At its last outing at the Farnham Club's exhibition in Aldershot, Freshwater sarted to show its age. Two minor problems developed.
The point in the fiddle yard had a blade come detached from the moving tie-bar
The central uncoupling magnets started sticking in either the 'up' or 'down' positions.
Fortunately, neither of these problems were too detrimental to the operation of the layout, and were probably not noticed by the viewing public. However, they needed
The petrol station is now firmly planted on the layout, and the final scenic work complete. This entailed more herring gulls, a couple of foxes and a few colonies of rabbits.
The Rev.W Audrey (from ModelU) is pondering over his Bradshaws Guide and deciding if his scooter would get him to Newport in time to see the train just departed from Freshwater arrive there.
This fox (also from ModelU) is not looking for fish.
Rabbits are more to
No major projects to report on for this entry, but lots of little jobs here and there that are moving the layout forward slowly towards completion (if that is ever possible).
First off, lots of telegraph poles and power poles. Seven telegraph poles where only two pairs are identical. Based on Ratio items, chopped about to provide the correct number of arms and 'pots', plus some 0.2mm diameter wire for two 'stays' where the wire course changes direction to cross the tracks.It took a l
Not much progress recently - I was diverted by a different project which was no 2mmFS.
Anyway, with a couple of exhibitions coming up in October (Fareham and Abingdon/Didcot) I have set up the layout ready for some more work to be carried out, and took the opportunity to take a few, up to date photos:
Not much progress to report on my Freshwater layout itself, as various projects have stalled for one reason or another. However, with some exhibition bookings a couple of months away, I had to make some progress somewhere. I turned to the fiddle yard.
Originally, in the rush to complete the layout for the 2mm Scale Association Golden Jubilee Challenge, I just roughly laid a few 60 foot track panels on double sided sticky tape across the fiddle yard and joined them up electrically. Th
With another exhibition looming (actually, tomorrow 9th May 2015 in Portsmouth) I felt I should do a bit more work on the layout. I had mostly been working on some more suitable motive power and rolling stock for the layout (none of which is finished yet). I had been making a few more trees in spare moments, including a large Elm tree that I am particularly proud of. These have now been planted, but lots more are still required, plus other ground cover.
Freshwater will have more trees than any previous layout I have built, so I wanted to get some planted in time for the Farnham show (and 2mm Scale Association AGM). Previously I have used plastic tree armatures from Heki and Woodland Scenics. These start off as 2D trees, the branches of which need to be bent to produce a not very realistic 3D tree before attaching bits of foliage.
This time, I wanted to try new techniques. I had purchased a tree-making kit from Ceynix many years ago,
I love the sound of deadlines flying by. Having a deadline certainly provides a bit of impetus to get things done, even if not enough things actually get done in time.
When I accepted the invitation before Christmas, I had just about got all the electrical and mechanical gubbins beneath the layout working as required (see umpteen previous posts) and so, 4 years after the initial deadline for the 2mm Scale Association Golden Jubilee Expo in Oxford, I thought the time was right to star
A busy last few weeks in the run up to exhibiting the layout at the 2mm Scale Association Expo in Keighley saw the completion of the woodwork, and application of paint to protect it (and cover up my poor joinery skills).
Setting up on the Saturday morning I was pleased to find that I had not left any important bits at home, and everything fitted together as planned. Even though I did not clean any of the track, it ran really well, with just on sticky bit through one of the points to
As I have said before, woodworking is not my speciality, but I am building my own layout instead of helping build a club layout, so I have to do everything. Before advancing with scenic work, I really wanted a secure case or lid to protect the layout in transit or storage, and before the next exhibition, I wanted to have adequate lighting in place.I looked at what we had done previously, and what other exhibition layouts are using, and then decided to do something completely different. I decided
