ozthedog

Mine is: "K2302SF GWR Steam Railmotor Dia. R Number 97 Sound Fitted (Simplified GWR Chocolate & Cream late 1920s onwards)" It's now shown as sold out on their website. My order says that it is "Allocated" so I guess its in the workshop awaiting its sound decoder. They were quicker taking the payment from my credit card than they have been in fitting the decoder.

I ordered my sound fitted SRM in January and I am still waiting. Tony - which version did you buy? Keith

A solution of sodium hydroxide , AKA caustic soda, will strip most paints. It is the usual ingredient in drain cleaner available from most hardware stores. As it is dissolved in water to strip the paint, ie not organic solvent based, I would guess it has little effect on resin. However I have never tested this so it would be best to try it out first on something that is of no importance. If you do use this be very careful not to splash it in your eyes if you value your eyesight as it is very good for dissolving animal tissue. You can also end up with very smooth fingers if not careful. ie wear googles and gloves and wash off well from the model after stripping.

The layout I am building uses servos for point control with the control board already in place under the board. The control board is attached to the crossmembers of the board support - not directly to the baseboard. Track control is by DCC but this can be disconnected whilst applying static grass. I am worried that up to 20kV of static generated by the applicator may damage the servo motors or their control board. I have trawled a number of model railway fora to seek the opinion of others and have found much advice that SG applicators will/will not fry electronic circuitry but no-one admits to having used a SG applicator with electronics in place. Of course I may have missed a post to this effect and will be happy to be re-directed if anyone knows of one. I have found the German post that it can fry LEDs and also that if applied to the track can fry controllers if connected. My question is - has anyone used a static grass applicator with electronics in place under the baseboard and what was the outcome? Thanks Keith

Harlequin, I had to use modellers licence to complete the run round loop and include the creamery. Here is the track plan as laid. The right hand curve is necessitated by the end of the shed. You can see photos of the build so far at https://gwrbranchline.wordpress.com/ . I am about to start building the gasworks on a 20cm wide removable baseboard that can be dropped in at the rear of the layout. Regards Keith

I am building Wallingford in 00 in a 3.5 metre long shed. This requires only minimal compression of the trackwork. I have prepared the trackplan as a mirror image of that drawn in the Karau book so that the gas works forms a backdrop. If you are interested I have described the layout build in a Wordpress blog. Website address below.

Does anyone know the colour of the Snailbeach District Railways Baldwins in the 1930s? The restored wagon in the Snailbeach museum is painted grey but that does not necessarily mean the locos were the same colour. Thanks Keith

I should have said that one of the 009 locos will be the new Bachmann Baldwin 4-6-0 if it ever arrives. Will that be OK on 230mm curves?

I am designing a narrow gauge / standard gauge interchange layout using XTrkCAD software. I have designed and built 4mm only scale layouts but I am a newbie to 2mm. The layout will have a 4mm standard gauge line and a 009 narrow gauge delivering hopper wagons from a mine. Could anyone advise me what would be a sensible minimum radius be to use for 009 / 2mm track? Thanks Keith

How did I do it? Not sure if it is relevant but the underlay is 2mm closed cell foam which is less solid than cork ie more compressible. Its actually quite a thin layer of ash except between the sleepers. Because you do have to saturate it with the PVA my problem was to avoid a puddling effect rather than steam rollering. If it looks wrong in places you can just go over it again. Its probably best to build it up in layers. Time consuming but worth it. Not sure if this helps. It is just trial and error - best on a test piece away from the layout! Keith

The layout was dismantled when I moved house 5 years ago so I only have 1 more photo (above). This shows the yard from the opposite end. The patchy appearance next to the wagons is shadow as the light was coming from the left. I should have said in my earlier post that I added detergent to the PVA. Even so it was difficult to wet the ash. Despite this I think the effect is worth the effort. I am just about to use the same method in the goods yard of my new layout.

This shows the effect that can be achieved with sieved wood ash from oak logs. The ash was laid down as a thick layer and then fixed with the same mixture as used for ballasting - 30% PVA solution in a water/IPA mix. Works quite well but difficult to get the ash to wet with the PVA.

Hopefully this might show my efforts with Vallejo paints

I use Vallejo acrylics to mix all my colours for painting buildings. GWR dark stone = Tan Earth (874) GWR light stone mixed from 1 drop Dark Sand (847) + 1 drop Mud brown (037) Because of the Photobucket problem I cannot post an image. If I can find out how to post a pic later I will.

Both ammonia and IPA are present in some industrial acrylic paint cleaners. Acrylic paints are made with acrylic acid and acrylic esters that polymerise when the paint dries on exposure to air. I guess that ammonia being basic will react with the acrylic acid compounds and cause de-polymerisation allowing the paint to be washed off with the IPA as a solvent and the washing up liquid as a detergent. Regardless of mode of action it seems to work well. As I and Fat Controller above have mentioned ammonia is an irritant so use with care. Keith

IPA from eBay is probably less expensive than Boots at £6.39/litre or £17.99/5 litres including delivery. I make my own airbrush cleaner: 30ml IPA + 65ml water + 5ml ammonia + 1 drop of washing up liquid. After cleaning flush airbrush through with 30% IPA. Best to clean outdoors or spray through a window as the ammonia is a nasal irritant! The cleaner mix is also good for cleaning acrylic paint off brushes. Keith

I have converted one loco and a few wagons to Dinghams and I am very happy with the delayed uncoupling which works very well if the couplers are all at a standard height. Therein lies one of the problems as any slight variation causes problems. Torper's jig should prove very useful when I convert the rest of my rolling stock. I made my own electromagnets to Dingham's design and wound the wire onto the core with a borrowed jewellers lathe. This just gives a nice slow rotation to allow control of the winding. The electromagnet and the uncoupling can be seen here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4OsXLv-4Sw I have also had the problem described by Penlan where the latches do not drop under gravity. They would benefit from being heavier' Keith

To be held at Doulting Village Hall, Somerset, BA4 4PL Shepton and District Model Railway Society will be holding their 42nd annual show with a range of layouts from the South West. This is a family friendly show with children admitted free to give parents and children the chance to see what can be achieved with modern models. The layouts booked for the show include Brockleigh, Cotehele, Devonport Road, Gauge 1 Demonstration, Milehouse Trams, Tormouth Quay, Wiveliscombe and cover a range of gauges from 2mm to Gauge 1. The Shunting Puzzle will also be present for visitors to try their hand at controlling a locomotive to shunt wagons and operate the points. We shall also have demonstrations by club members of modelling techniques. The Somerset and Dorset Trust and the Ffestiniog Preservation Society will have stands along with our regular model railway traders - Steve Lane, Joe Lock, and Tony Wilcox. There will be a chance to meet up with friends old and new over refreshments in the Catering area. Doors open 10-30 to 4-30 Saturday, June 10th and 10-00 to 4-00 on Sunday, June 11th – Adults £4, Accompanied Children under 12 free, 12-16yrs £2. As a free bonus we also open our Clubroom at the East Somerset Railway station, Cranmore just 2 miles away. Visitors will be able to see layouts under construction or restoration and run locos on our venerable club model of Binegar. More Information - https://sheptonmrs.wordpress.com

For the last year I have been using the Silhouette Portrait die cutter to construct buildings for my model of Wallingford station and goods yard. The walls are built of embossed Plastikard backed with 0.75mm plain card. This is fine for enclosed buildings but for the goods shed I wanted something closer to a scale double wall thickness as with an open structure the walls are seen in cross section at openings. A double layer of bricks would be about 9 inches deep or 3mm in 4mm scale. I decided to use 2mm MDF with a skin of Plastikard embossed brickwork on top. The Silhouette will not cut 2mm so I decided to have a go at laser cutting the building carcase and then detailing this with components, eg. the windows, cut with the Silhouette. This allows the same Inkscape drawings to be used for both which ensures everything fits together. This post is to show the outcome of the laser cutting which worked very well. I had my drawings cut at 4D Modelshop in London. The components fitted together well and after glueing with wood glue produced a building with 90degree corners that sits perfectly flat. I shall add to this post when I have made progress with the detailing. Keith

I use "No Nonsense Superglue" from Screwfix http://www.screwfix.com/p/no-nonsense-superglue-20g/26780. With no special storage conditions it lasts many months at shed temperature and at £1.79 for 20 g I throw it away after six months and replace with a fresh bottle even though the old stuff is still useable.

I use a closed cell foam called Plastazote available from here . It costs £7.17 + VAT for a 2m x 1m roll. Available in various thicknesses. I glue it down to baseboard with contact adhesive then glue track onto surface of foam with neat PVA. You need to be careful when glueing to the baseboard not to stretch it as you end up with thin areas. Cheers Keith

I am making progress with the Silhouette Portrait and Inkscape. This is the first building I have made that that incorporates a significant number of components cut on the Portrait. ie lintels which are composed of 3 layers, windows, door and slates. All cut from 0.25mm Plasticard except the slates which are cut from watercolour paper. This really is a versatile piece of equipment. The curved lintels would have been pretty tricky to cut freehand. Cheers Keith

For the cost of a staple and a magnet the Kirby uncoupler works a treat. You can see it working by searching youtube for "kirby uncoupler"

Just tested this with my software. I drew a 20mm x 10mm rectangle in Inkscape and saved the file with the Document properties set either to default units in mm + custom size in mm or default units in mm + custom size in pixels. Then imported both files into Studio Designer. mm + mm resulted in box changing to 16mm x 8mm whereas the box remained 20mm x 10mm with the settings of mm + px. Problem solved - Thanks MickRalph. Cheers Keith

Not on my version. I shall have to see if there is some way to set the defaults. I wasted some plastic sorting this out. Thanks Keith