Carlisle Canal was the former North British engine shed in Carlisle, coded 12C under nationalisation. The layout is set in LNER days, where the shed served the Waverly route up to Edinburgh, and Eastern region routes across to Newcastle.
The layout is around 10ft x 2ft, and features the large coaling tower, ash sidings, and a roundhouse/long-shed combination. It is, as any shed based layout, intended mainly for the display of locomotives. The layout is being built primarily for DCC operation. Construction started in mid-2017.
The track is laid and the electrics are mostly complete. The 14 road turntable has been installed inside a wonderful shed laser cut by a club member. The turntable is controlled an Arduino and stepper motor combination which offers ‘twist and click’ selection of roads. Ballasting – a major job on any shed layout – started just before ‘lockdown’…
Layout pictures
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- Overhead view of the Carlisle Canal track plan. Roundhouse on the right, fiddle yard/exit on the left.
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- Starting to install the DCC main bus under Carlisle Canal (Dec 2017)
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- The coaling tower for on Carlisle Canal. The tower should be ‘working’, winching wagons up to the top. (Oct 2018)
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- A view of Carlisle Canal from the fiddle yards (Oct 2018)
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- Top down view of the turntable, which will be inside the roundhouse. Approach road and most bays still to be laid. (Oct 2018)