Big jim's (now dismantled) 12 x 6 shed layout

[Anthony566]

Ive had to re-wheel and fit new coupling to all of my MRA wagons Jim

had same problems you've had with derailing...

 

cheers neil..

I have 4 sets of these and have not had any running issues so far ( i haven't ran them a lot ) is there a known issue with them ? Edited June 13, 2015 by Anthony566

[class"66"]

Both my yellow and blue/grey MRA wagons were derailing,took first set back to the shop.

but after speaking to few people at the Warley exhibition last year.

I did few changes to mine...

Hey Jim,wil you be buying the latest Hornby Colas class 56

[big jim]

a few hours in the shed earlier

 

first up i renumbered the colas 47 into "robin of templecombe" then began detailing it up a bit, cut back the bufferbeams, changed the buffers to oval ones to start, still got to add a coupling hook and a couple of other bits and bobs as well as painting the axleboxes yellow

 

the nameplate is slightly too far towards the middle of the loco but i put it where it is to cover the printed "rebecca" nameplate

 

then renumbered and named my 2nd colas 66 as 66850 "david maidment"

 

then i added west coast decals to the hachette "charter rake"

 

 

then i had a look at my observation saloon buffers which i recon are too small

 

so i razor sawed them off

 

drilled out the holes and added some A1 models turned metal ones instead

 

still got to take a bit more plastic off the chassis to allow them to sit back a touch

 

 

should look good painted up 

 

then the final bit for the evening, i tidied up the corner of the layout that is going to be a lifted line, got a laser cut bridge from the DEMU show the other week that i was hoping to use elsewhere but i cant get it to fit, basically im going to place it on the wall as the pic and 'corrugate' up the opening  

 

[big jim]

just a brief hour in the shed earlier

 

finished the coping stones on the rear yard wall as well as doing another 3 panels worth on the inner wall, which i need to make some columns for, then i began to put down some brick card on the wall in front of the rear mainline

 

 

im doing this slightly different to the other wall, its not having a retaining wall and copings as such, ive made the stone 'course' 2 blocks higher than the 'ground' due to the overhang of the coaches/wagons etc however, again using bits from my old layout, im going to add a fence to the top of the wall, (basically the old platform fence), it slots over the brick card nicely with no adaption and as it is mounted on the outer side of the wall it protrudes out meaning passing vehicles do not touch it

 

i didnt manage a pic as i'd not run the electricity cable out and the light was poor by the time i finished to get a decent picture but i'll try and get one tomorrow

[class"66"]

Like your retaining walls

[Andrew P]

Looking very good Jim, nice 70 and 47 mate.

[big jim]

so anyway, here is the fencing im going to use on the high part of the main line

 

 

while picking up my colas 56 from the model shop earlier i bought some bits to build the road access bridge

 

first up i made a frame from 'RSJ' and box section plastistruct

 

then made a central support column from tube and larger box section

 

next up i added a plasticard roadway and intermediate columns

 

between which peco girders will fit

 

added the last bit of road

 

and with all bar one girder in place (coz i cant find it!)

 

just enough room underneath for the trains to pass under

 

i think its looking quite good!

[big jim]

a bit more time in the shed this evening, a bit more scenics done

 

i picked a load of peco platform edges when modelzone had their closing down sale a few years back, i think i paid about £1 a pack, used what i needed to make the platforms but had loads left and didn't know what to do with them.........until this evening

 

 

fresh out of the pack, this is the 'stone/brick' sided type with no uprights

 

cut the top off

 

snapped the platform top mounting lugs off exept for 3 and pinned it down alongside the track to make a run of 'cable troughing'

 

and continued down the embankment

 

added a couple of AWS cabinets on a plinth part way down, the junction and short piece to the plinth are wills 'cable troughing' parts, as you can see the peco bits ive used are exactly the same size

 

 

then continued all the way down the embankment into the tunnel mouth, its tacked and glued to fix it in place so is solid, it will act as a nice ballast shoulder/retainer when i get round to doing that

 

next up i added some narrow columns to the rear of the wall where the brick card joins are and added coping stones

 

and that was that for the evening apart from sorting the handrail on my colas 56 and finishing the buffers on the inspection saloon

[Marcus 37]

Blimey mate, really cracking on now. Some really nice progress with the scenic's. Certainly bringing the layout to life.

Looking forward to seeing more.

Cheers

Marcus 

[yorkie_pudd]

Great bit of thinking there Jim adapting the edges and when ballasted will cover the pins up nicely - top work.

[Marcus 37]

Jim

Just been reading about you're problems with the MRA's. I had exactly the same problems with mine theres just not enough play in the couplings. I modified mine by putting on the coupling bars that come with the Dapol FEA's I had plenty of theses as they give you spares in the FEA packs. If you tip the wagon upside down you will see a bit that protrudes that takes the coupling just nicely. You'll just need some suitable sized screws to fit the hole. Since doing this with mine they have run fine. Hope this helps.

Cheers

Marcus

[DRS Crewe On A Mission]

Hi all,

 

I'm looking at buying some new engineers wagons. I'm debating weather to buy a five car set of the Dapol MRAs or a rake of Bachmann JJAs. Please could someone tell me the problem with the MRAs? Is their an easy fix to the problem? 

 

Thank you very much in advance.

[big jim]

Hi all,

 

I'm looking at buying some new engineers wagons. I'm debating weather to buy a five car set of the Dapol MRAs or a rake of Bachmann JJAs. Please could someone tell me the problem with the MRAs? Is their an easy fix to the problem? 

 

Thank you very much in advance.

 

 

basically the coupling bars are less than useless!!

 

anyway, a bit more time earlier, first up was tidying up the outside of the shed by giving it a fresh coat of wood stain, went for green this time!

 

and so to the layout.....

 

finished the coping stones

 

next up i wanted to have a look at the final bit of high retaining wall along the rear of the shed, i wanted to avoid just sticking the brick card to the wall of the shed so decided to push it out a bit with a piece of wood do give me a bit of relief

 

nice simple job, piece of wood screwed to the wall and levelled up

 

roughly level with the Hornby bridge parapets

 

then starting at the tall end worked my way back with the brick card

 

added some copings and job practically done

 

ive only gone about 1/2 way along the rear wall, to where the track levels out before dropping again to give the impression that "once upon a time" at the end of the retaining wall and there used to be a junction (curving into the shed wall as it were) that ran up and over the disused bridge portal i'm putting in the corner

 

i'm going to make the very edge of the old embankment out of spaceboard when i carry on with the scenics that way (it will only be about 1cm wide) which i will get to join up with the bit in the corner, part of which i've also started on this evening, again i've moved the bridge hole away from the wall to give a bit of relief, i can come too far out as the disused signal box will not fit if i do so!

 

Edited June 23, 2015 by big jim

[DRS Crewe On A Mission]

Thanks for the reply Jim!

 

It's very much appreciated.

 

It's good to know because if the couplings are practically useless I won't buy them. Not going to spend £120 on them and then buy the loads off Ebay probably near on £150 and have coupling problems and no doubt derailing as a knock on effect. Might as well spend more money and buy the Bachmann JJAs.

 

Layout is looking good Jim! The Colas locos are too! Cannot wait for Bachmann to release the Colas 70 now.

 

Cheers Jim for clearing that one up for me

Edited June 24, 2015 by DRS Crewe On A Mission

[big jim]

Kernow are doing the mra's at £89, i think hattons have them too, they have a slight livery fault that ive not spotted but its a fair saving over the normal price, they are good wagons at that price but you may have to do a bit of fiddling to get them to run good

 

There is a thread elsewhere on here showing how to fix the derailing problem with various solutions

[DRS Crewe On A Mission]

Thanks for letting me know about that Jim!

 

It looks like the livery errors are on the grey and blue MRAs as I am just on the Dapol website looking at them. Looks like they have been reduced significantly to compensate for this though because another set of the grey and blue MRAs are £160! I might consider buying them if you can pick them up at a cheaper price. Sure the livery errors won't be nothing too noticeable and lets face it once their running on the layout no one will know.

 

I will try and have a look for the thread

[big jim]

done a bit more trunking on the other line, again going to handy as a ballast shoulder

 

as im running low on the platform edge i'm going to wall mount the cable run along the retaining wall, going to use some plastic strip for it, a lot cheaper than buying more platform edge, obviously i'll paint it up prior to fitting but this is what i'm thinking, (blue tac'd on at the mo)

 

 

also added a bit more wall between the lines and added the copings

 

in the disused line corner i've had a bit of a move round, i'm a long way off getting any scenics in but i thought i'd see how it looked with some trees in place!

 

i got a gaugemaster scenic kit when i subscribed to model rail which had a load of trees in so i've placed them on the embankment, as i mentioned i was going to extend the embankment back towards the retaining wall but i think i'm going to leave it as it is as a "cut back" embankment, with the trees in place its also not as noticable that the embankment top is somewhat lower than the bridge parapet

 

you may notice that i've moved the signal box across to the other side of the line, i've also moved the bridge hole to the left slightly and bought it forward by 'embedding' it into the spaceboard, there is also a Hornby lineside cabinet added

 

once i do the scenics i'll position the trees properly and add some more but as i say its a long way off

 

in my head i can see the blank area between the tree embankment and retaining wall will have a countryside type backscene with some 'shrubbery'  disguising the join behind a nice run of pallisade fencing

[fishytrains]

I like the look of this and think I can visualise what you are aiming for.

 

Mike

[big jim]

i have ordered a couple of packs of these from a company called "scale model scenery" hopefully they will arrive this week, anyone had any experience of this company before?

 

https://www.scalemodelscenery.co.uk/shop/laser-cut-2m-palisade-security-fencing-gates-oo4mm176/

 

i think finished in green they should look the part, ideally i;d have liked to have gone for etched fencing but these are a lot cheaper as i need a fair bit

 

also thought i'd give this backscene a try as its exactly what i'm after, a little bit of industry and a lot of countryside

 

https://www.scalemodelscenery.co.uk/shop/modern-countryside-landscape-backscene-oo4mm176/

[sdw7300]

i have ordered a couple of packs of these from a company called "scale model scenery" hopefully they will arrive this week, anyone had any experience of this company before?

 

https://www.scalemodelscenery.co.uk/shop/laser-cut-2m-palisade-security-fencing-gates-oo4mm176/

 

i think finished in green they should look the part, ideally i;d have liked to have gone for etched fencing but these are a lot cheaper as i need a fair bit

 

also thought i'd give this backscene a try as its exactly what i'm after, a little bit of industry and a lot of countryside

 

https://www.scalemodelscenery.co.uk/shop/modern-countryside-landscape-backscene-oo4mm176/

Hi Jim.

I've used a download kit (billboards) and a couple of laser cut card kits from them and I was very impressed. The laser cut pallets and safety fences can be seen halfway down this post http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/76254-laoson-valley-1990s-to-modern-day-tmd-oil-terminal-p-way-yard/?p=1838580

 

Really enjoying following your progress (& the great photo's on your Colas thread).

 

Many thanks for sharing.

[big jim]

had a change around in the corner, again from the pile of unused stuff, i've replaced the tunnel mouth with a Hornby bridge instead

 

 

 

wasn't sure if it would work but i recon once the back scene is in place and the bridge hole is "pallasaded" up and undergrowth added behind it will look quite good

 

had a bit of a running session too, Heljan 47 with the hachette rake (complete with squeaky bachamnn brake end) inwas going to repair a bit of track on the edge of the removable section but i got frustrated with it so gave up and ran a train to soothe me, either that or something was going to get thrown!)

 

[big jim]

The backscene and fencing arrived over the weekend

 

The backscene is very good, good quality thick paper and not glossy, ive just placed it on the wall with blutac in the picture below to get an idea of how it will look, obviously ive got to remove the white border and line it up, the building on the scene will move closer to the wall end once its mounted properly

 

 

The fencing wasn't what i was expecting, thought it would be thicker however ive not actually made any panels up proper yet, as removed from the card they are very flexible but i recon once the legs and bracing is added to each panel they should be quite sturdy, i thought id see how they look in silver and green, painted in panel of each, silver is enamel and green is woodstain! They recommend acrylic paint which is what i'll use on the finished product but those types of paint were all i had to hand

 

 

I think the silver will look best against the backscene, the green is just lost against it

 

I recon these fencing panels will be ok for areas of the layout where they are not likely to be knocked, leant on or caught by clothing etc, if im going to put pallasade fencing up in 'high risk' areas then i'll to for etched

[Jack374]

Looking very good Jim, that backscene looks the biz, it'll look great once properly in place and ballasting etc is done

 

Thanks,

Jack.

[big jim]

Also picked this up from c+m models in carlisle on saturday from the 2nd hand shelf

 

I was thinking of replacing my substantial scratch built depot building with it

 

But it looks a bit lost!!

 

So i have tried it at the other end of the shed area, replaced the single fuel road with a double track by adding an extra set of Y points to it

 

Combined with a Bachmann fuelling plant instead of the 2 knightwing examples it looks quite good

 

I also got a 2nd hand Bachmann 'modern wash plant' that im hoping to place in the yard somewhere, there is enough room on the road nearest the platform for that

 

I was thinking of a 'back story' as to why the old (Bachmann) shed and new (scratchbuilt) one would be side by side and i recon it could be that the new shed is sited on the old station carriage sidings which since the introduction of units has been under used so has been redeveloped into a modern servicing facility, think derby etches park with its new meridian shed and the old 'wind tunnel' fuelling plant

[class"66"]

Nice TMD building.

just needs some depot warning signs now...