This is a view of the timber yard.
The nearest structure will have a roof added covering an open area to it's front. This is where a steam powered circular saw will go. On the far right of it will go a forge. The wood stores are from Will's and Atlas.
A couple of the brewery. The first is of the loading area. The second looking across the yard to the stables.
The building beyond the satble is the town fire station. This is the Skaledale one.
Still pondering over the signalbox.
Some new motive power has been seen in Somercombe.
S15 from a DJH kit.
Still have to take the brightness off the motion and DCC it. It also needs a crew and the weathering needs finishing.
My new Bachmann 3MT tank ready to work the stopper to Salisbury. The emblem has been changed and I have given it a light weathering.
My "Teddy bear". In the yard after working a pick-up down from Westbury via Yeovil Junction.
Finally for now, my Beyer-Peacock diesel electric pro
Built my ground signals yesterday and got them painted up and fitted last night. For the position of them and the type I am very much indebted to Beast 66606 for his advice. These have been made using the Ratio kit. I still need to fit operating cables, but this will done when the main signals have been built and placed. The same goes for point rods.
Here we have the calling on signal at the exit to the yard.
Next we have the triple signal which controls the movement to the bay, down main
Just spent 1½hrs working on this fence. The posts were put in a few days back. Tonight I added the wires.
You can just make out the wire. I used fishing line for this as it worked out pretty much to scale. Thing is, from normal viewing distance it cannot be seen, hence this topics title. I will persevere though, or at least until I run out of fence-posts.
I have decided that the engineering works at the far end of the private siding will be named Griffin & Fudge Ltd. An odd name you may think, but it is named after a real company in Bradford-on-Avon, that closed it's doors for the final time only a couple of months ago, after more than 50 years. My connection is that my late father was a personal friend and business customer and that my oldest friend has worked there for the best part of the last 20 years. So this is my little diorama named a
Not done much on Somercombe since my last entry. I was hoping to get some done this week with my week of rest days, but I left myself available and ended up with 4 rest days work, so far. One of the little jobs I am doing, is to crew the rest of my steam loco's. I am using Masterpiece Falcon Figures. I have tried other makes, but the variety of poses makes these, in my mind, the best.
Just added crews to four more this morning, my 2 Q1s, a Black 5 and my 8F. First time using my phone
Serious problems in getting motivated with the layout. I've run trains and built stock since the last entry, but done nothing on the railway. There are a few thing I am not happy with. For a start the turn into the station is too tight. It should have been 3' but is closer to 2'6". The section at the far end suffers from changes in temperature, leading to railjoiners un coupling, hence derailments, this need to be more solid. Not happy with my ballasting, looks OK for a modern layout, but not ti
Time for an update I think.
Finally getting some work done on the layout. It's been a while, but I have had a few ideas to get on with now. The last thing I wanted to do was to put something down and then be dissapointed with it. For the brewery/timberyard area I have looked out an old Humbrol/Euromodel wooden kit. This will be used as a workshop for the timberyard. I will build an open, roofed area to the front of this where a Woodland Scenics steam powered circular saw will go. Attached t
Thoughts are turning to how I should fill in this corner. From the road bridge to a tunnel mouth it will run through a cutting. What type of cutting is what I am pondering over. Should I go for a normal type with 45º banks, or perhaps a retaining wal about 5' to 6' high or a full height walled cutting. In real life there are factors to consider like land use and geology. It could be that I end up with a combination of all three on the inside of the curve and a walled one on the outside as this
Just about finished my 2H, just a lick of paint to tone down the Black Beetle wheels. Sitting here in the bay waiting to depart for Yeovil Town. Gloucester MPV is on a run down to Exeter, while 3MT is on the Exeter-Salisbury service.
Ignore the front bogie from my S15 lying behind the platform .
Both of the units are ones I have always had a liking for. My Grandfather moved to Ropley in the early '60s and 2Hs were a constant feature of the line and as I never saw them elsewhere, t
For some reason I cannot get any enthusiasm to get on with the layout. However I have not stopped modelling. At the moment I am putting together a rake of Kirk Maunsells. Work on these originally stopped when Hornby announced theirs. Working away through weathering my fleet of loco's and have finished crewing them.
Some of you may be aware that when my Hornby coaling tower arrived it was broken. Well, the replacement arrived this week and using some excellent material in help and advice sectio
Nearing the end of a week of leave. Started out with the best of intentions to get some work done on the layout. So far have done nothing. I do have excuses though. Monday I caught up with some old friends at lunchtime and evening, Tuesday, MoT'd the car and met up with some more old friends. Wednesday and Thursday I actually did some modelling of sorts, I finished putting crews in my steam loco's, 60 odd figures to paint and fix, but well worth the effort. Oh, and I mowed the lawns and fixed o
Decided that the layout needs some form of lighting. After costing out the streetlights, I decided to have a go at making my own. I will be putting them on two circuit. The night one will include the station and street lighting, plus some of the upstairs in the shops and the chipshop ,pub and cinema. The daytime one will do the shop interiors, goods shed. I purchased some white LEDs and copper tube for the street and station lights and tonight put together a prototype.
This is the design
Well, here it is, 'The Beast' My stretched Hymek on a Falcon chassis, to which I am indebted to 6026, for obtaining it for me.
Body now ready for what I hope is the final coat of primer. As for the final colour scheme, I am open to suggestions, but I don't want to make it too like the original Hymek scheme. One thought is two tone green, like the Brush type 4s, with white or very pale grey window surrounds. As for number? D0270 would fit in nicely between Lion and Falcon, but these were der
Passing through with Somerset coal for Exeter.
Golden Arrow kit on a Hornby 8F chassis and a Comet tender.
Also passing through, on a Plymouth - Portsmouth service, was the S15.
And a view from the roof of Wilkins Bro's brewery.
Now with the shiny bits well toned down, weathering just about finished, but still needing a crew, pick-ups and decoder. These can be done later, but at the moment there is a little tight spot whille running on test. It is gradually easing, but I won't f
Mostly working actually. But I did spend a little time on Somercombe and now I have a week of annual leave starting tomorrow, I hope to get more done.
Firstly I purchased a granite pestle and mortar from Tesco for the princely sum of ??7. Then, in return for a helping hand, I got hold of a tubfull of fine coal from one of my neighbours. Some of this has been ground up and graded, first through a cheap metal tea-strainer to get the dust out, then through some 1mm mesh for something that can be u
Everybody wants close coupling and in recent years the main players in the trade have made improvements with this on coaches and some bogie wagons. Yet the humble 4-wheel wagon seems to have been left far behind. All my kit-built wagons are fitted with 3-link, but the rest mostly have the old tension-lock type. Now fitting 3-link to these is not always an easy job, due to the way they are moulded. So what can be done to make these close coupled, yet still go around my tightest radius, which happ
With my ED finished, sorry no pic's but it looks just as it did before the conversion, thought turn to what to do next. With work on the layout somewhat stagnant, I'm sure when if the weather warms up I will get more enthusiasm, I am getting on with stock. First up is something I have fancied for a long, long time, a stretched Hymek on a C-C chassis. For this I have obtained a spare Heljan Falcon chassis. It looks like this could be a bit of a monster. I will get some pictures of progress on thi
Spent some time this morning working on the layout. I want to get the area between the yard and the control desk finished.
Looking down on the brewery yard from the Fire Station tower.
The terrace next to the shops will be going and be replaced by a longer one.
Stepping back from the first shot showing the Fire Station in relation to the brewery and next to the goods yard.
Did a bit more on the brewery today. Had a look, with the aid of Google Earth, at some of the older breweries around the country and came to the conclusion that I needed a brewery yard. Not completely practical to have it surrounded by building where it was sited, so I am going for the layout in the pictures below. Another kit has been added, a Vollmer kit from an earlier layout. A little work to do on it, like a new roof and a lick or two of paint. The boiler house was removed and now resides a
Had a bit of a play today. Then stopped to get some photo's.
Plymouth and Westward Ho with a Seaton to Newcastle service that will go up via the S&D. T9 30310 on a stopping Salisbury to Exeter Central service. xGW pannier waits in the bay with the local to Yeovil. Meanwhile 'Jinty' 47315 waits to take some empty wagons from local coal merchants back up to Radstock.
Bus service appears to be lost passing Clench's Bottom farm (blind says Paulton via Timsbury, must get a new one for
Before I took the chassis over for milling I gave it a quick test run. All working fine . Buffer beams and detailing are now fixed to the body. Still trying to work out the best way for fixing the body to the chassis, but this is a minor worry. A later job will be to fit etched grills and wire handrails. Anyone know if Shawplan do them, I can't find any conversion kits on their website, the fittings page was last updated on 24 February 2004 .
I have now found what I need at M.G.Sharp. A1 mod
Just been out and lopped those overhanging eaves from the Vollmer building, also cut back the roof at the gable. Looks much better. Another job done, is to make a start on the water tank to go on the roof of the main brewhouse. As I said earlier, this is made from the Will's vari girder pack. After working out the capacity, it may be rather large, but it does look in proportion to the rest of the building. Photos tomorrow with luck. But I do have to iron my uniform shirts and go back to work tom
Fed up with the poor performance on my Lima locos, I embarked on a plan to rid them all of their awful pancake motors. Already I had fitted extra pick-ups and this had made a considerable improvement. Enough so that I may yet leave my bubblecar and xGWR railcar. But for my ED I wanted to go for drive on all axles. My first thought was to use a Heljan Clayton chassis if I could get hold of a reject one. However, after a good look at mine, I decided that it would be best to use something more subs
It's been a while since I posted here and having to warm the shed up before working out there in this weather has led to a loss of enthusiasm . However I have not been completely idle. I have coverted one of my Hornby Stanier firsts into 'porthole' type. Comet sides. Quite pleased with the outcome and may do one of the old Mainline 60' ones.
Few odds and ends to do yet. Grab handles, extra footsteps on corridor side and I need to adjust the compartment arrangement. Not sure if they ever
