Irish Shunting layout Modernish

[richrua]

Hi guys. It's been a fair while since I posted on here. (I have been lurking in the background). A combination of a very busy time and feeling very tired because of a painful shoulder (which isn't quite right yet). Anyway . Enough excuses! I've had an idea in my mind for a small (4'x2' ) shunting layout for a while. Basically I was tired of the dull and dark attic  and needed a small self contained unit that I could set away when not in use. It will feature an imaginary cement depot with three sidings and a single line to the rear (Not connected on the baseboard) there will be a simple cassete based fiddle section that detaches (keeping the size to 4x2).

Here is the main unit. I have wheels on the side so I can move it about with ease.

The beading will hold mdf cover that will slide in. 

I have already mocked up the track plan. I'll do it again and take a pic later. I also plan to recycle some of my buildings from upstairs attic layout, which is handy because it lets me get a good idea if what it will look like without having to fork out too much. I also recycled the boards, the other side is fairly grubby but that won't matter. 

Stock wise - probably 80s stuff . The lovely cement bubbles of course. Gonna need a bit of advice on liveries . Have a good range of eras 141 and 071s etc so I might be able to go fairly wide era. Not sure!

[JasonB]

Great to see you back posting some work again richrua. Looking forward to watching this progress. 

[richrua]

Thanks! It's good to be doing a bit!

[richrua]

Progress at this stage is slow but thorough. Track underlay is down. Testing the track now with different rolling stock. Trusty power cab for dcc control. Next I suppose wiring droppers, fixing the track down and point motors. 

[richrua]

The track is now fixed . Test running this evening after soldering the droppers to the power bus. It works... and is a slightly neater job than it looks in the pics!!

[richrua]

You can see where I've  reused boards. Also, I've been reminded of how wonderful the baby gm s are . Well suited for shunting layouts as they run so well. 

[richrua]

I've now added in the point motors and tidied up the wiring a bit. The point motors are in good nick and recycled from the attic layout. Also recycled is the expensive ish but very useful DCC concepts point motors controller that lets me run the points off the NCE powercab. Bit of a test run with some stock too.

[jhb171achill]

That's got a lot of potential to be a very nice little operation!

[banntry]

Nice compact design.

[richrua]

Just been working on a simple system for allowing me to use small cassette s to add/ turn/ remove stock. I settled on a slide in idea. The guides should keep the track aligned, which will be fixed to the wooden slide part of the cassette. The cassettes won't be long - about 2 ft. The supporting board just slides in on bolts for easy removal, I really want to keep this layout to a limited size. Crocodile clips will do for power to the cassettes for now, probably upgrade to a more permanent power system at some point.