Middlepeak

Looking good mate, and the 4 years of hard toil is really paying off. I wish I could work that quickly! Hope SWAG goes well, and I look forward to seeing the layout 'live' later in the year. G

Board 3 has now been 'adjusted' to fit around the pipe box, so all four boards can be erected in their correct positions. There's still some minute levelling to do as the support framework is not perfectly flat, but in a way that's to be expected. In fact it might change as the shelves below are loaded, as the carpet underlay has quite a bit of 'give' in it. Once that's done, I plan to beef up the contact points where the baseboards meet the support frames with some strips of 7mm thick rubber sheet, which are intended to deaden any noise transmission through the structure. We'll see if that works! In the mean time I can at least run a train up and down the front loop, which also reassures me that the layout is going to be at the best height for operating and viewing. G

For the first time this evening I was able erect the first two Friden boards on their frames on top of the Ivar units. There was an initial great sigh of relief when I found my calculations and drawings had worked - that's not always the case! One or two points emerged for further consideration. Firstly, the third board that is supposed to fit behind the second one and carries the extension of loading bank siding needs the corner removing to fit round the pipe box on the wall. Not too much of a problem. Secondly, there's a larger than designed gap between the rear of the boards and the wall. Perhaps one option is to extend them to provide more background scenery. Thirdly, the next set of Ivar supports project out in front of the layout. This unit is designed to carry the power box and control panel. I will probably extend the boards at the front by about 60mm to compensate. Again just scenery. All in all I feel more confident of progress now. G

On that basis I might even be persuaded to go into business selling the etches that I designed for the same loco. That would recover the costs several times over! But then again, that wasn't the point of doing them in the first place! G

This gives much weight to the theory that it's not so much the story, but the way that you tell it that counts. I've never really been that interested in horse drawn pantechnecons, but I was captivated by the whole thing. Talk of equine trade unions and of course the sad fate of Mrs X - clearly very personal feelings expressed there. And of course some excellent modelling, which we come to expect from you Mikkel. Congratulations! Geraint

Finally a bit progress to report, with builders having completed the conversion of the new railway room before Christmas, leaving the decorator (me) to do the painting before the carpet layer arrived in late January. Since then I've been reconfiguring the IKEA shelving units which will provide the supporting structure for Friden, and today I brought the boards into the room to check on best fit in the reconfigured space. It would appear, from frantic activity with the tape measure and CAD package, that the new pipe boxes will necessitate a slight alteration to one if the boards, but nothing too drastic. Laying them out on the floor like this (not in their final position, I hasten to add) shows the full sweep of the yard from the Middleton end at the bottom to a point part way along the works at the top. The Middleton end will have a scenic fiddle yard, which will be erected for operating sessions, and the line will be extended in the other direction beyond the works, with a run of about 8 feet to another fiddle yard representing Parsley Hay and the 'main line'. The east portal of Newhaven Tunnel will probably provide the necessary scenic break. I've also finished the pointwork for the internal siding in the brickwork referred to in a previous post. If I can get these boards erected in the next few weeks, I can begin to think about wiring and maybe the start of testing! G

Hi Haavard, That's a nice idea, but there's still a lot of uncertainty around the customs issues with taking models outside of the UK after Brexit. Better to start small with a model or two in a case, I think!

Sven and Claus were out early this morning to do a track inspection before next weekend's Tonbridge show. A quick call at the station, where the station master and his colleague seem intrigued by the latest addition to the RGVJ's motive power. Riding on the flat wagon is certainly a novel way to see the South Jutland countryside!

Good luck with that one mate! G

Blimey! Is anything 'micro' in 7mm scale? The first of the pics from @montyburns56 is one of the ones that I've been thinking of replicating as a small 4mm diorama, so I can see the attraction in it. By the way, I've seen the photo of the Crewe Goods tender loco attributed elsewhere to Hurdlow, rather than Longcliffe, but again it's a great shot. As to comparing photo collections - by all means! I'm steadily going through mine and recording them all in an index prior to getting them into albums. Feels like a lifetime's work, and I haven't got to 3000 yet, but then again I haven't started on my books! G

Jay, Keep me posted on the Belper developments, and if there's any help I can give both you and them, please PM me. G

Many thanks Haavard. Thinking of the Skovde event, would they welcome a visit from an Englishman with an interest in Denmark? I'm not promising, but it sounds like an interesting thing to visit. Is there a website with more information? Regards, G

Hi Haavard & Mikkel, I really echo your views on the activities of the Ribe club. Because of my connections with the town, I made contact with them back in 2006 and have been a regular visitor to their clubroom ever since. They have been a constant source of inspiration and help for me during the construction of Obbekaer, and on a couple of occasions they have travelled, to England for Scaleforum 2013 and to Holland for Rail 2016, where they helped me operate the layout. They also arranged for Obbekaer to appear at the DMJU exhibition in Bramdrupdam, near Kolding, in 2014. It struck me at the time that they were successfully progressing a sort of finescale modelling that wasn't the norm for Denmark. They have always been content with their own company and with progressing their model of Ribe as it was in the late 1920's, without taking it to exhibitions. With a combined age of just over 240 between the three of them, I can understand why, but it's shame that their excellent work hasn't been seen by a larger audience. A few photos of them 'in action' at Scaleforum 2013. Best wishes to you both, Geraint

One very practical point - make sure your arms are long enough to reach a train at the back without potentially damaging any of the scenery at the front. I speak from experience!

Working assumption at the moment is Alex Jacksons, and the magnet locations have already been built in on that basis. That was the original intention with Middlepeak, until I found that the change of gradient at the foot of the incline uncoupled the ascending wagons with unerring regularity! G

Just proving that you can never have too much information to make a model accurate, a recent purchase from those nice chaps at The Transport Library yielded a view into the brickwork building in the very corner of a shot taken on a rail tour. It convinced me that the point leading into the coal siding that ran through to the back of the works could been seen through the doorway, so I needed to include it. The track in the works was inset into the concrete floor, so this piece of trackwork can be soldered up on PCB sleepers, with the concrete panels being formed of DAS or similar. One advantage of this is that it will generate another traffic movement for the layout, with a pair of loaded coal wagons being shunted onto this siding by the works Peckett. It requires a reliable coupling and uncoupling system though, and a removable building to retrieve any strays!

Just as an indicator, the bridge structure for Friden has been done in plasticard (individual stones, suitably 'distressed'), because there is less relief to the prototype stonework. Total time taken - about 35 to 40 hours per side, including a full weekend at Missenden. Dry stone walling will however be a different matter. A rough calculation suggests that about 12 actual metres of the stuff will be required. Probably hundreds of hours of work, but these walls are the real signature of the White Peak, and therefore just as important as the railway and the trains!

First reaction is that there's not enough relief in a sheet like that. Nor it there enough of an angular structure to the individual stones. For that reason, I've decided that all the stonework on Friden will be laid with individual stones - plasticard in the case of the underbridge and buildings where the stones are dressed, but probably DAS clay for all the dry stone walling. There's a lot of it! Sorry, but I don't think there's really a short cut, if you want it to look right! G

Farmer Kosegarten contemplates another trip round the M25 and he and his Danish companions from Obbekaer look forward to seeing you in Tonbridge. (By the way, we're P87, not P4! Just 12.5% smaller!)

Sounds like a loco problem rather than a track problem, so the only answer is to put some side springing on the pony truck. That said, there is photographic evidence that the Whaley Shunt would sometimes work into the yard tender first, so that would eliminate the problem! G

Thinking back to your buffer locking problem, is there just one place on the layout where it happens? If so, can you take a picture of it, looking down the track towards the front end of the 8F? That might indicate a spot where the curvature is tighter than you think. I'm sure we've all had that problem at some stage! The other thought is that (I presume) there's no over-centre springing on the pony truck of the 8F. That would suggest that the front set of wheels are not leading the rest of the chassis into the curve, as one would expect on the real thing. I'm not sure if there's a ready solution to that, especially as I've never had anything as large as a 2-8-0 to run on my layout. Maybe some form of spring to reduce side play would help?

Hi Jay, A very handy acquisition, and full marks to Cazz for her support for your endeavours. Looking forward to seeing Middleton Top 'on the road' (SWAG date now in the diary). Shout if any help needed with the preparation. Geraint

Wonderful photographs John and nice to hear of someone who is able to get plenty of enjoyment from operating a home layout. As someone who has always been confined to operating his layout at exhibitions, I must say I am looking forward to completion of a new railway room and home operations next year. Best wishes for Christmas, and while I remember, is there a plan of Kelvin Grove anywhere? Regards, Geraint

Just to show that there has been a small amount of recent progress, I finally summed up the courage to paint the underbridge. The base coat is Humbrol grey acrylic primer, with the various stone colours from a variety of Vallejo paints. Maybe one or two delicate washes required to bring out the mortar courses a little more, but that I'm afraid demands even more courage, which is now almost totally exhausted! Hopefully the bridge can be installed in a couple of months, once the track has been painted, wired and tested. Happy Christmas! G

All the best Jay! Just finished the painting in the new railway room, so once the carpet's down in January it will be full steam ahead at Friden! Looking forward to the Midlands get together next year. Geraint