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Jesse Sim

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    Sydney, Australia
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  1. If Sovereign Hill ever decides to add a heritage railway, boy I’d be beside myself.
  2. It was lovely John, dad throughly enjoyed himself. He apologises again for almost taking out that signal.
  3. Apologies, some people would have seen me post with just photos.... I accidentally clicked "submit reply" and I hadn't typed anything out yet......
  4. Alright, the last of the updates before moving into describing each individual train. We are in August last year (2023). My workbench looked like this, a right mess after a recent rebuild; new bench and fascia which allowed me to add another kick back siding for the Down lines. After getting back into watching Everard Junction's YouTube videos religiously I noticed he employed a workbench modular design on his own workbench and I started investigating for something similar that would keep my undiagnosed autism and OCD in check. Unfortunately I could not find something here in Australia and had to source the same design from the same manufacture as Richard from Everard Junction. The Hobby Zone workbench modules are brilliant and I was able to tailor their products to suit my needs using their designer on the website. It was so much fun. I eventually decided to bite the bullet and purchased the lot through Hattons, my last purchase from them, not that I bought all lot from them. The postage killed me... It went together really easy, each section comes with magnets and that is how the whole thing is held together. I'll post up some photos later this arvo with how the workbench looks now. Something else I worked on in August was the patio at the front of the "Train Room". Some of you may remember my room didn't fare well in heavy rain, flooding on numerous occasions, with one really bad one that stopped progress entirely for a few months. This was due to the room being at a low point of the entire property, I was gifted this room by my Grandfather and I didn't want to whinge but something needed to be done or I would risk losing what I have spent my early adult years building. The solution was a drain that wrapped around two walls and this has worked perfectly, over the top for a garage but for a train room.... it was needed and I am forever grateful. This leads onto what was accomplished in August; some new concrete to replace the paving job I did myself, that's being a bit unfair to myself but it wasn't the best and the heavy rains had washed away the pavers in some sections, so the solution: Looks a bit bland doesn't it? My Grandfather, Charlie, who worked and lived on this property, as I do now, was known for his love for gardening and took out many Local Council awards. Myself and my family have kept up his gardens and take pride in our home/workplace so it was only fitting that I made the front of the train room just as nice. The railway seat is from the Hawkesbury River railway station, how long they were in service I am not sure but I remember them as a kid when I was travelling by train to skateparks with mates. September/October my lovely partner, Rachel, and I did a little road trip South in to Victoria, along the Great Ocean Road and into South Australia. A few photos of the trip... if I may? One of the first stops was Sovereign Hill at Ballarat, a place rich in early Australian History, particularly the Victorian Gold Rush when local miners revolted against the British administration of the Colony of Victoria, mostly it was down to taxes being handed down onto miners. It was known as the Eureka Stockade and occurred in the early 1850s. Sovereign Hill (pictured) is Victoria's answer to Beamish. I visited many times when I was a kid, so it was good to be back. Couldn't help myself somewhere along the road between Ballarat and Apollo Bay, came over a bridge and I saw two locos parked to my left, quick u-turn sorted that out, Rachel was thrilled as always. Another photo of the financial mistake (a 4WD) at Robe, South Australia. Down along the South coast of Australia is absolutely stunning. Lot's of shipwrecks also. Before long we were in Adelaide and I was sniffing out railway museums... and Rachel was absolutely thrilled!! If I am honest, the photo above was staged, she is very supportive of my hobby. Right, that brings us almost to the end of 2023, I did some railway work over the Christmas break so I'll post that up a bit later.
  5. I run my express’ around twice but the slower trains just the once. I stole mimicked this from Grantham.
  6. Can’t wait to do the shutting in both directions next Easter (2025). I’m glad I’m not the only one that does this, no wonder my back feels 50.
  7. Over the past week I have painted the three conflats I worked on at the Forrestville show, lettered the five dia 2 wagons and repainted the LNER Flat T. If that wasn’t enough I also decided to start another project: manure filled wagons. One of the trains I’ve chosen to model from a 1937 Working Timetable is 71 Down, a pick up goods. This carried manure out of London for Three Counties, Arlesey & Langford, Biggleswade & Sandy. I originally intended to tarp these wagons but it was pointed out by a friend/mentor that the LNER would not have wasted a tarp and they would have ran open to their destinations. So, after reading a very informative thread from RMWEB user ‘Mikkel’, on using Humbrol Weathering Powders, clumped together, as horse droppings, (which can be found here), I set about recreating it on a larger scale. I started by making a false floor for the wagons, made from palstikard, I glued some polystyrene balls in with the powders and painted them different shades of brown. I mixed in some plumbers hemp to represent straw and placed the entire thing inside a few weathered wagons. I’ve made up a total of four and they are now glued in place. I chose to glue because I prefer permanent loads. If I ever decide to model anywhere else that doesn’t require poo filled wagons these can be simply tarped over. The wagons are from Rapido, show below: Oxford: and lastly, one of the Bachmann wagons I altered into a near enough representation of an LNER dia. 2. I’m quite happy with the way the dia. 2, I’ll post the rest up soon.
  8. We need a disclaimer before these type of pictures
  9. Some further shots of the rebuild. I think this was around about the time I was re-wiring everything. I made up new control panels, this time choosing a white background and black ‘lines’. Two seperate control panels, North and South, same as before. The work all finished with some stock in the fiddleyard. I’ve moved some trains around, some are in different spots, for example the Pullman cars are now in the Up lines as the Yorkshire Pullman. Looking the opposite direction towards the lift out section. What I might do, to regenerate interest in this thread, is go through the sequence describing each train and from what fiddleyard line they hale?(hail?)?? from. With plenty of pictures. What do we think?
  10. Right, after some track removal and a new board inserted in the front section, one of the first things I did was add a curved point at the start (or end) of the Down fiddleyard. This corner is very tight but only the smaller trains traverse this section, it works. The next shots should show how much better the new down sidings flow. One of the advantages of this rearrangement was the addition of an Up line, which you can see just below the roll of paper towel. Even though I lost a Down train it’s much more suitable having the extra Up train. The gap in the middle has since been fixed. These photos are from the middle of 2023. On the extreme right from top to bottom we have; Up slow, Up Main, Down Main, Down Slow and a kick backing siding. A last look at the finished project… More tomorrow…
  11. My dad said the same thing 🤣
  12. On the weekend was the North Shore MRC’s exhibition at Forestville which I attend as part of the BRMA (British Railway Modellers of Australia). It was an excellent show, the best in my opinion over the last few years. It was also an excellent turn out for the BRMA; Six demonstrators on Saturday and Five for the Sunday. A few photos from the weekend: Here’s our stand at some point on Saturday. Clockwise from myself (far left) we have Charles Rudder, a photo bomber, Bruce Wright, Rodney Vanderwaals, Lee Styger and El Presidente John Nuttall. I took a few models with me, I like to show a mix of my capabilities (without sounding pompous). From L-R from the top: Three weathered Bachmann wagons and a suitable loco for them, a heavily weathered Bachmann O4. Various wagons: A whitemetal lowmac with a Langley Models horse drawn carriage roped down, a DS GNR Vent. Van, a Parkside fitted open followed by a Bachmann wagon, both tarped and roped properly and lastly the scratchbuilt Flat DV. Next we have a DS artic, very happy with how she turned out, then a Craftsman C12 I built, painted, lettered and weathered. Lastly, the loco that children and adults liked to touch, a Hornby A1 altered to one of two that received the ACFI water feed gear; 2576 ‘The White Knight’. Children I can understand, they don’t know better (but they should), one parent decided to give me a filthy look for raising my voice at her children than teach her children not to touch. But I had one adult in particular go straight up and pick it up…. was it that bad years ago at exhibitions of old or has it gotten worse with the little shits that are around these days. Enough of little shits and stupid adults, I spent the weekend getting some conflat wagons built. These are from, you guessed it, Jonathan Wealleans and Graeme King. I’ve had these a while now and really need to get them finished, so I decided to do the tedious work at a show….the punters see a soldering iron, brass etches and small white metal parks and immediately think you’re a wizard practicing a dark art, so you get a kind of satisfaction from explaining and demonstrating a very simple job. So we I worked on a conflat V and two conflats for the insulated meat containers, I forget the type. I took along my recently finished DS GNR Luggage Brake and three finished conflats and their respected containers to show the finished product. Lastly a boastful picture of myself to finish off the post.
  13. It’s been some time since I last posted and if I am honest Little has been accomplished on the layout. However, some fiddleyard work was undertaken in the middle of last year. The work involved altering the Down sidings. When I planned the layout I tried to use as much of the old layout, Brighton Junction, as I could. I also, misjudged the tightness of the Southern fiddleyard entrance. Some of the heavier trains don’t like to traverse the tight corners and some express’ have a slight drop in speed. Apart from these limitations the layout runs and works impeccably and I am happy to live with the limitations listed above as they do not affect the overall viewership of the layout as a whole. But, the fiddleyard still needed some work to help with the viewing. I have attached the before shots of the fiddleyard, I’ll most likely spread the job across a few posts. So, here goes. Here is the old view of the Southern end of the layout. Tight corners, with two very tight and short kick back sidings. Sweeping around to bring us on the straight. Now in the centre of the layout, I added the crossover to be able to send a third line to the right, close to the control panel…. Lots of wasted space I thought! Here’s the edge of the board with the lift up section…well…up. Various wagons everywhere- I think I was getting ready to pack everything away. I didn’t take a photo of the lift up section- but that changed very little. I’ll post the next instalment later.
  14. Then why does Geoff West and I always get yelled at during the running sessions?
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