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Jolly good stuff, and a good five minutes out from the heat, the dust, and those damned eternal flies of a family holiday.

 

Winchelsea was pretty much the medieval Milton Keynes, although, fortunately, the latter is less prone to attack by French pirates. BTW, there is a plaque under a tree in Winchelsea, commemorating the most recent event of any note, which was when John Wesley preached there. Absolutely nothing has happened since.

 

Kevin

I have to disagree my motorbikes chain snapped in 1982 while short-cutting through the arch 

 

NIck

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Know what you mean.  I once crashed a car in Carmarthenshire.  Apparently that was the most exciting thing that had happened there in living memory.  I bet they still talk about it.

Excitement does happen in Carmarthenshire. The hairy one frequently leaps about and barks excitedly at people walking past her house, and even more if they visit. And I overheard what seemed quite an excited expression from someone only this afternoon, when she was seen consuming ice cream near the shop in Drefach Felindre. You obviously crashed in one of the duller parts of the county!

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Absolutely delightful, I can picture myself walking along just outside the Dodo, after having done a bit of bank cleaning in the Unit Automatic eXchange around the corner, mind you that would be in the late 1930's......)

 

I wish more modelled towns had railways attached!

 

Andy G

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That's rather a disrespectful way to refer to your wife, isn't it?

The silly old bitch is barking mad. She expects me to eat all the chocolate off the ice cream for her, and then hold the stick so she can lick it.

post-7091-0-07030500-1472500300.jpg

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"I go doing everything the wrong way."

No, it is the rest of us that do things the wrong way round. The landscape came first, then the buildings, then the railway and then more buildings (usually not so attractive).

But that approach is a bit more difficult with a portable layout where the boards have to be in pairs for storage and in liftable sizes (max about 4 ft by 18 inches).

Still thorouighly enjoying the thread even if not contributing much. Keep it up.

Jonathan

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Been up to Norfolk working again over the weekend, and managed to get out to Castle Rising.

 

Edwardian has been talking about putting a church in the background and St Lawrence Church has been mentiond int the past as a candidate for Castle Aching, so I went on a photo reconnaissance.

 

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post-3744-0-58257500-1472581603_thumb.jpg

 

post-3744-0-67619900-1472581626_thumb.jpg

 

There are some more that I'll upload to my gallery a bit later.

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The silly old bitch is barking mad. She expects me to eat all the chocolate off the ice cream for her, and then hold the stick so she can lick it.

attachicon.gifDSCF5610.JPG

 

You might tell her they do creams for removing facial hair these days

 

Don

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Castle Aching really is a delightful village. This is the advantage of the smaller scales you can fit a decent bit of village in, providing one has the skill and artistry shown to such effect by your good self.

 

Don

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Ahem, moving on!

 

Onthebranchline of this Parish posted a link to a brief film I had never seen before of Revd. Teddy Boston's model railway: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/114223-railway-vicar-a-short-movie-on-the-rev-teddy-bostons-layout/&do=findComment&comment=2417760

 

EDIT: Hopefully this is the clip itself: https://youtu.be/ah9HFuo_qKw

 

I watched it last night and wallowed in nostalgia for a childhood visit to Cadeby.  I remember sitting in the Rectory study taking tea and it being a most magical place, with books two-deep on the shelves and a selection of model locomotives in front of them!

 

Even as a child, I had secret mental reservations concerning some of the stock the Revd. used to make up the numbers; those '70s Hornby Colletts, the basis of the current Railroad items, but far, far worse in those days. I wouldn't give 'em house room, eschewing them in favour of Airfix coaches on my GW layout, which, as a consequence, only ever ran two passenger services on the mainline, a stopper formed of B Sets and the Cornish Riviera Limited!

 

This hardly mattered, because here was a slice of South Devon with the trains running in the landscape to a full timetable.  It was a miniature yet expanded version of the world of the Dart Valley and Torbay & Dartmouth, which we visited religiously every year.  These, of course, were the years when people modelled the GWR rather than the WR and the preservationists still used GW livery.  I was hooked.

 

At the time I finally drifted away from my model railway it was in a cloud of dissatisfaction.  I realised that the model railway that I truly wanted was beyond my reach.  It still is, but, perhaps, not for ever. I wanted prototypical stock for the line (I made a last ditch effort to build a 70' coach out of plasticard; it was execrable), and room for a long run.

 

My layout of a lifetime is still one in which prototypical full length formations run through a generous swathe of landscape.  I calculated that about 150 items of passenger stock and 80 or so locomotives would allow me, with much fiddling to produce balancing workings, to reproduce the mid-week winter timetable for the Newton Abbot to Plymouth section in the mid '30s.  One day, I'll manage it!

 

Still, it's a long way from Norfolk.  I need to get some funds in for wood, insulation material, etc, as I am itching to start on a model railway, rather than just bits to plonk on top of one! 

Edited by Edwardian
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My layout of a lifetime is still one in which prototypical full length formations run through a generous swathe of landscape.  I calculated that about 150 items of passenger stock and 80 or so locomotives would allow me, with much fiddling to produce balancing workings, to reproduce the mid-week winter timetable for the Newton Abbot to Plymouth section in the mid '30s.  One day, I'll manage it!

You need to move down to 2FS for that!  See the latest MRJ.

 

Jim

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My layout of a lifetime is still one in which prototypical full length formations run through a generous swathe of landscape.  I calculated that about 150 items of passenger stock and 80 or so locomotives would allow me, with much fiddling to produce balancing workings, to reproduce the mid-week winter timetable for the Newton Abbot to Plymouth section in the mid '30s.  One day, I'll manage it!

Go back 60-80 years, and you'd need a lot less, and the trains would be shorter so the layout could be smaller. That's my layout of a lifetime, but being older than you I'm not sure it will happen!

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I remember precisely when and how the railway bug bit me in adulthood.

 

I was 28 and staying in a holiday let in Dartmouth.  After a late evening, I was rudely and piercingly awakened by the sound of a steam whistle directly across from my let, at Kingswear station.  The fact that it then took me 17 years to pick up glue and a scalpel and do something about it is regrettable, but I have realised at last that it is the thing I now want to do.

 

Fortunately, aged 28 and unmarried, future financial retrenchment was a thing of, well, the future, and I did manage to collect together a number of the items I would need for that dream layout of my childhood. I have not the funds to complete the stock, or the funds or space for the fairly large shed I would need to run 10-coach expresses through Devon, so that probably is a retirement project! 

 

In the meantime, I have much to learn and I need to develop some skills.  The bonus of the  Armchair Years was the exploration of other companies and earlier periods, and I feel that the pre-Grouping scene will always be a big part of my modelling activities - now it's the only part!  In fact, apart from the GW '30s layout, my modelling is likely to concentrate exclusively on the time before 1923.

 

So, I am blissfully happy inhabiting Edwardian Norfolk.  The Brighton and the South Eastern would like to share a larger layout in due course.  Then there is North Western, South Western and Great Western before the Great War to dabble with.

 

One step at a time.  Currently I need to fund some infrastructure investment, viz, insulation and baseboard materials.  I hope to start work in September. 

 

One thing that I might consider is mounting a double track circuit on the wall above the CA Boards.  It would be mounted too high for normal operation, but would give me (1) a circuit to test and run-in, (2) something to air stock incompatible with CA, such as mainline trains of any length, (3), if I make it scenic, a photo-plank for any and all non-Aching stock, and, (4) a 'watching-the-trains-go-by' option (if stood on a box, of course).  This would be a simple and relatively inexpensive way to take the pressure for a second layout off, and, once in place, should in fact help me to concentrate on building a round the room extension to CA and to develop more stock.  The priority for now is to produce the main CA boards and a cassette system.  

 

It's good to have ambition.  The more insane, the better, of course.  

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After the new year into 1962 I was browsing Eames windows in Reading and spotted the February Railway Modeller. It was an illuminating moment I discovered that people took modelling seriously. The March issue featured Jim Russell's Little Western a big 4mm loft layout with upper and lower double track circuits a large station on the lower level. The bit that seemed most magical was the hidden storage sidings arranged so that when a train ran in it would halt and after a delay another would automatically exit  I think it was eight trains which could be stored in that way. Some really beautiful GWR models.

Don

 

edit ps that Summer on holiday in Exmouth I left the family on the beach and caught the Ferry to Starcross and then Train to Kingswear.

Edited by Donw
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I apologise that things have been a bit quiet.  Apart from anything else, it seems that I have been roped in to provide the intellectual heavy lifting and elegant precision drafting for another major energy sector judicial review (God help 'em!), so am a tad snowed under at present.  Then again, I have an unsold house to pay for, so can't complain at the extra work. 

 

I must, however, thank Dave very much for the further pictures of St Lawrence.  I suspect this may have to be the final choice for CA.  Picture, if you will, the church set towards the rear at the left hand end of the layout.

 

It is becoming clear to me that my lack of mastery of new-fangled technology is holding things back.   I think St Lawrence is one of 3 buildings for CA that can really only sensibly attempted using my methods if I produce elevations using Photoshop, or similar.  The other two being the station building and the school. 

 

Another such area is Silhouette cutting, which I have long suspected to be the way forward for scratch-building wooden panelled stock.  Now, I don't have a Silhouette cutter, but if I am a very good boy and say my prayers every night, I might just get one for Christmas.  To that end, I have determined that I must master the software in advance, so, a good deal of my limited free time must be devoted to learning to draw in Inkscape via a tutorial topic that Mike Trice has started, using as his example one of a set of coaches that I would like to build for the WNR.  It is very good of him and BGJohn is another acolyte.  Please feel free to visit and cheer us on once we get started: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/114528-using-inkscape-to-produce-cutting-files-a-worked-example/  

 

A third area, which still holds nothing but terror, is 3D printing, or, rather, designing for it.  I am convinced that the way forward is to be able to produce one's own designs for such fittings as roof vents, door vents, oil or gas lighting roof fittings, axle-box/spring assemblies, bogie sides, and buffer shanks. In the meantime, if I can master Inkscape and acquire a cutter, it will be a case of adapting proprietary accessories, or scratch-building, perhaps home casting.

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Hi James,

 

That sounds like a very good reason to be quiet for a while. It's a shame we all have to have a real life as well.

 

If at any point in the future 3D printing stops being the terror inducing thing that it is I just wanted to put out the offer that I own a 3D printer so could run off test prints that would be a lot cheaper than Shapeways, also it could come in handy for those plans of ours once they start.

 

And to throw another spanner in there 3D designs can be made in real life and "scanned" relatively easily using nothing more that a digital camera so it doesn't always have to be a scary learning curve.

 

Gary

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William Shakespeare said

If all the year were holidays, to sport would be as tedious as to play.

1 Henry IV, I,ii

Not only 'informative/useful' , but Thank you as well

 

dh

 

PS

the turn towards CAD and 3 D printing sounds like work again - rather than the escapist phantasy that always lures me to this thread. :paint:

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Another such area is Silhouette cutting, which I have long suspected to be the way forward for scratch-building wooden panelled stock.  Now, I don't have a Silhouette cutter, but if I am a very good boy and say my prayers every night, I might just get one for Christmas. 

 

From what I have read on the very long but equally informative thread on silhouette cutting, it can certainly help and especially if you are producing several similar items.

 

It is however certainly not essential and I think especially so if building one off items with little or no repetition. 

 

Source a drawing, scale it, trace round it, set it out in layers and then send the info to the printer  - compared with

Source a drawing, scale it, trace round it or transfer to plasticard, cut layers

 

If every set of cut layers is different, then I see little advantage except that the machine perhaps cuts more accurately than the hand.

 

I have a rake of GCR Parker stock built in the 80s - when silhouette cutting was something the Georgians did at the end of the 18th century to create human caricatures.

 

I will try and post some pictures over the next couple of days.  SHMBO (and is at least as good a modeller as me) has day trips out planned for the next couple of days. 

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Source a drawing, scale it, trace round it or transfer to plasticard, cut layers

 

If every set of cut layers is different, then I see little advantage except that the machine perhaps cuts more accurately than the hand.

It's the cutting by hand bit that's always defeated me! Much of it is too small and fiddly. For my big long term ambition, if I ever do it, I'll need to produce batches of rolling stock, and locos.

 

I think another advantage is collaboration, where we can share cutting files, or several people can work on different aspects of one file.

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I think that you need a round tower church for CA, not that monstrosity at CR. It is a truly horrible Victorian aberration, and not something that would fit into the genteal scene at CA. Firstly you don't have a large castle keep that you can copy the stonework for your church...

 

As for the sillouette, I use the studio software, and find it much easier than inkscape (and you don't have to export and import the drawings to be able to cut them). Look at my carriage thread to see my results. If you manage to draw something, I could always cut them for you...

 

Andy G

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