In my last few blog entries I have been hinting at an exciting announcement. Well today is, finally, the day of that announcement.

Indeed it has been a very exciting 2 months for me, although I have had other things on my mind and not been able to do much actual modelling I actually commissioned CCE to do some CAD design work for me on a piece of rolling stock I wanted to make.

My main interest is French N gauge (as regular readers will probably know). French N gauge is less developed than in other country's and there are some significant gaps in the RTR format. The piece of stock I have commissioned is a DU65 Draisine. I had a go at making one of these with Plasticard and really enjoyed the challenge. However I do not have the steady hands needed to do any better than the basic model I made so I looked into alternative methods of construction. 3D printing seemed like it might be viable.

So over the summer research was undertaken and the brief was set. Since then a number of sample images have been sent through of the ongoing design work. It is staggering to see the level of detail that can be achieved!

The reason why I chose today to post these is that I just placed an order for the initial sample to check how it will fit together and see if it needs any refinements.

The above shows the first image I saw of the Draisine.

The prototype has a variety of configurations and I wanted to be able allow modellers to choose which version they wished to have running on their layout. This meant that there are some "extras" included in the print which allows the modeller to model up to 3 varients of the Draisine.

The above shows the Draisine with the Pneumatic Lifting Arm in position, this will be printed separately.

I am aware that there was a kit manufactured by Vapeur 70 of the same vehicle, however it was made out of brass and is currently out of production. Therefore I thought that a simpler kit could be viable.

As well as this Draisine I am formulating a brand name so that I can sell these models on (and perhaps develop further models). I have come up with the name "Draisine 160" and the banner below is the logo.

I will, in time, set up a web site where people can purchase these kits.

Thanks for reading,

If anyone has any questions then please get in touch.

Stephen