Kelly

When helping out on the DEMU stand at the recent Diesel and Electric Show in Telford the other weekend there was a number of children interested in the models on display (both boys and girls). They seemed more interested in the Hornby APT and Networker than anything else on display as they probably looked closer to anything they've seen. What was nice was that the kids were interested and the parents were asking about how to develop that interest and costs, so the costs of second hand/railroad and newer stuff got explained as well as the Dapol kits as a cheap way to get them interested in that side (in the same way Airfix airplane kits could to some extent (some of the Airfix vehicle kits are usable too for model railways after all)).

Growing up where I did (Barnehurst/Erith/Woolwich), it was always going to be 3rd rail though if it wasnt going to be 3rd rail it'd be 4th or military narrow gauge (plans for both exist!). Reason for 3rd rail is it is a much simpler plan to try first. Will be the first proper layout I've attempted to build on my own too, apart from my father's aborted (his work meant he never had the time to fix the gremlins or get much beyond layout some track and wiring it up) layout in what was my bedroom (it was levered on the wall above my bed and I kept bashing my head on it!).

That Matilda is great The markets for airbrushes are fairly varied, from model makers/wargamers to body painting to craft and art. Obviously this is a boon for those of us on a budget computer case modders also use them, as do some car and bike customisers (for the file detail, such as ghosted skulls etc).

Morning. Full of cold on this sunny Monday morning. Thinking I'll go back to bed now I've had a play with Templot and figured most of it out.

Thought I'd make a topic for the layout now something is starting to happen with it (there planning and thoughts stuff over on the blog on here too). The most recent entries below: Key points of interest: NSE 1988-1994 era (initially) SE London area (Woolwich/Charlton) 3rd rail electric EMUs DCC (MERG) MERG CBUS system P4 Modular Planned using templot software - almost finished. Lasercut baseboards from Tim Horn - to be ordered Index: Planning and Research - Pages 1, 2 & 3 so far Templot plans - Pages 1, 2 & 3 Area photos - Pages 1 & 2 Baseboard building DCC/MERG/CBUS/Electronics Track construction Scenic items/buildingsIconic structures Chimney (pages 1-3 research) Substations (pages 1-3 research) Prior blog postings: https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blogs/entry/17505-track-planning-with-templot-dcc-and-baseboards/ https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blogs/entry/17470-%7B?%7D/ Updates and more information: For the latest updates to the plan see post 52. DCC/MERG/CBUS/electronics. Baseboards. Track construction. For some excellent and useful photos of the area to be modelled/based on, see unravelled's post here. For the latest stock updates see here. A bit about the layout: The layout will be based on the Woolwich Dockyard area of South East London. Part of the former Southern Railway's North Kent Lines. The initial era is to be around 1988-1994, so firmly in the NSE era, but also approaching privatisation. I extended it to '94 so that I could make use of the '92s I have. The likelyhood is I'll run a timetable of some sort for a particular year at a time so the most likely is to be about '92 with EPBs being on their last years and Networkers just coming into service in small numbers. The track plan and area have been chosen as they're rather generic in nature and fairly simple. With a bit of work in changed buildings both the era and the area could be changes. Technically any era from electrification to present could be represented by the plan with suitable removable items (all items except track and electronics will be removable for storage reasons). In practical terms it will likely be late 1950s-present as limit to era represented as whilst I could feasibly represent different era buildings and so on, I'm not sure it'd be practical to have colour lights and semaphore signals interchangeable (the point ridding would be a pain). The track plan: Originally I planned it in Templot and came up with this plan: It looked nice with the sweeping curves, but I was never certain I could reliably build a crossover over a transition curve. I also wanted a single slip on the left, but initially struggled to get it right in templot. Eventually I came up with the following plan: With assistance from Templot Club forum, the single slip was corrected and the other aspects tidied up. This is 95% there, theres a few items to be tidied up, but it is about how I want it now I think. Baseboards: Due to space restraints I know I cannot reasonably expect to have the full 11ft (plus 4ft each end for traverser) set up at home, so the plan from the start had to be modular in nature so each section can operate independently and also go together in different configurations. Using Tim Horn's laser cut base boards allows this to be achieved I think, as I can rely on them being able to be matched up with each other. This is another reason why the plan ended up straight rather than curved. The boards will be ordered from Tim Horn in due course, in 3ftx2ft sections, and one 2ftx2ft section for the level crossing. I'm still figuring out the exact dimensions and one board might be split down to allow a board to be 'dropped' lower to allow an underpass to be incorporated. Control and Electronics: I'm very much a geek and very keen on computers in general, so computer control has appealed from day one for me. But I don't want to limit myself to needing a computer to operate the layout, having it would be nice, but it isn't essential. DCC is though. Sound would be nice, but that will be a feature for a later development. I am a member of MERG (as well as the EMGS and Scalefour Society) and so intend to use their CBUS/DCC system as it will save on costs and seems to work rather well. I want to incorporate an eNtrance eXit panel for the control of the points/signals. Proper operation of the signals is something that is important to me and my cohort Natalie. Thankfully a member of MERG has already developed something like this using the CBUS system, so hopefully I can adapt it for my needs.

Great work on the CIGs. Will look forward to your future updates on your progress with the current CIG you've got on the go.

I've been trying to get my head around using the various software available for planning and controlling layouts, namely Templot and JMRI. I've mostly figured out Templot now I think. A rough plan has been drawn as below: I've been trying to figure out making it a bit more condensed (due to space restrictions) by using a crossing/slip, but haven't quite gotten it as one bit is misaligned. Being full of cold I'm not able to concentrate now to fix it,but I'm getting there at least! I'm not 100% sure which works best at present though. Seeing as I'm going with EM Gauge, I wish to keep the number of points as low as possible as I've yet to attempt to build any, so the double slip/crossing might be more complex than i can manage to build. We'll see though. I have been looking into affordable ways to go DCC and have found the possibility of a SPROG 3 + Raspberry Pi + JMRI. I already have a spare Raspberry Pi left over from when I upgraded to a Pi 2 for my media centre, and JMRI is free. So only the SPROG 3 (and possibly a wifi dongle and power booster) to buy at around £60, which is about affordable if I scrimp for a couple of weeks. The SPROG will also be useful as a programmer at a later date when I hope to get an NCE PowerCab. Figuring out JMRI will take a bit more time I think, but I think I've partly gotten the hang of how bits of it work, but until I have some kind of controller to go with it I can't make much more progress. Finally I've made the decision that getting the boards laser cut by Tim Horn feels the best bet as I'm not really that confident of my woodworking skills, and haven't really the space for that sort of working to some extend. The prices Tim's quoted are affordable if I spread a module out over a few months or so at least, so I can get one board started then order another later, knowing they'll interlink. The plan is still to keep the boards plain with all buildings and signals etc removable for safer storage. I'm thinking of getting the boards double depth to allow storage when in use for setting up items for the fiddle yard. The plan is to use cassettes rather than have a dedicated fiddle yard board made up, thus saving cost of some track. UPDATE: It seems that a new Rapsberry Pi Model B 3 has been released, featuring same chip and graphics as the Pi 2, but with built in wifi n and bluetooth 4.0. That could well be just the ticket with JMRI and mean no need for a seperate dongle for the wifi. A bargain at £35 too! UPDATE 2: there is now a layout thread for this layout here. There is also a thread for what I'm working on atm here.

I attended (with Natalie) the Diesel & Electric Show on the 19th and 20th of February, the first time it has been held and first time I've been to the Telford International Centre. We were there helping out on the DEMU stand all weekend. On the Sunday I started working on my 465/2 conversion from Hornby spare Networker (466) bodyshells, but more on that later. First a quick report. The show itself was good I felt, though I felt it could be improved in a few areas. Parking (particularly attendant/security communications in relation to directing etc) was a bit of an issue on the Saturday, but less of an issue Sunday. Aside from that the quality of layouts on show seemed good, with a good mixture I felt. The balance of traders could have been a bit better, would have liked to have seen a few smaller traders (reasons have been given for why this wasn't possible on the thread for the show on rmweb, which seem reasonable). I didn't buy anything model wise, but just a few tools and some books that were a good price for second hand. Glad to have attended and the DEMU stand was fairly busy for most of the weekend, with a number of queries and interest. What was nice was to see a good number of children interested and parents asking questions about how to get them started etc. On the Sunday I took along the parts for the Networker conversion I'm working on and made a start on one of the center cars (the non-toilet one). Part of the initial reason for taking the items along (I forgot to grab them for Saturday and detoured back home on my way back Saturday evening) was to ascertain which parts I'm still needing (one non-toilet bodyshell short!) after talking with Paul Wade (LyddRail) who had kindly sent me plans and detail drawings for the Networkers which will prove helpful as I progress. Hopefully I can manage to track down some more bodyshells (ideally I'd like to make 2 465/2 units (which means I need another 4 or 5 bodyshells)), they do come up occasionally on eBay, but seem to attract some silly bids at times. My efforts on the 465 center car were fairly productive, with the parts for one of the center cars cut out and temporarily glued to the rest of the body so as to get the underframe lined up. I managed to glue the end on the body a little out of line, so it'll have to come off anyway. the underframe was cut ever so slightly too short on one half, so a gap will have to be filled. I am however considering making a new underframe from plasticard due to the difficulty of getting the underframes (I can get them but they're a bit expensive now at nearly £10 each!). For the other car I am short a bodyshell (non-toilet car) to easily make the end of the center toilet car, and with how difficult it is proving to get extra bodyshells now, I am thinking I might have to cut up parts from the left over shell: Having scale plans will certainly help matters now (thanks to Paul Wade (LyddRail)), I will have to print them off and reduce them down to 1/76th from the 1/25th scale they're drawn in. I only wish I could find any plans for the 376s so I could have a stab at scratchbuilding one, suspect I might have to do that from photos/eye etc. Thats all for this update. Hopefully won't be so long between posts, but life (particularly my health) has rather gotten in the way in recent years. Attached are a few photos of the progress.

Nice 4TC and 33 there

Nice progress. Liking the MOD vehicles and feel. Have bookmarked the suppliers mentioned in this thread for future reference as I've a plan for a layout based around Chilmark (including the narrow gauge part), but that is liable to be a longer term thing, maybe even a diorama to start (the narrow gauge part mainly) as I have a NSE layout to work on atm instead.

Great post. I've been thinking about getting an airbrush recently and have looked at similar bundles to the one you went for. Good to see its turned out to be rather good value for money

Great work on the pub looking forward to seeing future updates.

I've dabbled with 1/72, 1/48 scale aircraft in the past, but don't these days as I have nowhere to put the things anymore and all the ones i did have didn't survive moving house sadly. Also dabbled with wargaming figures (mainly GW Warhammer 40K) over the years and the odd bit of armour (1/76 and 1/35).

They should work. But there are so many different makes and adhesives used that it is impossible to say 'Yes, they'll be 100% fine' as the laser printer could get too hot for them and cause them to melt, and consequently jam. Use at your own risk applies with such things. However, I'd suspect they should be fine. Hope the sciatica keeps away, it is horrible, I get it on occasions alongside my usual back pain (and fibromyalgia pain) and it is most annoying! Been a quiet day after a busy weekend just gone (Diesel & Electric Show in Telford) and been doing some planning work on the 465 I'm building, only to run out of ink when I want to print some plans off for it, do'h! Kelly

Yes, D838 was named Rapid.

The one at Coventry is probably fairly accessible. You'd likely need to email the museum and arrange a viewing day, which I'm sure they'd probably oblidge. It is located near Coventry Airport, which isn't too far from Coventry city centre or the NEC/Birmingham International Airport.

So, in the last post I caught up a bit with what was planned and what had stalled plans etc. I've been researching baseboard construction recently and come up with a couple of ideas now as a result. Construction methods: i'm suspecting I'll go with plywood on a frame rather than my original thought of a foamboard base with thin plywood on the sides. This won't likely commence until the new year due to other committments, but now a few things are out of the way (boyfriend moving house, getting a new mobility scooter and having to replace all the white goods in the flat) I should hopefully be able to make a start on the baseboards, finally! A trip to B&Q in the new year I think. Modular is the key: Plan is for the building of 2-3 3ftx1-1.5ft boards and a 2ftx1-1.5ft board for the level crossing. The decision really is how wide I want the boards. As the layout is effectively not much more than double track with no stations etc on it and a single siding going off to a dock or similar I'm wondering whether 1ft width might be sufficient, but 1.5ft might be better. 2ft might be better for the planned rat run behind the scenery though. What will decide this really is a) the size that will fit into my car (05 plate mondeo estate) and b) the size of the area I could store the boards. Dual or single? The other decision is whether to have dual levels or not. By that I mean the main boards having space underneath for storage of units, in a traverser format, with corner boards allowing access by raising/lowering height. I'm in two minds about it after talking with Natalie. Storage/fiddle yards: In terms of fiddle yards I plan to use cassettes of no more than 4 car length, with some being enough for 1 carriage/loco and some for 2 carriage/locos. Avoiding point building is a part of that decision, and easier to store/transport in my opinion as the cassette should be able to be put straight into a suitable storage box without handling the units/stock. Control: DCC is a given really I think. When wiring the layout I think I may try to allow for being able to run in DC mode, but that might complicate things too much. As for controllers, I had thought after consideration with Natalie that going with an NCE PowerCab unit would be best as Natalie being left handed found others difficult or 'odd' to use in comparison. Unfortuately as things stand at present it is unlikely I shall be able to afford one, so I am thinking either: Hornby eLink + laptop, or A SPROG unit with JNRI on a laptop. I might give both a try at some stage, and will investigate other methods. I know computer/tablet/phone control would be good I think. I am rather tech savvy and unashamedly a geek when it comes to tech/computers, so such control methods appeal to me. I am not short of suitable devices at least, having one or two spare laptops and a tablet laying around as well as a spare desktop computer lurking somewhere in the flat. Another option is using a raspberry pi/arduino to control the layout as I already have a raspberry pi to hand (well I will do when i upgrade to a raspberry pi 2 for my media watching on the telly). Signals and points: Signals on the layout will likely be 3/4 aspect colour lights as that is what exists on the prototype location. However I would like to be able to at a later stage change the era to around the 1920s/1930s or WW2 (can't go beyond 1925 due to 3rd rail) as that could give some interesting future stock opportunities (and WW2 interests me historically). The starting era will be 1990-1994 or so (the changeover period of the EPBs and Networkers). With this in mind the buildings will be changeable, and ideally the signals too so that semaphore can be added. How feasible this turns out to be is another matter though! experimentation needed perhaps. Control of the points/signals by a lever type panel would be good i think. I'd like some kind of link between the signals and points and train detection to change signals after a train passes. A recent article in Hornby Magazine has made me think of using a MAS-Sequencer by Heathcote Electronics for control of changing the signals, which signals I use I've yet to decide. I suspect DCCconcepts point motors/controls will manage the points on the layout by DCC. As there aren't going to be many points (3 visible in total iirc) hopefully that should help keep costs down a little. If needed any points in the non-visible areas can be manual (by switches/panel) to start with perhaps rather than DCC. Track and gauge: The gauge will be EM, and I've been a member of the EM Gauge Society for just over a year now. (I'm sure the templates that came with the membership pack will be very useful when plotting out the layout on a board!). I will likely use C&L Finescale track. Final thoughts: That concludes a rather lengthy update post really. I don't think there'll be much updates this side of the new year, but I hope to get started by the middle of January, and hopefully make a start on the conversions/kits also. Any thoughts and suggestions are welcome

It appears that No1 is at the Electric Railway Museum near Coventry (down the road from me). http://www.electricrailwaymuseum.co.uk/collect.htm I'm not sure if it was there when I last took photos there though. but theres photos from that visit here: Hope they're of help.

So I haven't updated these blogs for a fair while as life has sadly gotten in the way of thinking about any kind of modelling. That and my nature for being easily distracted by other things! I haven't forgotten about this layout plan, but money hasn't been available sadly to make a start on the boards for it. The plan thankfully is pretty simple at least so shouldn't require too much work track wise beyond a couple of points being built (it will be EM). I'm toying with the idea of it being dual level, with the lower level for storage of cassettes, but am in discussion with Natalie about the feasability of this at present. Hopefully in the new year some progress will be made. A 4EPB (BR built) and an 465 are in progress to some extent however, but no photos to share at this stage. A rough idea of the proposed plan is below. It will likely have a rat run behind some scenery to allow running around behind the scenes, as well as possibly curving around to a lower level at the sides for cassette fiddle yards with storage underneath, but none of this is final yet.

Morning. I'm not usually with it of late at this time to remember about early risers. awake as got a laptop to fix and backup and an MOT to book, oh what fun! First though off to post a birthday card for my grandfather who turns 95 Monday, and grab a cuppa in the cafe nearby to warm up I suspect as it feels bloomin' freezin'!

Traders are always asking top dollar as the saying goes, but they really have shot up in value, with how few good clean ones there are left now due to the rust eating most away. The joke was that some of the Victors left the factory already with value added rust included as at the time they both didn't treat the steel for rust prevention and left the body panels outside until needed.

There might have been a very small number released with the 1600cc engine, but majority would have been with 1800/2000/2300cc engines, though I'm by no means any kind of expert on that Yes, the oil crisis led to a lot of Firenza/Magnum models being unsold, so the bodyshells were rebadged as Viva E and stripped down to the 1256cc engine and even less thrills than the base models. Not many of those are believed to have survived, so they're perhaps one of the rarer models after the HPF and sportshatch (and HA Brabham models).

With the prices of genuine Mexico/Sport (and other sought after/faster models) Escorts not surprising someone has replicated one, probably quite a lot of bog standard Mk1/2 Escorts get such treatment as a result.

Yes, earlier HBs came with the 1600cc slant-four engine. They replaced the 1600cc with an 1800cc later in the production run to give it more power as apparently people thought they'd be getting a much better kick than the 1158cc (some early ones had 1057cc engines iirc) engine of the standard model. In the HBs life only the GTs had the 2L engines, it wasn't until the HC that it got complicated with engines, with some having 1158cc, some 1800, some 2L and some 2.3L (Firenza/Magnum models always had an 1800cc or above engine iirc) with most having 1256cc engines.