Edwardian

Take it easy and just suck on a Marlborough. Queen Anne did, apparently ...

Like the idea behind your 'seeding' of the fells, and it looks to work. It must be wonderful after all these months, to stand back and see it 'greened'. How green is my Fell? Just as green as I want it to be!

As someone who has had two previous attempts to get to grips with this technology, once with Silhouette and once with Inkscape, and, despite the excellent tutorials of Mike Trice and JCL, suffered near break-downs, I have steeled myself for a further go. I must again thank Mike for the effort involved in teaching us all, and for his clear and comprehensible tutorials. Having made it a certain way through Mike's posts with success, I reached the point at which the difficulties in cutting rounded corners from an Inkscape file were canvassed. I am not sure I quite followed the discussion, but the upshot appeared to me that without purchasing more software and/or learning to do something else clever yet laborious, the Silhouette cutter would fail to cut properly those nice rounded coach windows, even with 10 thou plasticard. This made me question whether I had set off down the right path by choosing Inkscape. I model in 4mm scale, in case that's relevant, and, though custom windows for structures would be helpful, the main impetus for using a Silhouette cutter is to produce panelled coach sides and ends. A number of the older prototypes have lights rounded only at the top, but I understand that is not a problem. Most will have 4 rounded corners. This is the hardest thing to do by hand, hence the need, as opposed to convenience, of a Silhouette cutter, for me, largely boils down to rounded coach lights, the one thing I now learn is a cutting issue if using Inkscape. In the circumstances, would I be better starting over with the Silhouette software? Yours Confused of the North

I remember precisely when and how the railway bug bit me in adulthood. I was 28 and staying in a holiday let in Dartmouth. After a late evening, I was rudely and piercingly awakened by the sound of a steam whistle directly across from my let, at Kingswear station. The fact that it then took me 17 years to pick up glue and a scalpel and do something about it is regrettable, but I have realised at last that it is the thing I now want to do. Fortunately, aged 28 and unmarried, future financial retrenchment was a thing of, well, the future, and I did manage to collect together a number of the items I would need for that dream layout of my childhood. I have not the funds to complete the stock, or the funds or space for the fairly large shed I would need to run 10-coach expresses through Devon, so that probably is a retirement project! In the meantime, I have much to learn and I need to develop some skills. The bonus of the Armchair Years was the exploration of other companies and earlier periods, and I feel that the pre-Grouping scene will always be a big part of my modelling activities - now it's the only part! In fact, apart from the GW '30s layout, my modelling is likely to concentrate exclusively on the time before 1923. So, I am blissfully happy inhabiting Edwardian Norfolk. The Brighton and the South Eastern would like to share a larger layout in due course. Then there is North Western, South Western and Great Western before the Great War to dabble with. One step at a time. Currently I need to fund some infrastructure investment, viz, insulation and baseboard materials. I hope to start work in September. One thing that I might consider is mounting a double track circuit on the wall above the CA Boards. It would be mounted too high for normal operation, but would give me (1) a circuit to test and run-in, (2) something to air stock incompatible with CA, such as mainline trains of any length, (3), if I make it scenic, a photo-plank for any and all non-Aching stock, and, (4) a 'watching-the-trains-go-by' option (if stood on a box, of course). This would be a simple and relatively inexpensive way to take the pressure for a second layout off, and, once in place, should in fact help me to concentrate on building a round the room extension to CA and to develop more stock. The priority for now is to produce the main CA boards and a cassette system. It's good to have ambition. The more insane, the better, of course.

Yes, but some vandal has painted over its nice lining and placed vulgar lettering along its tender!. I would be more comforted by a pre-1923, preferably 1913-14, example, but I accept what is said about the lake coaches and the C being a probable combination. Good for you for pre-ordering the first RTR standard gauge pre-Grouping coaching stock made to modern standards.

Ahem, moving on! Onthebranchline of this Parish posted a link to a brief film I had never seen before of Revd. Teddy Boston's model railway: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/114223-railway-vicar-a-short-movie-on-the-rev-teddy-bostons-layout/&do=findComment&comment=2417760 EDIT: Hopefully this is the clip itself: https://youtu.be/ah9HFuo_qKw I watched it last night and wallowed in nostalgia for a childhood visit to Cadeby. I remember sitting in the Rectory study taking tea and it being a most magical place, with books two-deep on the shelves and a selection of model locomotives in front of them! Even as a child, I had secret mental reservations concerning some of the stock the Revd. used to make up the numbers; those '70s Hornby Colletts, the basis of the current Railroad items, but far, far worse in those days. I wouldn't give 'em house room, eschewing them in favour of Airfix coaches on my GW layout, which, as a consequence, only ever ran two passenger services on the mainline, a stopper formed of B Sets and the Cornish Riviera Limited! This hardly mattered, because here was a slice of South Devon with the trains running in the landscape to a full timetable. It was a miniature yet expanded version of the world of the Dart Valley and Torbay & Dartmouth, which we visited religiously every year. These, of course, were the years when people modelled the GWR rather than the WR and the preservationists still used GW livery. I was hooked. At the time I finally drifted away from my model railway it was in a cloud of dissatisfaction. I realised that the model railway that I truly wanted was beyond my reach. It still is, but, perhaps, not for ever. I wanted prototypical stock for the line (I made a last ditch effort to build a 70' coach out of plasticard; it was execrable), and room for a long run. My layout of a lifetime is still one in which prototypical full length formations run through a generous swathe of landscape. I calculated that about 150 items of passenger stock and 80 or so locomotives would allow me, with much fiddling to produce balancing workings, to reproduce the mid-week winter timetable for the Newton Abbot to Plymouth section in the mid '30s. One day, I'll manage it! Still, it's a long way from Norfolk. I need to get some funds in for wood, insulation material, etc, as I am itching to start on a model railway, rather than just bits to plonk on top of one!

Truly, that is more information than we needed!

A great load. That is the fun of modelling, when skill, inventiveness and originality come together in a convincing way. Unfortunately, my shaving brush is still showing no signs of wearing out!

John, thanks, my thought exactly. From memory these are quite modern coaches - 1913 or thereabouts - so period-wise they would go well with the C in the general release livery. Whether the C in its mixed traffic role would typically have hauled these prestigious coaches when new is what I doubt.

Thanks for that. So, in this case, and as preserved NRM tie-in would probably be the best bet for a pre-Grouping version.

Question, would an "as preserved" D Class only be accurate for a model of the NRM, and BR and Grouping liveried standard range models? If one in the Full Wainright could accurately represent the class in service during the Pre-Grouping years, that would be a different matter. otherwise, it wouldn't go with the coaches. What irony. For years no coaches with which to run most engines, soon to be followed by RTR pre-Grouping coaches with no loco to pull 'em! What are the chances of a C Class 0-6-0 working these fairly new and modern SECR coaches on the eve of the Great War with any regularity? Low, I would have thought, but happy to be corrected. I am a bit bored of accurate models of inaccurately preserved locos. Unless you model a freelance preserved line set in a parallel universe in which everything has a current boiler certificate, I think these "as preserved" jobs are the wrong way to go, fit for Collectors and Runners. Many could be the basis of conversions, but they simply join a long queue of projects in my case. Given someone has gone to the considerable effort of producing a model, its a pity when sufficient tooling or livery options are not considered important enough. I am sure not all such options would be "uneconomic" in all cases claimed. It is getting to be an over used and under justified excuse, one suspects, because it can and has been done in certain cases. Any how, I am very much looking forward to their release; it would mean a couple fewer rakes to try to build.

I suspect that's right!

Know what you mean. I once crashed a car in Carmarthenshire. Apparently that was the most exciting thing that had happened there in living memory. I bet they still talk about it.

One thing I did understand; the word excised by the Automatic Prude. Pity the folk of Chorlton-########-Hardy.

The coal yard just looks right, to me, Gary. Where things look natural, the effort of making them so is seldom apparent!

The Dodo, Castle Aching; Aching Ales, Fine Wines, Good Stabling & Loose Boxes. It is a reduced scale building for the rear of the layout. The second picture shows all that will be seen of it from most usual viewing angles!

Beautiful wagons. Look forward to seeing more.

Simply beautiful collection of wagons you are building up there. Pleasure to see them.

Gary, you have been busy! What a splendid job on the coal merchant's yard. Very satisfying to see the bulk of the station taking shape. Look forward to more.

Well, bar a few extra details, the rear module is largely complete. I added a wedge-shaped fillet to the rear, so the module can now sit snug against the back-scene. I decided that my Ladies' and Gentlemen's outfitters should have a name. In retrospect, Grace Brothers might have been appropriate, but in the end I plumped for W. Awdry & Son. Now The Ostrich, Castle Acre, was not a building that I originally envisaged including. However, the row of three flint cottages did not look right next to the Georgian Lodge, so I shunted the cottages to the left and created a gap. Shadow Dave saw the potential. The gap I initially created was not that large, so Dave conceived of a Baby Ostrich and cunningly faked up an image to show how it would sit. That was persuasive. The Ostrich has a prominent deep roof with dormers. This made it ideal for the chosen location, because the roof is really all that will be seen from most viewing angles. The photographs below that show just the roof visible capture what is likely to be the usual, restricted, view of the building. Many of the shots are taken with the buildings in front removed. In some of the shots you will see grass areas in the centre of High Street, I am pretty sure that that these will be invisible on the finished layout, and they exist mainly to provide somewhere to plant a couple of trees in due course (further obscuring the Inn, of course!). Subsequent to Dave's post, I decided to move the cottages even further to the left and the resultant gap meant that, if I knocked the cottage off its end, I could accommodate the Full Ostrich. I used two of Dave's broadside views, stitched them together in Word (I know, Photoshop would be better) and, voila, I had Castle Aching's premier hostelry, The Dodo. There is very little relief to this model, partly because the façade will only be glimpsed from time to time, but mainly because it sits to the rear. I had to paint over some of the modern accretions, matching acrylics to the printed brick work. This proved effective enough for me to decide to paint the brick-work on the gable ends, rather than use printed texture. The legend on the wall reads: The Dodo Aching Ales Fine Wines Good Stabling & Loose Boxes The sign I had huge fun with, finding a painting of a Dodo, pasting it into a Word document, reducing and flipping to get a mirror image so that I could have the bird facing the street on both sides of the sign. The original had all manner of other birds surrounding the Dodo. I merely painted these out to leave the solitary, splendid, eponymous bird. The Dodo brings to an end, for the time being, work on smaller-scale buildings. There is more detailing to do, but I am content to leave that for a while; I have the shape of my first board now, so can contemplate some railway building. The rest of the village, like the Station, is to be full size and at the front of the layout. I need to up my game to make the front of house structures convincing.

The posts, specifically the discussion about remote control. I have so much to learn .... [glum face]

Great way to present a layout. A minor point, but I like the fact that you have sprayed the off-stage areas grey. What with bare boards and solder blobs, these areas can look quite untidy. Being neat and monotone makes them less visually distracting.

I am a man without hope. Therefore, occasionally pleasantly surprised.

Well I always do. Don't always understand them, mind you ...

Brilliant photographs. part of my thinking was that they are a number of manufacturers of agricultural machinery in GE territory, so the Mac K with its steam engine could go anywhere.