LightBrigade

Wow, many thanks everyone - I had a fear that this might be sufficiently niche to drop off the front pages without a second glace. Indebted to all of you for the information and suggestions. @Wickham Green too, I'm just young enough to be a metric boy so definitely happy with the dimensions you've posted, thank you ever so much - I think this might well be the starting point in a scrap timber pile for me to work with. And I will definitely need to measure it up and check carefully - I didn't think about the fact that rail salvaged from a scrap bin in 2023 is likely somewhat heavier than the 1884 chair was designed for (though it does slot in and locate quite neatly nonetheless). @Jeremy Cumberland, thank you for many further aspects I hadn't thought about in terms of making a display piece. The rail section looks mostly unused but I'll try it both ways around and see what works best. The rail sits naturally in the chair with space for the key "behind" as seen in my initial photo, so I think that's what nature/the Chief Engineer intended. Meaning my windowsill is now the four-foot... that might mean more safety paperwork!

Dear assembled wisdom... Regarding the wooden key that wedges the bullhead rail into a sleeper chair. Does anyone have any dimensions for these? The internet via Google is not forthcoming with an answer (except to hint some might be slightly tapered in order to wedge it in). Some months back I acquired an old LSWR chair from eBay which I have painted up, and more recently a suitably short length of rail to put in it from a scrap bin. Now I'm only missing a lump of wood to hold it all together - how hard could that be? It's not that easy to take meaningful measurements to allow enough give to wedge it all into place, and not be either too loose or not fit at all. If anyone has access to dimensions for me to fettle something, or better yet an old key to measure, I would be eternally grateful!

Seconding @sulzer27jd, many thanks everyone for the excellent information. Very useful for future operating the layout as well as building it as prototypically as reasonably practicable.

Many thanks for the quick and detailed replies both. In conclusion I'll model it such that platform change shunts will use the down line, with a GPL at position a (or rather adjacent in the 6'). The complexity of using the up line, while interesting to model such an arrangement, is prototypically unlikely unless I choose to make life difficult for myself on purpose! Thanks for the heads up on the overlap needed - I must admit I had neglected to think about that entirely. Applying a slight seasoning of rule 1 (sorry!), in order to keep the route box on the signal close to the station for visual interest, I think an outer home a suitable distance back is my best option.

Dear the assembled wisdom of RMWeb... 🙂 I'll set out the exact details underlying my question in a moment, but in summary what I can't find any documented online prototype examples for, or anecdotal recollection, is this: If shunting ECS from one platform to another at a terminus station beyond the starter signal, would the station signalling be set up for the shunt to take place in the outbound direction (and then reversing back once clear), or additional shunt signalling provided to proceed "wrong line" (thus then reversing and "arriving" at the correct platform in the inbound direction)? Preference is for UK main line modern image information (colour-light signalling, tending towards modern day if practices have changed) but any historic knowledge or similar situations from LU/overseas gratefully received! I am starting to model a rather space-constrained terminus (prototypically there would usually be a lot more space for this station than I have allowed, so the situation may not even arise, I know). Comprising an up and a down line, a scissors crossover, and two terminus platform roads (see attached diagram, platforms truncated). Although not pictured, the other end of the layout is exactly the same. Eventually I will likely automate some shuttling back and forth for when I don't want to drive - this will form a shelf along the long wall of the railway room. My current plan for signalling is shown - theatre box on arrival from the up line for platform 1 (top) or 2 (bottom), and calling on signal for entering an occupied platform road with its own theatre box (seems to be the new way according to forum accounts). Starter signals from both platforms for departing on the down line Assuming I may on occasion want to shunt a train from one platform to the other in a prototypically realistic fashion supported by prototypically realistic signalling despite the space constraints (I haven't yet thought through a scenario where this would be likely yet, admittedly), what I am struggling to find is whether a location like this would be setup up in one of three likely configurations: 0. Just don't do it and don't allow it! (Boring, even if prototypically most likely) 1. Without extra signalling, when given proceed aspects for the down line, set forward clear of the crossover, communicate with signaller, then set back 2. Using additional shunt signalling to proceed out of the platform as a shunt move along the down line to a limit of shunt clear of the crossover, then set back (presumably with a calling on in the "wrong direction" on the down line before the crossover indicating which platform) 3. Using additional shunt signalling to proceed out of the platform as a shunt move wrong-line down the up line to a limit of shunt (thus keeping the LOS facing away from prevailing traffic), then using the existing calling on signal for up arrivals to manage setting back into the other platform Any information on what should be done, examples of this sort of arrangement gratefully received. Plus any comments and input on if my initial plans are sensible, prototypical, both, neither... I'm working from reading and acquired knowledge rather than any first-hand experience. Many thanks, - Ben.

Mine arrived yesterday - I can only echo the comments already here about being blown away (nuclear puns unintended...). The packaging is simply top notch, and the models are stunning in the detail and that weight should give it a really realistic feel moving on the rails. I'm waiting to move house soon before I can start to build a layout for them. I can't wait! Maybe it needs a dockyard area to shunt them... One of the wagons did have the coupling upside-down in the NEM pocket, but that was all of 12 seconds work to pop it out and turn it over. Otherwise simply flawless. Can't wait for the Accurascale 37s

Wow, this is an exciting development. I will certainly be ordering some after a little more reading! This thread has been a rollercoaster of a read of all 75 pages over the last two nights, and been very illuminating into a significant spectrum of the hobby for me, returning after a break of 20 years. At the risk of opening yet another can of worms, I do have a question for the assembled wisdom here that was not in any of the previous replies (I checked!) - the LSWR tan and umber is not a livery I'm familiar with, most online research steers you towards the salmon and brown liveries as being typical for LSWR coaching stock. So when was the livery that Hattons have selected for the LSWR models representative of? I'm really after comments on the livery only, please - I am sadly not as gifted with free time and energy to spend in that time as some of the luckier modellers here, who have expressed intentions of modifying the coach bodies of their future purchases to be closer to their preferred prototype (that can of worms is not being reopened on my watch!). This will be very much for a layout as close as I can get to ~1900 LSWR Southampton and surroundings in RTR. Modification may be a future pipe dream.

Fantastic, many thanks everyone! I'll probably go with setts/cobbles on a more trafficked "road"-like section alongside the loading dock, and gravel otherwise except for maybe timber around some complicated bits. @Johann Marsbar, those Ipswich photos are brilliant visual reference. @skipepsi I will follow up with Peter too, thanks for the pointer.

Hello everyone, My question is - what would the ground surface around the rail tracks in an 1890s-1900s UK dockyard be? Concrete, cobbles, paving, other...? I'm building a small super-micro layout (link to follow once I do a build log) as a bit of a combination lockdown project and return to the hobby after a couple of decades and practice board before I mess up too much on a bigger project! Having treated myself to the Dapol B4 Guernsey in the original dark green (which I believe I read somewhere on here is representative of her in about 1897) and a couple of LSWR wagon kits, I'd like to model something believable for a small corner tucked away of Southampton Docks. To that end I would like to model the tracks inset into the yard surface for road vehicle/rail dual use as is often seen in industrial and dockyard settings. I'm finding it hard to find many photos with identifiable surfaces that definitely date from that sort of period. Some reading up online suggests concrete may have been used at that time although fairly new. City streets apparently would likely have been paved with granite setts or cobbles, and the surfaces in more rural settings may have been graded gravel macadam-style or just gravel or even mud. All of which would require rather different approaches to modelling them! Does anyone have any information on what might have been in place at Southampton? Any information appreciated.