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Far Wittering - inspiration from a 1984 Railway Modeller


Booking Hall
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I decided that the right hand end of the layout needed a tree to balance up the view, and to give my cows some shade, so a shrub in my garden (actually my neighbours shrub which overhangs my garden, got a light pruning! An hour or so later, a bit of paint, some postiche, a sprinkling of light and bright green flock, and voila, one tree.

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I'm considering using the cut off section of backscene as a 'view closer' to screen off the fiddleyard, perhaps with a low relief representation of a bridge mounted on it to link it to the retaining wall and through which the train would make its exit (or entrance!). This is something I should have considered much earlier, when I could have formed a curved corner for the backscene rather than an angle.

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42 minutes ago, Booking Hall said:

Thanks Steve, a tree is a good option. I'm well on with it now so I'll soon see what might do it.

 

I'll look forward to seeing that :)

Not the best pictures but I did the same in a couple of places on Ruston Sidings,

 

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This is what I've done so far. I mocked up a stone built arched road bridge, but it looked a bit 'heavy', so i changed my mind to a stone and timber accommodation footbridge. It needs a bit of weathering and the new piece of backscene is only temporarily pinned in place at the moment.

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Pretty much the last job to do was to make some knobs to go on the point operating wires. I was planning to turn up some brass ones on my lathe, but it's cold in the workshop at this time of year, so I looked for another solution! After a little bit of thought I superglued on some short lengths of the brass tube in which the wires run, over which I'd squeezed a length of insulation cut from some audio cable. A perfectly acceptable result, and still small enough to ensure operation will not be too 'heavy handed'.

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"Pretty much the last job to do "  isn't this phrase listed in the top 5 phrases never to be uttered by a railway model ? :)

Stunning layout, I've enjoyed watching this develop these past months ( during which time I've only managed some to sketch some 'planning doodles' ....)

I'm looking forward to seeing this at Padiham.

 

 

Andy

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Cheers Andy, truth is, I need to stop fiddling about with this one in order to make a start on the next one (or two!) layout(s). I do still have to add the Velcro for the drapes (and buy some drape material), and finish off building the stock, and weather it, and perhaps make a new controller, and make some raising pieces for the trestles to bring the track height up to 36". But apart from that it's completely finished!:D

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1 hour ago, Booking Hall said:

Cheers Andy, truth is, I need to stop fiddling about with this one in order to make a start on the next one (or two!) layout(s). I do still have to add the Velcro for the drapes (and buy some drape material), and finish off building the stock, and weather it, and perhaps make a new controller, and make some raising pieces for the trestles to bring the track height up to 36". But apart from that it's completely finished!:D

Oh, before I get too carried away on my next two layouts (a rail-served gasworks in a Christmas tree box, and my 0 gauge shunting layout), there's the small matter of all those buildings I promised to build for the club layout, not to mention the landscaping . . . .

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Greetings from Norway.


I registered on this site not long ago, and this thread was one of the first to get my attention. I spent the afternoon reading through the entire thread, and it's an amazing piece of work, such a stunning small layout!

 

Best regards,

Svein

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4 hours ago, Svein_H said:

Greetings from Norway.


I registered on this site not long ago, and this thread was one of the first to get my attention. I spent the afternoon reading through the entire thread, and it's an amazing piece of work, such a stunning small layout!

 

Best regards,

Svein

Welcome Svein, good to have you with us, and thank you for your very kind comments. I'm glad you've enjoyed the read.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 05/02/2020 at 11:22, 2996 Victor said:

 

Thanks! It a free weekend, so I'll definitely try to come along, and I'll be sure to say hello!

 

Best regards,

 

Mark

Unfortunately, I've just been told that the Brierfield St Lukes exhibition, in April, has been cancelled due to Coronavirus concerns, so unless something else comes along, Far Wittering won't be seen in public until November 2020.

Edited by Booking Hall
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I've a confession to make. I've developed a 'thing' for brake vans! Aside from the two ready built Slaters MR vans I picked up on Ebay, and the Cambrian SR lightweight van I'm building; for 50p I also picked up this early Triang short brake van with a cast metal chassis and the old, crude, sleeved, wheels. I thought it might be possible to adapt it for Far Wittering, but when i looked in my copy of Peter Tatlow's book 'LNER Wagons' I found a drawing and photograph of the NER prototype. It turns out that this is the one Triang modelled, and actually did a pretty good job of it. Aside from the ducket being a bit short and not 'sticky-outy' enough, the roof having torpedo vents in the wrong place and no chimney, raised mouldings for the grooves between the planking and only one stepboard (in the wrong place), it's actually pretty accurate over the main dimensions! Later models ditched the metal chassis and had a plastic one which did have the two stepboards, but not mine! 

 

Having been pleasantly surprised by learning this, I decided to 'improve' it as another brake van, one that would look at home on the line, a bit archaic and dog eared. I started with the chassis, getting rid of the old wheels and axles, reaming out the axleboxes to accept PECO shoulderless pinpoint bearings to which were fitted Bachmann spoked wheels. the open axlebox ends were covered over by a bit of shaped plasticard and microstrip to represent the box cover. Since I couldn't remove the moulded stepboard without major surgery and recourse to a hacksaw, I left it where it was and added a new, lower one made from plasticard, glued below the axleboxes with staples as the steel hangers. The old Triang D shaped couplings were filed off and new Dapol couplings will be added when the body is refitted to the chassis.

 

On the body, the moulded handrails were carefully shaved off and the ducket was sanded smooth. Then a cover layer of 010" plasticard was glued onto the ducket , a bit longer so it would bend down in a nice 'S' shaped curve to the bottom of the body, and a bit wider so as to allow for a recess at each side. part of this was then filled in with putty, leaving a rectangular aperture where the glass (glue n glaze) will be fitted after painting. Another piece of plasticard formed a 'lid' at the top. I couldn't remove the roof as it was securely glued to the body, so I sanded the ventilator detail off it and made a new overlay of 010" plasticard. I had to do this as all four corners of the roof had been broken off during the van's long life. The overlay was bent around a suitably sized bottle to give it the correct profile and was then glued on.

 

After that, holes were drilled for new wire handrails, bent from 0.3mm phosphor bronze wire. And that is where I've got to so far. Next job is to add the torpedo vents and chimney to the roof and some lamp irons and then it's into the paint shop.

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On 14/03/2020 at 20:31, Booking Hall said:

Unfortunately, I've just been told that the Brierfield St Lukes exhibition, in April, has been cancelled due to Coronavirus concerns, so unless something else comes along, Far Wittering won't be seen in public until November 2020.

 

Sorry to hear that, but understandable given the current situation. Hopefully it'll all be history soon and we can return to normality! Hope to be able to see the layout in the autumn.

 

Best regards,

 

Mark

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