railways in West Pennnat Hills (for the late Darrel Nelson) that N-scale US-outline boxcars were very cheap... so I went onto eBay and bought a few... I think I have about 15 or so now! I've also got two end-platform ('observation platform' carriages from the US and a set of Great Northern 'streamliner' carriages, plus a minitrix set bought off ebay.

So I planned that as soon as I got some of my aussie rollingstock converted to MT couplings, some of this stuff would follow.

So as of today: 10 boxcars using microtrains 1031s plus my 70-class (on the minitrix 0-6-0 diesel shunter chassis) now has microtrains couplings too.



I had a bit of fun shunting my growing micro-trains fleet with the 70 and the 45, before running several special trains to clear the layout:

1. 4520 took several boxcars plus the 3 MT-equipped K wagons + my COR tank wagon to Dunmore
2. 70xx took the remainder of the boxcars.
3. Thomas (now my only decent Rapido-equipped runner!) came and collected the Peco 4-wheel milk tanker and the 3 Rapido-equipped K wagons.

This was so I could build some hills to make the village of Jamberoo more, um, village like.



Despite Jamberoo being on the valley floor - and at the edge of the upstream end of the floodplain, our beloved little village is quite hilly: The main street only ranges from between 25 and 29 metres above sea level - that's not hilly. (The floodplain ranges is about 10-20 metres above sea level). But the highest point of Macquarie St, two streets back from Allowrie, is 60 metres above sea level.



So armed with the calculations of the heights of the various parts of Jamberoo (thanks to google earth!), we cut up some soft foam rubber using our 'spare' electric kitchen knife - a wedding gift I've rescued from being 'donated' to others many times!

This method is one I've never heard of before, but we had heaps of the foam lying around courtesy of a mattress that was 'trimmed' to fit in my daughter's half-size single bed. Once we have a basic form we shall papier mache the landscape.

The pictures show that the heights seem exaggerated; at one level they are: their vertical plane is to scale, but the horizontal plane is compressed. I got this idea on Saturday while sitting in a car on Tate Place (long story; has to do with my job as a minister!). Basically, from the northern end of Tate Place, looking south, one can see the houses in the part of Jamberoo represented by our model railway and they look 'compressed' and almost on top of one another... as they ascend the hill, there is a visual effect that they are closer to each other than they are.

And so we have deliberately compressed the horizontal while maintaining the vertical.



There is much more work to be done yet - but as the State Government says, "still a long way to go but we're heading in the right direction". Unlike the State Government, I expect to deliver.

Labels: micro_trains, progress, rolling_stock, scenery

Well, after complaining in my last post that my attempt to put Micro-Trains 1015 couplings onto my first K-wagon was a disaster (and it was!) I 'miraculously' rediscovered the "NSW N-Scale Group" newsletter that had the instructions. I'll post them here, trusting that Graeme Goodsell who wrote them would be ok with this!

I fitted two more K wagons with the couplings (this exhausted my supply) and refitted the original one and all three are fine now!



You can see the 'lighter' coloured sky in the background - still looks dark in this photo taken on a mobile phone camera. But compared with older shots it's much lighter!

From Jamberoo Rail...

I also repainted the sky - it was a vivid, bright blue so I attempted to put a wash of white paint over the top. Not as successful as I'd have liked, but it does the job for now. I can't put 'Saddleback Mountain' on the backscene until the scenery--at least in its basic form--is in place.

The next thing is to fix the track that is misaligned where the two baseboards join, but that's simple.

A good day for the Jamberoo Railway I'd say.

Labels: micro_trains, progress, rolling_stock

Well, today I had my first attempt at fitting a Microtrains 1015 coupling to an Aust-N-Rail K wagon. I remembered reading that Rob Carpenter (the designer of the K wagon and Mr Aust-N-Rail himself) had designed the coupler boxes to take 1015s quite easily, so I hacked away. Everything went swimmingly except that my couplings are way too low! I discovered that Microtrains couplings are a little trickier than I expected--more practice needed.

Anyway, I had some fun with our little consist of three wagons. Zoë the 2.5 yr old train enthusiast asked if we could run 'her' Thomas (who has been purchased for use on our tail-chaser layout for the church fete display).

Here are some photos:

From Jamberoo Rail...

Above: 4520 has crested the grade from Dunmore and is easing its train down to the Minnamurra River crossing.



Above: Descending the 1:40 grade down to the river.



Above: Crossing the river and floodplain.



Above: The floodplain, with an old dairy in the background.



Above: Coming off the floodplain and approaching the Dairy Factory.



Above: 4520 has crested the grade from Dunmore and is easing its train down to the Minnamurra River crossing.



Above: Entering the village boundaries.



Above: Shunting the oil siding



Above: Running around the train.



Above: 4520's little train has been placed in the run-around loop awaiting the arrival of the passenger service.



Above: The passenger train arrives!



Above: View from Mt Saddleback.

That's all for now: Lunch hour is over and it's time to go back to work!

Glenn.

Labels: micro_trains, progress, rolling_stock

I'm very excited because I've assembled my first pair of Micro-Trains couplers.

When I modelled HO scale I had no troubles assembling Kadees (the HO equivalents) but the N-scale ones are a tad tinier! Rory's advice to assemble them on the plastic sprue saved me from buying a jig and I fitted my first pair to the C.O.R. tanker that's been waiting for couplers for over a year! It's pictured here sans coupling:

I'm very excited... and now I can run my 45 class (see previous post) with two wagons!

Labels: 45, micro_trains, new_loco, progress, rolling_stock

All this time and I've failed to provide the track plan!

Here 'tis:

The colours represent the electrical sections (this was my electrical plan). Also note that the lowest track of the staging area has never been laid (my father-in-law started track laying for me and somehow missed that one). Also, the kink in the goods siding is not reflected on the layout; my wife couldn't get it out of the software version!

All these references to wife, friend Kate and father-in-law may lead one to think that I've done nothing on my layout at all... well I guess the stuff I do just doesn't get photographed! But I did the bulk of track laying, all wiring, most of the wiring 'harness' and the complete control panel.

I'm quite proud of my control panel, it uses RJ-12 connections (the modular telephone connections) to connect the controllers to the panel and the panel itself is made out of a cheap aluminium briefcase from Bunnings.

Labels: history, progress

Lots of progress on the railway so far!

• The track has been 'rusted'.
• The sleepers have been painted grey in random spots to 'age' them.
• With the help of Phil Badger my Minitrix 0-6-0 diesel shunter has become an as-yet unpainted NSWGR 70 class (thanks Phil!).
• The baseboard was cleaned of all the junk it had accumulated.

Jamberoo 'running sessions' are taking place but all rolling stock still uses the silly Rapido couplers as I haven't gotten around to Kadee-ising everything. And the rolling stock is all overseas stuff except the 70 class and the 6 K-wagons from Aust-N-Rail. I have the TRC ready to roll but it has Kadees. My oil tanker hasn't got any couplings yet!

Next stop: ballasting the track.

Labels: progress

We've got trains running to "Jamberoo"... no scenery, but all wiring is complete.

No Aussie wagons or locos, but we're running to a schedule using predominantly US-outline wagons and locos, with the odd German thing here and there.

Labels: progress

Here are the first two kits of NSW stuff I've built:

Labels: progress, rolling_stock

Jamberoo never had a railway but in 1892 (about the time the railway opened to Kiama) there were proposals for a branch to Jamberoo. I understand this was a serious contender until about 1907.

So our idea is to build the "what might have been but never was" railway. Jamberoo is the site of the country's first dairy co-operative and because transport was an issue it made butter (Allowrie brand I'm told) and very nice cheese... the town is also the place where the Illawarra Shorthorn was developed and first bred.

So our fictitious branch line will serve the thriving dairy factory on the aptly named Factory Lane. We're setting it in the 1960s because that's when the most recent time when goods would still have been shipped on the line, and it suits the availability of Australian N-scale rolling stock, as well!

We will have facilities to serve the cattle sales yards, the dairy factory, Fredericks' stores (both of them, the grocer and the supplies store) plus a lumber yard and general goods.

So far we've made a 1:1 printout on paper and bought some kits... and I've made some cardboard mock-ups of the various buildings in town.

Pictures of progress to date are here:


I'm going to research it with some older folk from town.

Watch this space!

Labels: history, progress