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Picking up the story again - part 2


whart57

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As I said in my previous piece, my intention with this layout was to create a bit of nostalgia through recreating a number of cameos from my visits to Bangkok. Additionally I wanted to include some signature pieces that would firmly place the layout in Thailand, since I have met very few railway modellers who know the slightest thing about Thai railways. That meant that the layout would have to be based on Thonburi rather than be a representation of Thonburi. An example of one of these personal cameos is how rail enthusiasts generally see trains arriving at Thonburi.

 

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This arrival over weed infested track, and grumbling past the squatters' shacks at no more than a brisk trot is quite typical. I have replicated that at the entry point to the layout where, once the layout is operational, trains will enter from the fiddle yard. Scenic work at this point is the most advanced so I can offer a snap to allow others to judge how successful I might be.

 

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As an aside, this picture also highlights some of the issues modelling an unusual prototype in a scale that is not mainstream throws up. Although the gauge I've used is 9mm, neither N nor OO9 track from PECO or other suppliers is suitable. The sleeper size and spacing is far too wrong to be used and the code 80 rail of OO9 is too heavy for my taste. So track has been handlaid using code 60 rail - which PECO sell for OO modellers to create SR electrics 3rd rail from - soldered to copperclad sleepers.

 

Scenic scatter products are of course suitable for a range of scales, but the mainly German suppliers have a blindspot regarding tropical vegetation. I still haven't got palm trees and banana trees that really do the job. Some are available from the wargaming market, but these tend to be the types found on Pacific islands, not the species of SE Asia. Presumably the fact the US Marines won the war against Japan but did not gain much glory in Vietnam has something to do with the skew among wargamers.

 

Another Thonburi scene I wanted to recreate was the engine shed as it appeared to someone walking up from the pier served by the river boats. This was something I had done many times on my visits to Bangkok, and so have a number of other railway enthusiasts

 

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Mine won't be quite so impressive. fewer shed roads and therefore only two of the three gables. Another feature that is an obvious part of the Thonburi scene is the water tower. Presumably this has been kept to service the handful of preserved steam locomotives, or perhaps no-one has ever got around to taking it down. Whatever reason, my layout had to have one, and fortunately a good representation could be made by making some modifications to a Kibri kit. The fact that German HO scenery is often actually 1:100 scale helped here. The tank diameter of the kit was only a millimetre more than scale based on my estimation of the prototype's size from a Google satellite view.

 

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The one thing Thonburi lacks from a model railway operational point of view is freight traffic. On one of my trips to Thailand I visited Chiang Mai and was able to spend a couple of hours looking around Chiang Mai station. Chiang Mai would make a good layout in my opinion. It's a terminus, has a loco shed, a small oil terminal and on the afternoon I was there, signs of some freight carried in closed vans. (I never ascertained what though.) Chiang Mai would not suit my requirement for a nostalgia layout however given I was only there for a two day conference.

 

The other place I had seen freight traffic though was on the Mae Nam branch (Or Manum, converting Thai to Latin script is not a consistent thing). This was in fact my first introduction to Thai railways as the J D Marriott hotel my company put us up in was less than a hundred yards from where this branch has a level crossing over the very busy Sukhumvit Road. You could hear the occasional hooters of the night-time trains when you were struggling to sleep against the instincts of jet-lag at 3am. Later I would get to see some trains running on this branch, unfortunately never on an occasion suitable for taking pictures. Eventually I was able to spend some time on a free weekend walking part of this line, just to see where it went basically, and then came across the small marshalling yard at Manum.

 

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This certainly had freight, but it was not really that interesting over the railway fence. On the other hand the end of the line at Thonburi was a bit more interesting, the rails just disappearing into a building site.

 

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The track plan I had worked to did assume this was how the layout would end.

 

Earlier I mentioned signature items that would set the layout in Thailand. I thought this tuk-tuk repair shop might be an interesting item

 

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Another ubiquitous feature around Bangkok is the 7-11 mini supermarket, so space for one of those needs to be found

 

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The most iconic feature I can think of though is a Buddhist temple, complete with chedi and bell tower. There is actually a temple beside the line at Thonburi, and there are some photos from the steam era showing a loco in front of it. I tried to take a picture like that but the modern drivers moved too fast for me. In any case that particular temple is too big, so the search was on for a smaller, but still interesting temple. I found a suitable candidate on the Rama 1 Road, and on my last visit took enough photos to allow me to model it.

 

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The external accessories are eminently suitable for modelling too

 

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A start has been made on this, with some help from my daughter who can work Blender well enough to create files that Shapeways can work with

 

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In the next instalment I'll conclude with the final concept of my Maenamburi layout

 

 

Edited by whart57

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  • RMweb Gold

That's a very nice cameo in the second photo. The structures in particular are spot on. It's sad to see so many buildings in this style having disappeared around the country by now.

 

This is clearly going to be good, I look forward to following further progress.

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Yes. They still need glazing, but the bodies are painted in the original Regional Railways knock-off livery complete with ด่วนพิเศษ written on the sides. I made resin casts for the undersides with all the gubbings and the bogies use 3mm Society castings. It's powered by a Geoff Helliwell bogie narrowed down for 9mm gauge. One of the three bodies was hacked about a bit to become a centre car, so once the glazing is done I'll have a three car set.

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  • RMweb Premium

Interesting, I am one of those who knew nothing of Thai railways but has learned a little from your blog.  

 

I always say that I enjoy modelmaking of any sort and the  modelling you have done is excellent and so very different. 

 

 

 

 

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