Nick Holliday

Although, as a keen Brighton fan, I should be agreeing with the ideas of basing the project on LBSCR stations like Groombridge and the Myers buildings, they are so redolent of the line that, unless the OP wants to base his layout in Sussex, they would look out of place. @drmditchhas tried to summarise the advice so far, but there is an implied assumption that the OP does want to base his layout on a particular line, which may not be the case. I would suggest that there are at least three possible ways to go. 1) OP selects a railway company and researches the potential resources, as @drmditchhas noted, and, hopefully can locate suitable drawings for his project 2) OP finds a drawing of a suitable style of building, more generic than the rather exotic LBSCR examples, and either follows the design exactly, or uses it as the basis for a building more in keeping with his modelled surroundings – perhaps changing a stone built design into the local brick and/or using available windows rather than bespoke copies. 3) OP takes his Metcalfe building, and replicates it, maybe altering brickwork and windows etc to suit his layout, and reconsider the platform canopy which is rather identifiable. There are plenty of drawings around, but until some of the OP’s thoughts are fully known, it is difficult to point him in the right direction. One thought is that often lines were originally built by independent, local, companies which would not be tied down to any particular architectural trend, and so the station building might not have any resemblance to others on the rest of the company’s system. Another is that sometimes the builders would go a bit off-piste, providing a totally out of place design, such as at Clapham in Yorkshire (see photo and RM January 1965) and some aristocratic structures on the North Staffordshire Railway, or use existing buildings, such as at Mitcham, and even an old tree! So I would suggest, unless actually having pinned down an actual location, almost anything, apart from the more identifiable designs, would do. Clapham (Yorkshire) Station (c) Ben Brooksbank/Geograph

This photo appeared in Stephen Brindle's book on Paddington, and is dated 1911, with the caption noting the temporary roof over platform 6, presumably associated with the new roof bay designed by Armstrong which was completed in 1915. SO it is possible that the lower flat roof evident in the Brighton loco's portrait has been removed, and perhaps the distinctive steel columns, with their braced arms, were retained and repurposed. This is another view of the same loco entering Paddington (from the John Minnis collection) on another occasion, and looking as it might be heading for the same arrival platform.

It definitely is Paddington. It is the most northeasterly platform, as you say, outside the main train shed.

Just received this magazine, and I'm slightly puzzled by the lack of captions to the excellent photographs accompanying the article on the superb Pencader EM gauge layout. (although MR have renamed it Pencander!) For some reason I found the absence of information rather disturbing; obviously many are self-explanatory, with the help of the locations being shown on the layout plan, but a bit more about some of the more unusual aspects would have been welcome. Fortunately I was able to find MRJ 296, where there is more extensive writing about the layout, which provided a reason for the length of modelled removed track in Photo 12, but in Photo 6 there are two lineside crosses, and it would be interesting to know the story behind them.

This might be of interest, http://www.swithland-signal-works.co.uk/plans/16_Carriage_Landing_No1.jpg A genuine Victorian example.

What you really need is Mike King's "An Illustrated History of Southern Coaches" OPC ISBN 0-86093-570-1, to avoid finding his other Southern books, which are all excellent, BTW. Sadly, this one appears to be out of print and commanding serious prices on the second-hand market. (£75 anyone?) but Mike does sell his plans separately at more affordable rates, for a large sheet containing several diagrams. For starters though, you could look at the useful Blood and Custard website, which has a relevant drawing that might be of use, although the subject is the Maunsell COR electric unit, so some of the dimensions may be slightly different from the steam hauled stock. This is an extract from the page, https://www.bloodandcustard.com/SR-4COR.html , elsewhere on the site can supply plenty of information about individual coaches if you go to the relevant sections. I think the end views may solve your question regarding heights, although I suggest you check your calculation methods, as your 12' 4" converts to 86.33 mm, nearly ½mm smaller than your figure, and the 12' 4½" on the drawing becomes 86.63mm, a small but perhaps still noticeable difference. As regards length, the quoted figure for most Maunsell stock (I'm assuming Maunsell, as the Bulleid 59' coaches didn't feature a full third) at 59 feet is taken over the length of the whole body, which featured bow ends, but not including the buffers and/or corridor connections, both of which being variable factors. The bow added 6" at each end to the body length, so the sides themselves were 58 feet long. Hence the sides you want to cut out, with windows and doors etc. should be 406mm long, with the missing foot supplied by the bow-ends. Apparently the headstocks of the underframe were slightly shorter, at 57' 11"!

If this is the one, then the LBSCR 6 wheel Pullman style vans could hardly be the inspiration. To put the record straight, there were only two of them, and they were built as mobile generators to provide the new fangled electricity to light the contemporary Pullman cars, and built in a similar style to match. The first was scrapped in 1912, and the second, larger one, was burnt out in 1915, and neither were rebuilt. It was the more orthodox six-wheeled passenger brakes, both centre ducket and two ended type, that were the ones rebuilt into 54' bogie stock, but not as full brakes, but with passenger accommodation added, either newly built or recovered from other six-wheeled stock.

I wonder if it might be more helpful to us on the other side of the pond if you could provide a better context for what you are after. The references you give are not that helpful to us limeys, so perhaps some examples of the sort of thing you are proposing to manufacture would be useful. Sketches, 3D renderings of early thoughts or even current products you are hoping to emulate/better would all help steer people in the right direction. You have rather a scattergun approach to your selection of prototypes, which seem to be on a personal fancy rather than part of a robust marketing strategy. The GER A55 Decapod/0-8-0 is a very strange choice. One prototype example which had limited life and activity in either incarnation, and the Beattie Well tank hardly flew off the shelves when produced in 00. There must have been hundreds of UK standard gauge locomotive designs, and thousands of wagon and coach designs, and plans of various levels of detail are available for a large number of them. Perhaps you could cast your net wider, or outline your ideal selection criteria, which might assist contributors here to point you in a suitable direction. However, if you are aspiring to A C Gilbert levels of modelling (American Flyer) then prototypical accuracy seems a low priority, and the addition of faces is hardly finescale, and likely to get the owners of Thomas's copyright up in arms. Your proposed scale, at 1/18 or around 16mm to the foot, has great potential for detail, but your comment "As my needs for them are for designing toys the frames are not fully needed" whatever 'frames' means, suggests this is not high on your agenda. As 16mm is a relatively common scale for narrow gauge modelling, often 2' gauge on 0 gauge (32mm) track, it might be sensible to consider this as an alternative. Smaller locos and coaches - after all a scale model of a BR bogie coach would be a hefty 42" long, whereas a typical NG coach would be a more handleable size and generally a greater potential play-factor.

According to the folk song, The Dalesman's Litany - Halifax or Hull

I wonder whether Susan Calman and Sandi Toksvig, both of whom having spoken about their interests in railways, would appeal to a younger demographic and a wider gender recognition?

No. 7 & 8 were something only their mother could love. The drawing does seem to capture its ugliness. https://twitter.com/SleeperAgent01/status/1280269864175894529/photo/1

Interesting that he give five eights of an inch as 00 gauge. This works out at something like 15.8 mm, even narrower than 16.5, so when did the current gauge become standard?

The NLS site does have some large scale maps from the fifties, but the coverage is poor. Parts of lowland Scotland, the London area and bits of Sussex.

Although Fittleworth had a curved platform, my version in 4mm is effectively to scale, so the radius of the curve is considerably larger than normal model railway curves. I was therefore able to get away with gently massaging the strip to follow the curve. I wonder if sharper curves could be dealt with by gluing a strip of plastic under the outer edge, to get the full depth of the edging, and then cutting along each groove, allowing the strip to be curved as required.

The Box Tree Moth is fairly common in south London. My daughter and my neighbour had considerable success using biological treatment, involving nematodes I think, and most affected plants survived and are flourishing.

The Steyning line was hardly a branch line, and throughout its life it was double track. If the conspiracy theories about its closure are true, its demise was purely political, with much massaging of costs and statistics to justify an unpopular decision.

Having piqued my interest, can anyone explain how this area of Dumfriesshire acquired this name? Or have I missed something?

This brochure gives an indication of their products https://www.bbprice.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/B.B._Price_Limited_-_Overhead_Line_-_Brochure.pdf Although the company is B B Price, and long established, they acquired B Birks in 2018, and moved their headquarters to BB’s buildings in Crawley Heath.

Just to be pedantic, BR didn’t abolish third class until 1956. Up until then second class only appeared theoretically, I believe, on the Southern Region in connection with continental services. As only first class was identified externally this shouldn’t affect models.

The first site I worked on after university was a Cementation project, at the Wembley Conference Centre, although when I arrived it had been taken into the Trafalgar House group of companies, under the aegis of Trollope & Colls. The name continued to exist as various specialist sectors, notably Piling and Chemical, and might still, as part of the Kvaerner construction group.

The Scalelink website is a bit of a nightmare for finding things. Don’t forget there were some horseless carriages around before 1914 and they have some kits here https://www.scalelink.co.uk/acatalog/Vehicles___Scale_1_76__OO_.html

What about in white? https://lightmoor.co.uk/books/great-north-of-scotland-railway-carriages/L9419

See the third post re the Epsom and Ewell exhibition.

As a 3mm modeller, you are probably aware of this company https://www.3smr.co.uk/locoscomponents.html . They do an etched chassis for the J50, including the coupling rods. From memory, I think they are rigid, but at around £7 each, a couple of them would provide you with enough parts to make a jointed set if the rigid approach fails, and also give you a generous collection of useful frame spacers of different sizes for other projects. (I think reduced at 75% from a 4mm etching)

If you scroll down a bit you’ll see that the EBay and Free to a Good Home are sub folders and there are hundreds of plain Wanted items below, so you should be able to create your request, unless there is a requirement to have posted a certain number of times, to prevent people signing up purely to trawl for bargains.