The basic construction went ahead with no problems following the instructions in the kit. I fitted Parkside NEM pocket mounts – took more fiddling than I expected to get the height right. I ended up carving off the vertical projections off the mounts and then cutting back the underframe bracing until the correct height was achieved – silly me for expecting that they would just fit

Nice kit to build, but you do need something like EMA Plastic Weld to stick the black ABS bits.

The body was primed with red oxide primer and Halfords Ford radiant red was used as the final colour.

HMRS transfers were used to produce its pristine Summat Colliery PO livery

After a couple of weeks to let the paint and transfers to harden I used a combination of the techniques described by David Spencer in Hornby Mag Issue 6 and bounce spraying the underframe to distress the wagon. I took it slowly as this little wagon had taken a lot of time – I didn’t want to mess it up in the weathering stage.

Real coal over a lot of lead made it a heavy little wagon that ran well at subsequent shows.

Who would have thought that I would have heaped so much attention on a WAGON?

The kit was from Dave’s original range and consists almost entirely of whitemetal castings, including the bogies. I started soldering up the frame and bogies, making sure clearances were there to allow it to go round corners, a bit tricky with the sandboxes in place.

Once the motor arrived I fitted it to the power bogie. The kit is designed for a DS10 but the Mashima 1020 fitted in easily with a bit of shimming underneath to get the mesh right and a plasticard packer on top to hold it down.

Once the chassis was sorted and running round the layout I continued building up the bodyshell, again soldering everything, not a drop of glue used before primer was applied. Basic construction completed in 7 days.

Following a coat of grey primer and some minor filling and rubbing back the door handles, handrails and route indicators were added – finally resorting to the superglue.

The loco was DCC fitted by adding a Lenz Standard decoder into the void on the unpowered bogie where the motor would go if there was one and running 4 wires via a small connector to the motor bogie – pickup on all eight wheels and a simple job to remove the bogies for servicing

The body was painted with Halfords Rover Brooklands Green and buffer beams brushed with Humbrol red enamel. The  cab ends were painted with a mix of Airfix M20 Cockpit Green and matt white enamel to get the right shade. The bogies and underframe were sprayed with satin black car spray.

18 days gone and I had  a well built, smooth running, DCC fitted loco that just needed a bit of finishing. So I did not quite meet my deadline, but after a break in Somerset (right next to the West Somerset Railway) HMRS transfers were applied, handrails painted silver and a touch of weathering bounce sprayed from a can. I had myself a loco that runs well on my exhibition layout for about half the cost of an out of the box Heljan version and before that was in the shops too!

A fictitious 1958 East Midlands Colliery in OO gauge

Why?

Summat Colliery is my first real attempt at a scenic layout, all my previous layouts have been very much of the train set type, radius 1 curves, foam underlay and minimal scenery. So when the Vicar of St Peter’s Church Mansfield suggested a model railway exhibition to raise funds I thought I’d better get a layout together. An appeal for a suitable layout on www.rmweb.co.uk produced two 8 foot by 2 foot boards with a track plan in place for what appeared to be a small terminus station. The arrangement was unusual in that one board had four hidden storage roads which served a sector plate on the other. Both boards had scenic break boards hiding the bits you’re not supposed to see. It had the advantage of being a blank canvas and was pre-wired for DCC.

The Track Plan

I really did not fancy the idea of just running small passenger trains into a station all day at a show so the idea of a shunting layout started to form. As I grew up next to a colliery it was decided to explore that possibility.

I wanted to use buildings as scenic breaks to hide the sector plate and storage yards, these are far more effective even when the viewer can, if they try, see what is going on behind in my opinion. So a Walthers Mine building kit was ordered – an American HO structure, but as I found out later really captures the look of a UK colliery building. This was test assembled and the various parts arranged around/over the sector plate to find the best position. Once this was done there was no way back.

So all systems go, I considered how the layout would operate and very soon another 4 foot non-scenic board was planned to allow loaded coal trains to exit off stage via a tunnel mouth though what was originally the station terminus. The other “road” allowing empty trains to arrive ready for loading. This would provide lots of opportunity for shunting empty wagons off scene and bringing full ones through the screens to the sidings ready for departure. Full wagons would move round the layout in a clockwise direction, from the storage roads through the screens to the sidings then off scene back to the storage roads via the tunnel. Empty ones would go round in the opposite direction.

The planning stage was completed by adding a small engine shed where the bay platform would have been with coal stage and water tower to service a small steam shunter. It was at this point that the name for the layout came about. It is derived from the name of a long since gone colliery near my home called Summit Colliery in Kirkby-in-Ashfield and the local slang for “something” – I like to think it’s “summat” like a colliery!

The period of the layout was firmly set in 1958 so that I could run a couple of pilot scheme diesels alongside my beloved Crosti boilered 9F -  the real version went into storage in 1959 awaiting conversion to conventional form.

Construction

The layout is of conventional construction, 2×1” softwood frames with 9mm ply tops covered in cork. The track is peco code 75 OO gauge with peco point motors underneath the boards. The track ended up being completely re-laid as I wanted to use PCB sleeper panels at the board edges to minimise damage in transit and to ensure a good join. During this process I found out that three of the points were code 100! These were replaced with new code 75 ones. Ballasting is again conventional with N gauge Woodlands Scenics ballast and cinders fixed in place with 50/50 PVA and water with a drop of washing up liquid.
The three boards sit atop modified B&Q trestles and are held together with toggle catches positioned so that the two scenic boards can also be clipped to transport end panels to make a solid box – I didn’t want my hard work to be damaged in the car park! All this engineering has given me a layout that can be erected within an hour single handed without tools and too much fuss.

Wiring and Control

As the layout was pre-wired for DCC it seemed rude not to carry on, so the wiring was finished, making sure that each track section had at least one pair of droppers down to the bus wires (domestic mains wiring cable). Point control is also DCC, a MERG pulsed accessory decoder board sits underneath both scenic boards to control the points on each section. These incorporate a powerful CDU and ensure the solenoids throw with a satisfying click every time. Frog switching of the live frog points is via external microswitches acting off the solenoid spindle. Peco PL13 switches were originally used but these proved too unreliable.

Scenery

As this was my first attempt at a scenic layout I enlisted the help of my wife and the good folk on www.rmweb.co.uk. Many an evening was spent with one or two boards on the lounge floor deciding what would go where and what colour etc. The intention was to set what is a very industrial scene in a green landscape so the site of the old station gained some embankments running up to the tunnel mouth and the other end a gated hedge. Grassed areas are hanging basket liner with various scatters to add different tones. Plants and flowers are from various sources, some home made, some bought in. The tall feathery grasses at the front for example are made from some discarded bristles from a plastic dustpan brush, whereas the yellow flowers and ivy are made by miniNatur.

The disused spur at the front of the layout was again my wife’s idea and took many evenings to get right, laying the track, then lifting it in much the same way as it would have happened in reality. This all had to be done before the main lines running by were ballasted so that the “new” ballast would lay over the old spur.

Buildings were built up from various sources, the engine shed is a Ratio kit, the warehouse with loading platform and the long building behind the shed are from Metcalfe kits. The two buildings next to the screen building are scratchbuilt in card from images downloaded from the internet.

Trees are mainly from SiSt Trees, including the quite expensive custom made silver birches that sit at both ends of the layout. I could have tried to make the trees myself but took the decision that if I was to finish in time for the Mansfield Show I would have to spend some money! – It’s always the way I find, balancing time and money when modelling.

The photographic backscenes are from the I.D. Backscenes “Hills and Dales” range and I hope suggest spoil heaps as well as firmly planting the colliery in the countryside.

Figures and fittings are a mix of Langley and Dart Castings offerings, a feature that always gets spotted at shows is the oil drum brazier that glows with an LED inside, I added a couple of figures sitting round drinking tea and sharing a joke to add to the scene.

Rolling Stock

The colliery is manned by a couple of Hornby Austerity tank engines, Harry and #49. Harry was originally the only loco in steam but following a couple of shows it was clear that there was just too much running round coal wagons being done, so #49 was purchased to assist. #49 generally works off-scene taking empties away and bringing full ones to the screens. Harry tends to work in the full glare of the public drawing the full wagons through the screens and taking them to the concentration sidings.

The Colliery also possesses an ancient 5 plank wagon that still bears the battered remnants of the colliery branding. Harry or #49 use this occasionally to take loco coal from the screens to the coal stage next to the engine shed. It was built from a Parkside kit and weathered following David Spencer’s article in Hornby Magazine December 2007.

The unfitted 16 ton coal wagons and brake van are all Bachmann RTR renumbered and weathered by Dave Roome. Half are empty, the other half filled with crushed real coal held in place with 50/50 PVA and water mix.

Regular visiting locos include:

• Crosti 9F – built from a Hornby Evening Star and Crownline conversion kit, weathered by Dave Roome
• WD Austerity – Bachmann RTR, weathered by Dave Roome
• Stanier 8F – Hornby RTR, factory weathered, still running an R8215 decoder and possibly the best runner on the layout.
• Standard Eight – my flight of fancy that was featured in Hornby Magazine
• Class 15 – a Dave Alexander kit, all my own work, even the weathering.
• Class 20 – unmodified Bachmann RTR

Other locos from my collection make guest visits, so you can expect to see a Standard 5, Clan, 2-6-2 tank or even a Deltic Prototype from time to time.

Uncoupling

Automatic uncoupling is achieved using a stunningly simple and cheap system first made known to me by it’s inventor (if that’s the word) Brian Kirby on www.rmweb.co.uk It consists of a steel staple shaped and fixed to the bottom of the Bachmann coupling dropper. Powerful magnets under the track attract the steel staple but not the non ferrous hook, pulling the staple down and raising the hook, allowing uncoupling. This only works with Bachmann couplings, so I have standardised as much as possible. Where a Hornby coupling has to be used the hook is removed and coupling relies on the wagon hook alone.

Pairs of magnets are positioned all over the layout at key locations. Carefully positioned figures give away the positions at the front, whereas blobs of white paint on the sleeper ends show where they are in the storage areas.

Signal

The colliery has a single upper quadrant home signal to protect the national network from errant movements on the internal colliery lines. A very tricky MSE kit which operates via a servo control mechanism triggered from a switch on the catch point solenoid. The servo mechanism is very clever in that it gives the correct “bounce” when the signal drops on and the action is very slightly delayed from that of the catch point.

Operation

I only get to play trains on Summat Colliery at exhibitions as in it’s full 12 foot length cannot be erected in my house. When it does get an invite though all the planning has paid off as there’s always something to do and the time flies. All too soon it’s time to pack up and go home! The layout is very reliable in operation, of course we get a few niggles  but most problems are caused by the operators not lining up the sector plates correctly or running against a point not set correctly. Surprisingly only one loco has ever been derailed by the catch point by a loco SPADing the signal. Towards the end of the day a game  of “see how fast we can run and get the uncoupling to work” breaks out which results in some very unrealistic shunting indeed and getting two or even three locos running at once with a single DCC handset can be interesting!

I’ve had loads of fun both building and operating it over the last few years, taking in the Derby, Elizabethan, Wycrail and Churchrail shows as well as two of our own Mansfield Shows.

I would welcome invites to take Summat Colliery to other shows in the future.

Based  on a Hornby Stanier 8F chassis and boiler with a BR Standard cab and tender the following parts were used:

• Complete Chinese made BR1C tender drive
• Britannia bodyshell
• Margate Stanier 8F rolling chassis (including bogie, wheelsets and coupling rods)
• Stanier 8F bodyshell
• Margate 9F cylinders and motion set with 8F rear motion bracket.

First thing to tackle was the chassis. The 9F cylinder block was packed to the correct height and angle above the chassis with layers of plasticard. Once this was done the motion was set up using the 8F rear bracket installed the wrong way round. A little filing of the link assembly mountings saw them slip into the support bracket and I was pleased to find that it all fitted perfectly.

Fitting a DCC decoder highlighted that the current pickup from the two tender wheels was insufficient for good DCC running so a loco drive chassis bottom with pickups on all drive wheels together with coupling the loco to the tender with a double contact drawbar ensured that there were no more issues with the loco stopping over points etc.

The boiler was cut from the 8F shell and the buffer beam/running plate and cab from the Britannia shell. In both cases care was taken to cut well away from the intended separation to ensure none of the desired material was lost. The Britannia running plate was cut approximately 30mm in front of the cab and a section removed so that the smokebox and its saddle lined up correctly.

The boiler was cleaned up and all Stanier fittings removed. Next it was mated to the cab/running plate assembly.  When I was finally happy the three components were bonded together using a liquid polystyrene cement and gaps filled with model filler. A coat of grey acrylic primer was applied to ensure that what looked smooth was actually smooth!

All the BR Standard fittings came from a Comet Models 9F detailing kit. Turned brass handrail knobs and brass wire completed the job. Items such as the reverser rod and regulator were made up from wire and a cocktail stick.

Finishing proved easy, as this was to be a freight locomotive unlined black was the order of the day. Like most modellers I use acrylic car spray paint where possible and this loco was no exception.  Etched plates were fitted for smokebox number, shed and build plates.

The chassis was stripped down and all unnecessary holes, slots etc filled with chemical metal filler and sanded flat. Several coats of satin black car spray were applied and the whole loco reassembled.

To read the full Hornby Magazine article click on the image below

Easy to strip down as there’s no valve gear/cylinders etc, just remove the tiny screw that holds on the linkage off the centre driver on the right. undo the two screws underneath and prise off the plastic cover plate from the rear – Wheelset drops out. Just 3 more screws and it comes apart. Reassembly is another thing with this model!

Remove the motor and the little springs/pads.

I use a TCS-M1 as with most split chassis these days, cut approx 25mm off the end of the orange and grey wires.

Now the first bit of J39 specific messing around. There’s very little room forward of the motor for heatshrink over the terminals so cut the ends off the motor terminals across the little hole in the end shortening the tag. Cut a very short bit of heatshrink, only long enough to JUST cover the final soldered joint. Trim the wires so that they are soldered right up to the end of the shortened tag. The intention is that the finished insulated connections are no longer than the original tag. This ensures that the chassis halves will fit back together as they did before. Later chassis also have some small projections on the lower contact spring mounting that also need to be removed as they prevent the insulated joint from seating properly.

The right hand chassis half has a bit of casting above the contact spring location, snap this off with a pair of pliers. Cut a notch in the rear fixing hole on the left chassis half (the right already has a nice notch to use). This is to allow the red wire to be wound round the fixing screw making electrical contact and the black around the plastic fixing peg (with the square end) – don’t forget to strip the ends and tin them

The decoder is sticky padded to the bottom rear of the chassis once it’s back together. There is just enough room to squeeze the body back on, it’s tight though, although once assembled there is more room for the decoder than you think.

These chassis are quite rough and an extended running in session might be needed to get smooth running once reassembled. Clean all gunge off the bearings and axles, check for loose wheels on insulators and fix with Cyano if needed. Apply a tiny smear of fresh plastic friendly grease to the bearings and gears and reassemble.

Wheels will need to be spotless as it’s only got 3 axles for power pickup.

So in short order I had a resin kit for a “full” as built loco and a donor Triang/Hornby R550 9F from the eventual owner. The R550 is an old version dating from 1973 which has the original permanently coupled tender and Fleischmann derived “Silver Seal” tender drive that was to lead to a bit more work than if I’d gone with a later 9F.

Starting with the tender, the castings cleaned up easily, one or two air bubbles to fill with model filler but nothing too onerous. A hole needed to be cut in the rear coal space to accommodate the higher tender drive unit that I was using and the large tender weight needed to be trimmed down at the top to take account of the thickness of the resin casting to ensure a snug fit on the original frame.

Handrails were added by drilling small holes in the dimples provided and using some 0.5mm copper cable stripped from figure of eight “bell wire” suitably shaped and superglued in place.

First issue with the bodyshell was that the casting has the blower duct/tunnel on the left hand side of the boiler that was only fitted to the rebuilt versions, this had to be carefully scraped off and made good using a sharp scalpel blade and fine grade wet or dry paper.

Once this job was done the rest of the bodyshell was fettled and filed, this took quite a bit longer than the tender, but then it is a much more complicated casting. It cleaned up really easily and what initially looked like a bit of a challenge very quickly acquired the look of the prototype.

The cab backhead and floor which is a separate casting was glued in place using epoxy resin then left overnight.

Next the lower door and some of the other fittings were added. The front of the chassis needed filing back a bit to clear the lower door as per the instructions- only about 1mm and the standard body fixings still work after this modification.

All the bits, once trimmed up, fitted really well together – no real hassles at all. One part that did need more fettling than the others was the blastpipe/steam pipe casting .15 minutes carving with a sharp knife with a good photo of the real thing to compare with and I was happy.

Handrails, operating rods and other boiler fittings were fashioned from “bell wire”, a bass guitar string was employed to represent the lagged feed pipes from the pre-heater to the main boiler and a small length of domestic electrical wiring cable stripped out of its grey sheath became the reverser operating rod.

Doing the fiddly pipework is a part of a build that I actually really enjoy and always end up doing more detail than I intended at the start. So the steam pipes to injectors ended up with representations of the control valves made out of fine wire and some old electrical insulation. The original Hornby pipework from the donor was fitted below the cab. Boiler and smokebox handrails were made from a spare Hornby “King” handrail.

Safety valves from the donor bodyshell and some nice Bachmann sprung buffers finished off the detailing.

The body fixing under the cab was replicated by gently prising out the threaded insert from the donor body and drilling the boss out on the resin kit 4mm. The insert was then very carefully pressed into place, secured with a drop of superglue.

The pre-heater parts trimmed up and superglued to the Hornby underboiler/motion support. After a quick test assembly to make sure everything was in the right place the joins were re-inforced on the insides with epoxy resin glue.

The final construction involved adding the extra steps under the right hand side of the cab using Evergreen microstrip cemented in an “L” section. Scraps of phosphor bronze sheet became the smokebox steps.

Construction completed a good wash in warm soapy water was in order followed by a coat of grey primer. This showed up some porosity in the castings which was filled before the final painting,  but that’s why we do the grey primer thing, it not only keys the top coat but it’s great for showing those minor little imperfections.

Following a few coats of  Satin Black aerosol, numbers, late logos, shed and number plates were added followed by a coat of  Matt varnish to seal. Real coal was added to the bunker covering the hole where the drive unit poked through.

The loco was completed in about a month and delivered in time for Christmas!