Salfords Light Railway

The Salfords Light Railway diary

August 2002

Doris (my girlfriend) and I have 2 weeks holiday. We were going to go away but I am spending a lot of money on the house, and she has just bought a new car, so instead we are going to spend time in the garden and make do with a few day trips out.

Speaking to Jeff Price of The Miniature Railway Supply Co. it became clear that I am not going to get the rail I ordered until after my holiday as he's very busy, so track laying will have to wait. However, there is no reason whatsoever that we cannot get on and work on the trackbed.

After fixing my neighbours wire fence (other side form the new wooden one - might as well get these jobs sorted now or I'll have to clamber over the railway in the future) we set to marking out on the ground where the trackbed was going to go. This view was actually taken a few days later after we started digging out the pond but you can clearly see the white lines. (Look in the Planning section for tips on marking out). I had bought some large garden boulders years earlier and these came in very useful for ringing the rockeries. In the bottom left you can just see part of the hole for the turntable which I have since fitted in place. The pile of wood is sleeper material (to be cut up with my new chop-saw) and is lying where the 2 track station will be.

After 10 day's progress we have finished the main rockery and pond, complete with a Welsh slate waterfall and Chinese (Japanese ?) Tea House. I thought it was probably a good idea to try and "finish" something in the 2 weeks, rather than have 100 unfinished jobs, even if it was nothing much to do with the railway. The trackbed winding through the rockeries is down though (10' radius if you're interested). I cannot do much around the station area until I get the pointwork, this way I will know exactly where the triangle will go (known as a "wye" in the US - often wondered why it is called a wye when a "Y" only has 2 sides but a triangle has 3? Never mind). At the moment, spare soil is heaped along the station area to raise the level several inches, but other than that I will leave the area alone.

One of the last things we did in the 2 week break was to lay ballast in the trackbed along the "other" fence leading up towards the shed. In these views there is 1 ton of ballast - be warned, it doesn't go very far.

Here's the result of 2 weeks work (still no track, but we're getting there as British Rail used to say).

August Bank Holiday Monday... Bright and early (OK, so it was 10:00) John goes to the shed to chop up the sleepers with his new electric chop-saw he bought cheaply in the local DIY store. Managed to cut up 90m (nearly 300 feet) of 19x38mm wood in to 250mm sleepers in about 40 minutes. These are now soaking in creosote. I hope none of the neighbours were trying to sleep-in!

[ author: - last updated 25th Feb 2003 ] [ HOME ]