One of my mistakes with the original control panel was that It looked awful from the front and had wiring where you expected to see two dogs end up chewing the same wire accompanied by accordion music on the back. This time I wanted to do things better. I used AnyRail to make a mimic diagram which I then printed and laminated.

Then I watched DCC Concepts’ youtube videos on how to build a mimic diagram. And I started again! This time I fired up my old InDesign DTP program, imported the black and white drawings and tarted them up a bit. The end result looks like this:

Not that anyone else will notice. The borders are CWR green for the Hatch section and SR green for Chard Junction. The fonts are Egyptian serif and Gill Sans. I know that I am actually modelling the whole thing in the late 50’s. But Rule 1!
These two diagrams along with one for the fiddle yards will be fitted to 3mm MDF plates that fit into this framework.

I am waiting for some small magnets to arrive that will be used to hold the MDF plates in place. So that whilst fixed, the plates can easily be removed for repairs. The whole thing will be self-contained with three 12 volt sockets on the back to power the Cobalt alpha panels inside, and a RJ12 socket that contains all the bus wiring. I am planning to fit a back panel with a thermostatically controlled fan to provide cooling if necessary. Due to a wild arm movement involving a paint filled roller I have just decided the baseboard edges will be the same shade of green!