High Fell, BR (NER) in TT 120

[Rallymatt]

If this is ok with the forum, I have thought I would start a specific thread on my ‘High Fell’ layout rather than hijack others with pics etc. Hornby announcing a TT120 range was just what I needed to return to the hobby after a couple of stalled efforts over the years. The Easterner was ordered on day 1, baseboard materials on day 3. Std ply sheet 2.4 x 1.2 m and some bracing timber, legs are breakfast bar legs off Amazon (IKEA tables were an option but didn’t clear the freezer) It’s cut so that if needed it can be split into sections for moving it’s not a mammoth task although some track cutting would be needed 😳 There was a planning rethink over Christmas and I pulled up some track, extended to loop to 3.2m (length of the room) and added an extra line and some crossovers, the reverse loop viaduct was also able to be extended and it’s much more what my original vision was. The open sections will have removable scenery boards in so track can be accessed for cleaning, etc.

Main High Fell loops are 3.25m x 1.25m and Dock scene 2.55m x 0.27m with a narrow link board

Edited April 25 by RB51
Added Dimensions

[Rallymatt]

High Fell was the last station on the Twizell Valley branch from Durham serving the dales market town. The valley is spanned by a single track stone viaduct allowing trains to enter the station from the east through the deep

cutting at Cragg Edge. The local geology proved more than a match for the early railway pioneers and spiralling costs reduced the plans to a single track entry to the station. After grouping, the strategic importance of the nearby Consett steel works prompted major engineering works. A twin track tunnel was pushed west turning the former platform 1 road into through east and west bound lines. Platform 1 was closed and the track realigned similarly the north side of the valley received a twin line looping up from Durham. The bottle neck still being single track through the now protected Cragg Edge. The original viaduct is part of a triangle allowing turning over complete trains.

Now as steam is in its final days High Fell has become a hive of unusual activity, after some disastrous diesel prototypes across Europe, an accord has been reached for trials of locomotives from across the continent. Just in time as BR (NER) is suffering a chronic lack of modern motive power. A BR130 heavy freight locomotive has been allocated to trials on the Twizell valley route and a DB 236 is being prepared to serve the goods yard at High Fell. A common Viking heritage has proved very lucrative in the area. An ancient recipe for Viking Hard Cheese has created huge demand in Germany resulting in regular ferry van services from Hull bringing German sausage and taking the Viking Cheese back across the North Sea.

[Dave the Busker]

That looks fantastic! grinning

[Rallymatt]

Thanks Dave, I saw you buildings etc on YouTube, it’s amazing how different it all starts to look with scenery. Just finished ballasting and weathering the extension. I like the results but not so keen on the doing but with ballasting.

[Rallymatt]

High Fell is lacking Hornby products, which is ironic as it’s their bold move in to TT 120 that’s got me back into building a layout…however while eagerly awaiting a raft of rolling stock and locos their superb buildings look great. These are the perfect place to try some super detailing, the goods shed has had some Humbrol weathering powders (dark earth and soot) applied, set on the layout with some weeds and a tree it’s quite convincing….. with some lighting you can see inside the extra loading platform and stone walling applied and a platform trolly….

[Rallymatt]

The station building hasn’t been weathered yet, it’s still being handled as that area is under construction. The detail is again superb and with some lights it really needs an interior! Just another little project but these are loads of fun, dead easy and cheap, just some research, card and some glue. Although the resin castings are quite thick, even a tiny led will ‘bleed light’ through the walls, a coat of Humbrol enamel solves that. A bit of tin foil in the roof makes a decent reflector for the led. On this one I popped the pre-wired led through a hole

in the board and used a piece of heat shrink tube (you could use a drinking straw but I didn’t have any) in a bit of black-tac. Normally I mount the lights in the roof and glue them in place. This is great for buildings that need to be moved. I bought this little circuit board on Amazon from Evemodel who do loads of bits for model railways (my signals and platform lights etc) It takes a feed from the track power and there are a range of plugs in the kit or screw fasteners to wire led lights to, you could plug a separate power source in on its own plug. You then can have a 3 volt supply to the building lights without needing to solder in resistors, and there is a built-in rheostat to fine tune brightness.

[TheTen2Fiver]

That looks really great. Wish the TT120 had come out at the beginning of last year as the perfect scale in my opinion. But I had gone past the point of no return last year in buying new 00 locos and much pre owned stock. I am keen to enjoy my NE region 4-6-0s and

0-6-0s and stock. However once a larger range of TT120 locos and stock become available in a couple of years I may well sell the OO and make the switch

Mark

[Rallymatt]

Thanks Mark, I moved back to the North East 18 months ago and one my other passions is cycling. Exploring NCR 7 (that is the old Tyne Dock/Consett line) that runs almost past my door, it got me thinking, but OO was just too big for the space I had, everything was a compromise too far. TT arrived at a time in my life when

I needed this positive distraction more than ever before. It’s a frustration that there isn’t more available right now but there are always work arounds 😁

[Jackster111]

What a great layout! It has a bit of everything.

Cheers

Jackster

[Rallymatt]

Thanks Jackster, I can’t wait to see other people’s creations too, already seen some

amazing layouts 😁

[Rallymatt]

A few night shots…

[taunmarc88]

Wow it looks so good! At the moment I have made a table top size layout but this gives me thoughts of expansion! I may have to leave a branch line at the edge of the board in anticipation

Imagine the look of the A4 and its train over the viaduct… I can’t wait to see!

[Rallymatt]

Thanks, I am looking forward to an A4 (and a 9f) going over the viaduct.

With your layout, just play about with a few ideas, you can see mine quickly evolved. Maybe a couple of easy to fit together boards can give you more flexibility, a day to day layout to operate (play trains) and add the other boards for longer running temporarily if you can’t dedicate the extra space permanently. (Playing bigger trains)

The minimum radius on mine is 400mm, if I had used setrack I could have narrowed the main loops quite a bit if I didn’t have the space. Maybe build a branch line station board, on a windowsill or book case/shelf, link it to a loop with a temporary ‘viaduct’ board?

[taunmarc88]

@Rallymatt That viaduct and branch idea is quite a good one. My room is a bit odd as I’ve got a window to the left, airing cupboard behind me and wardrobes along the wall to the right so I have to stick within 5’7 as the permanent table but there is likely a way to attach something at an L angle whilst I’m really into it. The other idea I had was gradients (or a separate level) but the length of gradient would be large. It would also reduce the non railway scenic area - although with the current lack of TT out there that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I have been having a bit of a wobble towards N, what with Metcalf and the small locos already being available now it’s tempting but I can’t help but think TT is the right move.

[Rallymatt]

I looked long and hard at N and some of the kit is very good but I just felt it was too small to justify the cost. The challenge of space never goes away. Sometimes go with what you have and get some track down, ballasted & weathered some scenery going and see how it develops, if you have space now, use it 😁

The viaduct, platforms, terrace houses and a retaining wall & road tunnel mouth (not shown at moment) are all Metcalfe N scale, the back scene is N too.

[taunmarc88]

I do think you are right, I'm going to have to do something with what I have just so I feel like I've started.

Question about your layout if that's okay... when you have the locomotives without front couplers pull into the station, how will you have them pull the train back out? I did look at designing a little terminus with loop but I don't know if I'm confident enough to fit a front coupler to blink bonny.

[Rallymatt]

I think once you have a try at some things you will start to see a plan come together and the great thing is, if you don’t like it you can change it.

Ok so A4 William Whitelaw (not who served in Margaret Thatcher’s Govt!) pulls into High Fell on a cross country express from Sunderland to Liverpool. The coaches are uncoupled from the A4, the station pilot (a shunter) pulls them clear of the ‘run around’ points, the A4 crosses over to the other track in the station and runs tender first ‘light’ at reduced speed back out of High Fell heading west (inside line) to arrive at the west end of the viaduct where it will be directed across the viaduct, through Cragg Edge cutting and back into High Fell station. The pilot will have pushed the train back up the platform, disconnected leaving the A4 to hook up to what was the rear of the train, and head out on its way across the Pennines

In the world of High Fell, the A4 has to stop to take on water (due to the heavy gradients through the dales) so will back into the headshunt opposite the huge water tower, when I find it make one, there will be a water crane at the headshunt and probably a diesel tank

This is what the idea of a reversing loop can achieve, they were a big thing in loco hauled days on the real railway, usually referred to as ‘triangles’ because of the almost total ban on trains been propelled (limited exceptions) and tender first was heavily speed restricted on British Railways. Bishop Auckland Station was a triangle for a long time and became a major junction as a result.

[Rallymatt]

I thought I would have a bit of fun with the Hornby signal box. I painted the inside to stop light bleed with some Humbrol matt black and made a very rudimentary lever frame with a sausage of black-tac and cut lengths of spaghetti painted in lever colours. The floor is just a piece of folded card, a warm white surface mount led in a length of heat shrink to hold it up, a resistor so the led doesn’t blow and hey presto….

[Jackster111]

Great job on the signal box!

Is your layout DC or DCC? This will be my first foray into railway modelling in a long time and I'm thinking DCC from the start.

Cheers

Kev

[Rallymatt]

Hi Kev, thanks, the signal box interior was a just to show it doesn’t take money and fancy bits to make something fun. 🤣

It’s DCC, and it controls all the locos (heady sun of 1 right now operational, waiting on an adapter plate for my DB236 shunter and Hornby A4 in Easterner set) the points and the light signals. The controller is a Dynamis and that works well. I am using DCC concepts accessory decoders to run all the points, and their associated LED output triggers the signals. The point motors are all Peco Twistloc solenoids. Hornby say their own point motors don’t work on their TT points but Peco surface motors do. I reckon the Twistloc motors would work fine for underboard installation. Might have an experiment when Easterner comes as it will have an Hornby point in the box.

[Fishmanoz]

Hi Kev, take a good look around the TT:120 topics and you’ll find a lot about DC v DCC including further useful links and see that some are going each way.

Personally, I went DCC from Day 1 over 10 years ago and am sure I made the right decision for me. Others have been DC for much longer than that and have no intention of changing.

Then HM7000 technology adds even more reason to stick with DCC. And that’s for someone who already has an expensive DCC controller which could now be redundant. In my case it is not as it will be working with RM or equivalent to extend layout functionality, not just giving up its power supply for the track.

[Too Tall]

Looking good Rallymat smile

I love the viaduct, I wont have room for one in my plans, but I may now steal the method for a small bridge if I can fit it.

Loving how you have really bought the buildings to life with lights, details and weathering.

[Rallymatt]

Hi Too Tall, thanks. Steal any ideas you want, it’s shared for that purpose. There are many layouts out there better than this but not so many in TT and I like people to get involved and use quite easy techniques to develop from the initial train set or item out of the box to something special.

If you use the idea of a diagonal across the loop for a bridge, there are 2 major considerations, Geometry and Electrics. All the straights and curves are in flexible track, if you use the set track from Hornby that will dictate the size of the loop you can fit the diagonal in and how it will work (you may have to cut a bit of track) Electronically this is a little more complicated, the train is effectively turned around by coming across the viaduct, that means there is an electrical conflict in the rails, the inside rail becomes the outside and vice versa, the diagonal has to be isolated and a reverse loop module or switching installed to prevent a short circuit.

[Too Tall]

Ha, no loop back for me, my plan is pretty much nailed down now (final tweaks to plan today to allow shunting without straying onto mainline ... (eventually, might have to compromise and have a newer diesel shunter in my planed loose WW2 era setting).

It will be a small bridge rather than your glorious viaduct.

Its more the cutting the board and having the tunnel below track level that hadn't occurred to me, so thanks for that thumbsup

[Jackster111]

Rallymatt and Fishmanoz, thanks for the replies regarding DC vs DCC. I have been reading the forums as suggested and have decided DCC is the way forward especially with HM7000 due to be released.

Cheers

Kev