Terry Metcalfe nearly made Ely in N gauge, hence the name 'Neely'.
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Factfile
Layout name: Neely
Scale/gauge: N gauge
Size: 14’3” x 4’8”
Era/region: Contemporary East Anglia
Location: Cambridgeshire
Layout type: Oval with storage sidings
Power/control: DCC
My early modelling credentials are minimal. I remember being allowed to look at our Hornby Dublo train set laid out on the dining room carpet as a child with my younger brothers but I have no recollection of ever operating it. I dabbled in slot car racing as a teenager. For my 50th birthday, I indulged myself and bought an LGB train set of the sort that I had coveted for many years and could now afford. More trains and track were incorporated into a moderately sized G scale garden layout. After my retirement in my early 60s, I kept the garden layout under the pretext that it would entertain my grandchildren. Unfortunately, this was not the case and I eventually sold all my stock and track.
In the meantime, having relocated house to be close to our two sets of grandchildren, my wife suggested that as there was a model railway club in the town, maybe I should join to give me something to do. So, in Autumn 2010, I made my first visit to the Ely and District Model Railway Club. The clubroom was small such that they could only erect their new N scale layout which was in the process of having the track laid. On the second visit, I asked if I could help. The layout was called 'Westgate Park'. It was built on five, very heavy, baseboards intended for exhibition as well as club use. It was conventional dc but so complex that it needed over 100 electrical connections between each baseboard which was a disaster waiting to happen. Several frustrating years followed where we tried to get 'Westgate Park' fully wired and working. (As an aside, 'Westgate Park' was finally made operational by using Model Electronics Railway Group (MERG) components, DCC and CBUS, in 2015 – more of which later.)
At the beginning of 2012, I resolved to build my own N scale layout avoiding all those things which I perceived as wrong with 'Westgate Park'. I set myself several goals: DCC operated; based on a real location; easily transportable using lightweight baseboards; curves with as large a radius as possible on the scenic side and to be suitable for exhibiting as well as being my home layout. I had in mind to use our large spare bedroom and fortunately, my wife agreed. 'Neely' is the result. It is based on the train schedule and a much-condensed trackplan at Ely in Cambridgeshire. It is operated using MERG hardware and the interlocked, route setting software is PanelPro by JMRI. It had its first outing to my home club’s exhibition in May 2015 where it performed well.
Why choose 1:148 scale? Having visited several exhibitions and after many discussions with Club members, it was obvious that if I wanted to model a real location it had to be N scale so as to make the best use of the available space in the spare bedroom. I also realised that this scale would enable me to run freight trains of a length that looked right. The sidings in 'Neely’s' storage yard can accommodate four trains of 13 or 14 container wagons plus loco and exhibition visitors have commented how the length of these trains makes the layout look more like the real thing. I was also impressed by the quality and running capability of available N scale stock and I still hold this opinion even though I have had to return a couple of new locos as not been “fit for purpose”.
What have I learnt? Since starting 'Neely' I have been to six or seven courses at Missenden Abbey held over Spring and Autumn weekends and the tutors there have taught me how to solder decoders into some of the locos bought second hand, to fit directional lighting to my Graham Farish (GF) diesel multiple units and I learned the basics of airbrushing and lining. They helped me with some of the more complicated MERG kits., I learnt a lot by trial and error – with the emphasis on the latter during my early days. For example, the first decoder that I ever tried to solder into a GF class 66 was fried within 5 minutes by the clumsy use of the soldering iron. More recently one of my colleagues discovered a badly soldered 37-way D connector in the clubroom which, embarrassingly, was one of my early attempts. I now use it to show how you can improve with practice – not that I claim all my recently soldered joints are good but at least I know how to use a solder sucker and solder braid effectively. I am now content to repeat my work until it is acceptable.
I tend to the view that less is more when it comes to scenery and that moving trains are what people expect to see at an exhibition. A pet hate is to see a wonderfully scenic layout at an exhibition become a static diorama because the trains aren’t running when either the operators are, unforgivably in my view, chatting or there is a breakdown. The latter is mostly avoidable by cleaning the track and the wheels, checking the layout immediately after setting up and having backup stock. We also carry spares of all the CBUS modules including a command station, booster and several controllers.
MERG – a treasure chest of goodies. MERG is a 2500+ strong club which provides electronic kits and components to railway modellers designed by electronics engineers. As well as superb kits, MERG has a web-based forum to provide a ready means of help and fault finding if kit builders run into difficulties. It is worth remembering that the Group caters for many novices. The kits do require reasonable soldering skills but are straightforward to assemble by carefully following the comprehensive instructions with each kit. The components are soldered onto a printed circuit board (PCB) which is annotated with the component references adjacent to the pre-drilled holes. It’s the solderer’s version of painting by numbers!
The 'Neely' baseboards are fitted with 15 way D connectors to carry the three power busses and the control bus between boards. The connecting wiring looms are identical at each end so there is no question of the wrong polarity.
The buses have been set up like a ring main system such that if a connector fails, power and communication is still available to all the components. I mentioned earlier that our original club layout had over 100 connections between baseboards – 'Neely' requires just 12 – so if you are considering a sectional layout then DCC and perhaps CBUS should be given serious consideration if only because of the reduction in wiring and connectors.
A description of 'Neely'
The layout is a depiction of Ely but not a replica so it’s nearly Ely or 'Neely' for short. The trackplan has all the salient features including the two long, layup loops for use by the container trains to and from Felixstowe and the triangular-shaped island platform. Making good use of Google Earth and my own site visits to lay out the points and track work, I must have made a reasonable job as most people recognise it as Ely even with the transposed underpass and level crossing! The planning of the layout including the complicated storage area was carried out using AnyRail which enabled me to try out different ideas for this area. After taking 'Neely' to the Nottingham two-day exhibition in 2016, it was obvious that there were several operating defects and I have recently made some alterations to the storage area to increase capacity. The layout is 14’3” x 4’8” (which just fits our spare bedroom) with a central operating area for home use. At exhibitions, we prefer to operate from one end of the layout.
There are nine baseboards - none bigger than 48” x 18” for ease of transportation. The lightweight baseboards were made to my dimensions by Model Railway Solutions (MRS). They came as flat packs with 12mm hardwood ends pre-fitted with alignment dowels, 9mm side frames and 6mm thick cross pieces in good quality plywood. Their strength comes from the baseboard frames being 4” deep which have also proved useful for protecting the Tortoise point motors and the many MERG PCBs located under the baseboards. The baseboards were straightforward to assemble using the screws and glue provided. Having now had the layout at several exhibitions, the ease with which the layout can be erected and dismantled is a joy and well worth that initial first cost. The baseboards are complete with 9mm thick plywood legs which slot into sockets and do not need the fasteners which were provided by MRS for security and rigidity. The baseboards and legs are varnished to keep out any moisture.
'Neely' has its own lighting rig using daylight white LED strips in lightweight plastic channels supported on aluminium shelving uprights and cross pieces attached to the rear of the scenic baseboards. The backscene was painted onto boards by John Mitchell, a club member, in grey and blue acrylic paints to represent a typical Fenland sky.
At exhibitions, visitors like to watch how we control the trains using the computer and seem to be quite taken by the operator’s ability to click on an icon on the display to change a route. Children, of course, take all this in their stride and, where their grown-up is happy, we invite them to have a go at operating the trains under supervision in our less busy periods. I also try not to be “precious” about visitors touching the layout – I take the view that most things can be repaired.
The track work is Peco code 55 on the scenic side with large radius Electrofrog points. Peco code 80 track is found in the storage area where there are medium radius points to provide better use of the available space. I made the points DCC friendly by isolating the common crossing from the switch blades using a jeweller’s saw to cut the rails and then bonding the stock rail to the fixed rail near the hinge of the switch blade. On the scenic side, the common crossing’s polarity change is handled by one of the switches on the Tortoise motor and on the storage side I fitted Peco PL13 switches to the Peco solenoids. I am aware of the strongly held views for and against the various methods of changing the polarity but my scheme has worked well on 'Neely'. The track was laid out using the AnyRail plan with slight adjustments made for the location of supports and then glued in position using Copydex, held in place with drawing pins whilst the glue dried. Cross boards joints use sleepers made from thin PCB to match the sleeper height were glued using PVA to the baseboards. When fully dry, the rails were laid across the joints having first cut away the plastic sleepers and carefully soldered in position. Ballasting, using children’s play sand, was carried out by misting the dry sand with water containing a drop of detergent and then applying weak PVA glue through a pipette.
Only after this had dried did I use a fine saw to cut through the rails to ensure that the gaps were minimised. The track, but not the points, was spray-painted with grey primer from an aerosol can and the rail tops cleaned using IPA but leaving the paint on the sides of the rails. Subsequently, the ballast was brush painted using a variety of greys, white, black and pink acrylic paints, thinned with water as appropriate to achieve the desired finish. The coloured light signals all work and are from CR Signals. The standard two and four aspect ones I built from kits. Those with feathers I bought as completed items.
The stock is a mixture of GF and Dapol. We run Class 66 and Class 70 freight locos and several two and three-car Class 158 and 170 DMUs, all fitted with Zimo decoders. Also at exhibitions, Neil Watson, who often operates Neely on his own (he is, after all, a professional signaller!) brings along some of his beautifully crafted steam locomotives which have the added attraction of sound. Two of the 170s were repainted for me professionally in the Abellio Greater Anglia livery. Some of the 66s have been hardwired to four-function decoders because I wanted to be able to switch off the rear lights when hauling a train. In addition, I have recently added three class 365 EMUs built using 3D bodies from Shapeways with GF class 350 chassis, Dapol pantographs and GF Voyager directional lighting units with Zimo stay alive components. I airbrushed the EMUs myself in the Thameslink Great Northern livery having been on a course at Missenden Abbey with Ian Rathbone. The decals were printed on my ink jet printer. All of my stock has directional lighting and many have been fitted with Dapol close couplings. Dapol’s Easi-shunt couplings have been fitted to the freight locos and to the ends of my freight rakes. We use their uncoupling magnets with 100% success (famous last words). Recently, I have constructed and fitted flashing rear lights to my freight trains based on a 555 timer design found on the Web again with Zimo stay alive components and an 0805 sm LED painted white which were superglued to the rear of the container wagons.
The scenery is conventional but lightweight using a mix of Woodland Scenics earth colour paint, grass scatters and WWS static grass. I have started to make my own trees using twisted wire to replace those made from Woodland Scenics Forest Canopy, which are easily damaged when setting up and dismantling the layout. The embankments are made from 5mm square wire mesh held in place over thin plywood formers with adhesive from a hot glue gun, covered in thin mesh cloth which is hardened using liberal coatings of undiluted PVA glue.
What have I learnt?
· Not to put Copydex under a point’s tie bar!
· In the storage area use micro switches operated off the tie bar to switch the polarity of the common crossing rather than Peco PL13 switches which can be tricky to set up correctly and then occasionally and randomly fail, possibly due to movement during transportation to exhibitions.
· Use point motors with built-in polarity switches on the scenic side of the layout.
· You don’t have to solder feed wires precisely at the toe end of the points because the solder makes it difficult to fit rail joiners. You can solder the dropper wires anywhere along the two outer stock rails. In fact, my feeds wires are extensions of the wires that bond the stock rails to the fixed extension of the switch rail.
· Always fit insulated rail joiners to the common crossing on points even when using DC.
· Try to minimise the amount of work that has to be carried out under a layout – if it’s portable, turn the baseboard over – if it’s permanent try to use solenoids and point motors which are easy to align and fix. Avoid soldering upside down if you can and, if not, wear eye protection.
· Finally, never say “I can’t do that”, adopt the approach “I can’t do it YET” and then learn.
Things that were still to be done (maybe).
· Super elevating the track on the main line.
· Replace the Metcalfe station buildings with buildings that better represent those found at Ely.
· Working level crossing gates.
If I had to start again, I’d redesign 'Neely' so that it could be readily extended when exhibiting – just imagine how good a 24-foot long layout would look!
Postscript
The layout has now been sold to the Scunthorpe Modern Image Group.
The layout in detail
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