Wright writes.....

[t-b-g]

I agree in many ways, Tony,

 

My point about Buckingham was that, because it's unique, only you (at the moment?) can 'own' it, and it's thus unattainable to anyone else. 

 

And, I think you're being slightly unkind to it (if without intention). Inspirational it without doubt is, and influential (it's affected me down the years in both ways), but if it were as 'easy' as Peter made out, why are their not dozens of clones of it? There never will be (nor ever could be). It's one of the greatest model railways of all time, and if 'great' were simple and easy, it would have no value at all. 

 

At least you're keeping it going. 

 

Regards,

 

Tony.

 

Perhaps I misunderstood your use of unattainable. I took it to mean that a layout like that was beyond what the modern modeller could achieve.

 

There is perhaps a difference between what is attainable and what people nowadays wish to attempt.

 

I have often wondered if I could build a whole layout with no kits or RTR.

 

Perhaps I could. I have built each individual thing needed for a layout from scratch before but I don't see that I would ever build a whole layout that way and I don't see anybody else trying it either.

 

My next project will be in 7mm and there will be nothing RTR in sight but I will be relying greatly on kits. I am building at least one loco from scratch just to prove to myself that I can and I will probably do the same with carriages and wagons.

 

One thing is for sure. We both get a huge amount of pleasure from following the hobby our different ways and long may that continue!

[Tony Wright]

Not at all. Just that the layouts illustrated as examples of excellence are pretty much all the work of groups, teams or professional modellers and that makes it unattainable for many.

 

As somebody who earns a crust from building models and working on layouts for people, I would not dare suggest such activities are any less of an achievement. Just that few can get their dream layout that way.

Not wishing to suspect your maths, Tony, but of the 19 layouts I illustrated on the previous page, 10 are the work of just one man in each case.

 

Of the others, only two are arrived at by what one might call 'chequebook modelling' (and I'm not using that term in a 'critical' sense) and the remainder are generally the work of small groups, pooling resources for the 'common' good; in effect 'trading skills'. 

Edited December 4, 2018 by Tony Wright

[Tony Wright]

Not wishing to suspect your maths, Tony, but of the 19 layouts I illustrated on the previous page, 10 are the work of just one man in each case.

 

Of the others, only two are arrived at by what one might call 'chequebook modelling' (and I'm not using that term in a 'critical' sense) and the others are generally the work of small groups, pooling resources for the 'common' good; in effect 'trading skills'. 

Tony,

 

I think a layout like Buckingham is both unattainable (and unobtainable) today for a variety of reasons.

 

Though there are still some contemporary outstanding examples of creative craftsmanship in the hobby, the inexorable rise and dominance of RTR/RTP stuff (not just in OO) has meant that far too many layouts seen in the press and at shows have a 'sameness' about them, almost to the point (as far as I'm concerned) of being boring. But, haven't I said this before? 

 

Buckingham, and its kind, could never ever be described as such. 

[Jol Wilkinson]

I can't help with Garsdale Road unfortunately but Marthwaite and Kendal Castle were dismantled after David's death as his widow needed to sell the house.  I knew the people who dismantled it.   The stock was sold, mainly at Christies and the track and some scenic items were sold on the Wakefield Club secondhand stall. I was lucky enough to buy some of the wagons, some track and some of the platform fittings, all of which have been re-used on Lancaster Green Ayre.

 

Jamie

Part of the 4mm Marthwaite model still exists  in darkest Suffolk, albeit in rather poor condition. It had IIRC passed through other hands who had made some changes to the track layout, before it reached it's present owner and several buildings were missing. That fits with bits of it being sold off. I saw it several years ago and was surprised by the rather cobbled up nature of the baseboards.

[Jesse Sim]

More views from the 'far side' of Little Bytham................

 

limestone loading dock.jpg

 

This is a shot I've rarely (if ever) taken, showing the limestone loading dock on the west side of LB. With so many limestone quarries in the area, the GNR recognised (at an early stage) that for every massive block quarried locally, there'd be tons of limestone rubble. This has a most-useful quality as a flux in the iron and steel industry, and was loaded into open wagons to be collected and eventually dispatched to Scunthorpe or Rotherham. 

 

A2 on Down express.jpg

 

Standing on top of a lorry(?), the photographer has captured an A2 on a Down express. I think this view works quite well, showing, as it does, the arrangement of the various buildings at LB. Not all are parallel with each other, something often missed on freelance models. 

 

K1 on Down empties.jpg

 

Now just standing on the dock itself, the picture-taker has exposed a shot of a particularly disreputable K1 (Nu-Cast, by John Houlden) on a Down mineral empties. The reason for making the main line run down a two-thirds 'spine' of the room, meant I could photograph the layout from both sides. 

That last shot Tony works wonders, I remember using it in August for the DVD I helped with, makes a very realistic view. 

 

I always enjoy sitting on that side of the layout, its a view you don't normally see. As if that side is the 'calm' side, if that makes sense?

 

As you would remember from my layout the main side everyone viewed the layout from was the outside with their backsides hard against the wall, two mates commented yesterday afternoon that it is different now viewing Brighton Junction from the middle. As I crawled to the other side I agreed. 

[t-b-g]

Tony,

 

I think a layout like Buckingham is both unattainable (and unobtainable) today for a variety of reasons.

 

Though there are still some contemporary outstanding examples of creative craftsmanship in the hobby, the inexorable rise and dominance of RTR/RTP stuff (not just in OO) has meant that far too many layouts seen in the press and at shows have a 'sameness' about them, almost to the point (as far as I'm concerned) of being boring. But, haven't I said this before? 

 

Buckingham, and its kind, could never ever be described as such. 

 

I agree with much of what you say, especially about the RTR sameness.

 

Part of the blame, I am sorry to say, lies with your former colleagues in the modelling press. There are far more magazines than there used to be and whereas they used to feature perhaps one or a maximum of two layouts, with the rest of the pages being filled with constructional articles, prototype information or suchlike, they now seem obsessed with having 6 layouts in each issue.

 

There are just not enough interesting, varied and well modelled layouts to fill all those pages each month and we tend to see of identikit RTR based ones. Apparently that is what the readers want, or so I have been told. Not this one!

 

The same goes for exhibitions. A dozen or more every weekend dilutes the quality of the layouts and the trade.

 

I certainly pick and choose which to attend and it was a very pleasant surprise to see the quality on show at Peterborough this weekend. Enough to make me want to take the two hour drive each way, which is rare!

 

So hurry up and get Kilnhurst on the show circuit!

 

I would still maintain that layouts like Buckingham are no longer built being a decision made by those building layouts and that there is absolutely nothing stopping anybody who wants to build such a layout from doing so.

 

If people could build layouts like Buckingham but choose not to because kits and RTR make their objective so much easier to reach, does that make it unattainable or just no longer desirable?

 

As for the maths, there were a number of layouts that I didn't recognise, so my thoughts were based on the ones I did know and I am happy to stand corrected if the ones I didn't know are all "one man" efforts.

 

Speaking of which, I have never built a layout by myself before the present project. They were all joint efforts with my dad, Malcolm Crawley, Ken Hill or Tony Johnson. So it will be a good test for me to see if I can actually do it!

 

It is odd not having somebody to bounce ideas off and when faced with several answers to a question, choosing the one to go for was much easier with more than one brain looking at the problem.

 

Back to the shed now, to put the finishing touches to a GCR tender in 7mm. The brake pull rods in the kit have been chucked away because the real ones were round bar, not flat rod. New ones are nearly finished. Nobody will ever see them but I will know.

[St Enodoc]

So, to play devils advocate, is it your view that if one has the means to invest heavily in a model railway, or to buy in help because we lack skills in all areas, and/or a large circle of skilled volunteers, then it is unlikely that the layout will attain "inspirational" or "iconic" status?

Tony

I'll bite Tony!

 

The Norris layout fell into exactly the category you describe and even after all these decades I still find looking at pictures of it inspirational. As a pioneer of finescale 7 mm modelling it can probably be called iconic too.

[Lecorbusier]

 

..... because kits and RTR make their objective so much easier to reach,

 

Surprised to see kits alongside RTR .... ? excluding heavily modified RTR used as a starting point as these are far from RTR in reality.

 

And kits of course if they are to represent a specific loco at a specific time also require an element of scratch building ... so again as a starting point.

[t-b-g]

Surprised to see kits alongside RTR .... ? excluding heavily modified RTR used as a starting point as these are far from RTR in reality.

 

And kits of course if they are to represent a specific loco at a specific time also require an element of scratch building ... so again as a starting point.

 

That is really a reference specific to Buckingham. Apart from the famous GWR Clerestories and a handful of wagons, everything else is scratchbuilt.

 

I have had layouts myself with no RTR on them but never one with all scratchbuilt.

[Clive Mortimore]

Yes, Clive, but the MR connections they "already" had were - and remain - worse than those on the GC.

 

I seriously doubt you will find many folk, if indeed anyone, living in the East Midlands of an age to remember the GC line before it was emasculated who would regard what we now call the 'Midland Main Line' as a better route - for passengers or freight. In either direction, too.  As a small boy I traveled on a number of occasions to Sheffield to visit relatives there, and my parents wouldn't have dreamed of going via Nottingham Midland Station in preference to Nottingham Victoria.

 

In more recent times the debate about the need to electrify the awful MML has been going on for over 30 years and still keeps getting kicked into the long grass.  There was a serious movement in the local business and political communities here a few years ago proposing that if the full electrification couldn't be afforded then we should go back to the route pattern of the 1850s, and give Nottingham a direct route to London by just electrifying the stretch of the old GN line to Grantham, joining the ECML there and on down to King's Cross.  Apparently it had been worked out that there was ECML line capacity to do that, and despite being longer than via an 'electrified' MML it would be faster too.  The notion failed because it was pointed out that removing the Nottingham inter-city passenger traffic from the MML would make the latter completely financially unviable.  So our travellers struggle on with a route that was pretty poor for most of the 20th Century and remains so today!

Ask the people of Kettering, Wellingborough or Bedford if they would be willing to travel to Northampton to be connected to the national railway system,because that is what the choice would be had the MR route been closed.

 

The residents of Rugby already had a good service on the WCML, and those of Banbury had the GWR line. What other sizeable town did the GCR run through south of Leicester?  

[Lecorbusier]

That is really a reference specific to Buckingham. Apart from the famous GWR Clerestories and a handful of wagons, everything else is scratchbuilt.

 

I have had layouts myself with no RTR on them but never one with all scratchbuilt.

One thing I have always been interested about is, ..... if you design a series of one off etches and then build a loco from them turning (or lets say 3d printing) your own chimney and dome etc ... would that constitute kit or scratch building? or is it someone else building from the etches which makes it a kit, even if heavily modified for their own purposes?

[Chamby]

Ask the people of Kettering, Wellingborough or Bedford if they would be willing to travel to Northampton to be connected to the national railway system,because that is what the choice would be had the MR route been closed.

 

The residents of Rugby already had a good service on the WCML, and those of Banbury had the GWR line. What other sizeable town did the GCR run through south of Leicester?

 

And that is exactly the point. At the time the GC was run down, car ownership was still mostly a middle class phenomenon and the railway network was still a necessity for the wider populous. The LM line was retained precisely because it served more communities. The irony is that the future need was for fast, unfettered running between major centres, for which the GC would have been much better suited.

 

Yes, misguided loyalties probably influenced the decision making as well, but they weren’t the first people to misread the future!

 

Phil.

 

Phil.

[t-b-g]

One thing I have always been interested about is, ..... if you design a series of one off etches and then build a loco from them turning (or lets say 3d printing) your own chimney and dome etc ... would that constitute kit or scratch building? or is it someone else building from the etches which makes it a kit, even if heavily modified for their own purposes?

I had that debate several times with the late Malcolm Crawley. He designed several loco kits and always reckoned that if he designed and built the kit, his loco was a scratchbuild but anybody else building the same components was building a kit.

 

I always said that if you design the components but they are made by machine, you have become a kit manufacturer rather than a scratchbuilder.

 

We never did agree and I still can't say for sure who was right.

 

My personal definition is that the major components have to be unique and individual to that particular model. When I build a loco from scratch by cutting out sheet metal with a saw, if I build a second one it will be slightly different.

 

But it is a huge grey area and the old terminology on kits and scratchbuilding doesn't really cover modern technology very well.

 

I would probably say that any model where the major components can be mass produced is more manufacturing than scratchbuilding but others may see it otherwise and their views are just as valid as mine.

Edited December 4, 2018 by t-b-g

[Northmoor]

I am sure there are many of us who would love to be able to model one of our favorite locations. Space and time are normally the enemies of such ambitions.

To model Woodford Halse between convenient scenic breaks, to 4mm scale will require something like 50'x15', so that's not happening for me any time soon, sadly.

[jamie92208]

Part of the 4mm Marthwaite model still exists  in darkest Suffolk, albeit in rather poor condition. It had IIRC passed through other hands who had made some changes to the track layout, before it reached it's present owner and several buildings were missing. That fits with bits of it being sold off. I saw it several years ago and was surprised by the rather cobbled up nature of the baseboards.

 

The Marthwaite that I got parts of was the 7mm version, I can't help with the fate of the 4mm version I'm afraid.

 

Jamie

[Tony Wright]

One thing I have always been interested about is, ..... if you design a series of one off etches and then build a loco from them turning (or lets say 3d printing) your own chimney and dome etc ... would that constitute kit or scratch building? or is it someone else building from the etches which makes it a kit, even if heavily modified for their own purposes?

I think it interests many others, Tim,

 

In my days of scratch-building, and judging scratch-built models, I think the generally-accepted convention was, especially with regard to locos, that if you made the main chassis/body parts (from whatever material one chose), then that was scratch-building. Acceptable bought-in parts were, obviously, wheels and motor, plus turned/cast/etched items such as buffers, boiler fittings and valve gear components. 

 

Today, the 'goalposts' have not only been moved, they're an entirely different shape. 

 

It's been my privilege to photograph the work recently of Atso (Steve), in 2mm Scale. He designs loco bodies using a computer, then has them 3D-printed. He then hand-finishes them. To me, it's every bit a part of scratch-building (even more so) as anything 'traditional'. The big difference is that most of what he does is cerebral (which counts me out!), rather than artisan-skill-based (though the latter is needed). 

 

Is the ultimate 'scratch-builder' now the girl/guy who designs/draws, say, a brass/nickel silver loco, has it etched, then solders it all together? Over to you, Mr Edge.

Edited December 4, 2018 by Tony Wright

[t-b-g]

Just to prove that my evening has not been wasted totally on the internet here are a couple of snaps of the nearly finished tender, complete with round brake pull rods with forked joints onto the cross stays.

 

Sand boxes and operating handles plus a few other details to fit but most enjoyable so far!

 

Tablet camera used so probably poor quality but I can't be bothered with the proper camera tonight.

[Headstock]

Ask the people of Kettering, Wellingborough or Bedford if they would be willing to travel to Northampton to be connected to the national railway system,because that is what the choice would be had the MR route been closed.

 

The residents of Rugby already had a good service on the WCML, and those of Banbury had the GWR line. What other sizeable town did the GCR run through south of Leicester?  

 

Evening Clive,

 

I'm sure that it would have been cheaper to bulldozer Bedford, Wellingborough and Kettering and move the population  to Woodford south New town. Alternatively, a stunted Midland branch line, a Jinty and a couple of coal wagons would have sufficed.

[Arun Sharma]

One thing I have always been interested about is, ..... if you design a series of one off etches and then build a loco from them turning (or lets say 3d printing) your own chimney and dome etc ... would that constitute kit or scratch building? or is it someone else building from the etches which makes it a kit, even if heavily modified for their own purposes?

You mean rather like the L12 that I did for Tony Teague of this parish?

I would say that the answer doesn't matter as the question [and its answer] contributes nothing that could in any way assist someone who wanted to do something similar. Everyone will have his own opinion which will be flavoured by irrelevances such as whether the 3d printer lives on your own workshop table or whether it lives in some firm's 3D print bureau 150miles away - or whether the etches were drawn using a CAD package or using red, cyan and black pens on a large sheet of paper.

Questions such as "is this a kit or is it scratchbuilt ? [or any combination thereof] are as passe as, "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin" - I would suggest.

Edited December 5, 2018 by Arun Sharma

[Clive Mortimore]

I think it interests many others, Tim,

 

In my days of scratch-building, and judging scratch-built models, I think the generally-accepted convention was, especially with regard to locos, that if you made the main chassis/body parts (from whatever material one chose), then that was scratch-building. Acceptable bought-in parts were, obviously, wheels and motor, plus turned/cast/etched items such as buffers, boiler fittings and valve gear components. 

 

Today, the 'goalposts' have not only been moved, they're an entirely different shape. 

 

It's been my privilege to photograph the work recently of Atso (Steve), in 2mm Scale. He designs loco bodies using a computer, then has them 3D-printed. He then hand-finishes them. To me, it's every bit a part of scratch-building (even more so) as anything 'traditional'. The big difference is that most of what he does is cerebral (which counts me out!), rather than artisan-skill-based (though the latter is needed). 

 

Is the ultimate 'scratch-builder' now the girl/guy who designs/draws, say, a brass/nickel silver loco, has it etched, then solders it all together? Over to you, Mr Edge.

Wot about the bloke who does similar but with plastic card?

 

I draw, design, hand cut, then glue it all together. OK I use commercial power units but I have had a go at making my own and failed so I adopted "why reinvent the wheel " attitude. The rigid framed locos have scratchbuilt chassis.

[t-b-g]

Wot about the bloke who does similar but with plastic card?

 

I draw, design, hand cut, then glue it all together. OK I use commercial power units but I have had a go at making my own and failed so I adopted "why reinvent the wheel " attitude. The rigid framed locos have scratchbuilt chassis.

 

If you could mass produce what you have made, for example if you cut the bits out with a laser cutter or other machine, I would say that you are manufacturing components. If you cut your plastcard bits out with a knife and a scalpel, I would call it scratchbuilding. So your crucial word to me is the "hand" in hand cut.

 

Using a commercial power bogie wouldn't alter that for me any more than buying in wheels motor and gears would for other people.

[Willie Whizz]

Ask the people of Kettering, Wellingborough or Bedford if they would be willing to travel to Northampton to be connected to the national railway system,because that is what the choice would be had the MR route been closed.

 

The residents of Rugby already had a good service on the WCML, and those of Banbury had the GWR line. What other sizeable town did the GCR run through south of Leicester?  

 

Aaaah - you mean like Mansfield, which was left the largest town in England without any passenger rail service for 30-odd years?  You will forgive me if, based on practical experience,  my sympathy is only limited ... besides, the lower end of the MML could easily have continued back in the 60s as part of the extended London Commuter network, which that bit of it they did miraculously somehow find the money to electrify a while back pretty much still is today.

 

Mind you, though I have limited interest in or practical personal use for the modern railway, I confess I find the proposals for HS2 for the East Midlands baffling.  What on earth is the benefit of being able to go like a bat out of hell all the way to a semi-derelict marshalling yard half-way between Derby and Nottingham, only then to have to change transport mode and catch a bus, taxi or (for Nottingham, if they can find the money to extend it two more stops) tram, which is likely to add at least the best part of half an hour in normal daytime traffic, let alone rush-hour, to city-centre to (either) city-centre journey times?  But the publicity naturally doesn't spell that out.  Better by far to spend a fraction of the money electrifying the MML and straightening-out the worst of the kinks.  I won't go 'all political' on what we could spend the rest of the saving upon, but you don't need much imagination to work it out.  And I do include 'HS3' in that.

[Michael Edge]

My work database lists how each model was built, the categories are s, ck, ek, p/e and MDE. S is only used it I have cut most of the parts from sheet, if I have designed and etched nearly all of it MDE is used. I still build quite a lot from scratch, not everything is etched even now.

In answer to Clive, you are definitely a scratchbuilding, just using different materials.

[Chamby]

Might I suggest that all of us on here are doing the same thing, but to a greater or lesser extent. Has anyone built a layout and all its locomotives and stock by themselves, completely from scratch? Tony makes reference to “acceptable bought in parts such as wheels, motor, turned brass and etchings etc...” and openly acknowledges the work of other people to compile LB. What we all do, to a greater or lesser extent, is bring together pre-prepared, usually purchased or traded components and add to this with our own modifications or original work to produce a composite result: part component, part original work. You only need to draw up a list of the manufacturers names of the components you use to see how much is pre-prepared for us. From Canon to Romford to DJH to HMRS to Hornby... these are all someone else’s work that you are compositing.

 

Of course there is a huge difference between someone building and fettling a kit, compared to simply sticking a crew, lamps and coal on a RTR model, but they are opposite ends of what is a very broad but importantly the same spectrum.

 

We will all have different views about where on this spectrum, a line is drawn about what constitutes ‘proper’ modelling or not. Often this will change over time as ones modelling expertise develops, and judgement becomes more critical as a result.

 

So it is unfair to talk in terms of black and white about what is ‘proper’ or not. We’re all modelling in the same way, just to different degrees.

 

Phil.

[EHertsGER]

Oh, all right, I’ll get into this, mulling over the consequences of my own laziness. In one instance I built a kit, but when I added up the parts I replaced by fabrication, as well as the rest of it that just had to be made from scratch, what did I build? To me it was just a kit, but now somebody else is going to paint it for me. Something like 70% is scratchbuilt, but I can’t, in my conscience, call it that. I’ve built another totally from scratch and yet that is to be painted by said subcontractor. Still scratchbuilt? I’ve built ‘out of the box’, painted and lined it: it’s a kit. Airfix on a grander scale, perhaps? I’ve built a body on a scratchbuilt chassis - still a kit, ‘cos most of it came out of a box. To me I’m scratchbuilding if I fabricate the parts, but then I bought another kit and threw the main parts, keeeping most of the castings I would have bought for a scratchbuilt effort. Still a kit? Oh, who cares! I enjoyed doing so and enjoy the results. Just ignore me.

 

Best,

Marcus