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Ball Clay Mine.
Ball Clay Mine.
This module is an attempt to create an impression of one of the many small scale ball clay mines that could be found in North Devon and Purbeck, Dorset.
The mine and the buildings were inspired by those found in the Chis Legg's excellent book, 'The Furzebrook Railway' about the Dorset Clay industry and the track layout was designed to be operated either as an independent 4' x 18" module or as part of a lager modular layout.
It takes 18 movements from a train arriving with empty wagons, to the departing with full wagons and using automatic uncoupling, can provide a very satisfying half hour operating session, if all goes well!
Currently, the module is still under construction and awaits more scenic work before it is finished.
For those interested, I have included pictures of the construction of the module and its buildings.
Ball clays or plastic clays are fine grained, highly plastic sedimentary clays, which fire to a light or near white colour. They are used mainly in the manufacture of ceramic whiteware and are valued for their key properties of plasticity, unfired strength and their light fired colour.
A set of scratch built tipper wagons sits in front of the wagon workshop
The mine and the tipper shed with wagons being loaded.
Work starts! 3mm cork is cut and glued and the track is attached with small track screws.
Point motors are installed and droppers attached for power.
Blue foam is added to give the basic shape of the landscape.
A mixture of filler and PVA is spread over to given an uneven surface.
The track is ballasted, the landscape flocked and the track is painted.
The loading shed is built up from square section lengths of balsa, glued together with a hot glue gun. The chutes are made from thin foam board.
The structure was sprayed with Halfords gray primer and clad with Slaters corrugated iron plasticard
The mine was also constructed from balsa but the excellent mine wheels were obtained from hippotoys on ebay.
The winding building was made out of foam board and roofed with Slater's corrugated iron plasticard.
Here's an example of one of the pictures that provided the 'inspiration'.
The buildings are then painted and weathered to resemble a rusty industrial building covered in china clay dust!
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