Well welcome to 2018. Much of my time has been family orientated with time spent at our clubs museum layout and meeting visitors from Rugby and Dorset in the UK along with many other nationalities.
My need to build as close to the prototype as possible meant the scalpel came out yet again and suitable adjustments were made to the plate girder bridge sides without destroying my previous efforts. The camera is certainly not kind! A general tidy up by using contract filler and nail files, I swiped the wife’s supply, I hoped that it went unnoticed!

Now for the interesting job of paint matching the existing Yorkshire stone buildings. Try as I may every building has a different shade. Maybe someone will produce a Yorkshire stone acrylic paint or recipe, you know like when you go to a DIY store to match the colour you chose a few years back and when you get it home and find out it is nowhere near the shade you are trying to match! For the Dandry Mire viaduct I’d probably be better off mixing a bucket full.

Assembling the pre painted items together onto a foam/hardboard laminated track bed posed few problems. First I used an extended 3mm 3ply sheet long enough to secure the whole structure to upper/main railway baseboard support rails, then a 3mm hardboard sheet of the same overall length and width of the bridge.
Although the ply may have sufficed, I used the hardboard as it ensured the next three layers of 3mm foam board were kept absolutely flat and also to screw down the track work above it if needed. The bridge base also used 3mm ply to tie the station and southern abutments together and to be eventually screwed onto the diorama baseboard.

Now for the pipe safety rails… for these I had an idea to use some old copper solid wiring (Ex Telecom phone) that when stripped of its insulation and tinned with solder I thought might just be the ticket! Being Garsdale, both safety rails are not identical as in keeping with the rest of the bridge. So in the end I found the trial of copper wire unsatisfactory, I’ve resorted to use a fabricated styrene safety rail instead.

Our Greater Waikato Railway Modellers club is gearing up for another busy year of exhibitions firstly in Tauranga with their club, and invites to show our exhibition layout in Auckland and throughout the North Island cities during the year. There will be plenty to keep everyone out of mischief or into it depending on your point of view!