Talk:Minffordd Yard

Stub points

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  The 4-way stub point looking towards Maenofferen shed. These points would be less stiff and difficult to change if the head and foot of the rails were "thinned" and made more bendable, like "heel-less switch rails on full size rails.
  Alternately, cut rail in pieces and re-join with "loose" fishplates. Well? ~~~~

It works well enough for the occasional use that it gets. Heritagejim (talk) 15:43, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

An interesting suggestion but, as Jim says, the 'point' works well enough as it is and the work involved in modifying as suggested would be out of all proportion to any gain. Actually, thinning the lower flanges might make the rail more inclined to 'dig in' to the steel strips across which they slide. Thinning to make them more flexible might also have the effect of making them liable to twisting out of gauge under load, which would be a catastrophe! By far the simplest method of easing their traversing would be to keep a bucket of the grease used to lubricate the slide chairs of points and apply a measure to the steel rubbing strips on the infrequent occasions that the 4-way stub needs to be used.

(QNNA) "Thinning ... MIGHT ... twist rail out of gauge, etc." Has anyone actually seen this happen with their own eyes? The word "MIGHT" has less confidence or believability than the word "HAS". FarleyBrook (talk) 03:45, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Type of rail?

The "thinning" of the rail would probably depend on whether the rail is Bull Head or Flat Bottom. BH is already thinnish and flexible, while FB has a wider and therefore a stiffer base needing thinning.

The picture does not reveal whether the rail in the stub points is BH or FB.

Speaking of N. S. Wales, here we have long abandoned Bull Head rail, except for fence posts. Turnouts/switches/points using FB rail, used to have loosish fishplates in which the switch blades need to flex; more recently, these are replaced with "thinned" heal-less point blades. I do not think there is a problem with "twisting". FarleyBrook (talk) 04:28, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Minffordd building by FR bridge over Cambrian Line

What do we know about the small light coloured building on the right in the picture below? Should it go on the Festipedia Ffestiniog Railway Buildings list?

FR bridge over the Cambrian Coast line with small building to right behind FR ballast hopper

According to Ian Ward the building has been there for 10 years or so and contains FR signalling batteries. It was intended to also house signalling relays from Minffordd booking office but it is not clear if these will be transferred there. It is clearly an FR building.MarkTemple (talk) 15:15, 4 September 2015 (UTC)

As MarkTemple states it contains batteries for the Minffordd signaling system. It was built in 1996 --Peter Harrison (talk) 07:11, 5 September 2015 (UTC)