Tony Simms

Hardly. It's a right mess. He'll need to get that tidied up before the in-laws come round for tea...

Hi Jerry I'm guessing you dictate your posts to your secretary then and she types them in? I too thought I would struggle, but I tried Blender and made use of some of the threads on here. It's a bit like Lego on screen! As with anything, there's a learning curve but I'll be able to produce a dozen or so vans faster and to a higher quality using this method than trying to scratchbuild them all with plasticard. I'm still learning but I'm fairly pleased with the progress I've made to date.

Nice car! I note no wing mirrors though? Drax is very much alive and kicking and has recently had a biomass unit installed. The ash mounds are all grassed as they reach "maturity" and there has been an excellent nature trail on it for a number of years. Indeed you can now walk all the way to Barlow Common where the Goole-Selby line ran. Once that line shut, the sidings became wagon storage, but also an overnight stopping point for the Royal Train.

Cold, cold day at Ormesby Hall (near Middlesborough). Inclement temperatures cause havoc with DCC and soldered joints, but delightful set of punters (not a trainspotter in sight!).

Looking good, Pete. I think we're all doomed to forever rip out and replace bits of trainset. It wouldn't be so much fun otherwise, would it?

Thanks for the comments chaps! Jez, I used thin washes of enamels and a dusting of weathering powders. I've done some maroon coaches too, but I'm not as happy with the finish on those. Pete, yes the Rapidos need to come off!! These will be replaced by Dapol dummy buckeyes when I get the chance to order some.

Somewhere, yes somewhere, is a "to do" list following the outing to St Albans. No doubt it will show up or I'll write another one following the Ormesby Hall show. Anyway, I did know that the point control box needed an upgrade. The original was squeezed into a tiny box I happened to have to hand and the wiring was from two lengths of six-core flex whose strands were just a little too thin. There was never a proper mount on the layout so it often dangled and swung! The result was regular electrical failure; a combination of overthin wire and excess stress. I started with some decent wires of various colours (to match the existing wiring plan). The packets say "7/0 2mm", but I tend to go with what looks right. These were soldered to a new 15 pin plug in the same format as the old one. The housing and cable restraint were affixed and then cable tidy was looped round the twelve strands of wire up to the new box. The box is about three times as big as its predecessor and I thought wiring would be easy. However as the switches were identical size to the old ones when combined with the thicker wire, soldering up was a bit of a fiddle. Maybe should have gone for some bigger toggles too! I drilled and filed two keyhole slots in the back of the casing to allow the unit to be fixed firmly but temporarily to the layout. The track plan was drawn with a paint pen and ruler following testing. Each pair of points is operated by one toggle. The crossovers are obvious pairings. In the goods yard/coal cells, I opted to pair the two outer points and the two inner. This seems to work and two dots remind the relationship between the switching for the outer pair for those unfamiliar operators. This should make operating the layout easier both at shows and at home. Elsewhere, I've been splodging paint onto pristine Farish coaches and thereby reducing their resale value by 95%. But who cares? I'm never going to sell them! Minor titivations are happening to scenery too including the addition of some timbering at each end of the yard crossing: Brafferton will be at Ormesby Hall on 23rd and 24th March. One of my regular operators will be sunning himself in the relative tropical climes of Ally Pally and on the Sunday I'll be flying solo as the lad is off to a swimming gala. If you'd like to come and play trains on the Sunday, even if only for a couple of hours, PM me and I'll arrange for you to be an official operator for the day. Otherwise I hope I'll see some of you there as punters.

The weeds/chippings centre line tends to be more where it is a single track road or track(!). My guess here, would be a road wide enough for two vehicle to pass quite comfortably (I might be wrong). You might get two slight chipping collections on the centre of each side...

Hi, I think your shade is about right (in the photos anyway). Whilst the surface shouldn't be too rough, there should be some potholes and crumbling areas at the edges. How wide is the road? Whilst you can go out and measure them, I always find they look too wide at scale width (mine do!!). Cheers. Tony

I've only just spotted the recent update on this project. Many years ago (when I were just a lad), I built a layout out of foamboard and successfully exhibited it for about five years. Here are a few shots of Masham: The boards were built as C-girders, a 6 inch high upright with 1 inch deep strips top and bottom. Bracing was every foot or so and the top was one solid sheet and a further lamination for the trackbed. The layout was one piece and 66" by 15". The best way to join foamboard is a hot glue gun; to make the girders I used a heavy duty tape on the outside of the joint and then a hot glue fillet on the inside. No flight case was necessary; the front fascia was thin styrene sheet and the exposed foamboard at the back was covered with sticky-back plastic. Built in 1996 and exhibited between 1997 and 2002, I just sat it on the reclined passenger seat in my Citroen ZX. The layout then resided with my in-laws before I sold it on a few years ago. I believe it still exists and works. In the first shot you can see Edward Sissling, who nicked my ideas and built the very nice Niddbeck Bridge (as mentioned in 2mmAndy's earlier comment). I've still to sue him...

Seems Like A Lifetime Pt 1 - Bill Bruford

Yesterday was the North East Area Group meeting of The 2mm Scale Association. We had a short overview/history from Mick Simpson on the various wagon chassis available over the years. Then a good number of us sat down to progress various chassis building projects. See http://neag.2mm.org.uk/ for more detail and a few pics. Within my own fleet of stock, I have a number of wagons that run on the Mike Bryant etched chassis. These date from the early eighties, use wheels on 13mm axles and to be fair, are a bit problematic. Wheels will often drop out, and being brass they are prone to damage more than the newer nickel silver etches. This is the underside of a Midland 3 plank featuring such a chassis: I have toyed with replacing these chassis for some time now and the workshop produced a chassis suitable for the said replacement. Removal of the old chassis was fairly straightforward with a scalpel blade, but it did dislodge one of the body ends which to be reaffixed. I also had to remove some of the new chassis to fit it between the wagon headstocks. Here is a comparison of one wagon in original state and the conversion requiring painting: To be honest, I'm not sure that the work involved is worth it. I'll paint this one up, but leave the other wagons on their old chassis and live with their foibles. I need to spend more time working on new stock rather than trying to resuscitate these older efforts.

Cue a series of snooker case layouts...

Thank you for a lovely set of photos Phil; I've not even managed to sort mine out post show! You're probably right regarding the backscene; at certain angles you get a disappearing sky. I'm not sure I could live without one though; the countryside around Brafferton is, on the whole, just too flat to allow for no backscene. And seeing my moobs is no substitute. The steam trains are coming, but will be in BR rather than NER livery. The D49 is still in disgrace re poor running and needs some more weight over the now sprung pony truck. The J94 performed quite servicably over the St Albans weekend and the N10 (0-6-2T) still awaits a new chip. Meanwhile the layout itself still needs uncoupling magnets and the point switchbox is proving itself not quite robust enough. Next show is Ormesby Hall (National Trust property near Middlesborough). Do come along if St Albans was too far south for you...

There's no despite about it; Frankland is one b|00dy awesome layout! An inspiration to anyone working in the smaller scales regardless of track standards.

Not my scale, not my period and not my chosen geographic area... But I love it!! When you spend such time and care to restore someone else's work, it's no surprise that your own stuff is so wonderfully evocative.

Events over December and the New Year have conspired to limit my modelling and posts on my blog. On the occasions that I've managed to sit down to do some modelling, I've been trying to get a bit more done on Brafferton before the St Albans show which is next weekend. As far as motive power is concerned, I managed to get the blue 108 rewheeled and chipped, and also found time to dig out my old J94 for a review. This old girl was a mainstay on Masham back who-knows-when. I discovered that the Mashima can motor had imploded whilst looking at ways of adding a DCC chip. By using an Association can motor, I created a bit more headroom to squeeze a chip in. The loco herself is looking a bit worn and down at heel, but she can still pull a train and provide a bit more variety on Brafferton. A new set of numbers and a light weathering should make her feel a bit better pending a full refurbishment. Sometime...

Lovely bit of modelling from all concerned!