Leaderboard

A few more wagons for the layout. The 2 Cambrain wqagons are Cambrian Models kits. I think the grey I have used is a little to dark, but I had painted them a lighter shade but putting on some Klear to reduce the shadow of the waterlside transfer has darkened the colour. The LNWR Ballast wagons are Ratio.

Another long pause in activity following my participation in the Channel 5 'Great Model Railway Challenge'. Having completed our heat, and then being in the final, we were asked to build another layout for the Radio Times. Then, Peco invited us to have our Santa layout on their stand at Warley, which was followed by a visit to Bognor Regis. Finally, I could get back to worrying about Freshwater, with two shows in February, Stafford and Tonbridge. As reported earlier, I use small 'rare earth' magnets for operating DG couplings. I mounted three magnets on a bar that is moved by a servo so the bar covers three parallel tracks. This gives me 9 uncoupling positions for the cost of 3 servos. However, two positions near the centre of the layout were always a bit temperamental, managing to uncouple some wagons but not others. I put up with this for some time, but for the Stafford show, I had inadvertently left my stock box at home. None of the few odd wagons we had with us would uncouple there, so I had to try to fix the problem before going to Tonbridge. I had checked many times that the magnets were moving to the correct position, centrally below the tracks, so I toyed with the idea of adding a couple more magnets to boost the magnetic field. Then I had a brainwave. This uncoupling position was close to the frog of a point, so two magnets were quite close together. I used another magnet to check, and found that I had one magnet with its north pole on top, and one with its south pole on top. Being so close to each other, the magnetic field was taking a short cut between the magnets instead of going up through the tracks. I turned one of the magnets round, and uncoupling was reliable for the Tonbridge show. It only took me 10 years to rectify this problem.

Once I was happy with the overall size and shape of the bridge, the underside of the arches, parapets and abutments could be tackled. South Eastern Finecast brick embossed sheet was wrapped around a curved former of a suitable diameter (Empty bottle of Aussie red wine!), then placed in a bowl of boiling water and allowed to cool. Once back to room temperature the sheet stayed in a reasonable curve and was glued to the underside of the bridge side walls. Flat embossed plasticard sheet was also cut to fit and glued in position to form the vertical side walls. Underside of brick arches I wanted the finished bridge to have sloping side retaining walls, so the bridge width was increased to accommodate this. Abutment piers were cut from more plastic card sheet and Liquid Poly was used to glue them either side of the bridge. Abutment piers from bridge rear Abutment piers from front 5mm thick foam board was glued using cyanoacrylate, to the inside surfaces of the bridge parapets to give the require thickness for the finished wall. 20 thou plain plasticard was then glued to the other side of the foam board, before using liquid poly to glue curved brick embossed strips to the road side of the bridge parapets. Foam board glued to bridge parapets Curved brick overlay strips in position The sloping retaining walls were then cut out from embossed sheet and glued in position onto the abutments. Once this had dried cap stones were cut from a couple of layers of 40 thou sheet and glued in position on top of the main abutment piers. Capping stones were scribed onto a strip of 40 thou plasticard and then glued on top of the parapet walls. I decided some small brick piers would finish of the sloping wing walls, so these were fabricated from the embossed plasticard sheet and glued in position. Sloping retaining walls End brick piers and capping stones The bridge was then placed back onto the layout to check that it would still fit in position and had the required clearances. Bridge in situ on layout Once the construction phase of the bridge was completed, painting could begin. I like to use enamels for painting on plastic and started by painting a base coat of brick red (Humbrol 100) over all the surfaces. Brick red base coat Once the brick red enamel had dried for 24 hours, the whole bridge was painted with dark grey mortar colour enamel paint and allowed to partially dry for an hour. Grey mortar paint Once an hour had elapsed the majority of the grey paint was removed from the surface of the brickwork using kitchen roll soaked in enamel thinners. The brick embossing helps the grey paint stay in the mortar courses, this is definitely a job best done outside in the fresh air! Grey paint partially removed In Situ on layout I plan on picking out some of the bricks in a warmer red colour to give a bit of variety and this along with a bit of strategically placed vegetation should help with the bridges final appearance. I thought I'd finish this blog post with a few gratuitous pictures of my Dean goods! Dean Goods posing "underneath the arches!" Best wishes Dave

After an enjoyable trip to the Biggleswade show on Saturday I spent yesterday making a start on the basic land forms for my model of Clare station. I had saved a load of 1/2 inch polystyrene which had been used a packing material for some 'up-market' glass white boards we had taken delivery of at work. I hadn't thought the landscape around Clare was particularly hilly but was still surprised by how much polystyrene was required. Sometime ago I purchased a hot wire cutter and this was my first chance to give it a go. It has proved very useful for cutting up the sheets and making nice angled cuts on the edges though I think it would have been nicer to have one that had a longer cutting wire. I've started by trying to make the hill at the Cavendish end of the station where there is a cutting with the small over-bridge. The cutting was wide enough for a third line which was originally used for loading. The white painted panel on the bridge was for sighting the advanced starter signal. From the opposite direction you can see the end of the lay-by and the single line towards Marks Tey. On this side of the bridge is the home signal and I'm toying with the idea that this might be sighted 'on the wrong side' of the track to make sighting easier around the curve. Going back to the station side there was a track down from the lane over the bridge down the hill which gave access to the now-removed siding. The siding was taken out in ~1955 and replaced by the simple coal siding. I'm guessing that in my time-scale it would still be easy to see where it had been. All that is left now is a hump which appears to be in the right place for a loading dock. I don't have any photographic evidence though of whether there was originally any kind of edge (timber shoring?). The picture on disused stations http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/c/clare/clare(1950s)old4.jpg shows the raised flat area but no kind of edging. I've not yet stuck any of this down and I'm trying now to work out how the land forms the edge of the river but it is nice to see something other than just flat ply for a change. David

In my imagination at the other side of the road bridge lies Sherton Abbas's engine shed, turntable, water tower and ash pit. Road Bridge However the Station Building would need a water supply and in 1904 it probably wouldn't have been connected to a mains supply. I've also thought that it would have been more convenient for locomotives requiring water to be able to access a supply near the platform rather than having to go to the engine shed. I'd appreciate any thoughts on all this! I thought that a water tower situated at the end of the run round loop might be suitable, here's a picture of that end of the layout . Stop block end of the layout. Before committing myself to anything permanent I thought a quick mock up in card would be sensible. As the station building is based on Abbotsbury, I thought the water tower from the same station would be a suitable prototype. The card mock up was made, but when positioned on the layout looks enormous and to my eye detracts rather than adds to the scene! Once again your thoughts would be much appreciated! Water tower mock up I probably should leave well alone, but still quite like the idea of a water tower. Something smaller might fit the bill, again any suggestions most welcome! All part of the fun!:-) Best wishes Dave

My son bought me a little present for my birthday, a tiny video camera. It fits nicely on a flat wagon and conforms to British loading gauge in 4mm scale. The inevitable result has been a Youtube video showing a run through the station. It shows up my dodgy track building rather well and I need to get better with the video editing software to fix the colour balance a bit better. I did try the 'black and white old film' effect which is really rather fun but I thought I'd show you the original version! With Fen End Pit going to the March show on 2nd I'll have to work out how to strap the camera onto a 16mm narrow gauge wagon for a trip between the works and the pit! Hope you like it. David

I wanted be able to put a mitre on small pieces of MDF which are used to make walls. I've decided that mitred corners look nicer than trying to interlace or butt joint but sanding the mitre is a pain. I looked at bench sanders as a way to do this but the commercially available tools are quite expensive (around the £80 mark) and mostly very large (sanding disks around 8 inches). So I thought I'd have a go at making one myself. I laser cut the bulk of the components in 6mm ply and 3D printed the 'cone' that holds the grit paper. The motor was purchased on Amazon for £12. It claims to be 'high-torque' and operates on 6 to 12v. Seems quite happy powered from an old Maplin power brick. I've made the front so it can be hinged to 45 degrees, I might try and make a sliding gate of some kind. Initial tests show it seems to work ok. I think I might reprint the 'cone' with a slightly larger hole. I had to drill it out to 5mm because the hole came out a bit small on the printer and really needed a drill press to make the hole perfectly vertical, it is close but there is more wobble than I 'd like. However the results look ok, this is a bit of 1mm ply which I'd laser cut some bricks on the other side of. I am going to need to sort out either some dust collection or a mask. I don't want to breath is stuff in as it might be carcinogenic (bit late to worry about that!) Now to get on with building more fiddle-yard cassettes. David

I am currently working on a new 009 loco that I will be able to 3d print once we get the printers working again. Now this engine may be familiar and if it is then I have done a good job, If it isn't then there isn't much I can do. Anyway the loco is Douglas from the Talyllyn railway. It still isn't done but I am getting close.

First out of the paint-shop today is our hard-working Bachmann WD 2-8-0 which had been the victim of some over-enthusiastic wood painting by my Dad, resulting in paint spatters all over the loco. So here she is after rubbing off all the paint spatters and plenty of weathering and re-spraying. I'd say 'not looking too shabby' - but actually her shabby state is what I was keen to restore! So here she is ... looking too shabby?

In my first post on the modular fiddle yard design I mentioned B8 turnouts had been chosen for the fiddle yard. There is very good reason for this which I can now show. For several weeks I have been working on a few designs for 2mm finescale flat bottom turnout construction fixtures. I started off with Templot to create the turnout drawing then imported this into Autocad as a DXF. This is where the fun began as I had to change some sleeper spacings in order to incorporate a 'hidden' moving sleeper to change the turnout. While this is nowhere near accurate, it suits me and removes the headache of soldering thin wire to the switch blades, feeding them under the baseboard surface and connecting to some sort of operating unit before it even connects to the motor to change it! The above is what I came up with. Some of you will notice it looks like a carbon copy of a Fast Tracks turnout fixture. This is no coincidence as after speaking to a few firms based in the UK I soon realised it would cost from £150 per fixture and all they would do is create a part from my drawing. The risk going down this route was my drawings may not be as accurate as I thought despite my best intentions. I then spoke to Tim Warris of Fast Tracks and he said there would be no problem converting my drawings into proper working fixtures but he would require a sample of rail to ensure the tolerances were perfect. This was sent off to Canada and two weeks later I had a package with my four turnout fixtures, a 'Frog Helper Tool', No8 and N010 frog/switch filing block and a 'Stockaid' tool to file away the foot of the flat bottom rail: While not cheap, I know these are exactly what I wanted and have been tweaked by the guy who produces these for a living to North American prototypes. These tools will likely last my whole modelling life and hopefully produce hundreds of turnouts. They are designed to work in exactly the same way as their American counterparts in that you have several key copper clad sleepers which slot into the machined pockets, the flat bottom rail slots into the grooves ensuring the 9.42mm gauge is maintained perfectly to allow you to solder the rail onto the copper clad sleepers. Once this has been completed you can proceed with removing the turnout from the fixture: The next stage involves a laser cut sleeper base which I have also designed from the same drawings as the fixtures. The few I have at the moment were samples created by Tim Horn and look fantastic but I have since edited the drawing to take the laser kerf into account. This sleeper base is glued to the bottom of the rails: This leaves you with a working turnout and all that is required is a few cuts with a jewellers saw to isolate the frog from everything else so it can be switched. The photo above looks really rough as it is a test turnout and I went a little crazy with my rotary tool while removing blobs of solder from the PCB sleepers. In future I will use a lot less solder and fill the isolation gaps in the PCB sleepers before painting to ensure all the sleepers blend in. This photo shows how much different the turnout is to an American one which is usually created with Tim's fixtures and looks miles better than the Peco Large radius code 55 turnout. The turnout I have built here is a B8 and will be the smallest turnout I will use on any layout. My other fixtures allow me to build C8, C10 and D10 turnouts too so I'm well covered for the future. The lighting isn't great but you can just see the subtle overhang of the class 57 on the curved road of the turnout. This is acceptable to me for a scenic section but I will likely use B8's exclusively in my fiddle yards. This turnout was a rush job but I reckon if I take my time and am careful with the solder I can build a whole turnout in around an hour. I have ran a few wagons and locos with 2mm finescale wheels through this test turnout and they are as smooth as silk. There isn't a bump over the frog and the travel over the switch blades is flawless - Something I never quite managed building by hand! I am currently waiting on an order of rail from the 2mm Association shop which should hopefully arrive tomorrow. If all goes well, I will be demoing these fixtures and tools on the DEMU/Scottish Modellers stand at Model Rail Scotland over the weekend. If you fancy a little look come and have a chat. Cheers Martin (NB: I have no connection with Fast Tracks other than a happy customer)

Now that the scenery at the rear of the layout and the backscene have been completed I've been able to make a start on the layout foreground. I decided to begin with the area immediately below the retaining wall. I built the retaining wall using Slaters Plastikard sheet as outlined in a previous blog entry http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/1131/entry-16523-retaining-wall/ back in the summer of 2015. Here's a picture of the retaining wall and the baseboard surface below it. Retaining wall Summer 2015 I started by painting the baseboard surface a dark greeny black colour, more black was added towards the centre to help give an illusion of depth. I wanted to use a clear resin to simulate the water and found a suitable product at the Telford show back in September. Solid water resin The resin was mixed together following the instructions and then poured on top of the painted surface to a depth of about 3mm. The resin takes approximately 24 hours to set, but as I was going on holiday the following morning, I left it to set for just over a week:-) Upon my return the resin had indeed set as planned, but the surface was quite porous in a few areas and although reflective, it wasn't quite the appearance that I was hoping to achieve! Poured resin surface. While I was pondering on the best way to resolve the resin surface problem I decided to add a base layer of grass to the banks either side of the pond using static grass fibres, I used a mixture of green and buff coloured fibres and increased the amount of green towards the waters edge to give a more lush appearance. Static fibres on pond banks Once the static fibres were set in position I went back to resolve the problem of the porous water! I decided the only answer was to sand the surface of the resin down until I had a smooth flat base to work on. The porosity only appeared to be in the top 1mm or so of the resin, so it was a fairly easy job to remove this using a sanding block. Once I had a smooth flat surface again I decided to try to simulate the patches of algae and weed found growing in still water. I used my airbrush to apply a translucent green in the shallows and then used an old stiff brush to flick little blobs of green paint onto the surface in a random pattern. I was rather unimpressed with the Solid Water resin, so looked around on the internet for a suitable alternative. Hobbycraft sell a clear resin used for making paper weights and embedding decorative items. http://www.hobbycraft.co.uk/crystal-resin-150ml/607011-1000 I decided to give it a go and once again following the instructions mixed up a batch of resin. This was again poured to a depth of about 3mm and left for couple of hours to thicken. Once the resin had become more viscous I used the handle of an old paintbrush to create a few subtle ripples and then left it to harden overnight. The next morning it was still tacky, but over the following 24 hours it hardened off properly with a nice shine to the surface. Hobbycraft resin. Encouraged by this result I decided to add some reeds to either bank. I cut some pale green fibres to length and glued bunches off them onto the surface of the resin using PVA woodworking glue. Fibre reeds in situ. Brambles and undergrowth were formed using theatrical postiche hair and assorted coloured ground foam held in position with matt acrylic aerosol varnish. Brambles and undergrowth. I thought that some lily pads would add to the effect and tried cutting some from green painted paper. I'm afraid they weren't a great success mainly due to the fact that although the paper was green on top, once cut out the edges of each pad were white! I was pottering about in the workshop when inspiration struck! During one of the bouts of decorating that Mrs Wenlock occasionally insists on, I needed to mask some paint and had used a product called Frog tape. Frog tape. Now as I'm sure you've noticed Frog tape is not only self adhesive, it's a rather fetching lily pad green:-) Armed with a paper punch I set about the tape and produced a series of holes into its length. Frog tape after hole punching! The circles of tape that had been punched out were stuck onto a pice of silicone sheet and then a scalpel was used to cut out a narrow triangular section out of each pice of tape. Punched out pieces of Frog tape. Lily pad after triangular slice has been removed. Individual lily pads were then peeled of the silicone sheet and pressed onto the resin surface. Lily pads in position. I also wanted to have a representation of the duck weed that seems to appear on still water. I painted areas along the retaining wall and around the reeds with Humbrol Enamel gloss varnish and then sprinkled a very fine ground foam onto the wet surface. Once this had dried any excess scatter was vacuumed up leaving a fine dusting on the resin. I'd previously bought some white metal ducks, so after a bit of research into exactly what livery ducks wear I had an enjoyable hour or so duck painting:-) Once dry the ducks were glued in position fulfilling an ambition that although my layout is firmly Great Western, I can say that Mallard appears on the layout! I'll finish off with a few pictures of the finished article starting with an overall view of the layout. Overall view. I'm rather pleased with the reflections of my 517 in the limpid and tranquil waters of Sherton Abbas! 517 and reflections. Until next time. Best wishes Dave

Now the track laying has been completed, its time to make a start on the signalling and point rodding for the layout. Despite reading numerous books on the subject, I must confess that I find comprehending the mysteries of signalling to be one of the more challenging aspects of the hobby. With this in mind, I decided it would be a good idea to get some expert advice! Fortunately for me, Mike (The Stationmaster) was a fount of useful information and clarified what was needed during a very enjoyable chat at the last RmWeb open day in Taunton. Apart from the Platform Starter, the rest of the signals on the layout would most likely have been ground signals. However Mike suggested that that a twin arm, single post siding signal could have been used to control the exit from the loop, through the double slip onto the main line. This idea really appealed to me, I think there's something quintessentially "GWR branchline" about shunting signals with the white ring on them and I was keen to have an example on my layout! I decided to use components from Model Signal Engineering to build my signals, so an order was placed with Wizard Models http://www.wizardmodels.co.uk/FrameSetShop.php?DM=wizabout One of the items in their extensive range of parts is a complete kit of components that build up to make a model of a wooden post 4 foot arm signal. This looked like it would be an ideal starting point for making my first 7mm scale signal. The parts arrived promptly, so armed with Derek Mundy's " Signals for the Railway Modeller"http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0950834009/ref=cm_cr_asin_lnk I made a start on the Home Starter signal. Components included in the GWR Wooden post, 4 foot arm signal kit The kit provides a white metal post that's long enough to build a signal up to a scale 26 feet high, but can easily be cut down to make shorter length posts. The instructions state that Home Starter signals were often set on 16 foot posts, so this was the length that I cut my post to represent. The kit includes a piece of sheet brass that can be used as a base for the signal, so I soldered a brass locating peg to this base and then glued the post to it using 5 minute epoxy resin. The signal arm is built up from etched brass parts and these were soldered together using using 188 degree solder paste. I'm always very wary of trying to solder brass to white metal, so once again I used 5 minute epoxy to fix the signal arm bearing tube in position. Post, Base, Finial, Bearing tube and Signal Arm The balance weight/arm pivot bracket was folded up and then carefully soldered to strengthen the joints. The balance arm itself was built up from brass etched layers, which were once again soldered together using solder paste. A 0.65mm nickel silver wire was used as a pivot and the components soldered in position using graphite as an anti-flux to ensure the arm could move freely. Post and Balance arm/pivot bearing The ladder was then cut to length and soldered to the brass bass plate and attached to the post with 5 minute epoxy. A safety ring was formed from brass strip and this was carefully soldered in to place at the top of the ladder. Ladder, Safety ring and lamp casting I chickened out from trying to make the lamp work using bulbs or led's, so the rather nice lamp casting was simply glued into position onto its bracket! The signal arm was tried into position and the back blinder fitted to check that there were adequate clearances to allow the arm to move freely. The arm is simply held in position for the pictures with a blob of wax and will be removed to allow painting to take place. Finished signal I still need to form the operating wire, but In my opinion it captures the look of a Great Western Railway Signal! As usual your thoughts and comments are very welcome and if anyone can point me in the direction of a picture showing a single post, twin arm ringed shunting signal, I'd be most interested. Best wishes Dave

Before I can finalise the height of the backscene at the point where it curves around the front of the layout, I need to work out the contour of the landscape in this area. During the planning stage of the layout http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/1131/entry-9648-mock-up-completed/, I decided to have a twin arch road bridge that would act as a view blocker between the off stage area and the main layout. The height of this bridge will dictate the profile of the land around it, so before I can progress any further with the layout, I need to tackle it's construction. I looked on the internet for suitable prototypes, this link from Miss Prism was very inspirational. http://www.derekhayward.co.uk/EastGrinsteadHighLevelLine/Hartfield/20389229_8HCJW6#!i=1613519584&k=2qrHw3C&lb=1&s=A I regularly walk the old track bed of the Cardiff Railway http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Railway, It's one my dog Henry's favourite walks. Between Coryton and Tongwynlais a very nice five arch bridge crosses the line and this bridge also helped provide prototype inspiration for my model. I took a number of pictures of the bridge, some of which I've included below. 5 arch bridge crossing the old Cardiff Railway between Coryton & Tongwynlais Armed with all this information, I made a start on the model by drawing out a paper template to check the proportions of the bridge and the position of the arches relative to the track work on the layout. Paper template Once I was happy with the paper template these dimensions were transferred onto a sheet of 40 thou Plasticard. South Eastern Finecast do very useful sheets of embossed brick arches and abutments, so I decided to use these to represent the brickwork. Arches inlaid and horizontal brickwork in position Arches cut out & top curved profile cut The horizontal courses of brickwork stop just above the brick aches and are then laid to follow the curve of the bridge parapet. In order to represent this, the brick plastic card sheet was cut back to expose the underlying plain 40 thou sheet. Horizontal brickwork cut back to allow curved brick work to be added Once the brickwork had been cut back, brick sheet was cut into 3 brick high strips and these were laid to follow the curved profile. I decided that a couple of raised brick string courses would look good, so these were built up in situ on top of the brickwork. Curved brick courses being laid Finished inlaid curved brickwork and raised string courses Completed bridge side Once this first side was completed, I used it as a template to draw around to make the other side profile of the bridge. I needed to work out how wide the roadway over the bridge would most likely be, so I counted the bricks across the width of one of the abutments in my photos. The picture showed that the prototype bridge was 19 bricks wide, so assuming a brick was 9 inches long then the bridge was 171 inches, or 14 foot 3 inches wide. This equates to 99.75 mm in 7mm scale, so I cut some width spacers 100mm wide, which was close enough for me! These spacers were glued in position between the sides and allowed to dry for 24 hours. Spacers in situ Other side added Once everything had set in position I placed the bridge onto the layout to check that I hadn't miscalculated any clearances anywhere! I had to cut some of the roadway to follow the curve on the backscene, but that apart it seems to fit in quite well. Bridge in position on layout I've still got to form the underside of the arches, the side walls under the bridge, the piers either end of the bridge and the retaining wall abutments, but I'll save all that for the next blog entry! Until next time. Best wishes to all!