Month: October 2020

After “Storm Alex” had done its worst, the line clearance gang went out and did their best. Then Bertram was assigned to take a mixed train, with coal trucks, up the valley. Always enthusiastic to be away with the train, Bertram set off at an alarming pace, but soon settled down to the job in hand!

Mike Barton

The forecast was for 24 hours of continuous heavy rain! The perfect opportunity for a day in the workshop and what better project to be working on than a waterwheel!
The waterwheel will become part of a watermill that will disguise the outlet from the pond pump pipe for our emerging garden stream. The watermill building will be a modified Pendle Valley kit. The wheel comes from that kit but it was in a basic form and so it was adapted to create closed and larger “buckets” for the water from the leat to do its work. I didn’t know if it would actually work, but this morning the skies cleared a little and the chance arrived to test the wheel using a watering can. The position of the leat where it discharges water onto the wheel and, in particular, the amount of water flowing over both seem critical, but the test has revealed that it can be done! Some of the water from the stream will have to be split off to feed the leat, just as in the real, full sized world. A sluice gate of some sort with a fine adjustment will be needed to regulate the water flow …. and I may have just the thing in the scrap box.
More tests will follow in due course.

Mike Barton
North West Wales 16mm Group Coordinator
nwwales16mmgroup

Website: http://nwwales.16mm.org.uk

Alice in action 4th October on 6G Garten bahn after the rain stopped. Working passenger train in ‘bunker’ mode & freight in ‘tender’ mode. Good smoke effects with the still, damp air.

Hi all, a loco is waiting for some dry weather to run in, since the last post I have finished Phil Sharples loco with some extra detail and a couple of figures. 6 x Triang skips bought off of ebay for approximately £6 to £11 each. I have bought another of his locos to build and create a 18inch mining line to run with my 2foot line.
I have knocked up a master of a deep sleeper with chairs to cast a load, gauged at 24mm. The master is slightly larger to compensate for shrinkage. I am planning to just bury the line in grey river sand instead of fixing, will give me a bit of flexibility to chop and change.

Hope to see you all in the near future. Will try and connect tommorow on zoom.

Cain Howley