I had a bit of spare time over Christmas and thought I would get out my old Hornby track stencil to draw up plans for a new layout. I have filled countless pages of graph paper with plans and there is a strong chance that I will move on from this plan .. but it seems to have most of the features that I want so I shall stick with it for now!

Not counting various ungainly contraptions in the 1980s my first layout, which I called Handcross and set  in LBSCR Sussex, was also 6x4 feet in size and also mostly Peco OO Setrack, closely following the track plan of Reverend Awdry’s first Ffarquhar layout. I must confess that I struggled a bit with getting my trains to run nicely on it. I had adopted the Sprat and Winkle couplings that the Reverend had used (with the kind assistance of Michael White of this parish.. of whom more later) but probably should have paid more attention to fitting them at consistent heights etc, as my trains seemed unable to deal with the tight radii and I soon became disheartened with the whole thing and went off to build something else with Streamline points and graceful curves.. 

But there is something very compelling about the idea of sticking to the restrictions of a 6’ x 4’ board and the geometry of Setrack so I thought that I should like to revisit the idea. 
 

The aforementioned Michael has been something of an inspiration in this regard. His recreation of the Ffarquhar layout can be found here on this website (I wish I knew how to add a link) and he has managed to have some success with his Sprat and Winkles. I particularly enjoy watching his video on YouTube of his recreation of the Reverend Awdry’s operating sequence. 
 

Thus enthused, I have been studying in more detail what happens when S&W couplings encounter tight (2nd radius) curves, and more importantly reverse curves. But I shall set out my findings, in the next instalment..