CharlieJohnson

Loved Warley as this was my first time attending the show and got the chance of a life time to join Bachmann Europe on their stall with the rest of the Who's Counting Rivets team from TGMRC 2019.

We just got confirmation today. Our Miniature Miniatur-Wunderland layout will be attending Warley as Guests of Bachmann Europe. So you will all get to see the full 3 boards of the winning team Railmen of Kent, plus the Loco Ladies layout and ourselves. Hope to see many of you again and see many on your there too.

For me it was celebrating my 28th Birthday on the first day of filming for the semi finals. Plus though out the heat, semi and final we had cake getting cut in different ways by Tim. The chain saw was the only one shown. Plus we duct taped our team captain up to stop him panicking.

The damage was also done to the prelaid track underneath too. So without pulling the layout apart we weren't able to repair underneath but I was able to replace that bit of track.

The goal posts were moved so many times during the final. All teams suffered at least 1 issue with functionality. On our layout it was our coal Hoist as we had said that was going to be working along with my workshop and the glowing core. We never mentioned that we would have the crane working yet James pointed it out. We were also told that the layouts would be filmed all though as one take then during our demonstration as we went first we had to stop and keep going back over again and again. Due to a really bad accident with out Jurassic Park layout when moving it into storage after out semi final we weren't able to fully run the track as we had wanted but we're able to have all our animations working. On our final layout so many details were missed out from our doppelgängers all over the layout to our 99 red hotair balloon atop the mountain. We also had more animations that weren't shown at all which wasn't helpful. In the end we gave it our all and it came down to our first layouts that decided the winner of the show.

They were more concerned converting it to DCC than us running it through the flames. We didn't tell them until after our demonstration and at the very least they can say its flash proof.

Yeah there was so much more packed into our layout that didn't even get a mention. Plus I don't know if I was just me but they seemed to really rush past our layout and focus on the others a lot more. Should have been a 2 hour special.

We had so much fun building our final layout just wish more was shown of it. We poured so much into that layout that wasn't shown on TV.

Yeah the class 24 was the prototype that we asked to be fitted with DCC so we could run it and then we went and ran it through fire. Plus you might have noticed Bachmanns Crane too.

One design I had come up with for our layout was based on the Hunger Games but this would have been far too difficult to build in the 3 days so this idea was dropped. But I was happy with our Jurassic Park layout. And as it doesn't have a railway in the movie it ment we could be a lot more creative when it came to rolling stock. blockquote widget

Yeah I think I remember that being said. Did mean teams in the first 3 heats could lay a lot more track than those in heats 4 and 5 due to one of the rules being you could only lay track on 2 baseboards but over all it was a great experience.

Awww I miss all the crew. They were great fun and loved having a laugh with them. Even helping move the layouts into storage. Even Kathy helped move the layouts. Mind one thing I want to see changed for next year is better base boards as 2 different designs on baseboards were used. 1 design of 2x 4ft x 5ft and 1x 2ft x 5ft during the first 3 episodes and 3x 3.25ft by 5ft. This ment dur to the rules some teams could lay a lot more track on two of the boards than others. Other than that I can't think of much else that would need to be changed.

Cheers Chris. I did rather like your scratchbuild items and I thought you using it to make the camera crew was a lovely touch and I wish they had shown your war memorial, it was very lovely made. And tbh I was so nervous doing the scratchbuild challenge as both you and the young lad from the railmen of Kent had won your SBCs in your heats and I hadn't so I felt I had to give 110% this time round. I thought I might be able to win it during our heat just just missed out. With both you having a win under your belts I thought one of you might win it. Plus in that suit was very cool inside due to the fans and was definitely collet indoors than outdoors.

Not much longer until the grand final. Would have liked to of had a longer screen time due to there being 4 teams instead of 3 but we shall see how it goes. But we have 4 wonderful teams in this final who have all worked hard to get here.

I still love watching her reaction back and playing it over. To get that reaction and an audible wow from Kathy really had made my day. Plus during day one it was my 28th Birthday so got to enjoy my birthday doing something I love. Nothing I made for the SBC was planned everything was made up there on the day as I had actually forgot there was a scratchbuild challenge on until we were called up to stand in our spots. I ended up making the weather detection system to use the metal from the head scratcher, the skeleton in the Amber was the first one built as I wanted it to mirror the mosquito in the Amber from the end of John hammonds cane. And the nodding Dino was a quick 10 mins build as I wanted something to move and after playing with the thing I saw a nodding animation take shape. Really happy with how they all turned out and as I say (or lack of) I was speak less when I was told I had won.