Despite Mr David Larkin confirming for me the floor of a XVA wagon is an open frame-work, compared to the BDA steel bolster wagon's wooden platform, I am determined to have a means of conveying over-size steel from the manufacturers up north to a small ship-yard south of Atherington East Yard, at Tilling Docks. The wagon would be conveyed at the head of the goods train 'passing through' my goods yard, so I need not consider load handling in my little general sidings.
What decided me
Having bought many Preiser figures last month, I have taken photographs trying composition and colours. The layout is strewn with 1970's wagon-load stock at the moment, and while bauxite shades dominate, I wanted to try other-coloured wagons in some pictures to see the effect. Sadly, focus and camera-shake is not my strong point, and some backgrounds must be excused.
D7070 rests in the grain/warehouse siding, having brought in a special Company train of minerals from Acton Y
In an effort to provoke the Fates into an announcement of a ready-to-run new 'OO' wagon, instead of all these high-spec. re-releases, I have made a model of an IIB 'Inter-frigo' ferry-wagon to convey (under Rule 1) meat and fish to and from the Sussex Weald.
Unworthy of close examination - owing not least to my unsteady hand and unwanted ability to glue tiny pieces of plastic to everything except where wanted - I am content with its capturing the
Taking a week off work recently, I started 'the factory' as what I thought would be a quick, simple, discrete project. This monolith hides the passenger station viaduct on the left of the layout, behind the minerals yard and arrival/departure sidings, currently substituted by cardboard boxes to give an idea of the 'massing'.
I can not say the modelling has been enjoyable, but have been able at last to stage a cameo dreamed of when first mooting the layout's track plan. A VIX is shu
Just wished to add my paean to Revolution Trains' S.R. General Manager's Saloon, 'Caroline'. Arrived on Monday, and on initial inspection it looks excellent to me. Taking the precaution of un-packing it on a white napkin, only the coupling hook fell off, which I am too ham-fisted to re-attach.
Here it is, arriving at Atherington Victoria upon news of an out-break of Victorians populating the platform. (Please forgive my flippancy, but I have nothing better in which to pose it.)
It has been another case of 'two steps forward, one back', spending a few days off in the garage on short tasks. Panicked last night at realising - why only now?! - that if my track around the passenger platforms was raised on 2.5mm. cork, there would be an unrealistic step up to the coaches. It had not dawned on me that wishing to sink the buildings into a 'scenic base' to eliminate gaps, meant they would be too low. Next I was worried the curved platform was too close to the track, so the e
Thought I would add my two-penn’orth of praise for D.E.M.U. Show-case 2023 with some photos of my favourite layout there, @sf315 ‘s ‘Hillport Goods’. All the models were to an enviably high standard I thought, but this one beat the others by a whisker (and a few of my resulting pictures are presentable), having the liveries I like best and capturing an ‘atmosphere’ I find so evocative. Thank you to the operators for letting me distract them with my photographing: I was trying to reproduce the
Atherington Victoria station's tarmac platform is laid, and more viaduct parapets are made (if not glued in place yet).
I am unsure where all the photographs of the platform's progress are, but pleased the task worked on over several weeks is better than expected. My heart-felt thanks to @simon b and @Wheatley for giving their expertise on a previous post (no. 40) about making tarmac surfaces. This is just the basic structure, with more work needed to vary
Progress on the ballast and station platform being slower and less competent than wished this Bank Holiday, I finished a kit that has been cluttering my work-bench for years. The Ratio Lineside hut has been modified to be 'more Southern' with a pukka brick chimney and replacing the stone base with brick again.
The chimney is a piece of plastic rod with Milliput to embed it as cement. I was most pleased with still having the dexterity to attach the dra
I should have arranged something special for my fiftieth 'post', but progress is neither so orderly nor inspiring, so here are just a few more pictures and words as a few more steps forward are taken. Thanks to Grandad's Train Shop of Selby getting a bag of ballast to the Post Office at 09.05 on a Monday morning Recorded Delivery for me, I spent last weekend doing more gluing, and this weekend painting the ballast and making a milk-discharge siding.
The viaduct walls hav
I have not posted here or done work on the layout for a long while, owing partly to the temperature of the garage and partly to reluctance to start the destructive relaying and points replacements in the goods yard. I know I will leave this half-finished and unusable for ages if not fully motivated.
Inspired by @Andrew P 's scenic work on Tonleigh Bridge East Yard and @young37215 's wonderful photographs and work on his West Highland Line, I decided to devote the long Easter weekend
The garage being too cold for modelling work, I had a burst of ‘compositing inspiration’ to accompany the cough/cold over the Christmas holiday, and made three sets of imaginary Working Time Tables for Atherington Victoria. The exercising of the “little grey cells” made it an enjoyable distraction. One must decide the routes’ lengths and imaginary station positions after poring over O.S. maps (and ignoring the geography), comparative train speeds, and head-codes and reporting numbers. Write a
I was to write about the Gaydon Great British Model Railway Show I attended yester-day, but forgot to take my camera - it was one of those mornings before departure - so instead will just post a photograph of the new Bachmann VGA (37-601C) I bought there instead from the Cheltenham Model Centre stall.
73 124 propels the first VGA to Atherington East Yard and an SPA of plate for one of the light engineering firms nearby. Closely watched by the Yard Superintendent, the wea
Please accept my apologies for cluttering up the list of blogs. Re-numbering my posts is an attempt to get them back in date-order, as 'editing' to restore the lost photographs then puts the post at the head of one's list, and so quite out of date sequence.
I am very sorry for the temporary dominance of the 'front list', and assure readers it is not a crude attempt to 'bump' interest. I look forward to reading far more worthy entries from others as soon as possible. Thank you for
Inspired by @Ray Von 's queries more than a year ago, I have had the idea of a Working Time Table for my layout nagging me for just as long. Composing a clock-face list of arrivals and departures for a week-day, at last I had chance to play on 'Word' at work one quiet Saturday and draft a sample page.
This meant I had to give thought to station names along the lines, route times, and what of 'reality' to leave and what to ignore or replace. The following needs its names making fict
... Scarlet, and Crimson with rage. A point has broken, so must be dug out thus destroying all the track leading from it, then replaced and ballasted again. I tried to fix it by soldering a 'jump lead' to the following rail, but did the wrong rail (should have been the inner), and cut the wire too short to move it to the correct one. My, how I laughed on realising.
There is plenty of 'real life' going on around me to keep this problem in perspective, but why bal
In an effort to escape the problems on my own layout (see future post), I sought solace last weekend at Sutton Coldfield. Glad to see it is now rather easier to reach by public transport. Realising quickly (a) how difficult it is to photograph a layout that captures its atmosphere accurately, and (b) it is impossible to photograph every one, I offer (sadly mediocre) photographs of three.
Being a declining wagon-load goods yard in B.R. Blue, it was inevitable 'Clackmannan Goods' was
Both surprised and pleased with the results of my pretend-ODA first kit previously, I bought a Peco 'Parkside' PC60 BR Ale Pallet Wagon. An excuse to run something more unusual in my Southern Region goods yard, using 'Rule 1' to extend their working life into the late-1970's wagon-load network for breweries nationwide.
Had I the time and talent, I would write a 'missing manual', but will just offer some tips I should have noted so others, if interested, do not make the same mistakes
No, it is not a Turner sea-scape, but my umpteenth attempt to get a simple, even coat of tarmac-grey on the loading area for my goods-yard.
I started with a darkened (water-based) Green Scene 'Light Tarmac' textured paint, and failed to apply it evenly. Then I decided to cover this with a coat of sieved sand, glued down with P.V.A. This did not adhere evenly either, not helped by my doing it in three areas (if immediately after each other on the same after-noon). 'Bother', I thoug
The third stage of this task has not been 'fun', I admit. I will spare the details of what felt like 'one step forward, two back' - see the bodged height of the girder, for example - but I think the viaduct looks presentable now, and have learned much from its construction over too long a time. Most importantly, paint everything at once, so one does not get variations in tones.
(Not a total success the final picture, but I like the perspective
I have been spending the last few weekends trying to finish a few projects that have been dragging on for ages. This, the attempt to finish a section of 'new' track for the yard, has had enough done to it as I can manage. The conceit is that the entrance to the yard has been relayed recently with the lifting of a short siding against the warehouse/ grain silos loading bay (all yet to be built), replacing the king-point with a 3-way and slewing track to a single, shared siding along the side of
Happening upon the ex-Pipe 'ODA' wagon in 'government stores' (military) trains, I like the idea of running one as a pleasing visual addition to rakes of 'Vanwides'. So tempting fate to have a manufacturer bring one out R.T.R., I bought Peco's Parkside wagons PC43 4 mm. kit at Alexandra Palace in March, and have just finished it, thus:
Paints by Precision Paints, water-slide transfers by @railtec-models .
Unfortunately, I did not do my research first.
Thanks to @phil_sutters selling me some of his surplus road vehicles, I have spent some time trying to re-paint various kits and models, sadly in a quality quite unworthy of his prior work. The chemical tanker looks as if moulded from icing, so thick is the paint, but all have photographed better than I expected.
Two Bedford chassis will have box bodies made for general grocers' or light engineering companies' collections and deliveries, when I have the inc
Weary of the clutter on my un-built viaduct passenger station behind the Goods Yard, I decided to do something about it. From this:
... to this :
Thanks to some box-files ...
... with bodged dividers made from corrugated cardboard, some divisions lined with bubble-wrap:
Had I the talent, they would be bespoke boxes of wood with dove-tailed joints, etc. But I do not, so this will have to
Passing Cooksbridge timber yard whenever we went up to Town by train is a vivid memory from childhood, and I am pleased to say it is still trading (if never rail-connected to my knowledge). We even walked out there from Lewes one day in the 1970's when it caught fire. My commuting providing free drinks-stirrers every day, I had to have some loads of timber for my Goods Yard. As storm Eunice prevented me from going to work on Friday, I put the 'forced holiday' to good use by finishing my model
