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Hi Peter, I hope that at least some of the ironwork is still out there somewhere. For the model version I’m probably going to have to compromise with the nearest fit from this page: https://yorkmodelrail.com/product-category/00-scale-ho-scale/canopy-brackets-and-valances/ Unless my 3D printing skills get a big boost quickly! Best wishes, Iain

Hi Peter, Very happy to help in any way I can, and equally interested in your project. I will send you a PM with my contact details, but feel free to contribute here too. Thank you. Best wishes, Iain

Hi Stanley, Always good to hear from you my friend. All ok here, just v v busy and rarely have time here to do a lot. Have completed the 3rd/4th rail on the DC/slow lines, hopefully managing to locate the barrow crossings/walkways correctly. Now building the pointwork for the shed area and making sure it all works as I go. Plus building a loco, well, just because! All the very best Iain

Good afternoon Peter, thank you for all and any contributions, absolutely none of which are, or are likely to be, irritations. I’m delighted that this is of some interest, and I hope it might be more helpful if I build a bit more of it and operate it largely as intended. Others on here have helped me hugely and will know more but here we go. The 1950 track plan from BRILL July 1994 that I am working to matches the red revisions on the one above, and the 1948 OS map which I bought. From what I have gathered, locos would come on shed after taking an up train into Euston either: Providing banking assistance to the ecs move out of the station, and coming on shed by falling back as the pilot and stock crossed from the Down EC line to the down fast and then down slow. The two lines to and from Euston and the shed were effectively the “wrong” way around. Some moves requiring banking assistance seemed to go straight along the down slow and so it would take a train loco via either down crossover and the scissors in whichever direction was appropriate onto the shed as it fell away from the rear of the stock. Or some locos simply reversed onto shed along the down EC line which doubled as a down loco line. Whichever of these happened, the loco was then moving tender first along the NE face of the shed to the turntable. It was then turned, and then coaled, and ash deposited at the ashplant. It would then take up a position at the SE end of the shed, facing north, awaiting reversing down the bank to Euston to take another down train out of London. It would have been watered at one of the water columns as appropriate during this process, since the shed area was so tight. If a loco needed more work than simply servicing, it would end up in the shed itself, having had the fire completely dropped rather than just cleaning the ash etc. There is a lovely account with accompanying photos of all this in Modern Railways the world over I think that was the case from around 1937 when the modern coaling and ash plants were completed, until it stopped being a steam shed in 1963. Now, I’ve probably got something wrong, or have explained it poorly. So please do feel free to ask. best wishes, Iain

Thanks, Alan. Mine is here: Various damaged Hornby Scots and a Patriot donated bits. Plus a Brassmasters chimney, top feed and other gubbins, a load of scratchbuilding, Gibson bogie wheels, Comet tender body, full repaint, Fox nameplate and transfers I made several errors: Top feed pipe should be at least half embedded in the cladding. reverser support bracket was the wrong way round I didn’t lop 1.5 mm from the smokebox after lengthening the boiler by 3.5mm, so overall the smokebox door sits about 2mm too far forward. I used a Hornby Patriot chassis, which has the wrong drivers and balance weights (should be Scot ones) and more importantly was doomed to failure in the usual fashion. Iain

Thanks for the heads up. Reading this at 11:15pm in Mumbai, and wondering how on earth I can get a copy! Iain

Thanks again dggar, and Mike. That clip is wonderful. Iain

That’s extremely helpful, thank you. Hi Graham, If you’re looking at the photo I think you’re looking at, no that’s just in primer. The section was subsequently sprayed using a Railmatch can: If that looks too red, it’s helpful to know and I can adjust. I was planning then to use the airbrush to weather the whole lot once ballasted, so this is just a base colour really. Not sure about York yet - it falls during the only 10 days I am in the uk for the next 11 weeks, so a pink ticket may not be justified. But thank you and if I can come, I will, and I’ll bring something appropriate to support the roster. Iain

Thanks. I had assumed the goods yard shunters would be allocated to Willesden, but helpful to know that some were 1B. Come to think of it I had seen an allocation of 0-6-0 shunters in one of the shed books, but had also made an assumption here that crossing the very busy lines to get to the yard would be impractical and so they were there for some other duty. Do you mean they were allocated there in 1959-60 or that they changed to the D numbers then? I have found from http://shedbashuk.blogspot.com/2015/12/camden-1935-1963.html D3849 and D3850 were there in Jan 1960. Iain

As far as I can make out, the numbers on the shunters on the photos I have begin with 13 so I imagine someone (ie almost everyone) will know more than I do. A bit more progress on rebuilding Primrose Hill station: Plastic roof added and marked up so the courses of slates can be glued on and not look horrific. I couldn’t create the exact roof profile as on the prototype because the overall building shape is a slight approximation, so the ridge line on the section running SE-NW isn’t raised and it’s just an L shape. Using the same technique as I did before, which I think came from Geoff Taylor’s Right Track DVD. Slate pattern printed on thick paper, cut out two lines at a time. Each slate is cut only about 1/3 of the way through both courses so that there is the impression of separate slates when completed. Each course is stuck on with PVA, overlapping one course at a time. The PVA is then smeared over the top to smooth and seal. The rest of the station buildings had a few more things done. The platform was surfaced with 280 grit wet and dry paper, and edged with plastic profile. Canopy roof used 400 grit - these seemed to give something in the way of texture but without overdoing it. Stairway completed. Roof of this and all of the Goods Shed workers’ ablutions building roof sections painted with a “bitumen” mix of satin black and talc. The station building roof I made up a mix of Precision slate grey which is quite a blue-green grey, and a Humbrol grey. Water tank, gutters and down pipe made, painted and added - although a couple more still to do. Need to add the station canopy supports too. The section of the 4 mainlines in front of the station has now been sprayed with some track colour and sleeper grime, then cleaned. Still to add the white paint blobs for the 3rd/4th rail insulators, but otherwise I hope it’s looking ok. Iain

Thanks Mike. I have a few photos with some diesel shunters in the background in the goods yard but I can’t post them. I’ll try to read some numbers but they are a little blurred. Would love to pick your brains on signalling one day. I have the signalling diagram and plenty of not-very-clear photos. Best wishes, Iain

Thanks Mike, that confirms what I remembered. Pity. Presumably their successors were just what became the 08. My diesel shunter knowledge is pretty low. Iain

I’m doing a year or two either side of 1960, Mike. I meant that any remaining jackshafts had been moved elsewhere by then rather than that there were none left. As I recall, it was you who showed me the info in a book on your stand at Scaleforum a few years ago, in fact. But equally happy if I have been mistaken and if it gives me the chance to have a go at what looks an interesting build, I will. Iain

Splitting this post up into parts, sorry. Retaining walls for the dive under. On the fast side of each wall, one long line of 80x250 strips, and in the slow sides, profiled 80 thou to follow the contour. Clad in English Bond and topped with some strips to represent the chamfered profile. These were then attached to horizontal strips of 30 thou to enable me to locate them securely with pins to keep the curvature and the walls completely vertical. The pins were then trimmed and dressed so the walls can be finished offsite and relocated. Then, the beginning of a bigger job - 3rd and 4th rail. Peco chairs - tried on the short section of the North London line through Primrose Hill station. Like trying to glue vaseline to teflon with olive oil. No solvent would touch them, not even butanone. Also not cheap when you have 28m of conductor rail to add. C&L brass chairs? Very nice but in the region of £500+ by the time I would have finished. So, advice from Mr Worthington was to use brass pins and just solder the rail to these. There is no obvious chair but I am hoping either it won’t matter or maybe I can put a spec of thick old white paint onto each before weathering away to very little. So this section is a bit of a proof of concept before I do the rest. The conductor rails sit a little low but this is deliberate as it helps track cleaning a lot. Each pin needs tinning, trimming and its hole drilling accurately. Then the code 55 FB rail is tinned on its underside and soldered to the pins in lengths. I chose to paint this section to see how it would turn out, so here it is in primer. My spanking new compressor has a different outlet to the airbrush hose I have, so the sleeper grime etc will have to wait a bit. Feedback welcome. I could redo this if I need to, and better to decide that now than later. Finally, Primrose Hill station building needed a new roof. The original model from the old layout was extended, but extending the roof looked like it was too complex and too flimsy, so I set about making a much more complete and sturdy roof. The building is sliced diagonally by the backscene so it’s not ideal, and the slight approximations mean that the exact roof profile of the prototype could not be followed. But here we go: Iain

A few little pieces of advancement, none yet completed. The goods yard backdrop is now fully operational, with a separate storage yard. I may yet connect it to the up fast which it adjoins, in order to access the main storage yard. But I didn’t want to overcomplicate things and the idea of the goods yard being operational in any form was to provide occasional movement in the backdrop to the main lines and shed. Below is the approach on the scenic side. Only the first turnout is operational - the others are to dead ends and on the inlaid trackwork it was beyond me to make operational turnouts. And below the 2 road storage to the “north west” I have little info about workings in the goods yard except: photos of what I assume are 350hp shunters that would in time become 08s I suppose. Not sure whether they would be in black or green because I haven’t bothered to investigate yet. I have a few older photos of LMS Jackshaft shunters and would have loved to have a go at building a Judith Edge kit, but they were all gone by my period. A tiny bit of info on the “Camden Goods” - a WCML equivalent to the Scotch Goods. I have 1 photo of this double headed out of the yard with a Scot and a Black 5. so I envisage a bit of wagon movement, plus the occasional arrival and departure. Just to change the scene behind the main lines from the viewing side. Iain

Always good to see your work, Jason. Following with interest. Hope all well with you and the family. Iain

Haha yes some of them were running way too fast for sure. 45735 will be hard to match a banker to. You need to drive the trains a bit on here because of the dive-under and the end curves. So making a video is a 2 person job really. Iain

Many thanks, as always, Stanley. I assumed it was a building for those working in the yard but you’ve added a very helpful load of detail! best wishes, Iain

Thanks, Jol….. I know you would! Bring one, and it can. But you might need to regauge it first! Iain

Hi Tony, It’s possible - or maybe a water tank above a toilet block? some very grainy crops from screenshots (I hope it is ok to post these: I’ll remove if necessary) show what looks like an overflow pipe to the rear (the station side). From the bridge: from the station platform, looking south at it: and looking west, ish: Iain

Probably yes. Just feels like a bit of constructional overkill for such a building. Camden No.1 finally got a name, although the board is not too prominent. Neither was it in real life. And a few trains to celebrate the new year. Most of these have been seen before, but things have developed a bit. On here are: 46245 (Hornby body, Comet frames, Comet tender) 46239 (currently running without a trailing truck while I sort out some unreliable running. Same as 46245 bar the tender) 46251 (much modified Hornby) 45735 (somewhat too briskly - Bachmann/Hornby hybrid) 44741 (first outing on video. Like 44687, this was a massive conversion from a Hornby base) 44687 itself 45027 (DJH kit plus detail) 45371 (Brassmastered Hornby) 46145 (Comet kit) 46144 (Hornby body, Comet frames, Hornby tender much modified) 92220 (much modified Bachmann) The trains themselves are made up of what stock I had available, rather than being representative. A mix of Bachmann mk1 and porthole, Hornby mk1, Stanier pIII, Comet and other kits, much modified Airfix and Dapol, and Comet sided hybrids. Hope you enjoy. Iain

I’ve built the main part of the control panel for Camden No.1 which basically will control the mainlines. Finally got all the crossovers fully wired and switched. Laid two kickback sidings off the innermost Up fast storage road. These go under the main fiddle yard control panel and the standing workbench. One road holds 12 and the other, 11. Will I ever need that much storage? Who knows, maybe not, but I didn’t fancy laying it when I was running out of space at some point in the future. Iain

A New Year update from Camden, and all good wishes for 2023 to everyone who reads this, most of whom probably wonder whether I am on Pluto time if I am ever going to finish this. Anyway, here we go…. A couple of bits of building, and refinement of existing buildings. The block below is such a characteristic feature of Primrose Hill station in the period that I am modelling. Yet, while there are many photos with it in, there seem to be almost none OF it. It isn’t quite finished - there is a bizarre little square turret on the low part of the roof to add. Then weathering. The accompanying hut is also an improvement on what went before. The best photo I have of this was posted on this thread by Stanley (1B Camden) I think: I’ve also started to get the station itself done. Again, evidence isn’t easy to come by, but I hope this is a decent stab given the space I have, and it should provide a good backdrop to the main event. Slaters platform canopy awning, and a scratch built platform and what I assume was a waiting room. I have guessed at LM colour scheme, which will get a lot of weathering in due course as it was fairly down-at-heel by this time I think, I have some stills from a YouTube video in NSE colours but only b&w fragments from the 60’s. I need some canopy supports, York Modelmaking do some less ornate ones than those that were actually there, but I will probably go for these given it is only a background. more to come….. Iain

Thanks for these video clips - much appreciated. On this most recent one there was also a link to this: Which has at the beginning a slightly less grainy sequence of the E side of the shed from Train of Events. Work has been crazy recently so not much to show but a little bit of progress on the Primrose Hill station area: Iain

Thanks both, Iain