The era wasn't going to be an issue : BR blue is the best train livery ever (there, I said it), not least because that was the colour when I worked on the Railway. It is going to be set in Somerset. Or Wiltshire. Or, for technical reasons, Aberdeen. Plan A was a simple wagon repair facility but...

Technology Ramble Alert ... I had bit more room than it looked, about 14ft x 3ft, with a 4ft wide bit for the last 3ft. So, out with Templot and... well, I admit it, building one set of points was great, but I know I'd never actually do it again thus leading to Soddingham 3.0 (4.0 if you count the never-really-intended P4 edition) never actually happening. So, Peco. I thought about Marcway, but not for me, I like 'proper' chairs etc. Templot is a superb tool if are designing a layout where you intend to make everything, but it's way over the top if your are using ready-rolled points (and the Peco geometry makes template creation very long winded), so, as Martin (Mr. Templot) advises, I tried Anyrail. It won't run under Wine on my Linux laptop, but happily is ok on my Linux desktop, and it is rather better than I expected. In fact does exactly what I wanted. Enter the baseboard size, load the Peco O templates and join the gaps with flexi track. It really is that easy! One of my issues with ready rolled model railway track, well the points at least, is that, after working with the real thing and playing for hours with Templot, the 'flow' of the track is all wrong, your eye derails. So, what to do?

After a spot of infinite monkeying with Anyrail a solution sort of presented itself: by sticking to curved and Y points (and a double sip, because that's the law) it turns out the rafter jutting itself in the way provided the solution by making me 'sweep' a bit. Using curved points not only avoids horrible-looking sharp curves but saves a lot of space too - assuming you've ruled out 'medium' radius straight ones on the grounds of looking way too sharp. I'll still have those dreadful bent sleepers Peco insist on using (yeah, there's probably a production reason or something) and the blips on the tie bars, but it's not so bad in O (I could cut them off, but taking a saw to a £100 piece of track makes the old ring twitter a bit) and I can live with it. The main thing is I think the layout has a flow to it, and that's what I wanted. Result.

As I slipped in there, like Topsy, it just grewed. A bit. And gained a two(ish) coach platform. And the ability run-round a 4ft or so train, though passenger stock would have to be shunted from the platform to reception road to do it - not that it would fit anyaway. No Mk 1s are on the shopping list, they just take up too much room in general - as would a DMU. And DMUs don't actually do a whole lot really. It also turns out that the goods shed road has ended up about 3m long! This good news came about because I thought about how I'll actually be using the layout, which is basically a bit of shunting puzzle playing and a lot of scenery making - in between bouts, or indeed R&R from, musicing. Just me, a gronk and whatever wagons come up on eBay at the right price. I thought about a 'proper' fiddle yard, but I just know I'm not going get up and wonder down there, ducking under the aforementioned rafter, just to run-round when the point of the thing is a chill. So basically the 08 hauled train disappears into a tunnel after inordinate amounts of shunting, waits until I fancy another go.

The final design - Plan Z-143.23/98. To me, by making everything a bit curved, this captures the spirit of the real thing. The result looks far more like it was designed on Templot rather than Anyrail.

Back To What I Was On About...

Unless Amazon make a spectacularly favourable mis-delivery, there will be no passenger service to Soddingham, at least that we ever see, despite the platform. Somehow the place has retained a fair amount of wagon-load traffic, some coal, stuff that goes in goods shed, and whatever goes in whatever wagons I manage to pick up. Wagons also come and go without stopping for tea, part of the Westbury/Frome/Cranmore/Radstock trip working (which was actually a Class 47 turn, the one time we did it with an 08 it took all week just to get there). For whatever mystical reason the gronk lives at Soddingham in it's own little siding - a shed would be pushing it a bit. Another bit of luck from having the somewhat transparent passenger service is that Soddingham has retained it's signal box with an implausible number of dummies (ground signals) - a relic, I'm assured, of the GWRs 1930s habit of signalling nearly every possible move. While Soddingham is a bit of a sleepy backwater in many ways, there is evidence of better days ahead. This is evidenced by the brand new points and concrete sleepered, branch line track laid in preparation for new the quarry line. Well, I had to use them! This all sounds like a done deal, but I spent and long time agonising over whether to go ahead - it might not be the worlds biggest layout, but the basics, track, point motors, an engine and a few wagons soon mounts up, especially when you are looking at RTR/built kits to buy. Cue Rails Of Sheffield. While investigating prices of stuff I wondered found a (brand new) double slip at a very good price indeed - way cheaper than eBay or anywhere else. Cool. Now I have a thing about 08s, in blue obviously, but in a lot more years than I care to remember of playing trains I'd never actually owned one - I guess when you are younger it's all about the expresses or somethng. I wonder... Yep. They had a Dapol one in, in blue with TOPS number. And, again, the cheapest in town. At 3.00am out came the card - Soddingham is on.

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