Docks away!, or, making a virtue out of a necessity . . .

[Booking Hall]

On 11/10/2022 at 09:32, Schooner said:

 I know less is more...but in this case bigger is better* to my eyes.

Thanks for those observations Schooner. I'm still undecided, but I'm pushing on with the large fishing boat anyway. I think it might look good placed as though it has just slipped its moorings.

[Schooner]

The only right answer is the one you pick!

 

...and if you wanted and excuse for her to be in that attitude but in a more static situation, then she could still be driving back on a stern spring to get the bow out clear of the puffer...

 

:)

[Booking Hall]

A few days steady work has brought the fishing boat to an almost complete stage, now just the rigging and detailing to do. I think I will model it as if it's just getting under way. Once it's complete I intend to glue both ships in place and then re-model the sea around them to 'bed' them in.

 

As a change from building the boat, I've also been working on an old Dapol kit of the Scammell Mechanical Horse which I will finish in British Railways colours. I scratchbuilt a second trailer top to use up the underframe details which are provided for the Watneys Beer incarnation. Also in view are some of the resin moulded accessories which have just arrived from AnyScale Models. Painting these is another job on the list.

Edited October 30, 2022 by Booking Hall

[Booking Hall]

Rigging the fishing boat is well underway (and testing my patience!). Adding to the detail by making tiny pulley blocks makes me glad it's not a Tea Clipper!! I'm making them from a piece of plastic sprue turned in my mini lathe, with a strip of metal cut from a beer can as the frame. The mechanical horse has now been painted and awaits its glazing, transfers and weathering; and pPainting the resin moulded detailing accessories is coming along nicely.

[Booking Hall]

All rigging now done, tyres added as fenders (on both vessels). Time to fire up the airbrush and dirty the fishing boat up a bit, it looks far too clean as it is!

[Booking Hall]

Now weathered and ready to glue into position. Also finished is the Scammell mechanical horse. An overall view shows the state of the layout at present.

[Booking Hall]

Some further details and an important operational aid have been added to the layout today. For cargo handling a lifting net has been provided, courtesy of our local supermarket where I found a net bag of assorted cheeses. Cut up, painted and given a lifting eye at each corner, it doesn't hang quite as flexibly as would a proper rope net, but it's pretty close. A small piece of lead below the barrels helps.

 

The drainage engineer has also been busy, installing some 3D printed gate valves. Water trickling out will be added when I re-do the sea.

 

Finally, one of the 'plug-on fiddlesticks' has been made, which will increase the scope of shunting operations. I will add some sides and an end after painting, to prevent stock being knocked off. Not particularly elegant, but hopefully adequate. A further one for the opposite corner is in manufacture.

[sb67]

Great stuff, love the cargo net! 👍

[Booking Hall]

Been a bit of a marathon, but all missing photos have now been reinstated in this thread.

[Andrew D]

1 hour ago, Booking Hall said:

Been a bit of a marathon, but all missing photos have now been reinstated in this thread.

Much appreciated Paul. I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds your modelling hugely inspirational. That’s my Sunday afternoon taken care of, going back to the beginning again! 

[Booking Hall]

11 hours ago, Andrew D said:

Much appreciated Paul. I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds your modelling hugely inspirational. That’s my Sunday afternoon taken care of, going back to the beginning again!

Thank you Andrew. Enjoy your afternoon read.

[Booking Hall]

One fiddlestick completed, the other is partly finished. These just (at the moment) connect with fishplates which are soldered to the removable section. In time I will come up with a better, more positive way of attaching them to the main layout. They just allow a loco and up to three short wheelbase wagons to be shunted clear of the pointwork, which should be adequate.

[TrevorP1]

2 hours ago, Booking Hall said:

One fiddlestick completed, the other is partly finished. These just (at the moment) connect with fishplates which are soldered to the removable section. In time I will come up with a better, more positive way of attaching them to the main layout. They just allow a loco and up to three short wheelbase wagons to be shunted clear of the pointwork, which should be adequate.

I like your fiddlestick idea! So neat. I’d like something for one end of my new project that will just allow an engine and a couple of wagons to pass through the scene. That might fit the bill. 🙂

[Booking Hall]

On 15/11/2022 at 21:21, TrevorP1 said:

That might fit the bill.

Glad to have helped Trevor.

[Booking Hall]

Well, that's been a disappointing evening. I set the layout up on its stands, cleaned the track, vacuumed it all, plugged on the fiddlesticks and ran a few small locos. Sadly, only one (the BCGD 0-4-0ST) managed every track without stalling. All the others stalled on every point, and in some other places as well!

 

Of course, the main reason is trying to run slowly over the Setrack points and their large plastic frogs. I don't think I will ever use them again as I have similar problems on Brierley Canal Road. However, that doesn't help here, so I will try some electrically conductive paint on them. With each 'road' being just a dead end and only two power feeds for the whole layout there should be no polarity bridging issues. I think I have a bottle somewhere, but even if I can find it, I know it is getting on for 40 years old, so it may well be just a solid lump by now!

[Andrew D]

I feel your pain Paul. I'm also sworn off Insulfrogs after my boxfile layout. Maybe the old Tin Foil trick might work if you can't find that paint, or if it's the solid lump you fear? Maybe laid over the frog and possibly carefully painted in it wouldn't look too bad. Hope you manage to sort it. 

[Booking Hall]

Well, in the end Broadhaven wasn't required as a last-minute stand in at our exhibition, but at least the possibility gave new and renewed impetus to the project. Just need to keep it up and finish it now!

 

I did a thorough search for the ancient bottle of conductive paint, without success, so I've ordered a small bottle which should be here this week. I'll leave the layout set up in my modelling room for the time being until it comes and I can try it out, then I'll continue with the detailing. I'm not entirely happy that the fiddlesticks overhang the spare baseboard on which the layout is sitting, but it's currently the longest flat piece of board I have.

 

A few things which remain to be done - make some cargo items to put in the transit shed, then it can be glued down and bedded in. Add a buffer stop to the quayside line. Add some cargo to the hold of the puffer (whether it's being loaded or unloaded is anyone's guess!). Once that's done, glue both boats down to the sea and add more waves to hide the gaps, paint and varnish. Add mooring lines. Add general dockside clutter and cargo. Paint and add people. Add telegraph poles and lighting columns to the roadway and bridge. Repaint the road on the bridge so it matches the town street. Add seagulls and their deposits! etc. etc . . . .

[Booking Hall]

A Google Earth type view of the layout to compare with the original plan . . . . .

[Booking Hall]

Just been up on the roof of the International Stores at Broadhaven, and snapped the view from there.

Edited December 10, 2022 by Booking Hall

[Fishplate]

On 25/11/2022 at 20:09, Booking Hall said:

Google Earth type view of the layout to compare with the original plan . .

 

I like that a lot ! I do like small shunting layouts.

[Ben B]

I really like that, and its a great, unusual angle. The greyscale shot is particularly convincing :)

[Booking Hall]

A mixture of general pre-Christmas busyness and the cold weather means that not much time has been spent in the model railway room this week, but I have modified, assembled and painted a bufferstop for the quay siding (it needs weathering when the paint is dry).

 

This is one of the new PECO code 75 bullhead rail ones and was the only type my local model shop had in stock. The modifications consisted of removing the moulded lamp from the top rail and cutting off one set of the clips which are intended to hold the bufferstop onto the rails. I will glue it in place eventually.

[Barclay]

Love your oil drums - can I ask the source? (with apologies if you have already mentioned it)

[Booking Hall]

10 minutes ago, Barclay said:

Love your oil drums - can I ask the source?

Hi Barclay, thanks for the kind words. They're downloads from Wordsworth Model Railway, but I've wrapped them around a straw liberated from McDonalds. I detailed the process earlier in the thread on June 3rd 2020 if you'd like to look back for it.

[Booking Hall]

One of my least favourite railway modelling tasks is painting figures, having to go back to each one several times with different colours and to touch up where I was a bit clumsy. But after several sessions, most of the figures I need for the layout are nearly complete. The last stage will be to give them a wash of thin black to highlight creases and folds in the clothes, and to remove the bases and insert pins up their leg. The figures are a mix of the Dapol workmens set, the two figures which came with the Dapol mechanical horse, and some 3D printed figures from an Ebay seller.