JustinDean

In the calendar. Nice one Rob. Jay

Despite the van having a flat tyre and spending most of the day under the layout with a soldering iron and multimeter SWAG was a very enjoyable day. Lovely to catch up with some familiar faces and meet some new ones. This was a much needed learning experience for me having not exhibited a layout for over 30 years. The environment of SWAG is perfect for testing things out and testing it was! What I thought was a failed motor at the turnout leading on to the layout was actually insufficient power to throw the solenoid. There were also a couple of dead spots due to the built in switch on these motors not working properly. Some time ago @Middlepeak kindly gave me some Tortoise point motors to play with and these will now replace the Seep ones currently installed. Apart from this the layout still needs backscenes and a working incline plus a bit of tidying up here and there. This will be done over summer before its next outing at Taunton RailEx in October. The Railway Modeller chaps seemed quite keen for an article on Middleton Top also so maybe that will happen once the above has been completed. I’m ready for a lie down now. Here’s a few snaps I took of the layout today: Jay

Thanks Martyn and good to see you! Jay

SWAG is nearly done. Plenty of electrical issues to sort out when the layout is back in the workshop!!! Thanks to @NHY 581 for organising a brilliant day again and also to all those who came and chatted about the layout. Jay

Layout up. Now just got to get the flat tyre on the van fixed. Jay

The layout is as ready as it’ll ever be for Sunday bar one point motor I need to replace. This probably should be viewed as a work in progress! Anyway, here’s some cows. Jay

See you Sunday folks. Jay

See you on Sunday! Jay

Nowt going on at Aston on Clun? Been a while since we’ve seen any layout action Rob. Jay

Middleton Top has come on a long way this week. It now has a fiddle yard and fascia’s are fitted. Some more scenic details have been added along with bits of weathering and general tidying up. Next week will be testing ready for SWAG on the Sunday. I’ve realised that SWAG falls 4 years to the day I started this thread. A fitting way for the layout to emerge I think. Right. I’m off to get a curry. Jay

I’m pretty sure Rob was wearing a shirt that looked like this last year. Also it’s not far off the Middleton Top backscene at the moment. Jay

So far booked for the RMWeb SWAG get together in a couple of weeks then RailEx in Taunton towards the end of the year. Would be nice to do some more; closer to home would be great! Jay

Ah, my neck of the woods! Both in model form and where I live (Wirksworth). Hope you had an enjoyable break. Jay

So the psychedelic sky experiment isn’t going so well. I shouldn’t have used a second dye as this seems to have reacted with the first. I have another idea in an attempt to rescue it…. Meanwhile I’ve been planting weeds and bushes. There’s quite a large area of undergrowth behind the loco stores/grounded brake van so I’ve tried to get a variety of species in there: The bottom of the field barn needed bedding in and the track making a bit more muddy: More growth around the bases of stone walls: The backscene is currently drying. Hopefully I’ll get some time on that tomorrow! Jay

I was going more for The Levellers c1992 vibe mate.