Hello RMWeb members, time for another long overdue update!

This time rather than looking at my non-existent Workbench I will write about my layout that I am slowly building and am at the point now where most of the big hurdles have been jumped.

Speedlow started life as most layouts do as an idea on paper, mainly doodles in between my workload waiting for the next batch of documents to land in my in-tray. Little scraps of paper here and there, doodles of track plans based on places I knew of around the Buxton area that I had visited like Peak Forest, Great Rocks, Tunstead and the Hindlow branch. I didn't want a continuous run layout nor did I want a layout with the seemingly mandatory station on it. No in true Number Six fashion I wanted to rebel and go a different direction. Maybe not quite running across the beach in The Village (still need to do that sometime LOL!) and venting anger at the Village.... What I wanted was a layout based on the railway things that I remember the most that being the Railfreight scene around the Buxton area in the late 1980s into the early 1990s up until the end of Speedlink operations. For me this was the best time as you still had a great mix of diesel traction being used on freight services around the Buxton area with several liveries present with scope to include pairs of blue 20's right up to brand new class 60's with a good wedge of Buxton class 37/5's in between. I had modelled a good chunk of the Buxton 37/5's long ago either using the Lima 37 model or the later Bachmann 37/5 model and had re-painted and re-liveried models to suit.

As you may have seen from previous issues my main modelling passion is wagons especially those that have a connection to the Buxton area and there are plenty of those to go at. Some are simply re-worked models from Hornby, Bachmann and Lima whereas others may just re-parts like the chassis to form the basis of an as yet un-modelled variety of PGA hopper wagon known to have worked from the Peak District quarries. This was my other inspiration to create a layout where these wagons could be modelled and used. And so the idea of having two quarries linked by a common exchange yard came about and thus incorporated into the doodles...

And so from the doodles a rough idea for a layout track plan came about with regular revisions until I was happy. Then it was time to put the proposed track plan to the test by drawing it out onto good old wallpaper backing paper rolls. I started doing this around April 2010 and had the idea of having some custom shaped baseboards built for me. It wasn't until the October that year that I found just the person to make my boards for me and that was Colin from Black Cat Baseboards from Hull who was coincidently positioned opposite the club layout I was helping to operate. So I bit the bullet and had a chat with Colin as to my requirements and sure he would be able to make them for me and as they weren't needed urgently and could wait until the new year of 2011 I placed an order for the main 4 baseboards each 4 foot long with a maximum depth of 21 inches at one end and narrowing down from the 2 foot mid point of the 4 foot length to a 9 inch depth. This meant that the once the boards were positioned the track layout would form a natural curved alignment.

This was the initial track plan idea as drawn up on the backing paper using photocopied Peco point templates

As all modellers know even once a plan is drawn up and you think that is that changes often occur at the track-laying stage that don't always seem possible when it is planned on the paper version. This will become apparent later on as the layout progresses. The key to these additions is IMHO to enhance operation capability and allow flexibility not to cram in extra unnecessary sidings that clutter the layout up. In effect you have to justify each extra point and length of flexi-track.

Fast-forward slightly to the stage in September 2012 when having slowly laid the cork using Copydex and acquired a good quantity of new and used Peco code 75 track from the collection of the late Graham Neve, who was one of the co-founders of Hazel Grove & District MRS back in the 1960s. I was fortunate to acquire an entire box of new wooden flexi-track along with a good quantity of short left and right hand points from Graham's model collection at a very good price indeed thus saving myself a considerable sum of money buying new track. The only new items I needed to buy were the two catch points, the asymmetric 3-way point plus the code 100 3-way points and short left and right points that would be used in the fiddle yard. I also ordered an extra 2 foot extension board from Colin to be added to the end of board 1 to permit a slight increase in the quarry track works.

The start of track laying in September 2012 with Inspector Lucy keeping a beady eye on the works :-)

More to follow soon!

Cheers Paul

Edited: 1st April 2023 missing images restored.