cornamuse

awesome work - love how the carriages are going. Do they need to match heights? they could come from a variety of sources and times, sourced second hand ...

Well, stab me vitals! I look away for 30 seconds and all this work has occurred. Very much like the talk about people - they are a real fixation for me on my layout, as there is really no excuse for rubbish figures when you look at the lovely work wargamers do. I know some of the figures are out of proportion, but we accept 16.5 mm gauge and shorter distances between things. The important thing is for them to look alive - people are something we are genetically programmed to focus on, so unconvincing ones really affect a layout - especially small ones. Yours are looking great - I tend not to worry about height too much, unless they are giants! what I do look for is clear features and some hint of character- even if that means a more emphasised face. yours are looking great - and will suit those lovely buildings very well looking forward to updates!

So here we have the café finished - A dresser on the wall, with the little known Durham Tea Steins hanging from it There are boards up to tempt the punters and we finally have chairs - well chair backs. Inside the café with the lights on, it all seems very cosy, and enough is visible to make me pleased I bothered!

very nice work! There is a really satisfying look to this station - nicely proportioned and very solid looking.

Very Very nice work here - I look forward to seeing the progress!

Finally made some progress on a job I have not been relishing - the inside of the café right at the very front of the model. Officially the C&D Tea Rooms - named by the small controller as usual (D is for Daddy ) so - the room is foamboard drawn out in ink and painted in using watercolours. the tables are foamboard with legs made from carved Chinese tooth picks that I have had for years. Sadly, the legs will not be visible when the room is in place, so I will probably make it removable so I can accost complete strangers and force them to look at my legs ... On the subject of legs, our poor customer doesn't have any, any more. they wouldn't fit and couldn't be seen anyway. he also has new arms and a serious repaint from a diesel driver to Her Ladyship's Master of Hounds, just nipped in for a cup of tea, cake and sandwiches. He doesn't look overly happy, but then I wouldn't after the bodged surgery I carried out! The tea and coffee urns are beads, pins and the usual odds and sods. We need chairs (backs only) and then I am tempted to carry on until I have gone way over the top in terms of detail, as I am actually enjoying myself. The next stage will be the kitchen upstairs - with a range and a nice big kitchen table and copper pots hanging up.

This is an abso-blooming-lutely fantastic model - I love all the little details that you are working on and adding in - and that you show so clearly how you have done them. I am already planning how to get a working stationary engine into the next stage of my model - especially with working governor! thank you for posting all this Andy

very very nice work there, Mr Edwardian! glad to see you back on with some rather excellent model making. Let me know if I can help out in any way - like for instance cutting windows using my computerised cutter... not suggesting yours aren't up to it - but my awesome wife bought me the machine as an aid to sanity! thanks for the inspiration Andy

Details elsewhere on the site - Gainford spa in boxfiles etc .. Have built 2 freelance boxtanks - one a piano tank, the other a more typical box. They are inside cylinder (because I can't manage to build the motion, so far) the piano tank now has skirts, since I took the connecting rods off out of frustration - runs much better without. anyway - with the early period, and the varied life of these little locos - freelancing isn't too big a deal, as I am sure I can find most of the details on one of the versions, somewhere! The majority of the layout is freelance - the idea being to convey the 1860s on a small independent company in the North East. There are so many gaps in the available information that freelancing has been used for reasons of sanity! A small tender loco may be a next step - again it will be freelance, but with a flavour of ... not sure yet Very much built on the cheap: O gauge, using wagon wheels and "smokey Joe" motors and gears. The rest, chassis included, is cardboard, with an occasional piece of wire or cocktail stick. They are documented in a thread in making cardboard locos in the 7mm area, but cant remember the precise link. All the other rolling stock is cardboard too - and surprisingly resilient! hope that satisfies curiosity, provides enough details and doesn't feel like hijacking. Back to some better quality freelancing now .....

Absolutely, Mike. The green building occasionally visible is a Friend's Meeting House, which seemed appropriate, given the local history! And the small area between the fountain and the tea room will be the perfect spot for the preacher and his wife to hand out leaflets proclaiming the evils of Gin and encouraging people to sign the pledge. Now THERE is a detail you don't often see - I wonder why ...

Just found this thread.... I am currently off work, on drugs and off my face this thread is making soooooo much sense. It also puts my freelance early "Neilson" box tanks to shame.

Good point - I will have to decide who has provided it, to add to the History. It is conveniently sited - by the water tower / coaling stage. I have a nasty feeling it will be fed from the same source! Perversely, though, the real Gainford does have a spring with a nice outlet, where they have been known to carry out baptisms.

Hi guys: Latest steps made : Firstly a cast iron drinking fountain. It has always been the intention to put one in - hence the large stones and semi-circular steps. It seems a little bright, but does lift the front nicely. Second is skirts for Loco number 3 - and a new motor, which required major surgery. Oh what a happy boy I was. However, there was no choice - electric steam locos are NOT supposed to smoke like that! Anyway, with a larger motor and no connecting rods, it now runs nice and smoothly, and I feel like I have cheated ... well only a bit! Edit - multiplicity of spelling mistakes and loco number 3, not 30. although, by 30 I may have made a perfect runner

Thank you - and yes - it will never be extended within the scene - it is built too much as a specific scene. The pithead will most likely be the next model - my small human is keen to see it, although it will take some research - not sure what the early Victorian ones looked like. Downside? more ***** chauldron waggons, which are a right pain to build

Gosh, thank you, gentlemen Edwardian - welcome to the sunny land of the Prince Bishops! This is the dry season Thank you for the comparison to Madder Valley - I adore the whimsy that is in that layout, but it is a BIG compliment! Yes the layout could be extended - it is very much in the thinking - I would like to create a loco works, colliery, and maybe a wharf with a canal. That said, it is a micro layout for a few good reasons - 1) this will be the first layout I have ever got to a reasonable level of completion 2) I want to exhibit at some point, and have back problems, so lifting is a major problem 3) I don't have a great deal of space - so maybe it will be a series of cameos

Thank you Marc - and I apologise for the greens pretty colour-blind here, so what looks right to me often looks pretty horrific to everyone else. I am looking at some pictures and you are right - there is a fair bit around. Given the size of the scale and layout, I feel I ought to get species specific once I have a spare decade or so to do it! In the meantime, however, some slightly subtler stuff will start to take root... Next tasks include inside of café, water fountain for the wall (where the semi-circular step is) and the skirts for the loco.

two here from my micro layout "Gainford Spa" needs more work to make it really up to the standard here - but here we go: Sepia shots from early in the railway's existence - well as early as the camera could manage

no work tonight - been ploughing through schoolwork however - 2 pics to try to convince my 4 year old they are good enough to be added to the "how realistic is your layout" thread. the small human from del monte - he say NO

Painting is VERY much helped by the quality of the figures. No real secrets - plenty of threads on here do better They are done wargaming style, starting from dark colours and building up. Quite relaxing once you get started on it, and you see the personality come through. These AC Stadden ones are so good that ours have names and stories and personalities. I have got rather attached to them, really!

Thanks Dava here we go - buffer stops - probably not right for the period, but I can't think of any reason why not! and a landscape view of the progress. adding some real coal next, I suspect - to the drops, loco facilities and the locos, as well as a load or two for the coal waggons

Thank you both of you! the clay has worked well, and would have been even better if I had a) taken more time and b) done it before I built the s***ing case round it - it definitely looks better with the cinder ballast over the top, but would work well as concrete. I wouldn't try carving setts though - it stays too .. er ... chewy - the carved paving areas are foamboard, as in all other areas. Not sure about the buffer stops - been looking all over for information. It will have to be short, but then the speed would be low, so I guess that would be ok. I am also looking at major butchery to create the last S&D guard to stand on the platform. I know it is supposed to be an independent line, but we have decided to use the same nice red jackets! ALSO need to find seated workmen for the other open carriage. 3 or 4 would do, as I can hack them about to make more. Any good whitemetal ones anyone come across? need to be early Victorian looking.

Dark scatter material added. Lo and behold, we have cinder ballast. good thinking, Dava. may need dry brushing to help it tone in later. Next job - some buffer stops and foliage.

ooooooooooh puddles - that is a good idea - despite the clear blue sky, it is County Durham.

And now .... almost the full layout. Plus all the rolling stock (I am about halfway through what I need for the sequence I want to operate) Still needed - sheep / cattle wagon; lime truck; more chaldron waggons; dandy cart with horse (motorised maybe - not the horse!); more open wagons; carriage wagon with carriage on it; etc etc Loco 3 is getting skirts because I am sick of re-quartering wheels. Will buy proper ones next time!

OK, groundwork at the point where I might not be ashamed to take the model out to a show. need to research the colour of ash etc - and how much vegetation might take root in it. I have decided the line is - as most small independent railways - a bit short of cash, so the trackwork is likely to have some greenery. Well - mostly I am doing it because I am not totally happy with it, and I also like verdant growth here we go - comments and suggestions welcome - but I cant take it all up and start again...