LukeB

I've got three Dapol Class 67s and they're all a bit iffy. One, the motor blew up so is now a dummy. Another runs fine for a while but really slows down after about five minutes of running until it's cleaned again. My best runner now has a problem with the drive. When pulling a load it runs fine on a straight but on a bend the friction seems to overwhelm it. The cause seems to be the worm drive at one end failing to engage with the gear tower on the bogie. The result is that the wheels at the other end are powered and spin but fail to get enough traction without the bogie at the problem end providing any drive. I've swapped bogies from my other 67s around and all of them are not driven by the worm drive. It's as if the worm drive is not quite low enough. I think one of my 68s has the same problem. Is there a neat way to fix this problem please?

Last year I bought some 3d printed kits to convert a container wagon to a railhead treatment train. I finally started work on them in December and got them finished this week. They're not especially detailed but they're a nice enough representation given the absence of an RTR model. With that in mind, they're mounted on cheap wagons from Kato (I wasn't willing to spend £70 or so on Farish or Dapol ones to suit when the 3d prints were so lacking in detail). There's a few more 3d prints that I'd been working on in these shots, including loco access steps from West Hill Wagon Works. I tried out Montana Gold paints given their good reputation in the art world and they came out really nicely. My masking has to improve, though.

I've put a bit of thought lately to what I want from this layout. I do have some steam era stock but it's very rare that I run it - I tend to stick to modern image stuff. So recently I've done a bit of buying and selling to get a better variety of modern stock. Christmas had a pretty good haul which I've already had on the layout. My wife was really brave and went to Harburn Hobbies to pick something out that'd suit what I model and came back with a Network Rail Mk2 which fits in really well. My parents bought me the Revolution Caledonian Sleeper set last Christmas, expecting it to arrive soon, but I ended up unwrapping it this December and it looks great (but is very draggy, which I'll need to remedy as this seems to be a known issue).

I was tempted but then I'd have nowhere to put my road vehicles!

It looks a bit out of place, but here's a souvenir from my trip - a Rapido Via Rail GP40 hauling sleeper cars for The Canadian through Shanford. The locos are massive - it only just fits under the bridge on the mainline despite being to a smaller scale. It's also a beautiful runner, much nicer than any of my Dapol or Farish stock, and it was relatively speaking cheaper too at £140. Ignore the pins - they're holding down some ducting that's being glued in place! The setting's certainly a bit different to the real thing -

Here we go, a bit of progress. I've been busy planting vegetation, installing fences and getting some details sorted. I did install a load of Scale Model Scenery chain link fence but once installed it looked just like what it was - some mesh fabric held on cardboard sticks. So, I ripped that out and bought some 3d printed security fencing from Etsy which is much better. I've also treated myself to a new Dapol Class 67. I have two already - an EWS one and a Caledonian Sleeper one, but the Sleeper one just died on the old layout. Harburn Hobbies had a good look at it and said it would have to go to DCC Supplies who stock all the Dapol spares. The cost for that was as much as this one in DB Schenker red on eBay so I've taken the driveshafts out of the dead one and will use it as a dummy for double heading and rail head treatment and other infrastructure trains. The DB Schenker one with the maple leaf livery is also a nod to my next trip - across Canada on the Canadian sleeper next month. DSC_3719 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr DSC_3717 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr DSC_3695 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr DSC_3696 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr DSC_3694 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr

Thanks for the suggestions everyone - some seem a little tricky to get hold of in the UK but I've tracked down a couple and look forward to reading them.

I'm catching The Canadian in a few weeks and would like to take a book to read that's about the Canadian railways. I'm not after anything particularly detailed - more in the popular style, like Christian Wolmar or Andrew Martin's books about UK railways. I'm not bothered if it's about the history of the railway as a whole, or a specific bit of it or even a specific train (something about The Canadian itself would be great). Has anyone got any recommendations? Thanks

Work has actually been progressing nicely on Shanford, but I've not been great at photographing it - I've been too involved with doing it. A little bit of work that I enjoyed was painting some 3d printed models. Here's progress on a borehole drilling rig, a UAZ 469 and a Trabant, along with a bit of vegetation laid along the branchline.

It finally looks like the layout is getting somewhere. All the buildings are built and I've installed them on the eastern end of the layout along with the road. This all went together a lot more quickly than I expected - a solid afternoon and it was done. The plan now is to work meticulously from left to right on the scenery and remaining structures. First step will be street furniture on the road, then a lot of vegetation on the left hand end. DSC_1988 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr The second bridge took nowhere near as long as the first. It's based on one at the end of the road which goes over the canal. Unfortunately, despite a slight downslope on the road from the back of the layout to the front, the bridges are higher than they should be. I scaled down the measurements of the real railway bridges but the clearance on the layout didn't work and I don't know why - as a result, the side road you can see on the right here is too steep, despite the embankment being much higher than it should be to raise the road and houses closer to the main street level. DSC_1995 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr The back of the houses on the side street, which survived an incident with my wife's boots fairly well. DSC_1987 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr The gardens are fully planted now, with things roughly where they are in real life. DSC_1986 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr A view up the main street of the shops and slightly damaged tenement building. DSC_1985 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr

I went to Model Rail Scotland the other weekend. I had a bit of Christmas money in my pocket and had looked forward to spending it on some scenic supplies. Unfortunately the stand I got some really nice things from last year wasn't there, and everyone else was selling the same old stuff - principally, static grass that was a bit bright. When I got home I fell down a bit of a rabbit hole and spent an amount of money that I'm still a little queasy about on some Martin Welberg Scenic Studios products, having seen how effective they are on @bmthtrains - David layout. First to go down will be some grass mats. I've not used a grass mat since I built my first model railway and normally I'd do this sort of thing myself, but the standard of these is much higher than I could achieve. The intention is to create a sort of edge-of-the-city scrub. IMG_20230303_185032 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr IMG_20230303_185041 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr This has put me in a bit of a quandary about what to do with the large open area at the front of the layout. I had intended to leave this level-ish, with a slight rise above the baseboard, in case I wanted to put a factory or something there in future. Now I've got these mats, and having seen some of the layouts at the exhibition, I'm tempted to cut away some of the front of the baseboard and create a fall in level from the track. This will help create a better view of the trains and maybe be a bit more realistic. I could always cut more away later and create a platform for a factory at a lower level. In reality, there is a slight fall in this direction but it's probably only 2.5m and the area at the bottom has been flattened to create a platform for development. If I were to do this I'd probably go for a gentler drop. IMG_20230304_192505 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr Anyone any thoughts?

The backscene has arrived. I designed it myself using photos I took in the area. I got it printed on self adhesive plastic by Scalology, who also make the ID Backscenes range. It only cost £17, I'm pleased with it. Here it is on a test fit - I've now trimmed the white border off the bottom and mounted it on card and wood. IMG_20230217_190729 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr

Here's a little bit of the progress I've been making on my buildings. I've been working on three at once - two tenements like the first one from 2021 and another building that has two storeys at road level and three at the back. This one has shops along the road and a total of eight gardens accessed by stairs down the side. The downside of modelling somewhere in Edinburgh is the sheer number of windows! IMG_20221111_211010_1 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr The shop fronts are made of acetate overlain with self adhesive paper. IMG_20230101_183022 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr Round the side there's a lot of pipes and cables. IMG_20230218_163451 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr This is the new building on a module with the colony buildings I made last year to make sure the gardens are the right size. IMG_20230221_131606 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr The first bit of garden detail is done- grass, beds, paving and fencing. There's still lots more to do. IMG_20230222_180702 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr

The ballast has dried and I've done some more work on some buildings (photos of that will follow in the next post). I've put a bit of effort into weathering the track. I'd not intended to do this but I was looking at photos for locations of AWS equipment and the lack of uniformity in the track really jumped out at me. I've used Vallejo weathering powders in predominantly dark and rusty tones. I've used a lighter touch on the main running lines and branch. And gone heavier on the sidings where locos have stood. I'm quite pleased with how my lifted line has turned out. I'll post something with a different loco to the 37 next time!

Another long gap between posts, and it’s the electronics that are entirely to blame. Because I’ve found them a bit of a faff I’ve not been as keen to get on and do them but finally I’ve completed my control panel, ironed out all the issues and soldered everything. The results is that everything works as it should (or will until it’s painted and ballasted, when I bet everything will go wrong again). The control panel is not as professional looking as I’d envisaged but it works properly so I’ll stick with it. I’m damned if I’m resoldering all the connections again. IMG_20230131_152743 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr The next step was a first for me – I’ve not painted and weathered my track before, just left it as plain black sleepers and shiny rails. Having seen the difference it makes, though, I thought I’ve have a go. I masked off the important bits- IMG_20230131_193019 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr Then set to work with some Vallejo Leather Brown. This looked a little lighter than I’d expected but it seems to have turned out OK. IMG_20230203_174942 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr IMG_20230131_194352 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr Then, last weekend, I finally got to set about ballasting the thing. I mixed DCC Concepts Legacy Ballast (brown mix) with Woodland Scenics Iron Ore and Grey fine ballast to try and compared it to a couple of photos. While they don’t look the same in this image I think that’s just the photo of the screen picking up the colours wrong and they’re not a bad match. IMG_20230205_092643 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr I use a Lightwork Ballast Spreader from railwayscenics.com and it makes it so easy. It still took a couple of hours to fill in around the points and glue it all down. Now the ballast is drying but once it is I think things will really pick up – I’m on to scenic modelling, I’ve made some headway with the buildings and have a backscene. I’m also off to Model Rail Scotland which usually gives me a kick to get going. IMG_20230205_092818 by Luke Bradley, on Flickr