Heinz57 Posted August 31, 2013 Author Share Posted August 31, 2013 Thanks very much for the kind comments chaps. It makes all the hard work worth while! I couldn't be happier with how the layouts turning out. In fact I'm having trouble actualy getting work done at the moment because few minutes I stop and admire the layout! @Terry, that is indeed a Walking Dead poster! I got the idea after seeing the one on yours Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted September 22, 2013 Author Share Posted September 22, 2013 Latest Update 22/09/2013 Hi all, After a busy week I've finaly got around to posting this update; and I am pleased to say that the layout is (almost) complete. All that is left to do now is the Arena building and a hand full of final details. Most of what you see in the following four photos are the final details stuck in place around the layout. I will most likley add more things at a later date but for now they will do. Other than the platform lights at the station, the final details have been the only addition to that main portion of the layout, so everything else you will be familiar with already. The major additon was the construction and completion of the final board, which is the fiddle yard and underground mail platform. Unfortinatly the only photo I have doesn't do it much justice, it is of it in a near finished state but with loads of other stuff hastily dumped over it as I raced to complete the scenery. The board took about 15 hours to complete, spread over several days.The first day was the board itself being built, then a couple of days later with help from my friend Simon the track got laid, and not long after the wiring followed. The platform was completed by spending half an hour here and there in the evenings after work. A week last Thursday the layout was transported up to the club room ready for testing/fault finding in preparation for the Loughbourough Show shich is this weekend. Nothing major to report in relation to this, we found a few minor problems, as you do, mostly due to dirty track and some dodgy points. Everything is just about repaired now. Finaly, a reminder that the layout will be apearing on behalf of the Ilkeston MRC at the Loughborough Model Railway Show this weekend as organised by the Soar Valley Model Railway Club. The show is on both the Saturday and the Sunday, further details are avallible from the Soar Valley MRC website. So thats about it for this update, not the most exciting one I know but there wasn't much to report on. Thanks for taking the time to read this update and stay tuned for the next, Heinz Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdw7300 Posted September 23, 2013 Share Posted September 23, 2013 Looking good. Thanks for sharing Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted October 12, 2013 Author Share Posted October 12, 2013 Hi all, I've been meaning to post this update for over a week now. Only just got round to it! The other weekend the layout went to the Soar Valley Model Railway Show at Loughborough. It was a very good weekend. The layout worked fine and the audience seemed to realy like it. Any problems were only minor. The return on the points failed before opening on the Saturday. That was quickly discoverd to be a faulty connection on the cross board 'D' connector. This was rectified by putting a tempory wire across to 'jump' it. We had a few problems with derailing on the double slip, but this was down to the point not being set right and will be rectified when I re-build the control panel complete with indication LEDs to show which way the points are set. I would like to say thanks to everybody who supported the layout that weekend, and the positive feedback the audience gave it. A special thanks to Stevie B who drove all the way up from Cambridgeshire to visit the show and see the layout. Also, I would like to say thanks to the show organisers for their hospitality and making us feel most welcome at their show. Below are a few photos of the layout. All credit of these photos go to Steve Boley and were posted here with permision. A general view showing the exit from the tunnel, and the headshunt/entrance to mail platform (where the Frieghtliner 66 is) The (unfinished) Arena Building with two stage trucks outside The Halfords The warehouse The bus depot The road and station platform The mail platform The signal box ** I have a list of things to do on the scenery which I will complete before the layouts next outing at my club's show in Feburary 2014.... Firstly I need to finish the arena building, this is probably the most important as it is the centre peice of the layout. Next I will re-build the warehouse building, its good but seeing as its my first finished building it isn't as good as the others, so I will re-build it to bring it up to the same standards. Finaly, and this is the most noticable change to the layout, I will extend the scenery on over the the fiddle yard, I will get rid of the Royal Mail building and mail platform (should we pretend it was sold off? ) and have something else on there. The first idea was to have a Stobart depot on there, now this is a good idea that I like and would look good (and gives me an excuse to display my large collection of scale Stobart wagons) however I decided against it because although it is something differant and isn't seen often it has still been done and isn't completley original. The current idea I'm kicking around is to have the front of a few shops and a car park, half of this car park will be closed off with traveling showman setting up a ride in preparation for a street fair. The rest of the area the fair (will) occupy is off scene, we only see a corner of it if you like. So there will be the ride half under construction and a few modern fair trucks parked up. Although fairs have been seen before on layouts, they are mostly set up and more old fashioned, we hardly ever see them being set up and never with the more modern transports of today. So thats all to come and progress will be coverd in future updates. That is all for this update though, thanks for taking the time to read it and I'll see you in the next update. Heinz Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sammyboy Posted October 12, 2013 Share Posted October 12, 2013 I noticed the "Top Gear Live" lorry in the photos above so that must mean Hammond, Clarkson & May are coming to town with there big flash cars! Sam Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted October 13, 2013 Author Share Posted October 13, 2013 Haha yes they are indeed Sam, Top Gear Live is visiting the BA Arena! Take another look at the platform, see who else you can spot Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium PhilJ W Posted October 13, 2013 RMweb Premium Share Posted October 13, 2013 Haha yes they are indeed Sam, Top Gear Live is visiting the BA Arena! Take another look at the platform, see who else you can spot I can't see the train made up of caravans? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
cromptonnut Posted October 13, 2013 Share Posted October 13, 2013 Haha yes they are indeed Sam, Top Gear Live is visiting the BA Arena! Take another look at the platform, see who else you can spot Do I spy a Stig by the buffers for the bay platform? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted October 14, 2013 Author Share Posted October 14, 2013 You do indeed sir! Thought it would be a nice little cameo there. I've wanted to include him on a layout for a while. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Posted October 14, 2013 Share Posted October 14, 2013 Station looks good, love the halfords yard.good looking set up. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted October 19, 2013 Author Share Posted October 19, 2013 Thanks, glad you like the layout! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swifty11 Posted October 19, 2013 Share Posted October 19, 2013 How big is Arena? Thanks, Tom Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted October 20, 2013 Author Share Posted October 20, 2013 Hi Tom, The arena is just over 2ft long, its big! Its actualy a reduction from the original idea which called for it to be 4ft long! Cheers, Heinz Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swifty11 Posted October 20, 2013 Share Posted October 20, 2013 Hi Tom, The arena is just over 2ft long, its big! Its actualy a reduction from the original idea which called for it to be 4ft long! Cheers, Heinz Oh lol. Sorry me being a blond. I mean how big is Arena parkway the layout? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted October 20, 2013 Author Share Posted October 20, 2013 Sorry Tom my mistake! Arena Parkway is 12ft x 2ft Cheers Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swifty11 Posted October 20, 2013 Share Posted October 20, 2013 Sorry Tom my mistake! Arena Parkway is 12ft x 2ft Cheers Thanks Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted October 22, 2013 Author Share Posted October 22, 2013 No worries Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swifty11 Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 Any new progress? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted March 13, 2014 Author Share Posted March 13, 2014 Hi Tom Very sorry about my late reply, I've only just noticed your post. There hasn't been a great deal of progress on Arena Parkway I'm afraid. Nothing worthy of an update. Over the Christmas period I decided to undertake a partial re-wiring of the layout and build a new control panel for the layout. I wanted to include indication LEDs on the control panel to show which direction the points are set, most particularly the double slip and hidden point. Unfortunately this didn't go to plan, due to the cold weather over December I didn't bother going into the garage to work on the layout and I had a lot of work commitments so all work ground to a halt. Come January I couldn't hold off any longer, the layout was appearing in a show in February! What I had to do was wire each board separately in the dining room, THEN do the control panel on its own. The wiring was completed at the end of January, but the layout had to go to the club room the same week to be prepared for the show so I didn't get chance to test it before hand... Once the layout was up at the club room we set it up to test it and fix any minor bugs. There wasn't going to be any, or so I thought. It turned out that the partial re-wire was a big step backwards and caused more harm than good. Not even half the points worked, the indication LEDS... Well no chance. Signals down, and jerky running on the tracks. Not even the lighting circuits worked! What a disaster, and to make it worse to be able to test properly I needed an important 'gender changer' adapter for two of my 'D' cables (the cables themselves were MALE-MALE - that's no good!). These connectors took three weeks to arrive! finally only a week or so before the show these connectors arrived so we could try and fix the points. This took time, they were finally working at 1am on a cold Saturday morning, the day before the show! What a disaster it was! I did also want to work on the scenery over the winter, do some alterations to that. I didn't get chance to - due to the problems with the wiring. Now the show is out of the way, and the layout isn't going out again until April I have been able to have a good focus on the wiring again. I'm building a new control panel (again, the last one was scrapped), and if I get time some work on the scenery. I will admit though, I'm going to start slowing down with work on Parkway, after the announcement of my new project - Elveden Road (construction due to start in April). The layouts next outing will be at the Bingham exhibition in April, where it will be appearing on behalf of the Ilkeston MRC At a later date I will post whats what with Parkway showing the details of the current wiring and scenic overhaul project. Cheers, Heinz Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swifty11 Posted March 13, 2014 Share Posted March 13, 2014 Oh 'eck! Sounds like a nightmare to me! Any shows up north Heinz? Really want to see this layout in action as from the original pics it looks great!! Edit: where did you buy the little model 'stig' from? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted March 14, 2014 Author Share Posted March 14, 2014 Yeah it was a bit of a nightmare, I came very very close to actually scrapping the whole layout. It was so frustrating, it seemed to be fix one problem create two more! Unfortunately there are no show visits planned up north for Arena Parkway I'm afraid, all of the outings will be in the Midlands area. I actually did the model Stig myself. I started with a base figure - I forget which one - and after a bit of cutting, filing and various other surgery I ended up with that. Not bad eh? Stay tuned for a new update to come soon. In the mean time, if you haven't seen it already Tom, check out my new layout Elveden Road. I think you'll like it! Cheers Heinz Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swifty11 Posted March 14, 2014 Share Posted March 14, 2014 Yeah it was a bit of a nightmare, I came very very close to actually scrapping the whole layout. It was so frustrating, it seemed to be fix one problem create two more! Unfortunately there are no show visits planned up north for Arena Parkway I'm afraid, all of the outings will be in the Midlands area. I actually did the model Stig myself. I started with a base figure - I forget which one - and after a bit of cutting, filing and various other surgery I ended up with that. Not bad eh? Stay tuned for a new update to come soon. In the mean time, if you haven't seen it already Tom, check out my new layout Elveden Road. I think you'll like it! Cheers Heinz Hi Heinz, Yes I had a look at your other layout and am following it mate! I look forward to progress! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobster Posted March 15, 2014 Share Posted March 15, 2014 Nice layout - Like the Bus Depot. Cheers. Bob. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinz57 Posted March 17, 2014 Author Share Posted March 17, 2014 Thank you Tom for your support. Glad you like the new layout too. Any more progress on yours? Thanks for your kind comments on the layout Bob. The bus depot is an area I'm quite proud of too. A few more details inside the building wouldn't have gone amiss, however it still looks good and when its full of buses one can't tell the lack of detail. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swifty11 Posted March 18, 2014 Share Posted March 18, 2014 Thank you Tom for your support. Glad you like the new layout too. Any more progress on yours? Thanks for your kind comments on the layout Bob. The bus depot is an area I'm quite proud of too. A few more details inside the building wouldn't have gone amiss, however it still looks good and when its full of buses one can't tell the lack of detail. Your welcome Heinz! Its been a long few months to be honest and although the maral has been there, I just haven't had time to get stuff done. Now I have a bit more time I have lacking maral and can't be too bothered! Plus my website, youtube and flickr have been keeping me busy along with school work! Lovely layout, and if the stig needs a home after the layouts retirement do message me! Tom Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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