A Dean's for Hallatrow

One of the photos I have of Hallatrow shows Dean Goods no.2395 with a goods train posed in the station c.1912. Fortunately some time ago I picked up a Mainline Dean Goods off a second hand stall at an exhibition. Some Sharman wheels were acquired at a Leatherhead Scaleforum so all that remained was a compensated chassis kit for the loco and tender, these being acquired from High Level.

The High Level loco chassis minus pick-up's

The High Level tender kit can be built as either beam
compensation or with CSB. I chose the CSB version.

The body's have been temporally re-united to the chassis's
to check for height.

More work on the Signal Box

Things have been moving on slowly lately but now the roof have been completed.

The slates are Slater's with Scale Link ventilators and other
bits of evergreen rod.

However, the time has not been wasted, in August a trip to Somerset and the West Somerset Railway. This allowed me access to the signal boxes on the line so that I could research the interior of the Type 7 on the line, Bishops Lydeard and Blue Anchor.

Interior of Bishops Lydeard box.

A new Station Building - part 2

I thought add another photo of the station building, this time with the canopy in place. The valance was an Exactoscale etch purchased many years ago.

This photo was taken from the platform side, which is the opposite side
under normal operating/viewing conditions   

The Type 7 Signal Box

As my model of Hallatrow depicts the station before the footbridge was built and after the re-modelling, i.e. late 1909 - 1910, the type 7 box is required. As I don't have a plan of the box I did not fancy counting bricks but the is a plan of the Bishops Lydeard in the book on the West Somerset Line - The Minehead Branch.

The plan was re-scaled to 4mm and and a mock up made to see how it would look on the layout. This proved to be not imposing enough, Bishops Lydeard box only had/has 33 leavers whereas Hallatrow's had 62.But by cutting and pasting the plan an additional 2 windows are added, making a better looking mock up.

Fortunately the distinctive windows and doors are available from Modelex, being those from the Chuchward kit.

Front view of box 

Side and front showing the Churchward etch windowsand doors which are
held in place with 'Blu-Tack'. The brick work is South Eastern Finecast Flemish Bond.

The signal box temporarily in its place on the layout with the embolic roof.

Signalling at Hallatrow

Originally the Bristol & North Somerset Branch was worked by Ticket and Staff and Hallatrow was in the Pensford to Radstock section. With the opening of the Camerton branch in March 1882 the junction and Hallatrow becoming a section post required the provision of a signal box which was provided by Saxby & Farmer. This enabled two goods trains of a goods train and a passenger train to cross at Hallatrow.

With the extension of the Camerton branch to Limpley Stoke the Great Western applied to the Board of Trade to convert Hallatrow into a passing place in May 1909. The enlarge layout required a new and larger signal box to be built. As a result a Great Western Type 7 box was built with 55 working and 12 spare levers and opened in September 1909.

Three Type 7 boxes still exist in Somerset - Cranmore (a type 7B) on the East Somerset Rly, Bishops Lydeard (a type 7D) and Blue Anchor (a type 7B) both on the West Somerset Rly.

Cranmore's Type 7B signal box

The Hallatrow's new box can be see on the left side of the photo which forms which forms the blog header.

New Book

Just found the definitive book on the Bristol & North Somerset line "The Bristol-Radstock-Frome Line" by Colin Maggs  published by Oakwood Press this year.

This book follows the typical structure for a line history i.e. History,Line Description, Stock, Timetable and closure. There also is a chapter on the Camerton branch.

A new Station Building - part 1

When Hallatrow was exhibited at the final of the 18.83 Challenge I did not have a station building, however Tim Venton of Clutton fame had previously made a model and has loaned to me ever since. So I thought it was about time I made a start on a model of my own.

The engineer for the Bristol & North Somerset Railway was William Clarke, who was the engineer to a number of local independent companies whose lines were to connect their local community to a main line. In a number of instances these companies were initially worked by the Great Western and were later taken over by them.

As a result his distinctive architectural style can be found around the Great Western system. The station building all followed the same basic design, only increasing in size with the importance of the station. An article in 'British Railway Journal' No. 8 on William Clarke's 'Standard' Buildings gives further details. This article and the Wild Swan book on the Abbotsbury Railway have copies of the original plan of Portesham station. A re-scaling of these plans and that of the GW official survey, plus photos confirmed that the station building at Hallatrow and Portesham were to the same basic design and size. Thus the Portesham plan was used as the basis for Hallatrow's station building.

A site visit in 2003 confirmed that the building still existed, although it has been altered when it was converted into a private dwelling.

After looking at the various types of plastic stone, Wills' Course Stone was a good match and Evergreen strip for the cornices etc. And so finally we have.

The component parts before assembly

The platform side

The rear view from the entrance road

Now that the basic structure is finished all that is left are the windows, doors, canopy, roof and chimney.