It's only been five weeks since SWMBO mentioned that a move may be on the cards later in the year.
Despite the cold, in that time I've seen the new baseboards delivered, new track and all the accessories come in brown boxes.
This weekend a milestone has been reached, all the track hase been laid, the new DCC Cobalts have been installed and tested the main bus has been wired up, complete with droppers on every length of track.
Next thing is to test the track, and get some trains runni
You know that feeling you get when things are going well.
It has happened to me more than once, and it has happened again.
Just as I completed the track laying, SWMBO announced that we should go house hunting, I was not amused, it came completely out of the blue, and had never been mentioned in the previous 5 yrs, so like a developer building on a flood plain, I thought I was safe.
This meant some serious thinking, all layout work came to a spark emitting grinding halt as I considere
Just in case you don't know what I 'm on about, I mean these bad boys :
Now they are not cheap @ £17.95 each, but they do the job of several switches in one go, and they can be interlocked.
Those in the picture are not mine btw, I see this chap had the same problem as me, getting all the guides lined up properly, unlike him i didn't glue mine down before thinking about it !
I am a little confused about DCC's instructions in painting these, it says to polish the guides up to a br
Isn't it great having a week off when no-one else is at home.
So each morning after doing the chores that are expected of I can disappear into the shed and make some real progress.
So far I've manged to bridge the gap by the door, with some crude buy nifty woodwork.
I've made it so that in future years I can convert it to a lift out, rather than being a guzzunder !
Doing this has meant I can at least make up two complete loops, which mean running trains is literally hours
My foray into scratchbuilding has taken a step toward the ambitious lately.
I had a gap that needed a bridge, I first thought about an off the shelf solution, but what I wanted wasn't available and rather go for second best I decided to get out the styrene and build my own.
I decided that I wanted the bridge to be functional as well, not just a piece of decoration hiding a bit of MDF !, so it had to be capable of carrying some weight.
First I built a framework from "H" and "C" sectio
Having failed to get trains running ( see previous entry), I decided to turn my attention to trying to complete another build, last week I bought some lights from Kyte Lights and the Andover Model Railway Clubs Modelex, I got 10 for a very good price. Not strictly the GWR prototype, but nothing a coat of paint wouldn't help.
It was handy that the moulded base could be separated, however the lamp part was fixed to the pole, painting it would be tricky, I gambled on the fact that I wouldn't co
My visits to the shed have taken a bit of a back seat recently, I've had to go onto light duties at work because of a trapped nerve in my left shoulder, the pain at times was unbearable, sleeping was a no-go. Thankfully a prescription of tramadol has put a stop to the worst of the pain, but I'm having to wait for a scan to determine which nerve is actually causing the pain.
The tramadol is so good that it has allowed me to get into the shed this weekend, the goal being to get a train running
At Model club last night (5-8-15) I asked the question what was the best way to model line fencing in 'N' gauge, the reply that I was given was basically that it would so small that I needn't bother, mainly because no-one would miss it.
I thought ...."Challenge Accepted"
With an afternoon off work I decided to set to and think about how I could build a lineside country fence within scale and most of all quite cheaply, I know you can buy fencing, but it works out very expensive when you w
In my quest to get some movement on the rails I have placed an order for some block signalling electronics.
I chose to use SEEP point motors mainly because of the price, ( they were cheap), I soon found out that there is no such thing as a free lunch, and if you want to use LED's as indicators on your control panel you need a points indicator thingy because the LED's need constant power.
Two have been ordered, each will be able to run eight sets of points, with only twelve on the board s
From what I've seen and read on here most people seem to have a firm idea of what they want to create and or re-create.
For me the idea seemed relatively simple, I wanted a layout that reflected all the places that were prominent in my early years around where I lived.
For those of you interested Chase Hill does exist, it stands 600ft high and watches over the town of Ross on Wye in Herefordshire, and whilst there never was a station at Chase Hill, I saw it every day, and ventured into i
Many years ago when I was about eleven my parents bought me a train set for Christmas, train set was actually a very loose term for what was in the box, a loco, two carriages and a couple of coal wagons, the track was a just a circle, and a transformer/controller.
This set was duly set up on the table, and I watched as my two older brothers played to their hearts content with my train set !, as dinner time approached the ‘set ‘ had to be packed away to make room for the laying of the table, as
