Right, well, those of you who were following my blog last year will be aware I was modelling in N scale. This year, a scaling up in the size of my student flat (plus new flatmates I actually intend to live with for more than a year) has allowed me a little more time and space, and as such the N scale has been packed into two shoeboxes, for playing with at a later date. However, I now have a 5'6" x 2' alcove in my new bedroom, and the blessing of the two flatmates to build a layout. Nothing fancy
Having built the Peco Wonderful Wagon chassis (and yes, I will be building one of the tank wagon kits on the same design of chassis!) I was left with a spare pair of Peco Anita couplings, as they come in packs of four and I'd only used two. I recently obtained a second-hand Mainline coke wagon, and noticed that the locating pegs for the Mainline and the Peco coupling were the same distance apart. Curious, I unscrewed the Mainline coupling and fitted the Peco one (using a spot of glue as there's
Having posted a while back in Modelling Questions, Hints and Tips about Peco's Wonderful Wagon kits, I received a whole ream of replies saying that I would do better not to bother wasting my time with the kit. Were they right? Was I about to waste time and money (both scarce resources to a student!) on something that would vaguely resemble a wagon if viewed short-sightedly through frosted glass on a foggy morning? Would the sprung buffers work? Would I melt the axleboxes? Read on, if you dare...
With the news that some of university exams at the end of the semester are being postponed (due to the 1 foot plus of snow we've had in Edinburgh preventing the delivery of exam scripts, chairs, tables and invigilators), it seemed like a perfect time to kick back with a bit of modelling. The purchase of four Peco 15-foot wheelbase chassis kits enabled me to make a start on the chassis of my hacked-about Tomix Clarabel. Some careful measuring and two cuts with a hacksaw later (the cut locations h
Listeners who are listening may have seen my cunning plan blog entry about hacking about a Tomix Annie and Clarabel into decent representations of typical UK four-wheeled coaches. I was hoping for a fairly simple job - cut/file off the noses and faces, repaint and plonk on the layout. When they arrived, they were too tall, too wide, and wouldn't negotiate my curves without falling over. I hemmed and hawed before deciding to carry out my first "proper" piece of model bodging. Cue buying a saw and
Having a layout involving sharp curves (140mm radius), bogie coaching stock looks a bit silly (with three mark 1s covering approximately 180 degrees of curvature), so I have decided to go down the route of 4-wheel coaching stock. A quick look on eBay was horrifying and caused the student loan alarms to start wailing - they generally go for about £25-30 a pop! Then I remembered having seen the Tomix Thomas the Tank Engine range in N scale. Fantastic - one set of Annie and Clarabel available for
Having established a nice oval of track and got a train running by the slightly simplistic method of applying a 9V battery to the power cables, it was time to think about speed control. My nice Bachmann controller has apparently travelled to the dimension of lost socks during the move to the new flat, so I had two choices: Fork out for another one (not an attractive proposition for a poor student, especially as I wanted a PWM controller for low-speed running in N gauge) or put my studies for a d
Having obtained my stupidly-tight curves for my N gauge shelf layout, I realised that my Farish 94xx (crudely repainted in maroon) wouldn't navigate them, with its too-long (!) fixed wheelbase. This is not going to be a layout where I can run 9Fs and Pacifics (although to see a Pacific navigate a 1-chain radius curve would be fun!). As such, I decided that I would attempt to modify my 94xx to allow it through the curves. How? Flangeless centre drivers, of course!
Being a poor student, I don'
I received a parcel in the post from Japan, containing an oval of Tomix "Mini Fine Rail", and, following some experiments, have discovered that it *should* be possible to build a roundy-roundy-style layout in N scale within a 1-foot width board. Experiments with a Farish 04 shunter and some Peco SWB wagon kits show that they will run around the 140mm radius curves (admittedly with some grinding noises from the wheels of the 04), although the Rapido couplers will not work reliably on the curves.
After some playing around with the shelf layout, the track plan has evolved somewhat, following the purchase of a Metcalfe brewery kit to add some operating interest. At present, the projected layout is looking somewhat like this:
However, the Tomix Mini Fine Rail track system (primarily intended for trams) has come to my attention, and using it, it should be possible to fit an oval onto my 1-foot-wide shelf. I'm not sure quite how well it would work, but I have done some rudimentary ex
Well, the time came for another trip to Harburn Hobbies (usual disclaimer applies - no connection other than satisfied customer, etc. etc.) and departing with a yellow bag that felt much lighter than when full of 00 stuff (although the wallet felt heavier, so that's probably not such a bad thing!). Some more track (almost enough to complete the station and scenic area), a Peco platform kit and one wagon (to test my tracklaying until the rolling stock I made last year turns up in the unpacking!),
After a year in university halls, in which I dabbled a little in 009 and N scale (mostly building wagon kits and two Parkside 009 coaches), I moved into my flat for the next three or four years on Monday. Considering that I had the smallest room of any of the bedrooms in the flat, I didn't hold much hope of having any space for modelling. Cue two surprises when I arrived.
The first surprise was a shelving unit with shelves 5'6" by 1'. Hmmm... enough space for a small N scale BLT?
The se
OK, I'm not quite sure how these blogs work, or if I've got file uploading right... let's try it and see, shall we?
Well, it's scary, but somehow I've got through the first year of university in Edinburgh, and returned to sunny Sussex just over a week ago. Having recovered from a nasty stomach bug (it actually was a dodgy curry, ironically enough) and been given a clean bill of health by the doc today, what better than to crouch over some noxious chemicals and sharp blades for a while? No, n
