Great Western Railway 7ft broad gauge turnouts/points/switches
Page 1: Catalogue of turnouts | Page 2: Wiring up a point | Page 3: Assembling a crossover | Page 4: Assembling a double junction
Isambard Kingdom Brunel chose the 7ft broad gauge for the Great Western Railway and fixed that the space between running lines should be 6ft, the distance still used by lines using what became the British standard gauge of 4ft 8¼in (disparagingly referred to by Brunel as 'that wagonway gauge'). Creating crossovers and double-track junctions in British standard gauge is comparatively straightforward as the gauge is less than the gap between running lines, 'the 6ft'. However, as the broad gauge was wider than the 6ft, the geometry of trailing and facing crossovers, and of double junctions, means that amongst other aspects the frogs' positions overlap. Consequently, if we use two ordinary left-hand broad gauge turnouts to create a crossover then the running lines will be about 9ft apart instead of the correct 6ft. Therefore, I've found it necessary to make several different versions of left-hand and right-hand turnouts so that the correct 6ft gap between running lines is maintained. I am producing a couple of ranges of turnouts each based on the approximate length of the standard turnout which determines the radius of the curve.
60ft series broad gauge animated turnouts
These match the broad gauge spline track with brown ballast.
Fig 1: Left-hand turnout (kuid:169585:39701) and return curve to retain correct running-line spacing (kuid:169585:24012).
Fig. 2: Right-hand turnout (kuid:169585:39702) and return curve to retain correct running-line spacing (kuid:169585:24013).
Fig. 3: Y turnout (kuid:169585:39703).
Now things get a bit more complicated.
Fig. 4: Left-hand turnout centre section (kuid:169585:24016) and special left-hand turnout (kuid:169585:39704). These make up a trailing crossover. On the right, special right-hand turnout (kuid:169585:39705) and right-hand turnout centre section (kuid:169585:24018). These make up a facing crossover. Fig. 4a: Zoomed in to show some of the nodes used to indicate where to connect up the invisible track splines. These are explained in the subsequent pages of this tutorial.
Fig. 5: Pieces for a double crossover. Lower left - special cut-down right-hand turnout (kuid:169585:39709), lower right - special cut-down left-hand turnout (kuid:169585:39708). At top of figure 5 is the double crossover centrepice (kuid:169585:24024). Fig 5a: close-up showing some of the coloured spline point position indicator nodes.
Fig. 6: Top left is the crossing for a double junction off to the left (kuid:169585:24017); top right is a single left-hand junction crossing the intervening running line (kuid:169585:24022); at the bottom is the special cut-down left-hand turnout that fits these (kuid:169585:39706). Fig. 6a: Close-up of some of the node points.
Fig. 7: Top left is the right-hand double junction crossing; top right is the single junction crossing; and underneath is the special cut-down right-hand turnout (kuid:169585:39707).
Fig. 8: Left-hand (kuid:169585:24014) and right-hand (kuid:169585:24015) X crossings - these do not produce the 6ft spacing between running lines (which is why we have all those different bits and pieces above!). They are suitable for non-running lines such as goods yards, and also single line branches.
Fig. 9: Track spacer for maintaining 6ft gap between broad-gauge running lines (kuid:169585:24011).These scripted turnouts conflict with the built-in fixed track junctions introduced with Trainz06 and cause constant non-fatal error messages. The solution is to use either these animated points (and any others using Andi06's script) or fixed track junctions in your route. Do not attempt to use both types in the same route/layout.
Thanks to teddytoot for getting my animated points working and to Andi06 for letting me use his script. All screenshots taken from Trainz2004.
Page 1: Catalogue of turnouts | Page 2: Wiring up a point | Page 3: Assembling a crossover | Page 4: Assembling a double junction
If you have any queries please send an email and I'll try to answer sensibly.
Steve, July, 2011
