NeilHB

Details of our 2023 Open Day are now up - Elsbridge Town will be there. Keep an eye on the topic for more details:

Evening Folks, the Trent Valley Group is delighted to announce our next modelling day - Saturday 28th January 2023. We’ll be in our usual location of Our Lady of Lourdes Church Hall, Mickleover, Derby. 10am to 4pm, and entry cost is £5 per adult (children are free). There’ll be (as usual), plenty of tea, coffee, bacon butties and a good selection of cakes to tempt you all with. We have a limited car park on site, but there is a regular and decent bus service from Derby City Centre (the Mickleover - bright pink buses so you can’t miss them!). If you’re getting the train the nearest station is Derby itself, and the Bus Station to catch the Mickleover bus is a short (10mins) walk away. Layouts: Elsbridge Town - 7mm Standard Gauge (Neil Blair) King Edward Street - O14 (Simon Jones) Whiteoak Light Railway - O-16.5 (Allen Law) Wheal Ponder - O-16.5 (Andrew Young) The Basin - O-16.5 (Dave Marriott/West Midlands Area Group) Kinver Light Railway demonstration/info - O-24.5 (Kevin Hughes) Brymston RR - On3 (Paul Martin) Trengarw Builders Yard - O-16.5 (Alex Bingley) Black Drake Wharf - 7mm Standard Gauge (Phil Traxson) Trade: EDM Models 7mmNGA Modelling Goods 422 ModelMaking Iconic Rail Port Wynnstay GLR Model Railways Demo: Building Association Slate Waggon Kits (Adrian Gray) Building Construction (David Wright) 7mm Scale Trams (Ian Thompson) I’ll keep updating as more details are confirmed. Looking forward to seeing you all there. If you’re in and around the East Midlands and would like to bring a layout/demo etc do please get in touch!

They do look very nice indeed - oh for the equivalent in 7mm scale! An interesting comparison as well James with the Hornby offering - maybe its just me but the Hornby one looks green rather than brown?

Having great fun messing around and playing trains at the moment, a little video of tonight’s escapades shunting the evening mixed train with No.1 ‘Godred’:

IIRC it was a mix of second-hand stock, and some wagons inherited from the contractor. I'll dig out the WSP book later and double check.

It’s alive! Elsbridge has been wired, and I’ve had great fun playing trains this afternoon 😃 ‘Godred’ had the honours of hauling the first official train: Only one mild moment of panic until I realised I’d plugged the controller into the wrong socket (d’oh!), and I did get my wires crossed when I’d wired up the point switches first time, easily sorted though thankfully.

Smashing stuff John, the Gunpowder Van is lovely, and the private owner liveries are great! The Merrily Watkins books sound rather fun, I shall have to investigate them.

Having made changes to the layout, it’s now time to make some changes to the rolling stock! Don’t worry though, nothing too drastic, just a change of livery for the ETCo goods stock. Having acquired an unbuilt ABS kit for a GN Colwick 3-plank dropside (thanks Mike!), I picked up a tin of GNR Freight Brown at Guildex. Whilst mulling wagon liveries over the other day, I wondered what the colour would look like on the ETCo wagons… Quite nice as it turns out! ‘Godred’ has arrived with a mixed tram at Elsbridge, run round and shunted the tramcar under the trainshed whilst it then shunts the wagons: Before departing later on with the down mixed tram: Peek-a-boo!

Lovely work Mike, the attention to detail is superb.

Thanks Nearholmer. I'm must admit I'm looking forward to that aspect too, I shall be able to get some practice in with the current boards as I'm hoping to include a very low relief street scene along the rear (if space permits). The Wolverton & Stony Stratford Steam Tramway was really quite delightful, I do like the very nice mix of urban and rural running that it had, something which has influenced the ETCo quite a bit. I've got my vernacular architecture books on standby for when the building construction begins, and I'm always on the lookout for suitable vehicles for the layout (to cover the proposed 1890-1925-ish time period).

All the track is now down, and I just need to sort out the wiring (oh the joy), but in the meantime I’ve been having fun messing around with stock to get a feel for how things will look: I rather like this black and white shot of ‘Godred’ waiting to depart with a down mixed tram. I’ve also been doodling some designs for the various buildings required on the layout. The Goods Shed - a timber framed and clad structure which will sit on legs to keep it off the ground. Canopies on either side to cover the door openings, and probably a slate roof or maybe corrugated iron, I haven’t decided yet. Parcels Lockup - this will sit on the platform near the ramp. Again like the goods shed it’s timber framed and clad. Double doors opening onto the platform, but I’ll only be modelling the portion to the left of the dotted line (the rear will be open and cover the point switch for the loop). Trainshed/overall roof - timber framed and clad to keep within the house style. Though I’ve drawn the back as closed in, on the layout it will be open so that you can see the trams when they are in the platform. Oh and I’m already thinking ahead to another module to represent Elsbridge High Street with the trams running down the middle of the road between the houses.

Compared to our previous cat Zeus, Tigger thank goodness is a useless hunter, and only brings things home very infrequently. With Zeus if he’d only brought one bird/mouse home a day it was a slow day! Tigger has a wonderful tendency to run after birds miaowing at them. Given that he’s ginger it’s not exactly a stealthy approach! Anything brought home is exchanged for a couple of dreamies and all is right again in the world. Too cute for his own good bless him.

British Railway Journal No.22 (Summer 1988) has an article and drawings by James Snowdon on the Loco hauled stock of the Metropolitan Railway, which covers the eight-wheeled stock, plus the twin-set four-wheeled ones.

Excellent work Dave, this is coming along a treat.

I think that looks rather bloomin' good! Is the Essery book worth getting James? I'm been wondering about it for a while now, but hadn't seen a copy at a show to peruse before buying it.

Love the livery James, it looks great!

Thanks Dave, I’d done a little bit of track painting, but it’s definitely on the to-do list once I’ve re-laid it all 😆 Good suggestion about the platform, I might see if I can remove a few courses from the edges that I’ve got as I’d still like to use them and have a slightly raised platform, even if it’s just a few mm above rail level. I had a good jolly to Guildex yesterday with Mr Young, and managed to source most of the bits I needed, and only acquired a couple of bits that I didn’t need but did decide that they’d do nicely! This afternoon I made one small adjustment to the trackplan, and flipped it all so that the tramway enters the scene from the rear of the layout, meaning I can disguise the exit to the fiddle yard a bit easier: I also sorted out a new end board to enclose it all properly, with a new hole into the FY: A lot sturdier than the previous effort, and a much smaller hole to hide too! Looking through it from the FY does give a good view along the layout, and I can set up little scenes like this with “Sigrid” departing on a passenger tram, whilst the lorry waits impatiently for her to get out of the way - once out from between the walls the line will run down the road: There will be a gate here across the rails to separate the railway yard from the road. From front left we have the loading/cattle dock, adjacent to the loop will be the water tower, plus a suitable tree here to add a bit of height to the middle of the scene: At the rear can be seen the wall bordering the road, and the corner piece indicating the entrance to the goods yard (which will be gated). At the other end we have the station at the front right, and this will be covered by the train shed for a approx 1.5 tramcars in length. I’m tempted to have a small wooden parcels lockup on the platform too, to break it up a bit. Still debating on the length of the platform itself at the moment (and the height too thanks to the prompt from Dave). The back siding serves the coal staithes and the goods shed (I’ll replace the corrugated iron shed with a timber one I think), if there’s room I might add a yard crane: I feel much happier now with it all, and the revisions mean that the trains will traverse pretty much the entire length of the layout. Now I’ve got all the track sorted and cut to the right lengths, I’ll make a start on pinning it all down and wiring it up hopefully this week (although it’s back to work tomorrow after two weeks off!).

Thanks all for the comments, glad to know that I’m not the only one that rips up layouts part-way through to start again! There’s a definite feeling of renewed enthusiasm towards the layout at the moment, and hopefully that will continue now. Off to Guildex later this morning for a jolly so that will help.

I hope you are all sitting comfortably, as what comes next may be a bit of a shock… Ffarquhar Road has been closed and lifted. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve become increasingly dissatisfied with the layout, both in terms of track layout/operation, and the back story that I’d devised for it. So yesterday, after having a just flipping get on with it conversation with myself, I set to and lifted the track. The extension boards have been removed and put to one side for future use, and we’re back to the old 400mm width, which feels a bit more manageable at the moment. So where next? Well we’re heading south-west back to the originally planned layout, Elsbridge! I’ve had a play around with the points I’ve got, and come up with what I think is going to be a more enjoyable layout to operate, and enables the full loop to be on scene: Although simple, I think this will be more enjoyable to operate. The layout represents the station as it was shortly after conversion to steam haulage in the mid 1880s, so is fairly basic, but serves the needs of Elsbridge well. The line enters from the front left (ignore the tree - the line will running down the road at this point before that diverges towards the front of the board), and splits to form the run round loop. The front siding diverges from the loop, and serves the coal staithes and the goods shed/store. Back left is the loading dock siding. The station platform is back right, with the platform against the backscene. There will be a train shed over the headshunt capable of holding a Tramcar and luggage van. Sadly there’s no room for the station building I’ve got, but I’ll save that for another project. Loop length is long enough to comfortably accommodate a loco and the passenger set, or loco and four wagons, although three is likely to be the maximum to ensure the layout doesn’t feel too cramped. “St Machan” is seen in the loop with the passenger set. Later on we see “Sigrid” with an up mixed service. The Tramcar can either be left at the end of the platform road, or in the loop nearest the front siding, there being enough room here to leave that whilst shunting is carried out. Thoughts please folks? I know it’s a bit of a drastic change, but I do feel happier now about the layout.

This has just made my day - thank you @rapidoandy 😀

Caer Caradoc is absolutely stunning John. I love the concept of the outside framed non-Terrier as well, that's delightfully quirky.

Spot the difference… Having a play around with building placement and after talking to my fellow coconspirator of silly ideas, worked out that I could fit in a dedicated new siding for the Farmers Cooperative Society, as a kick back off the new front siding: I’m going to raise the provender store up to wagon floor height, which will work better for loading/unloading. If I move the tree, I can comfortably fit two wagons in the enclosure. It acts rather nicely as viewblocker for the fiddleyard entrance/exit, better than the intended cottage, plus adds to the fun of operating and shunting the layout. Where the Farmers Cooperative gated enclosure previously was, the loading bank and goods shed will now sit nicely (once I’ve extended the track slightly), and means it can be accessed via horse-drawn and motor vehicles easily. There may be room now for a yard crane (as drawn in pen), and a possible cattle/sheep loading bank at the end of the headshunt. As a parting shot here we see that “Sigrid” has arrived at Ffarquhar Road with an up mixed tram. What do you think please folks?

Personally I think that looks rather good Mike.

The extension boards arrived this morning, and by the end of my lunch break had been assembled and taped up to within an inch of their lives 😁 Whilst they were setting, I took the opportunity to do a much needed revamp of the FY entrance trackwork, to give a slightly longer lead in and a bit more trackwork so that I can scenic it, hopefully blurring the lines a bit between layout and fiddle yard: I also took the opportunity to replace my dodgy soldering on the power wires with more of the pre-wired Peco ones, much flipping easier!! Post work I’ve bolted the boards on temporarily so that I can get a feel for what works etc., and what doesn’t. The proposed goods shed has already been canned, as it looked too cramped. It’s so much better now, with loads more room to play with, and a cope for some moorland scenery at the front (still not sure about the house). I rather like this shot looking down the layout, it’s amazing what an extra 200mm width does to the whole view of the layout. Final placement of the front siding is still to be determined. I’ll finish off with this view of No.4 “St Machan” arriving on an early evening up passenger.

The latest occupants of the coal bunker roof look great John. I really like the flat sided Brake Third, that's rather charming.