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About this blog

Industrial, light, and narrow gauge railway ramblings!

Entries in this blog

O Gauge wagon salvage

As threatened below should be some photo's of O gauge wagons I've been working on, or perhaps salvaging might be a better description, oh one small thing please don't expect anything truely fine scale or accurate to the nearest thou or so!   A few years back I bought from a certain well known internet auction site a job lot of built O gauge wagons, now I knew from the photographs that they weren't that good and lets just say I was not disappointed! They were stashed away as "someday" p

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Long time no entry

I haven't put anything on my blog for a long time so let's start again with a quick catch up.                                                                                                           In the intervening time we have moved back into Andover, in the process lost a bedroom (the railway room), a bathroom and a garage (it's called "downsizing".....don't do it!). I now have in the garden a 3m x 3m cabin insulated and with electrics which must serve as both railway room and worksho

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More than one on the go

There I was beavering away on my RT Models Sentinel when I realised (not very bright this one!) I had in total three Sentinels on the go at various stages.   A Hornby one that has had a repaint and awaits re-assembly, transfers, flush glazing and etched wipers. A freelance double cab version from TB for the 009 which sits on a Kato chassis, and of course the RT version still being built. Which when finished will be in a pale blue livery as my old 7mm scale Impetus one was years ago.   Enough

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009 to standard gauge (with appologies to Relaxing Hobby)

Inspired by "Relaxing Hobbys" conversions to standard gauge from 009 I thought I'd try my hand at following the same path! For some years now some slightly battered W&L vans have lurked in the "someday" box, well with nothing to lose I introduced them to Mr Razor saw and they got along splendidly as hopefully the photograph shows.   New ends and floor, a Cambrian Gloucester chassis kit, some Kenline wooden brake blocks, new roof, some Fourmost vents and the job's done. In fact I rebuilt t

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Building work at Wherewithial Quay

Wherewithial Quay is going to the Wessex Group do at Colehill at the end of the month so this has given me the impetus to complete some work on the Layout. Firstly the warehouse at the center of the layout has never had it's down pipes for the guttering fitted (not my favourite job I will confess), well this task is now complete. Some flaps have been fitted in front of the inward opening doors to aid the workers on the first & second floors to retieve sacks and so on from the hoist (these fl

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Pepper!

I am still working on the last pair of cottages for Wherewithial Quay, which I also managed to loose one of the windows for! Window problem is sorted and actually looks slightly better for the larger window. However the left hand cottage (the cottage in question) is intended to finished as "pebble dash" and was built with the Wills "render or concrete" sheet material, but try as I might I wasn't happy with the texture or colour. I even tried mixing talc' with what I hoped would be an appropriat

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Another new small layout!

Last year at Expo NG I was discussing with various folk the subject of railways and water and I said I had always wanted to build a layout including beech huts! Collectively we came to the conclusion that all that was needed was a little imagination and an APA Box. So this afternoon while waiting for some filler to set (really?) on "Wherewithial Quay" I set to and assembled my "Box", fitted some small battens on which the"sea" will sit (this one will be a tide in layout) and cut the "sea" from s

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In the flesh

I'm busy working on buildings for Wherwithial Quay (it's ok you're spared photographs this time) mainly finishing off and planting. Slightly gutted as I seem to have lost/misplaced/can't find/the cats gone off with it (delete as appropriate!) one of the Grandtline windows for a cottage, I guess I'll have to enlarge or otherwise change the opening. The layout will be appearing in the flesh as it were at the Wealdon Railway Group show at Arudel this Saturday. 10 - 5 at the ist Arundel Scout hut,

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Progress on building works at Wherewithial Quay

Time marches on and I have tried to resist doing anything to the Manning Wardle I class chassis (opps-sorry mention of standard gauge!), I have however managed to get the top two cottages finished and ready to fix into place on Wherewithial Quay. Along with the pavement in front of same and the tumbledown chapel next door, next projects will be the props holding the chapel upright and the Post Office which is the next building down the hill from the chapel.   After which it will probably be th

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The attention span of a..............?

Just over a week to go and I should be beavering away on Wherewithial for next Saturdays 009 open day organised by the SWOONS group, however I am easily distracted....   While waitng for some glue to dry I thought I'd just do a few small jobs on another recent aquisition from a 2nd hand stand, it's an Impetus 4mm scale Manning Wardle class I which someone had started. in fact they'd got as far as errecting the frames, to S4/P4 standards as it turned out. All my 4mm scale standard gauge stock

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No wait there's more...

As I promised earlier (rashly!) a few more photographs of rolling stock for the light railway project.   Last year I bought from a society 2nd hand stand a largely built etched brass kit for some sort of non-passenger freight stock, which proved to be a Roxey kit for a S&D van. Well at the time my railway is set many of these vans had been absorbed into Southern stock, so this seemed like a sound idea to follow and a good friend lent me a book on Souhern liverys. Well to say it made my br

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Appologies & another attempt

Sincere appologies to all who were rightly offended by the poor quality of the photographs in my last blog entry, I have had another go this AM and all looks much better. Indeed there is a bonus photograph to suggest whreabouts in the country the light railway is supposed to have been!   Ex LNWR 6 wheel brake van   Light railway brakevan after "Relaxing Hobby"   Local coal merchants open culled from two Trix opens.   I hope I am forgiven, more to follow soon-ish!   John.

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Good intentions...

I had good intentions of getting on with the final buildings for my 009 layout(?) Wherewithial Quay, however I decided it would be an equaly good idea to complete some of my oustanding projects. Rock & a hard place methinks!   The oustanding projects won. Two of the projects are brake vans (for which I seem to have a cetain affection). First up is a LNWR 6 wheeled affair bought second hand from a member on RM web some tine ago, this I have regauged to EM (in situ!) added a new roof, some b

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Proof of the pudding

Just to prove that my recent blog entry was not just waffle & hot air concerning the light railway project, behold a station building and a coach.   The building is slightly modified Hornby with a new corrugated iron, glazing and a metal chimney for the office stove. Plus a suitably tired looking looking paint job.   The coach if one may so dignify the relic that you see before you is a 5 and 9 kit obtained from a friend of mine and reworked a little with a new roof and compensation. The

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Blowing the dust off!

Gosh what can I say, last entry in my blog February 2012. What have I been doing, indeed what HAVE I been doing??   Smallest first I think, Wherewithial Quay my Cornish 009 layout, last seen slowly dragging itself from the primordial swamp that I call my railway room. Actually it was shown at the Wiltshire group of the 009 Society members day last weekend at Pewsey, it's one and only point motor this year survived the ordeal and overall it was well received. It seems that my holidays in Cornwa

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Leaving it too late as usual!

Long time readers might recall last February(!) I bought a ready built baseboard to make a new fiddle yard for my EM gauge layout "The Works Yard", last February note!   Well over the last year I've cut some holes in it, added a new level to it and generally faffed around. The point is the layout is due at both Devizes and Swindon in March, so I'd better pull my finger out . The plan is as follows, try and get all the track laid this week including any droppers from the plain track. Next f

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Warewithial Quay point motor

Visitors to this blog might recall that I was operating the one & only point on the layout with a Hoffman pattern point motor, which duly decided to play up from the off once I arrived at the Wiltshire groups members day at Pewsey back in August. This point motor has been removed, it is no more!   It's replacement is a slightly modified Tortoise point motor hidden inside the large warehouse occupying center stage, see below for the now you see me now you don't photographs.   Some years

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New Small Layout gains a name!

After many months of consideration, debate and suggestions (helpfull & otherwise!) I can announce that NSL now has a name...it is to be christened Warewithial Quay. Of all this I will post more anon.   John.

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New Small Layout & other things...

Well a month has easily passed since The Wiltshire Group show at Pewsey and NSL's debut. Running up to the show I was having some doubts about how insane I would be driven by the limited operating potential of having only 5 wagons! However I can report that as the layout is as much for talking about as it is operating the potential for insanity was not as great as I feared.   However, as is always the case what worked well enough at home decided to misbehave on arrival at Pewsey! Yes the "Hoff

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MORE very small layout progress

As promised I have all being well, attached a photograph and a scan of the New Small Layout (hereafter referred to as NSL, at least until I come up with a name for it!) , hopefully these will remove any doubt or fuzziness from the issue and prove that I do know what I am talking about. Since last night the walls for the derelict chapel have been glued together so for the purpose of the picture you can finally grasp where it's going to be sited. It will sit on a level site with a small retaining

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Very small layout progress

Well folks, I've been pottering around on the new and very small 009 layout this weekend and can report that some progress has been made, it has to be as the layout will be at the 13th members day organised by the Wiltshire Group of the 009 Society this August.   Progress has been made on the buildings front, well certainly on their positions on the layout. I wanted a chapel on this layout after the two I had on Lower Peak Wharf only this one's going to be derelict and about to fall down, to t

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Update to "The Butterfly Returns"...

This evening I can report that after a small tweak of the "Hoffman" pattern point motor (made by "Conrad") the electrical side of matters is now complete. Indeed this momentous occasion was further enlivened by the running of the first locomotive over the track work. Now to the buildings and scenic side of matters.   John.

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The butterfly returns...

Hello all, it's been a while since I posted any updates so here we go. Not done too much lately, suffering a slight loss of direction and focus but I have been working on a couple of Parkside LNER ply vans. One a salvage job bought as a body only that had been built, this received a new chassie with vacuum Moreton brakes while the other was a new build which has received LNER 8 shoe vacuum brakes and is now awaiting a visit to the paint shop (AKA garage with the door slightly open). There's als

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No baseboard hell this time!

I must confess that today I have done something I never thought I'd do, allow me to explain. My small EM gauge layout "The Works Yard" has as its fiddle yard a small sliding sector plate running on some quite expensive drawer runners, the sliding action is really nice and smooth and so it should be for the price I paid for them .   However, because the movement required sometimes is beyond the end of the runners (in other words they are being used in the same fashion as they would be for sa

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It's been a while!

Some time has passed since I added an entry to this blog so here goes...   This morning I went along to the S Scale meeting and AGM at Oxford, managed to pick up some bits & pieces for my various items of S Scale wagonry. Wheels and brake levers+guards for the 16ton mineral wagons and some spoked wheels for the ex LSWR resin van-looking forward to building the van now!!   On the way back down South to Wiltshire I called in to the Newbury MRC exhibition for a quick look around (is this sh

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