Placing Buildings (1/35)

After having worked out the basic design and general placement of the buildings, walls and fences on module 4, I had to figure out how close to the track I could place them. As Nystrup Gravel is a very normal industrial railway, there is no such thing as an authorized construction profile that regulate minimum distance from track to buildings or other objects. I do however want all my locos and rolling stock to be able to pass safely through the industrial district, so I did some testing during this week. The results (and some figuring out what equipment Nystrup Gravel might acquire in the future) showed that a minimum distance of 4 cm. from track centre was sufficient. Allowing for 1 cm. of extra clearance on each side of the track I decided not to place any object closer to the track centre than 5 cm. I also considered that there has to be room for my hand when cleaning rails.

Nystrup Gravel's speeder is tested for fit between buildings on module 4. The building of Bankes Bakelit needs to be heightened a bit. Good thing to have a card board mock up to work on.

Two strips of plywood acts as a guide for the brick wall. I will add a wooden fence where the masking tape is placed.

Part of my rail profile collection in action, holding down the plywood strips while the glue sets.

The foam board wall test fitted between the strips. My plaster castings of brick wall segments have been glued to the foam board with PVA-glue. On the wall's other side I fitted Tamiya's brick wall paper. Most people will never see that side of the wall so I guess a rudimentary presentation of bricks will do. I'm looking forward to see the speeder race past the brick wall.

Not only my 1:35 scale model of an industrial railway have a somewhat relaxed relationship to a construction profile. On the Danish beet railways the transfer of a steam locomotive from one line to another led to the loco simply being put out of use. On its first test run it turned out to be too large to pass under a viaduct. A report from a test run in the 1930's of a steam loco that had been in service since 1920 found that one particular house near the track could only be passed by the loco if no one in the house fancied to open the windows!  Distances from the new loco to other buildings also seem much smaller than comfortable. No attempt seems to have been made to set up signs to warn drivers.

Scan of the document from Maribo sugar factory with notes of distances from the new loco and stationary objects near the track. The above mentioned window was in the farm building on the Bukkehave-Nebbelunde line and the remark in brackets is translated to English: "The windows must be closed when passing."