Katier

Most kits do include Castings, especially those on the 3mm shop, I think the only ones that have none or are limited in what they do have are the Worsley Works and Bill Bedford ones, but both of those supply etchings in multiple scales and are very much a case of scratch-aid kits. All the Finney and Smith, 3mm Society and most, if not all, of the 3SMR kits include castings.

Straight answer is definitely. Heck you can put a O-gauge layout in those dimensions However it entirely depends what you want out of your layout. The 0-gauge one would probably be an industrial type layout or small MPD, the OO-gauge similar but bigger or an end-to-end fiddle to terminus. N-gauge you could get a decent roundy in.

Truth be known - quite tight.. under 2ft. Kids have run trains at well over realistic speeds for decades on 6x4 baseboards. Whether that LOOKS right, is a different question, but it will run just fine.

Nice work, interesting to see a completely different approach to my model of the same thing. You say 'finished' but don't appear to have modeled the vertical timbers at each end which are a pretty significant feature of these vans. I went as far as joining the timbers through the underframe as per the prototype, however they have now had to be removed to allow couplings.

Looking at the track plan I can see a lot of potential problems and revisions needed. Can I suggest that you drop a post in the layout planning thread so you can take some advice. As it stands the terminus is pretty much unworkable which will ultimately frustrate you if you don't revise it.

For those who missed it the close shave is featured (without commentry) :- and yes that IS his shoe being removed by the train!!!

Yeah - I bet he's a poor driver too. I was staggered, I'd take the course just to avoid the points and fine - clearly he had more money than sense!!

Just watching 'caught red handed' episode 2 on bbc iplayer and much of the end of the program might be of interest to you folks as it covers level crossing lunacy... including probably the luckiest 'level crossing lunatic' ever!!! http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01rbqz3/Caught_Red_Handed_Episode_2/

Definitely cries out to be brought back to life!!!

Can't speak for the one last seen on the canal.. but Oliver Oss is safe and sound

Sounds like a lot of money unless you get a lot in a packet or is it the pocket AND a coupling? Hope the pockets are available seperately because I want to use them to explore NEM converting TT stock (and thus using a mix of magnetic and non-magnetic couplers on TT stock ). Continental TT also uses N-gauge NEM as it's standard pocket so the concept should work, just need lots of pockets!!!

I hope you guys don't mind a bit of 'thread drift' but the Oss has been recently found on my bed!!! Courtesy of my (new) GF who is a bit of a Pony and Oss nut she decided her (unnamed at the time) huge stuffed Oss needed a name.. so inspired by this thread.. said Oss is now officially called 'Oliver Oss'

Lovely concept and interesting layout you've created. I definitely agree that Hornby's 'typical' room is WAY wrong.. 8x8 or thereabouts isn't unusual as that is roughly the size of a typical 'semi's' box room. I am definitely lucky in that I have a 12x15ft room which is essentially available for railway.. but would never be able to justify even an 11x12 in there!!!

Amazingly so far there is no evidence of my recently arrived 'track inspectors' doing any 'inspecting'

Indeed and I think the recent Railway Modeller series covered all the bases.. including 14.2mm/21mm dual gauge!!

Regarding the baseboard I decided to look on freecycle on a hunch. MDF Wardrobe Computer desk Shelf Unit Futon Couple of chests of drawers All strike me as potential options for a wood based, baseboard (for free).

Regarding manual points. Two options spring to mind.. Peco point motors come up at shows sometimes very very cheaply.. Or you can pick up Conrad point motors at £3.99 each so for barely £35 this layout can be electrified - of course that's a substantial part of the original budget but an alternative project might use, less points and/or only electrify the 'on scene' points.

Even £150 in this day and age is pretty damned cheap!!! Pretty sure N-gauge would do £100 no bother. 3mm-ft if you strike it lucky with Peco HOm track and don't mind running Triang - doable just about.

Nothing - although I'd love to see a success made in that budget for S and T. Z is probably doable, ok no bids so might go well above 100 but there is a Z gauge 'mixed lot' for £50 on ebay right now.. only think you'd want to add to it is probably more track ( points in the main).

Loving it, now all we need is people to accept N-Gauge, 3mm/ft and O-Gauge challenges within the same budget *giggles*

I'd use scalescenes and any other free kits plus some scalescenes paper and/or home made textures (although that does make it slightly more complex). Accessories would of course depend on what but I bet much can be cheaply scratch built ( matches for instance would be free - handy for fence posts ). Obviously the A4 needed would cost.. although not sure how to count the ink from the printer!!

Hope your planning on making this fine bridge out of brass and wood Not sure if it helps with beam height calculations but don't forget the bridges on the old tettenhall line are still in-tact and while being probably a bit more substantial than your bridge are publically accessible and thus easy to measure/access (and are contemporary with the layout).

Interesting reply, ironically Emmyton is an unintentional Minories adaptation ( I planned it before seeing Minories) and in my case is a 4 platform station which, like Minories, has all platform faces with arrival and departure. Unlike Minories, however, the platform lengths are noticeably different with the result that each platform can still serve different operational interest. For example an excursion might be limited to platform one (and temporarily foul the departure cross-over ) but generally 2 and 3 would be departure as 1 won't have much in the way of waiting room facilities. Therefore trains will often arrive in 1 and be shunted to 2 for departure. 3 would be mainly push-pull/railcar/DMU's due to lack of run-around while platform 2 would handle departures shunted around from 1. In addition ( of course ) if you follow Minories faithfully it doesn't have crossovers on the platform roads. Thus chances are while all platforms are bi-directional some stock shunting is the norm.

Unfortunately yes it has. Minories is designed so that all platforms are accessable from all roads. As you've designed it you have to arrive in one platform (which is bi-directional) but the other two platforms are departure only. To 'cure' this you need to move the second 'between cross-over' point to the other side of the nearest cross-over, OR, replace that point and the nearest point with a double slip point. The latter would allow you to keep the length down.

Completely doable. give yourself 3' for the throat, 4'6 for the platforms and 4'6 for the fiddle yard. I'd say mediums would be very likely to be ok.