SRman

A minor update for Newton Broadway layout: with assistance from Mrs SRman, I have now levelled the backscene properly along the western end. I had accidentally introduced a slight slope downwards towards the left in my hurry to get it all up for the BRMA meeting. As a small distraction, I decided to de-brand the two Dapol JHA wagons I had in the earlier Yeoman livery. The first side I did was not entirely successful: I used some Fox transfers straight over the previous Yeoman banner. Unfortunately the transfers were slightly translucent. I then tried to disguise this with some graffiti transfers. The other side of the same wagon, and the two sides of the second wagon were cleared using T-cut and a little elbow grease. I have left the bottom blue "skirts" at this stage because they have all the wagon data panels. If I can replace those, I can complete the job with the T-cut method. The first pic shows the 'before'. Second pic: the first side done, with the second wagon still in original form. The remaining two photos show the wagons from their opposite sides.

Rails currently has several Dapol class 73s going at a little over half price, at £89.50 (U.K. price). I need more class 73s like I need a hole in my head (it is there somewhere!), but I succumbed to temptation and ordered two from the later released batch, so there should be none of the electrical gremlins of the earlier releases. I have LL blue 73 126 and Executive 73 136 on the way now. The actual price for me here in Australia worked out at roughly £89 each - less VAT but with postage added.

... and don't forget the 'wasp' stripe ends on the 08 mentioned in the OP, and likewise for any other small shunters.

You could have a look at Scale Link's etched frets: https://www.scalelink.co.uk/acatalog/SCALE-LINK-FRETS.html

You may have to Brush up on your humour there. 😉

Continuing the last post with more photos. On the rolling stock side of things, I decided to run a couple of items that haven't been run for a while. First up was my old Hornby Black 5, which I had weathered heavily. I wanted to de-weather it a bit, so gave it a few thin washes of coal black. I think it may need one more wash layer. These show the before and after effect so far. I also chose to send the Swedish LKAB IORE twin electrics for a trundle around the layout.

I have been modifying the Wills viaduct to suit its new location. It is almost right now, just needing a couple of stone infills on one pier and the join (or rather, gap) where the end arch goes off at an angle. I widened the departure end to give more clearance on the curve by combining bits from two of the arches, utilising the leftover arch from its original positioning - it had four arches originally but only needs three here. I placed it all back on the layout to test the clearances, but it will come back up again for finishing work. In the meantime, the layout is runnable again. After some adjustment to the lateral positioning, I had to move the signal on the lower level by a round 1 cm, but that was easy enough seeing as it was only Blu-tacked in place! 😁 The DSB/DB double deck coach is HO scale but it is one of the longest vehicles I own and has deeper underframe/'tween bogie detailing than any of the British stock. If that can clear the parapet walls then anything can.

If you take the Mk 2C coaches to come, you can add Scotrail and Inter-City Scotrail brandings. The only variation I can't see is blue/grey with InterCity branding (no hyphen). All credit to Accurascale for being thorough.

To be fair, Graham Kennedy who hosted Blankety Blanks was gay, himself.

A couple more photos of the backscenes: one a more overall view of the room, the other the end piece I added this morning. I was working single-handed this morning as my wife has gone to her quilting group, and the alignment slipped slightly. there are only four screws involved, but I needed a break, so straightening it up can wait a little longer. The apparent shadow in the back corner in the first photo is actually caused by the angle it slopes away from the camera as the right-hand scene is actually curved to clear the window sills and curtains.

Most of the sugar cube speakers are 8 ohm impedance. The LokSounds do have some tolerance, with ESU listing the acceptable impedance as being between 4 and 32 ohms. All the usual sound files are locked to a decoder so cannot be copied, but the functions are not locked and can be remapped at will. I have been doing this remapping to many of my previously fitted sound decoders to try to bring the most used functions into line with each other.

Thanks Stuart. I could certainly use a bit of the Southern fencing, and maybe a few other bits and bobs. I'll make up the list in the next few days and get back to you. The postage sounds about normal for small items to Oz. 👍

Still with the upcoming BRMA meeting on Saturday 20th in mind, I decided that I must add the backscenes along the western side of the layout. With assistance from Mrs SRman, and a little bit of swearing, I turned the train room into a shambles for a while! I did succeed in getting them into place, and am quite pleased with the effect. I did also manage to scuff a part of it as I manoeuvred the boards into place in the very narrow confines behind the layout.

No option for anywhere other than U.K. delivery?

The same occurred with the class 92: Accurascale standardised the function keys between the sound and non-sound variants, it's just that pressing those functions that would have worked sounds will do nothing on the non-sound locos. I have been remapping quite a few different sound decoders for locomotives from different manufacturers to help my memory a bit without having to consult the list sheets all the time. That's just a personal preference, but, as you said, it makes sense, especially when dealing with the same type of locomotive.