Having discovered that there is an update to Anyrail available, I've done some colouring in type stuff to the trainset plan. Quite satisfying, in a non-productive way!
Well hoots mon etc! I can't believe that so long has passed that it actually took me a little while to find my way back to my own little blogette (I have a spurious nil entry blog set up by accident, and its not too easy to navigate beyond that one)
any hoo, time has passed and not much has seemingly happened, but its all been great fun. I've wrecked a few settrack points in my search for the elusive 'electro-frog' conversion, and instead, I've changed the parts to code 55 electrofrogs (a l
a quiet weekend at magnolia mansions - too windy to go out on the bike for any great length, but not a lot going on, so got hijacked by the girls to get some scenery in on our little layout. Its going to be 'finished' before I've even got my cab-control working at this rate...
Had some fun running our Spanish wagons and a Feve carriage around in honour of the looming big event, and sure enough, justice was later done (eventually)!
sadly, I was the only one in the house cheering on Spain
so, over the construction period, I have, like a lot of peeps before me, been both glad of and despairing of, the properties of insulfrog points, particularly the settrack variety.
My simple mind had taken me to a point of considering that really, the issue with running n gauge small locos is that there is simply too much dead track as they trundle their way around complex track arrangements.
To counter this, thought one was - why not run them with an attendant wagon with extra pickups a
all is quiet on the Abercorn Branch. The electrics seem as fully operational as a settrack layout seems to allow, and the chances of my moving things to cab control before the darker days draw in seem , er, 'remote'
Scenery is in the hands of the female of the species (both large and small as wot live in this house) and is moving not a jot at present.
Operating the thing though seems to me to be a confirmation that the layout will serve us well for the next little while. (ie, all seem ag
The last entry here prompted some comment that made me go back and examine what brought me to the layout that we have. (trackplan in previous entry) After all, a railway is a serious thing, and no-one builds one without good reason, surely?...
As a father to 3 interested, but small, daughters, and a novice modeller, I thought we needed to come up with something to act as:
a medium-term training exercise for me, to cover as many modelling aspects as possible - track/scenics/electronics/k
So, here's an attempt to show the trackplan that resulted from a good few months of deliberation and discussion, and finally, agreement on location.
Its a 1500x600 thing made simply from sundeala board on 3 thin bits of wood saved from an abondoned futon. Its almost exactly everything that is advised against in board construction, as the supports are used on their weak axis and warp and twist a little in the sun and varying temperatures of the bedroom. BUT it was constructed to accommodate a
hmmm
too many Dr Who moments of late.
Time to see if i can get a photo up here...
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ooh - look! it might be here. If this works, I'm impressed by the not-needing-to faff-about-with-uploading elsewhere first bit.
Anyhhoo, this image dates from January of this year, and marked the first connections between two bits of streamline track, with extra faffing to ensure continued use of the majorly set track resource base, as we started to commit to a layout that wouldn't be pulled a
trip to Glasgow on the train,did some work(!) (it snowed in Glasgow, briefly) read a bit about progress on the Airdrie-Bathgate line en route; back via the soon-to-be-history East Coast Glasgow to London, off at Motherwell and then continue later from Bellshill via the fantastic (for those like me that travel from Embra to Bellshill frequently) new semi-fast service from Bellshill to Embra to pick up the girls from after school club and away for a little taster tennis lesson for them at the comm
I'm always intrigued by articles describing railway modellers early fascinations with (almost invariably) steam engines etc etc.
For me it begins differently, as a boy in the early/mid 70s when family magnolia, having fled fortress Scotland and secured economic migrant status in Ingerland, became located on the Bedpan line. Not for me though any fascination with the real thing, but rather many brief periods with my nose pressed against a toyshop window in St Albans as I waited for my bus hom
Cripes
it's only taken me 3 weeks or so to find this chuffing thing again to add an entry - I'm not sure I'll be able to get back again either as i don't really know how I got here.
Bit like life, really.
Anyhoo, the branch is back out from hiding and is sitting comfortable on the new Ikea £49 table. My back and knees are sore from bending down.
Last bit of the first stage wiring is completed and all track sections work, including the reverse polarity bit. Isolating sections all
Not being familiar with the world of blogs puts me in a similar position to my familiarity with the world of model railways.
A year and a bit ago a 'significant' birthday saw delivery of a small train set in british n gauge. Me and my three young daughters (and my young wife!) have spent the intervening period learning a bit about the topic. we're now ready to complete the wiring on our 1500x600 board to give us 4 (maybe 5) cab control sections on our folded loop layout. It struck me that it
