I blame Gareth. This, I can assure you, is a default position - but a very good one - derived from long experience of shifting the blame. Admittedly I had been mulling over doing a 'what's on my workbench and how I've managed create a masterpiece/complete pigs ear' for a while, but lets be clear - this is all Gareth's fault. Why? Well he has volunteered the EMpire Project to appear at the MRC's March 2015 Alexandra Palace show. Well so what? It’s already done that, so why blame Gareth? Because, gentle reader, there was a tiny little caveat... with completely new stock to portray [wait for it] a GWR china clay branch in the Edwardian period. And as the number of GWR pre-grouping modellers, who do EM gauge, are active [!] modellers, involved in Empire Mills, who could nominally supply stock for a china clay branch is, and are members of the MRC is, you've guessed it, just 1 - me. Hence what was going to be a leisurely production of stock has now gone into overdrive - and I'm also supposed to be progressing my own layout too.

So this blog will attempt to keep up with the frantic efforts to produce at least half a dozen EM gauge locos (DCC to boot and hopefully sound chipped too) and associated rolling stock that could, if viewed in a gentle light, be imagined to frequent a GWR Cornish china clay branch as well as the stock that may one day see the light of day on my own layout (or more likely the way my layout is going) on the South Hant's MRC's Hope under Dinmore - maybe...

Now I've already managed to shift some of the work back on to the all too deserving shoulders of Gareth; kits of a 517, a part built 1076 pannier tank and an even worse part built 850 saddle tank were chucked at Gareth and he was invited to get cracking. However, he's clearly been slacking as it's been over a week and he hasn't finished any of them. He has, however, explained at length my errors in putting them together - probably fairly, it has to be admitted. And I'm sure he will delight in pointing out my rubbish soldering and dodgy kit building, either on this blog or his own.

So what can we look forward to?

Loco wise and in no particular order there is a:

• Nu-cast/cotswold 42xx in original condition
  
• Alan Gibson 1076 saddle tank
  
• SE Finecast 1854 saddle tank
  
• Dean Goods (Belpaire boiler) on a High Level Kits chassis
  
• Martin Finney Dean Goods
  
• Nu-cast/cotswold 2021 saddle tank
  
• Hornby 28xx in 1911/1912 condition (superheated, D4 boiler, no top feed, Dean 3000 gallon tender etc etc)
  
• Roxey no 34 0-4-4T
  
• Nu-cast/cotswold Armstrong Standard Goods.
  
• Modelex 45xx
  

And then there are the other locos waiting to be converted/built for my own layout..

• Bachman City (to be fair this one is done, sans DCC chip, but I owe Mr Butler and have to convert his one for his 'Westcliff' in return for him making me a stock box or 2...)
  
• Craftsman 36xx
  
• Finney Stella class
  
• K's Dean single
  
• M & L Dean single (I like Dean singles...)
  
• I'd also like to get my hands on a 44xx, a steam railmotor, a straight framed 29xx and a Scott Atlantic...
  

Wagon and carriage wise we can expect:

• More GWR and PO china clay wagons than is healthy.
  
• PO Coal wagons
  
• Brake vans
  

And when that is out of the way...

• GWR NPCS like Pythons...
  
• 4 and 6 wheel siphons
  
• Fish wagons
  
• Assorted GWR open and closed vans
  
• 4 and 6 wheel coaches
  
• Dean clerestories
  
• And probably some sexy Dreadnoughts, Concertinas, or Toplights for the City to pull...
  

So not a lot at all!