Sheehaun Light Railway

[DJ Dangerous]

11 hours ago, LNERW1 said:

I'm not quite sure why the semi-mushroom pun…

 

 

[LNERW1]

11 hours ago, Metrovik said:

My god, one engine on your railway has more backstory than my entire layout!

What did I tell you about never underestimating how autistic I am?

51 minutes ago, DJ Dangerous said:

 

 

Well that certainly sort of explains it.

[LNERW1]

Preliminary earthworks along the south wall of the garden, from Knockrann curve to Barnacollin bridge. Annoyingly difficult to level out since the shovel snapped. Apologies for the rather dark video but I only thought to record my progress after the sun went down.

Since the railway room has been built, theres been a line of spoil along the southern edge of the garden, which I’ve started shaping into an embankment leading to behind the new building. I thought I’d post this as I’ll be visiting family in Spain from Monday to Thursday, so I won’t have another opportunity to share progress for a while. At the end of the week, once im back home and it’s daytime again, I’ll do a full walkthrough of the planned alignment. The railway has been planned for nearly four years now, so hopefully 2026 will be the year it finally comes to fruition.

Edited December 28, 2025 by LNERW1

[Mol_PMB]

I hope you have a great time in Spain - hopefully it won't be as dark as your garden!

[LNERW1]

It's a bit of a risk going to Valencia as it puts me within missile range of the Canaries, so I'll have to take a break from being an insufferable asshole to poor @DJ Dangerous when I'm down there! But needs must. Hopefully I can get a bitta video of the Spanish choo choos to put up here, and maybe on YouTube since I only have one video up as is.

[DJ Dangerous]

On 28/12/2025 at 7:24 PM, LNERW1 said:

It's a bit of a risk going to Valencia as it puts me within missile range of the Canaries, so I'll have to take a break from being an insufferable asshole to poor @DJ Dangerous when I'm down there! But needs must. Hopefully I can get a bitta video of the Spanish choo choos to put up here, and maybe on YouTube since I only have one video up as is.

Don’t worry, Valencia is just as far from Canarias as Laois, for all intents and purposes, so you’re safe…

For now!

[LNERW1]

Guess who’s back? Quick video tour of where I am now, as promised.

 

 

[LNERW1]

Work progressing at Green River Cut, 9 March 2026.

[LNERW1]

And further record of the works around The Cut and Green River (Barnacollin):

#

[derek]

Black and white pic is the business 

[Patrick Davey]

Fabulous project, can't wait to see the trains running!

[LNERW1]

A slight mishap during test runs.

 

 

[Flying Snail]

1 hour ago, LNERW1 said:

A slight mishap during test runs.

You needed to get it up to 88!  

 

Very nice to see a garden railway, looking forward to watching this develop - is the track powered or are your trains battery operated?

Edited March 11 by Flying Snail

[LNERW1]

At the moment all my stock is track powered, 18V DC. However the majority of my track was made before the collapse of the Soviet Union and has basically been in constant outdoor use since, so it's not all in the best condition. As such I'm just not bothering to deep clean track, tighten fishplates, swap out some sections, rewire points, and worry about where to put power droppers, and I'm planning to slowly work my way through my collection, fitting them each with radio control one-by-one. However, at the moment I have no RC locos and no controllers, so I can't actually run anything. However, I do have a short term plan, which I will hopefully be able to share soon.

[LNERW1]

Well, no update on RC yet, but I have gotten a bit of landscaping done at the Cut at Barnacollin, since some of the cutting wall had been washed over the tracks. As such I’ve started removing the sloped loose earth and excavated back to an almost vertical face made up of more tightly packed earth. Ive also cleared the debris off the track and replaced it with an even layer of fine soil- hopefully this will allow for some “green track” to form similar to that seen on Bord na Móna.

 

Just a small update for now, but hopefully I’ll have a bit more progress to share soon.

[DJ Dangerous]

Love the buried track, looks excellent.

How do garden modellers keep weeds and plants at bay, in general?

[LNERW1]

2 hours ago, DJ Dangerous said:

How do garden modellers keep weeds and plants at bay, in general?

My personal approach is crossing my fingers and yanking out any longer blades myself if I need to, but that might not be the greatest strategy, I don't know.

[DJ Dangerous]

21 minutes ago, LNERW1 said:

My personal approach is crossing my fingers and yanking out any longer blades myself if I need to, but that might not be the greatest strategy, I don't know.

Would it be worth getting some gutter piping, drilling drainage holes in the bottom, then filling with stones and gravel as a track underlay?

Might also function as a form of retaining wall?

[Broithe]

4 hours ago, DJ Dangerous said:

Love the buried track, looks excellent.

How do garden modellers keep weeds and plants at bay, in general?

I make no recommendation, either way, about this approach.
 

 

[Mayner]

9 hours ago, DJ Dangerous said:

How do garden modellers keep weeds and plants at bay, in general?

Unfortunately weed/plant growth on ground level lines are almost impossible to control unless the track is laid on a stone or concrete base, its almost impossible to controll grass/weed growth in top soil.

Ideally grould level lines like the Sheehaun should be laid on a bed of fine stone min 75mm thick topped with crusher fines (stone dust) or a bed/ slab of concrete (min 50mm thick). 

One alternative that might work for the Sheehaun would be to use a sand/cement/peat mix as a track base/ballast instead of a concrete slab, this was popular method among UK garden reailway modellers during the 1980s, the peat/cement mix was more flexible than ordinary concrete/sand & cement and peat retaining mositure apparrently caught that typical BnM 'green track' effect. There was a "Model Railways" magazine  article in the early 80s about running live steam in the garden  (Greater London) and some track repairs to the peat/cement mix track/base/ballast.

 

 

 

[Galteemore]

14 hours ago, DJ Dangerous said:

Love the buried track, looks excellent.

How do garden modellers keep weeds and plants at bay, in general?

Constant running of trains! John’s points are quite correct. The mix he describes is ‘Rowlands Mix’ and was adopted by some 16mm modellers. It’s scenically very effective and could work with the plastic track typically used in 45mm gauge - it was fairly damaging in the long term to the wooden sleepers typically used in 32mm gauge. 

 

Edited 6 hours ago by Galteemore

[Mayner]

2 hours ago, Galteemore said:

Constant running of trains! John’s points are quite correct. The mix he describes is ‘Rowlands Mix’ and was adopted by some 16mm modellers. It’s scenically very effective and could work with the plastic track typically used in 45mm gauge - it was fairly damaging in the long term to the wooden sleepers typically used in 32mm gauge. 

 

Description of "Rowlands Mix"by Dave Rowland. https://www.wis.co.uk/andy/16mm/rowlandsmix.html author of Bradford Barton Tralee & Dingle book, full of excellent photos and drawings of locos and stock https://www.abebooks.com/first-edition/Tralee-Dingle-Railway-Rowlands-David-Bradford/32380000274/bd

[LNERW1]

Very useful, thanks a lot. I’ll try that on the cutting section and see if it can then be used on the rest of the line.