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Ropley overview. Visible progress is being made with the embankment to the left now in place. Happy New Year all! Well, the first blog post of 2013 and I finally have some visible progress with the layout to show! Over the New Year period, a few days off work have seen several major steps forward made which have totally transformed the look of the model. Firstly though we'll briefly go back to signals. The last blog entry showed the first stages of the Up Starter signal, and this is now largely complete. You can see a few updates on its construction in the 2mm Scale section here. Also now started is the Down Inner Home signal recently installed as the final stage of the prototype's resignalling. This will eventually allow bi-direction running through the station giving the line much greater flexibility. Due to the road bridge further up the line, this is quite a squat affair for sighting reasons, and has been installed in to a cut out in the embankment. This area was modelled before the signal was installed at the real location, so it was necessary to do some small scale excavation to make room for the model. The Down Inner Home signal being placed. The photo below shows the Up Starter temporarily placed to make sure it is in the correct location. The finial is only held in place with blu-tack at the moment so if it is accidentally caught, it won't snap off! The Up Starter in position. The biggest progress has been with the embankment which is now in place for the entire length of the layout. This has also required the section of platform which extends on to the area being modelled to be made. Starting with the embankment, foamboard was used to create the basic shape of the ground from the backscene to the edge of the slope. This was laid onto spacers cut to shape, which allowed the slight curve of the ground toward the rear to be replicated. It may be difficult to see from the photos, but a thin strip of land at the top of the slope is flat where the footpath runs, and then the grassed area slopes up towards the rear. At the start of the treeline there is a raised area to allow vehicle access from the top car park, along with a small raised viewing area I chose to use foamboard in an attempt to keep weight down, and hopefully it will prove strong enough to cope with the occasional exhibition. The actual embankment is formed using polyfiller mixed with PVA for added strength. It needs a sanding in a few places, and I'll certainly never make it as a plasterer, but it does the job! The newly installed embankment. A basic platform structure was created from plasticard and fixed into position. On top of this, a 1mm thick layer was added which featured the cut outs for the platform seating and the water crane. The seating areas are made up from old sleepers, and these will be added later into the cut outs. This layer provided the edge for the embankment along the platform as you can see below. The basic platform structure in place, showing the cut outs for various platform furniture. The actual platform surface will be a second layer of 1mm thick plastic cut to the correct shape and fitted into these cut outs. Also visible in the photo is the platform edging. This is a separate layer made up using my own brick paper produced using photos of the actual platform at Ropley. This area differs from the more common flat fronted platforms found in the area, and indeed slightly further along this platform, as it was an extension built only a few years ago. The brick paper was fixed in place by soaking it in Mek, and the stepping made up in layers before being cut to shape. I'm quite pleased with how this has turned out as I wasn't entirely convinced paper was the right material for the job, but it would be much more difficult to reproduce the brick colour of the real thing by using embossed plastic and paint. In the photos, this is only temporarily held in place and still required the two cut outs for point & signal rodding/wires adding. The platform surface presents a further challenge as it is made up of patterned edging stones so some more thought is required on how to replicate these in such a small size. The photo from which the platform edging was produced. Hi-Viz man takes a break to admire the newly formed topography! This little spurt of activity has really made a significant change to the look of the layout and means I can start to progress scenery away from the water tower area. It does however raise a few challenges, amongst which is replicating the fencing which runs along the top of the embankment, something which is not available commercially. The grass here is also very short, so replicating this with static grass may be difficult with the shortest available still being slightly too long! Cheers all, Tom.

Good afternoon all, First of all, a happy new year to you all. I made my annual visit to the Warley exhibition in Birmingham last November and decided to join the 2mmFS association having been inspired by the 2mmFS layouts and boxfile 2mmFS layouts on this website. My thoughts were to attempt a small project involving the easitrac system. Having previously built a swiss layout in N scale, I decided to model a swiss themed 2mmFS layout as the sleeper spacings seem fairly similar (please correct me if I'm wrong), and there are no swiss 2FS layouts out there (that I know of) so thought I would have a bash at being the first! Before starting the layout, I decided to make a list of criteria to be considered: - The layout must be small enough so my wife doesn't realise that I am filling the house with railways! - A small project would mean that it wouldn't intrude too much on the progression of my longterm N scale layout based on Par station in Cornwall. - Use the easitrac system with only straight sections to build initially so that I can get used to building and laying the track before moving onto turnout construction. - A layout that can be added to in the future if I wish to do so. - Double track mainline - I will not be able to model scale length trains on this project however. - A swiss themed "moving picture" layout sweeping through the swiss alps - plenty of scope to model some great landscape! The track layout was drawn out in full size across 4 sheets of A4 paper using the track dimensions in the associations handbook ( I am still wrestling with Templot!!) I have designed and built 2 baseboards measuring 60cm x 22cm each giving me a scale length of 0.1 miles of track. The trackbed has been raised on the boards using 9mm ply wood so that I can create the effect of a double track mainline running round the side of the mountains. Next, I need to order up the track for construction and consider how and which system I am going to use for the fiddle yards at each end of the layout. Any suggestions most welcome on this. Below are some photos of progression to date. As always, all comments are welcome. Side and middle struts all cut up ready for assembly. Base frames assembled and trackbed placed, prior to gluing, giving an idea of the overall size of the layout. A few items of stock have also been purchased. Here is BLS loco Re465001 with an EWiv coach and driving trailer in the swiss green/grey colour scheme. Best regards, Jeremy

OK, so it's back to the cobble scribing, and now I have to scribe the area on the opposite side of the siding. This is the main area where road vehicles arrive, having come down the approach road to the goods yard, and is a pretty large space, if considered purely in cobble-scribing terms... So, I was always going to depict the majority of the area has having been (rather crudely) tarmacked over, with just a small(ish) are of cobbles remaining immediately next to the track (the reasoning being that they would have wanted to keep cobbles around the track area itself, in case of needing to change a few sleepers or other PW maintenance). In some areas, the tarmac will have come adrift, and the original cobbles left showing below. This is the progress so far: Edit - a couple of additional views that I forgot to upload... This shows the 'edge' of the tarmac, scribed on with a curved scalpel blade (No.15), prior to the actual cobbles being scribed: This shows the overall plan. The area inside the blue line, between that and the siding, will have full cobbles, with just a few more patches of 'broken tarmac' outside of that. The peripheral edges of the white filler may disappear under scenery in due course. I will also probably make the blue line straighter and parallel with the siding for much of the remainder of it's length, where I haven't yet scribed, to represent an attempt by the railway authorities to tarmac that part of the yard in a neat-ish fashion:

As I was browsing the internet one day I came across an article written by someone on the subject of locomotive wheel configurations which featured a photo of a Double Fairlie and I was quite taken by it as I'd never seen or heard of one before. I decided I'd like to try to make a model that represented the prototype in the article. Here is one of the many pictures I subsequently found on researching the project, it's very atmospheric I think. It shows a Double Fairlie back in the days when the Festiniog Railway was little more than an industrial line, prior to its closure. For those of you that are unfamillier with this loco more info can be found by clicking the link below :- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairlie_locomotive On my initial search I found some photos and measurements which would enable me to get started. The very first thing that struck me was the resemblance to the 0-4-0 101 Holden tank engine of which I had one chassis in my spares box. I managed to get another cheaply, together with two spare bodies, Hornby's Connie and Terry. The initial Idea was to mount these back to back with their chassis making the two bogies, which would be mounted inside the bodies in similar fashion to those on a diesel loco. I made up two mounting plates, cut both bogies down in length adapted them with brackets made from plasticard so that both bogies were articulated. Despite only a very brief description here all this took a considerable amount of work, I made up a bridging section and joined both bodies together. on conducting trials I found this design was unworkable, it derailed on the first bend due to insufficient clearance inside the bodies for the width of the 0-4-0 chassis where the can-motor was mounted, so it was back to the drawing board. Prior to this discovery I had started to make the necessary alterations to the bodies such as cutting off the cab roofs, re-profiling the cab front panel, filling in the round window openings and cutting out new square windows, re-positioning the domes, removing all the cast in detailing, etc. After it was revealed that it didn't work I put it aside, as by then I had begun to think it was taking over my life and i was heartily sick of it and needed a change. Here's some pics of the alteration works :- To join the two halves together I needed to fix a sole plate bridging the two, I also made up and fitted the fireboxes that run between the two boilers. All this had to be done before any test runs were possible, so as you see a considerable amount of thought and work had already gone into this project. No wonder I was pig-sick when it didn't work out. In my next entry I'll show you the continuation of this saga. see ya later.

As I said before I had shelved this project with no great desire to carry it on, however after a couple of months I was able to look at it in a different light. The bogies I'd tried to use were completely wrong, the scale was all wrong too. In height it was ok but in length it was way too long, something like 8 scale feet too long. This was largely due to my trying to use the RTR bogies, something had to be done. With nothing to lose I proceeded to hack the thing to bits. I had to lose something like 32mm from the length. I managed to achieve about a 28mm reduction overall. Firstly I cut off the smoke boxes and then lost some 5mm from both boilers, I lost another 5mm from each pair of tanks and around 8mm from the central section between the two cabs, all I had left was a pile of bits that somehow I had to fix back together fairly seamlessly. I managed it successfully, to my surprise it all fitted back straight and true. I then proceeded to fill and prime the joints and generally make good ready for painting. I made up and added some detail inside the cab and hand painted it before fixing the roof on. I made this by laminating two layers of 0.010 thou plasticard bent by putting them in a jar inside a saucepan of water,heating it and allowing to cool.I then fixed first one in place and then adding the next layer held in place by matchsticks and rubber bands. I omitted to say about making the chimneys, I made these from 1.5mm plastic rod fitted inside 3mm plastic tube fitted inside 5mm plastic tube [i think} topped with a blank disc that came from using a hole punch on 1mm plasticard finaly finished off with a sliver of 5mm tube. I achieved the belled out effect using Squadron green filler and rubbed them down with 400 grade wet and dry, holding them in a battery drill. This assembly was cut to length,then inserted into the stub of chimney already cast into the body, the joint blended with more filler. The whole thing was then given a coat of primer ready for painting. While I let the primer go off properly I set about making some different bogies for it. I'd given up on motorized ones, they were to problematic given the limited space inside the body, I could have probably used something like a Tenshodo or Black Beetle to power it but at this stage in the build I didn't know how it would turn all out, I could easily have knackered it with a poor paint job or something so a cheap alternative was to use two steam engine bogies which just by chance I had in the spares collection. I cut off the front steps, removed the mounting bar together with the wheel sets. I made the cylinders using roughly the same technique as the chimneys, fixed them in place and wrapped them with 0.25mm plasticard I ordered replacement 10.5mm bogie disc wheels from Mainly Trains, these were fitted and to me looked the bizzo, albeit no coupling rods were possible. I made an extension to the front of the chassis that I drilled and fitted with a re-shaped plastic buffer to vaguely represent the prototype. I cut out two mounting plates for the bogies drilled them 2mm and with 2 part epoxy I glued on 8ba nuts to the inside face, ready for an 8ba fixing/pivot bolt that would go through the hole left from the original mounting arm rivet in the bogie. I made up the distinctive round sand boxes with the same method as the cylinders/chimneys, hand painted these and the cylinders to match. The body was painted with a French make of paint which isn't really true to Merddin Emrys's livery as it was [ it's now been painted black] but I went with it because by now the project had gone on too long to go back and strip it, with all the inherent problems that that might have caused. I lined it using HMRS pressfix LNER lining which were as-near-as the real thing, again this was a potential hazard because I'd not done lining before. So here's the result, I'm quite chuffed really, it's an improvement over the USA class project, not perfect by a long way but better. The prototype Merddin Emrys I've ordered some etched nameplates from Narrow planet who make the sets for the FR shop in Porthmadoc, these won't be ready until some time in January. The smoke boxes have been given a coat of matt varnish and the vacuum pipes are fitted now. See ya later.

As mentioned in the previous blog entry, I've been restoring a small collection of secondhand scratchbuilt 4- and 6-wheelers. I should point out that I'm cutting some corners here: The premise for this project has been to see what I could do with the coaches with simple means and materials, and without breaking them down into their constituent parts and starting over. First job was to remove the rooves and discard the glazing and droplights, which were beyond saving. The coaches have etched brass sides, but have been assembled with glue. However the original builder did it properly and only the coach seen here (another First to dia R1) needed a bit of reinforcement in the corners. This 6-wheel First/Second Compo to diagram U16 was restored some time ago. Most of the repairs are hopefully self-explanatory. The coach was built with droplights in the luggage doors, which it shouldn't have. This mistake is probably due to an error in Russell's Great Western Coaches vol 1 (p47). Fortunately I have a copy of the Newsletter of the Great Western Study Group No. 51 (1996), which includes an invaluable list of known errors in the Russell volume. The windows were blinded with plastikard filed to shape. A bit tricky, but filing and fitting can be a strangely pleasing exercise, I find. This 6-wheeler was originally a W3 parcels van. Certainly an interesting prototype, but I already had a W1 parcels van and didn't really need another. So feeling a bit reckless I converted it to a V13 PBV, which as far as I can see has virtually the same dimensions. The main difference was that the V13 had guards lookouts, and I found some in an old K's kit that happened to have the right measurements. I wait with baited breath for someone to tell me that there was some major difference between W3 and V13s that I haven't noticed! (if so please do tell, it has not been painted yet so there is still time to change it back!). On some of the coaches I added new springs, while on others I repaired the existing ones with thin strips of glazing (the thinnest material I had to hand). I am not sure the latter is totally rational, but then modellers rarely are :-) Here we have another unusual beast - a six-wheel saloon to diagram G20, the one that is preserved at Didcot. It is currently receiving the standard treatment of repairs. The interior of the G20 Saloon, which has had a new lick of paint. I haven't been able to find any drawings of this diagram, so I am not sure if the arrangement of the seating and tables is correct? The brake gear has been replaced on some of the coaches. This is of course a simplified representation. In fact, brake gear has for too long been one of my blind spots and I'd like to learn the details better. That's it for now. So far I'm very much enjoying this work. It may not be text-book modelling, but I find it relaxing and it's nice to breathe some life back into these old models. Go to part 3

In an earlier Post I detailed the construction of some corridor connectors for my Bachmann Collett coaches. I have now added a Hornby Hawksworth Full Brake coach. I like the look of the Hornby Hawksworth coaches, perhaps with the exception of the corridor connectors, which could well be the subject of a separate Post. I bought my first Hornby Hawksworth Full Brake coach back in October 2010 for use with a rake of ‘express coaches’. Most recently I have added a Full Brake to the local ‘semi fast’ set. Initially I had problems keeping the Hawksworth Brake on the track. At one particular location where there are both horizontal and vertical curves the Hawksworth coach at the front of a seven coach train would jump the track. In my opinion the Hornby Hawksworth coaches are very light weight and I solved the derailment problems by adding some additional lead ballast. I think the Table below might be quite instructive. This confirms the low weight of the Hornby Hawksworth Brake relative to other commonly available coaching stock and shows that I increased the weight by 35 gm to a level comparable with Bachmann Mk1s. Table of weights of some commonly available coaching stock. To add ballast, the coach has to be disassembled. The underframe of the Hornby Hawksworth coach is fixed to the body shell by clips protruding from the glazing. These clips can be carefully ‘eased’ with a small screwdriver to enable the coach to be pulled apart. The plastic used for the glazing is very brittle and I broke one of the clips. However not to worry, the brittle plastic is perfect for gluing back together with a solvent such as MEK / Butanone. Underside of Hornby Hawksworth Brake Hornby Hawksworth Body Shell and Underframe separated Finally a picture showing what 35 gm of lead looks like: Sheet lead attached using double sided tape Moving on the view below shows the relatively new Hornby Gresley Full Brake pictured here with its younger Bachmann Thompson counterpart. The Hornby brake is to replace ‘one that I made earlier’ from an Ian Kirk kit bought at the Kings X Model shop for £8.25 back in October 1986. Kirk kit (top) and Hornby model (bottom) The Kirk kit makes up into a very good model. The most obvious difference between my two models is the lack of handrails for the Kirk kit. Presumably these were to be made and fitted by the purchaser – something that I never got round to doing! Kirk kit (left) and Hornby model (right) I might also say that the roof profile of the Kirk kit is perhaps a touch too heavy as shown above in this end view. As to the running qualities of the new Hornby model - it is too early to tell. I have had occasional problems with Bachmann GUVs at 120 gm, so the performance of the Hornby Gresley at 127 gm will be interesting. On that ‘merry‘ note something to look forward to for 2013. Best wishes to you all out there.

After three days of ice packs on my face and pain killers I have had to have a root canal job on a tooth. Now that I'm recovering and feeling human again, I have pushed the G16 project a little further. I have put a temporary wheelset on the bogie and given the body a preliminary coat of black. On reading the potted history of the class in the instructions, I have realised that I need to remove the capuchon from the chimney - a few strokes of a file will fix this. I am almost ready to fit some of the small parts like the steps at the front of the footplate and te cab roof ventilator. Also before the final coats of paint go on, I need to add the wires/pipes that go diagonally from the fronts of the tanks to a position just behind those bulges over the cylinders, and add some lamp irons. The sprung LSWR buffers I have for it will go on after spray painting has been completed. At this point it seems to be moving freely so I can consider putting the motor and intermediate gear back in.

Ah, I see Swiss railways have claimed another victim.....!

I thought American HO modellers worked to an approximation of 1oz per inch of model (28gms - though 25gms makes it easier to calculate for some of us). In the practices I've had this works out a bit heavy for long coaches and a bit light for short vehicles sometimes. However, I have taken to buying lead shot. If you put this in cling film or small plastic bags, you can squeeze it into odd shaped places depending on what's available in the model.

Modellers try to recreate the real thing. But sometimes we don't know how the real thing looked. Then what? These photos show my experiments with what I think was a standard livery for larger GWR goods depots around 1907, following lots of browsing of photos in books, and a brief discussion in this thread (many thanks gentlemen!). The trouble is of course that photos from the period don't have, er, colour - and are full of light and shadow. So it's hard to tell grey from light stone, or light stone from dark stone, or dark stone from chocolate. Above is the same photo again, without the colour. I think it highlights how hard it can be to interpret colours in b/w photos. Also, the photos themselves are just reproductions. Alas, the treachery of images ! You'll be forgiven for thinking that this livery doesn't look very GWR. Neither did I at first. In fact I hated it, and thought it was completely counter-intuitive. I felt that shades of dark grey would be more appropriate. Or at least dark stone which was the preferred livery for ironwork on the GWR's public station buildings. But certainly not this BR look! Still, the photos that I could find suggested that light stone ironwork with a darkisk chocolate base (to hide wear) was in fact common. And that it was often more clean than I would have thought. So I left it for a couple of days, and I began to get used to it. I also realized that it made a lot of sense: In a place like this you'll want things to be as light as possible. Looking at the results so far, I think it may need a little more weathering after all. Maybe I should also align the height of the chocolate base so that it's the same all around (at 4ft heigh?). Plus, the weathering highlights in the chocolate has made it look too grey. Perhaps this livery didn't just apply to goods depots. Looking at photos of other large non-public buildings on the GWR at this time seems to show the same livery (see eg the photos of the Swindon Works Road Wagon workshop in Kelley's GW Road Vehicles p27)... But then again, I fully realize that this livery may turn out to be all wrong. So, any further comments and info would be much appreciated.

Like some sort of UFO, the goods shed has descended from space (the spare bedroom, actually) and landed in the prepared cut-out in the cork surface of the base-board. It's been there before, but I thought I'd re-fit it, just to complete the station scene. Dave.

I bought 3 damaged body shells on Ebay one was a dock authority shunter, one a Hornby detailed Castle [Neath Abbey] which I repaired and fitted with minimal alteration on to a 4-6-0 Hornby chassis. The third one was a cheapo Lima 0-4-0 'international' loco, they come in a train set. So this is how it started out :- This is what I was aiming to represent :- These USA class engines were ordered through the US Army Transport Corps during the 2nd World War from the Vulcan Ironworks in the USA . Amazingly over a hundred made it across the Atlantic despite the best efforts of the German U-boats. After the war most were shipped to the continent to replace loco's destroyed by allied bombing. The stock of aging steam locos in Southampton Docks was in need of replacing and the USA class was found to be ideal to cope with the very tight radii of the lines within the dock area, so 14 were obtained by the Dock Authorities and saw several years of service there. When they were eventually replaced by diesels they were transferred to departmental duties on the SR,none of them did much mileage due to a tendency for the axle boxes to overheat after a short distance, some have been preserved. I needed to fit this to an 0-6-0 chassis rather than the incorrect 0-4-0 used by Lima. The short 4-6-0 chassis stripped of it's front bogie bracket proved ideal as the wheel spacing is somewhat closer than the 0-6-0, of course the driving wheels were much too large and were substituted by those from a triang 0-6-0, the 4-6-0 coupling rods were re-utilized. I made up a bracket from plasticard and attached inside the rear of the body, the front fixing was made into the plastic post coming from under the boiler. I set about cutting the steps and skirt from the rear of the cab, the bell, head light and the overhang of the roof was removed too. I then blanked out the forward windows, raised the height of the tanks, and fabricated two cylinders from plasticard. I attached the latter to the underside of the boiler along with a buffer beam. I made up the rear dome from plastic and attached it where the bell once was. I then did a base coat of primer to see where the bad spots were, these were corrected and another coat of Railmatch acrylic primer applied, it all started to come together at this stage, seen here. d I followed this with two coats of Humbrol coal black No 85 acrylic satin finish and then started the detailing work, handrails, buffers, etc. The prototype has a steam pipe that runs back from the boiler to ?, at that time I knew not where, so I made it simply disappear back into the body, I now know it goes into the cab. Finally I applied the HMRS pressfix transfers which, weren't entirely successful due to me following their instructions for the height above the running plate and failing to spot it was too high thereby clashing with the bottom of the cab windows, hence the difference in height between the 'southern' and 65 And there you have it, my first project, when I have time I'll post some more. see ya later.

I managed a few hours over Christmas to get the chassis painted and over the last two evenings I've got it running again! Pretty pleased with the neat phosphor bronze pickups which should blend in pretty well with some black paint later. The rods are VERY sloppy and there is a bit of a stick due to this. To get an idea of the problem the crankpins (threaded screws) have an outside diameter of 1.6mm. The holes in the rods are 2.2mm! I've found some 1.6mm i/d tube with an o/d of 2.4mm so I will make some bushes for the rods sometime Waiting for a new 60w soldering iron and then I'll get on with replacing that chimney on the body

Hi Silver Sidelines, afraid my memory was playing tricks. The HO (NMRA?) rule of thumb is 1oz per car, plus 1/2oz per inch which should make your stock easier to pull! (I have no inclines except where the track sags....)

Interesting to see how light the Hornby coaches are. I wonder why? Is there a secret cost benefit to making light coaches, because transport costs per unit are lower? But the bulk would be the same. Anyway, they do look good in their right livery (not GWR I mean). The difference in the roof profile is amazing, and says a lot about the benefits of a well-moulded modern RTR coach, I think.

Hi everyone, I've been registered on RMWeb for quite a while but haven't done anything about adding any content, other than the odd comment here and there. I've only been modeling railway stuff for just over a year and my knowledge of railways doesn't add up to much but I'm learning all the time and find the subject very interesting. Of course I went through the usual phase of 'train spotting' when I was a kid and lived right near Hither Green sidings outh East London where you could hear the trucks being shunted quite clearly throughout the night, it was a familiar sound which I missed considerably once I got married and moved away from home. My mate's dad was the Foreman down at the engine sheds so we saw quite a bit of the 'workings' of the southern railway, and spent many happy days out in all the Main London stations. I've developed an interest in re-modelling old RTR stuff into a representation of something else. So far I've turned a Lima 0-4-0 international loco into a USA class shunter, 2 Hornby 0-4-0T body shells into a Double Fairlie, [Merddin Emrys], refurbished an old Gaiety 0-6-0 57xx saddle tank and I'm currently scratch building a 2-4-0T [1308 Lady Margaret]. update Well it's two and a half years on from my initial introduction and I've learned quite a lot since my first RTR bash, the USA tank, which when I look back at it now seems very toy like. I don't do much in the way of that sort of work now, largely because the massive increase in postage has made it difficult to buy old models, if you can get them. Ebay has degenerated into one gluttonous delve into the honey pot, and also there just aren't the old spare parts and non runner models you used to see. You've probably looked through my blog before coming here to read this intro, so you will probably know of the Dubs crane I scratchbuilt. I quite like scratch building, I find it stretches my imagination, last yearI went through a sort of lazy stage where I just built a few kits, then came an entirely scratch built Mink G wagon, I went through a rolling stock phase and then I read a thread on here posted by JCL about the Silhouette Cameo cutter which I'd never heard of before. After reading through that thread and various others on the same theme I decided that was the new way to go. I purchased a cutter the smaller Silhouette Portrait, downloaded Inkscape a freeware design program and set about learning how to use it to produce the CAD cutting files for use with the Portrait cutter. Approximately one year on and I'm currently making a model of a class 50 diesel with the parts cut entirely from card board sheet. My first foray into card modelling was with my Metro Vick, which aroused my interest in that medium. So if you haven't looked at my blog have a look through it, there's maybe something of interest to you in there See ya later.

I got a bit tired of cobbling (or 'setting') a few days ago, and the unexpected receipt of a very kind gift of a Mainline bogie well wagon from a friend got me thinking about rolling stock again, so I dug out a number of other recent purchases, albeit this time more recent Bachmann productions. Notwithstanding the relatively unpredictable excitement of running things on TT2, I've found that completely unsprung and uncompensated short-wheelbase items do stay on the track when running on Callow Lane, so this gave me more impure thoughts. Whilst most of my stock is sprung or compensated, the thought that I could 'get away with it' by not doing so, decided me to undertake a few 'quickie' conversions by way of a distraction. Apart from the bogie well wagon, I settled on three recent Bachmann releases - an ex-LNER steel open, an ex-LNER box van and an ex-SR 'pillbox' brake van. I was a bit concerned about not compensating or springing the brake van, but the moulded detail on the underside, coupled with a decent dose of seasonal laziness and a desire not to accidentally cut right through the plastic to the top surface of the verandahs, decided me to have a go at making the longer wheelbase brake van completely rigid, too. I know that this goes against the majority of advice for building/converting stock in P4, but hey, the 'it's my trainset' rule kicked in, and so I decided to put my faith in a decent amount of weight in the vehicles instead. The alternative to leaving these vehicles rigid, by the way, would probably have been to installed Masokits springing units, but I didn't have any of these, and I just didn't fancy the extra work involved in butchering the Bill Bedford units that I did have in stock... In the end, all four vehicles turned out fine. I considered filming the high-speed push-along trails through all the sharp point work on Callow Lane (B6 and A6), but I didn't in the end, suffice to say, they all hold the road just fine. Here are some photos (sorry, but I haven't weathered any of these vehicles yet). General view of the wagons concerned: Box van: Box van chassis - only a little plastic behind the axle guards had to be removed to fit the wheels. These are Exactoscale 3-hole discs, the axles are running in the original plastic bearings - these wagons won't be doing a huge mileage in their time, shuttling up and down between Callow Lane and it's fiddle yard... I did add some simplified brake stretchers between the brake shoes, which were drilled 0.4mm and brass rod inserted. The brake shoes were also trimmed, with some plastic being removed with a sharp scalpel on the rear/inner face of the brake shoe, to ensure it didn't foul the flanges: The steel open essentially has a similar chassis to the box van, although in this case I had fitted brass pin-point bearings a while ago. This required the Gibson axles to be slightly shortened in the electric drill (done by filing the side of the pin point with the drill rotating, just enough to take off 0.5mm or so, this wouldn't have been necessary if I hadn't fitted the brass bearings). This one is so free running, it meanders off for a little perambulation if you so much as breathe on it... The pillbox brake van: With this one, there wasn't even any need to remove any plastic from the axleguards. I did pare the backs of the brake shoes back again, prior to fitting the Gibson wheels. The addition of the Bachmann brake rigging gives the brake gear a bit of welcome stability: Happily, the brake van also holds the road well, and was subjected to the same high speed push-along speed trials as the others, plus the usual 'every which way/permutation of shunting with a loco'... One thing I found was that the more recent Bachmann wagons had enough room for two layers of 'roof lead' in place of the metal weights provided. The bogie well wagon was already quite heavy, so I didn't add any weight there. I also added a bit more lead inside the body of the box van, which now weighs in at 67 grams.

Firstly a quick Happy New Year to all the readers of this blog as this is the first post of 2013, I wish you all a peaceful and prosperous year ahead with hopefully plenty of time of modelling all things Southern! One of the regular sights on Fisherton Sarum is my Z class pushing loaded loco coal wagons up the incline to the coal stage. Maunsell Z Class 0-8-0T number 957 was allocated to Salisbury primarily for shunting the East yard, this was due in part to the fact that the yard was shunted 24 hours a day and being three cylinder locomotives the Z class had a much softer exhaust beat than for example the ‘bark’ of a traditional 2 cylinder locomotive such as the G6 Class. It was reported that on the days when the Z Class was on shed for routine maintenance such as boiler wash out etc. the locals would complain about the additional noise of its replacement in the yard! My model of number 957 is built from an old Milholme white metal kit powered by a Portescap motor that ensures that like the prototype she is quiet, very powerful and does not slip. She may well at some time be pensioned off to be replaced by the excellent DMR etched brass kit that is in my pile of kits to build but that is likely to be some time off yet. This is extract from my main blog at www.grahammuz.com The full post including additional information and pictures can be found here

It's been a while since I blogged. I have been pottering around on Neptune Road adding odds and ends as well as weathering wagons, fitting Kadees and shunting with the 63'er (Baby Warship/Class 22 if you prefer). Local exhibition looming next month! I had prepared some small playing cards to use, each one relating to a wagon. 8 wagons are placed on the layout, 8 cards are shuffled and 5 are drawn and the 5 wagons then have to be gathered in that order with 3 being "in the way". It can take about 15 to 20 mins to complete. Nothing new or ground breaking just fun! However, this week I obtained some old BR wagon labels and intend to use those in the same way but instead of the playing cards. Hi Vis vest and a Mr Chuffy hat and I'm away! Fellow railway pal, Marc "Growler" Smith, kindly offered to take some more pics for me so after popping to Machen quarry on Sunday to phot top and tail 66's on a rail tour, he did just that. Here's a taster - cheers Marc Roger