A Visit to the Victoria Southern

 Today Ray and I had the great pleasure of visiting Kym Harvey in Ballarat Victoria, to run a few trains on his Victoria Southern layout. We started out by catching the VLine Regional train to Wendouree station where Kym picked us up.

Southern Cross (Spencer Street) at 7.45am 🥶🥶🥶🥶🥶🥶

Kym is building a fantastic layout in his rather sumptuous shed, the back end of which, he has a sealed room for a doubled tracked dog boned loop layout with numerous towns with switching opportunities aplenty. He runs a radio controlled Lenz Command Station with Yard Panels operated through Traincontroller SmartHand add-on. (I liked it) The rolling stock is a mixture of VR, SAR, AN and some of the more modern names floating through Victoria over the last 50 years or so. He runs things he likes (what a concept). 

Kym had prepared a mini Operation session for us. I ran his newly acquired Overland around the layout twice, to orient (indulge) myself, before doing a couple of switches jobs. Ray just dived in the deep end doing switch jobs from the get-go. I ran my locos with sound on so the throaty roar of 900’s pulling the Overland and 800’s switching was a joy for me. Ray isn’t so keen on sound. He ran in stealth mode.

Kym’s wife Lynette provided a wonderful Morning Tea and Lunch for us all, which was greatly received. But, we had to be on the 1438 back to the big smoke so we headed back to Ballarat Station and the trip back to Melbourne. 

Ray and I had a great time, catching up with Kym and playing on his layout. Thanks mate. We will all meet again on Platform 11 at Southern Cross tomorrow at 9.20 for the trip to the Showgrounds and the 2025 AMRE Exhibition.

The entrance to Kym’s Train Room ( side note, the two lamps were the last two tail lamps operated on the SAR before they were removed from service)

SmartHand Control Panel (just touching the point and it throws)

Ray in his element

A bit of Foreign Power heading to Yimpi Flat

Dyson Yard

Tuesday AM Timetable 18 June 2025

 The next planned operating session on the GSD is scheduled for Wednesday 18 June.

It is planned to run the Tuesday AM Schedule as planned by Geoff M. The documents are outlined below. 

Arrive 1030 for coffee, 

Clock On 1100

Clock Off  1200

Lunch  1200-1230

Clock On 12.30

Clock off  1330

Coffee  1330 - 1415 ish

Running Sheet

Timetable

 

Trains 

Operator Roster

Train Orders (Revised after advice last Session)

Any Questions?

The Commish

 

 

Not All Holiday

 Just spent two weeks in Bali. A week of diving and a week of relaxation, well it wasn’t all relaxation. Still being in the process of developing the supporting paperwork for operations and having run the Monday AM and PM schedules. I spent many hours in my hotel room writing, or typing, out the paperwork for the Tuesday AM scheduled, getting ready for a June Operating session. Train Orders, Station Timetables, Blue Lake Switchlists etc. I also spent time processing images of my locomotives to use on the Traincontroller interface. 

15 years Operations of the BDR

 May 3rd, 2025 saw most of the BDR team, past & current assemble for the 15th Anniversary of BDR commencing regular operations

Geoff, Steve Ray, Bob , Don, Reg, Craig, Connor , David & myself  to a lunch time BBQ all wearing the Border Downs T shirt.  

Snags, onions & coleslaw with buttered bread & a choice of sauce - very nice followed up with a chocy cake that slid down very easily.

The Boss cooking up onion.

Some tall stories of all types

On a board were photos of the various stages of building the BDR

 a record of events

   and some notes from the History book

Reg. Bob. Steve, Ron,  Craig at the far end, Connor, Ray, David, Don - gunzel Geoff

this time Gunzel is Kris, the Boss according to Geoff

A very enjoyable period of time.

remember crew for May 8th

Geoff - main line driver

Steve - Train Control

Ray - Border Downs Station Master

Craig - poison train plus

Connor & David , the other crew members.

I now have two records to my name  - on both Wild Creek & Border Downs, I have the most operating sessions just behind the railway Company owners.

Sol

The Wolf Creek and Western Expansion

 Geoff has decided to expand the WCWRR further creating a little congestion on the layout. He has moved that layout around so that the Largest town, formerly Bristol is now in the centre of the layout, renamed Eagle. Now stay with me, Eagle is now Bristol, Bristol is now Eagle, Hudson is now Independence, Greenville is now Hudson, Franklin is Greenville, and Clinton and Dayton are Dayton and Clinton. The new area above Aaronsberg Yard is Franklin and Indepenence is either Jesus or Jehovah’s, I’m not sure which, maybe Jacksonville or Jump City. Anyway things have changed in the WCWRR. 😱😩

Bristol, I mean Eagle Yard

The new Franklin above Aaronsberg Yard

Dayton, or is it Clinton, 

The SAR finally hits the South Penn

 Imagine my surprise as I entered the Train Room expecting to see Carlisle in my face and there staring at me was the town of Jamestown, half way between Gladstone and Peterborough. 

Like me, Steve is finally taking the plunge to come home. He has redesigned his layout from the ‘once planned but never built South Penn’ to his real passion ‘Gladstone’. As luck would have it, his layout design facilitates a section of the standard gauge line that ran from Broken Hill to Port Pirie, intersecting with the narrow gauges at Gladstone , to Wilmington, and at Peterborough, to Quorn and of course the Broad Gauge to Adelaide. His Staging conveniently acts as Port Pirie, Adelaide and Broken Hill.

The modelled section commences in Peterborough (formerly Bedford) with the Narrow Gauge Branches to Quorn (Narrow) and Adelaide (Broad) up through Yongala (formerly………), Bellalie North (formerly Summit), to Jamestown ( formerly Carlisle), down through Caltowie (formerly…….. ) to Gladstone with its Branches to Wilmington (Narrow) and Adelaide (Broad). Jamestown has a Branch to Bundaleer North (formerly Pine …..) for the extensive logging traffic to Port Pirie.

Welcome home Steve.

835 and 848 haul a string of OB loaded with wheat from Caltowie to Jamestown and on to Port Pirie for export.

Later in the day the 830’s are seen hauling a mixed goods towards Gladstone

Monday PM Schedule 16/4/2025

 Today saw the second running of the GSD as an Operational Model Railway. Seven brave souls entered the Bear Pit and undertook to run the Monday PM timetable. Sixteen trains, only one Passenger, 166, and that was a mixed.. The relative positions were:

Train Controller Geoff Tynan

Blue Lake Yardmaster : Steve Weedon

Operators: Ray Brownbill, Ron Solly and David Orr

Operations Quality Supervisor : Geoff Matthias

Commissioner: Yours Truly

Things got off to slow start with phone logging on issues and general orientation to paperwork and the layout orientation, but they soon started to settle down. The slow start did put a few trains behind schedule but over all most worked through the issues and good few hours was had by all.

The Bear Pit being ‘Geoffed”

I was expecting problems as it is only when the whole crew is here that the layout is put under pressure and weak point break. This was only the second time the layout was put under such pressure.  We had problems with power to some points in Wirrega,  Murray Bridge and Bridgewater, some of my paperwork was less than salubrious, for instance one Operator noted that he had to take a crossing loop in Tantanoola to cross his own train (Doh!). The timetable worked pretty well and each of the train gave the operators plenty to do. Thanks to Geoff. Steve worked Blue Lake hard and made a few suggestions to improve its workability. That’s always a good sign we are getting there. All in all though I got the impression everyone had a good day, even though I finished with another long list of things to do before the next session in June.  They all said they enjoyed the cake.

Steve and Ray in Blue Lake

All trains movements were completed and clock only stopped twice due to delays.

One major issue was the Train Orders did not have enough info on them to be useful so I have set about rewriting them based on Geoff M suggestions.

Whilst I appreciate the patience of the operators I feel I took another step forward toward a reliable Great Southern Division.

Train 731 has left Dry Creek Yard nd passes Mile End on its way out of the city to begin its long haul to Melbourne.

Train 9127 crosses the Dartmoor trestle heading in to Blue Lake to pick up an SAR loco for its trip through SA to Dry Creek

312 passes Bridgewater station on its way to Mile End

42

Greetings

 In his book Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams posed the question "What is the meaning of life, the Universe and Everything?" scientists fed the question into a Kray Computer which took 10,000 years to come up with an answer. The answer 42.

Well its been a long time since my last post on this site. Not 10,000 years, but Life, the Universe and Everything have played their role in the absence of reporting.

So where am I at with the GSD?

After a few visits by the thought police, advice was given regarding 'improvements' that could be made to the layout to enhance its operational functionality. In addition Geoff Mathias has provided me with a full set of operational schedules that will see 16 and 17 trains operate over a 12 hour timetable covering four sessions, Monday, Wednesday and Friday AM and PM services and Tuesday and Thursday AM and PM services. I have also sought to improve my 3D printing skills and have built some half decent models for the layout as well as completed some projects for friends.

Dry Creek Yard

Geoff M suggested I put a four track yard in on the opposite wall to the Mile End Yard to give extra staging tracks for the Adelaide end of the layout. This would require the installation of a bridge across the doorway and changing the area in which i do my 3D printing.

Whilst all tracks are not yet in, the base board, points and some tracks are now operational, so the Melbourne Jets will arrive and leave from Dry Creek.

Blue Lake Livestock Loading area

The Blue Lake livestock loading area has been moved around the corner from its original position to better service the Borthwicks Abattoir..

Murray Bridge

To make Murray Bridge more interesting Noske Bros have built a large Flour Mill on the edge of town and have contracted the SAR to deliver bulk grain to the mill in open wagons and take bagged flour in covered and out.

Timetable

With all the work Geoff m did on the timetables I have had to prepare all the paperwork to support its delivery.

I have printed temporary Carcards & Waybills for all rollingstock to cycle through 4 movements, as well as spares to support cars moving to different areas over time. I have printed Train Orders with a timetable on the reverse so operators know what is required of their train. I have developed Switching documentation for the Blue Lake Yardmaster that tells him what has to go where and from where a car is coming albeit industry or incoming train. And, I have drawn up the movement diagram for the dispatcher

3D Printing

Dartmoor Goods Shed

I printed, painted and set a goods platform and shed at Dartmoor

Insulation Vans

I have finally completed an RX Insulation Van from design through 3D printing, painting, decals and running. RX 9025 Celery Sue is now operational.

OBf

The design of the OBf wagon is still not 100% but I think its getting there. a bit more fiddling to do.

Locomotive Repair

One of the problems of buying second hand locomotives is you buy other peoples problems. But these machines are just simple mechanical beings that just need simple repairs. tighten a screw here, solder a wire there, easy..........

I have had a group of Trainorama SAR 930 locos on the shelf for some time needing new gears on the axles. I had replaced many already with a wide white gear I bought on eBay, but they proved less than satisfactory. I saw Australian Modeller had a better version similar to the NWSL gears I installed in Geoff M's 930's. So a couple of packets of those and viola, 930's running much better as a result.

The 520 I bought has been lying idle for too long. I started rewiring it and thought I would try some new sugar cube speakers to enhance the sound. Erm, as I hooked them up to the decoder tester I accidently put the metal parts across the track which led to the decoder becoming a steam engine in its own right. Poof, so I am up for a new decoder, but I have used the opportunity to install a Decoder Buddy I bought from NixTrainz in the US. These clever little boards sit in  the tender facilitating a plug in decoder. I have also converted all the wiring to the correct NMRA codes for functions. I have contacted Pete Mickalelk  to try and get the original sound file as he built the model and the original sound file was brilliant. Otherwise I shall have to load a US Mountain type loco file.