SeanNeedham

That's looking superb, Ron. Nice work indeed! I can't wait to see how the Castlefield Viaduct develops, and waiting patiently for the instalments with that project!

Doing a bit more looking around at the local places, so I went a mooch round earlier, with the camera, just to get a few snaps of the local station. I'm going to go back when the weather is a bit better to get a few more (it was mixing over bright, with thunderstorms this after, so I didn't fancy setting the camera up on mounts and going busy with a yardstick). However, if anyone is interested in pinching them (the roof does bow like that), the edge of the platform is 18" from bed, the distance from platform edge to building is 6' exact, and the bottom of the door frames to get a measurement line is 4'. I'll be going back when the weather is more stable to get some better ones, so these are only temporary images! This first is the north end of the station, where the twin line would have gone through (passenger/freight passing loop), and latterly a spur running behind to the old factory that is off to the left hand side about a kilometre away. Just a view of the north end elevation. South end elevation showing the goods loading bay (where the park is now). General front elevation. The rear elevation had the same window pattern, but the outer pairs of doors were replaced by windows of the same dimension that run along the top floor. And this place is one of the two little goods stores that were on the back to the old factory. With a scaling meausrement across the bottom of the door frame at 3.5'. I didn't manage to get a good image of the other store, as with the distortion from the ultra wide angle lens I was using, and the bowing of the structure, it just didn't look right! As I said before, if anyone is interested in nicking the images, feel free to do so, but please do not link them directly off my server.

With this conversation, it feels more that I'm not building a layout as such (and still not turned a tool in anger, bar painting up stock), but actually creating a historical document or reference. Whilst the weather is nice this afternoon, I'm taking one of the works cameras to go and do a research run of one of the old stations in the area; as even with the photos from the gentleman, and the only one I found on line (which is a scan of a postcard and can be found here), there are very, very few references to it at all. I think that the picture on the postcard is the only one that shows a track plan, and I think over the weekend I may nip round to the gentleman's house and ask him about the track plan, and then recreate a diagramme based on this reference and what his knowledge was. This is the only shot of the station building I have in my collection which is online, even though I go past it every day (and this one was taken about a week or so after a road accident which damaged my shoulder and knee, so the only place I could balance a camera was on the deck). http://www.flickr.com/photos/catalafotografia/894101918/in/pool-21113710@N00/lightbox/ I suppose I really should take the tape measure and notebook as well, just to go and get some measures, as even though I have decided on building a street scene, I think that some time in the near future, I may end up building here as well. Thanks for the comments, and I will try and keep the project updated, either as just a research piece, or to use as my main focal point and put the english on the back burner totally.

Ditto here, Ron... We've a mix of foggy mornings, overly bright sunshine mid part of the day and then torrential thunderstorms, not conducive to research jaunts (but if the weather holds out this afternoon, me and my camera are going to do one) or scenery building as I can't leave things to cure out on the balcony. I look forward to the images!

Just putting that one down in my modelling notebook! Can't wait to see some photos of the painted up structure, Ron!

Well, two of actually. One of the older gents who i speak to on a regular basis popped round earlier, and he does like to talk, to put it mildly; so I thought the evening was going to be totally unfruitful. The gent in question was a signaller on the old line that ran through the area, and worked out of the railway station in the village (I'll dig some of my personal photos out sometime). We were sat on the bench in front of the apartment, and he asked me if I was interested in the local railway, and what scale I was modelling to as he'd seen me wandering through the village with a bit of flexi under my arm a while back. So I told him that I was attempting to build a small representation of the line, and what gauge; and I've rarely seen the reaction that I got from him. He was off like a proverbial hare, and a few minutes later he reappeared with a small box. He passed it to me and said that he wanted the photos back after I'd had a look at them, but I could keep the other bits in there. In it, was a pair of 0-4-0 short wheelbase tank locos, of the type built by MTM in the same era and style what I'm working to. He proceeded to explain that he used to model railways, and he'd built a layout for his grandchildren, but they weren't interested in the old things, much preferring the noisy, brightly coloured 'new digital' things instead of the locomotives he'd presented me with. We sat there, with me looking at these locos, and they are superb in detail. I don't know where the bodies are from, or who made them, but they are very solid chunks of metal indeed; and they are built on top of, I think, Fleischmann chassis (not had a proper look yet, but they run beautifully). He said that he'd not got round to painting them up, as they were still in primer as he was going to do one each for the two grandkids but as they wanted digi-diesel... So I said what I'd do with them, and went indoors to pick up the one that was currently on the workbench. His first words on seeing it were "That looks too clean!", so it looks like some weathering and sun fading is going to be done on them, but he mentioned that not all the locos up this region carried the green/black, as a couple were just in black with white/grey lining, some in green/black and with silver lining, some in straight black and a couple more had the red running boards on a black loco. We sat for almost an hour, with me taking notes as he explained some of the workings that used to pass through; some of the incidents that he'd seen and also the operating practises of the region. When we'd finished and he was off for his dinner, I asked him how much he wanted for the locos, or what he'd take in payment (apart from the bottle of wine I gave him), and all he said was "Just make it look like the area, capture the essence don't worry about recreating it perfect, so the memory is still there" and as he walked away, he stopped for a moment and looked back. Then he said, with a smile, "Let me come and just run the trains for a bit." In all, it got me thinking about what people like this chap get out of what we do as modellers (at any skill level), and whether it is a form of remembrance, a tribute almost to what they did in what we do (whether completely prototypical or not); and also it got me thinking that when someone like this shares the advice, stories, and even though he had just given me two very fine locomotives, who got more out of that hour sat on the bench out front. I've a feeling, in all, it wasn't me.

Pete, 2 projects? I've already got 2 projects on the go! The things that got messed up were the ones that were out of the way, but when people come round it doesn't matter because I don't think 'No tocar', 'Prou', or just plain old 'No' are in the vocabulary and people will move them closer to the edge just so people can have a 'look'; though I've just ordered a small starter set for the kids to play with... At least it will keep them out of my 'MPD' for a while... Hopefully. I did end up having a little spend when I was in town (got ten minutes between jobs), and spent 400€ on something that no-one will ever directly get to see... As for the beer, sound's good; I'll let you know, even though my consume is about 5 bottles of wine a year! If you are ever up towards the Manresa/Berga area, give me a shout. Though I am trying to orgainse a photosession that you may be interested in as well.

Thanks Bill, I thought they were the ones you were talking about the other day. I've found a company here in Barcelona that are going to be producing some coaches like this in N-scale, and also somewhere that has a few of these kits, so I may just have to buy them "just in case" I change the gauge sometime in the future. Once again, thanks for the advice, much appreciated!

The more things I post, there will be a recurring theme of other people's (namely family) involvement in what I do, and generally to the negative of what I'm trying to achieve. I thought it only involved things like high end camera systems and expensive hardware, but today, I realised that it also extends to the creative stuff that I do as well. After being in and out all morning doing bit jobs, and spending the intermediate time between runs painting a loco up, and also doing some board work, I popped out for the final run of the day... More political stuff. On returning back to the office, thinking "Up these photos, go to the bar, come back and talk English for 25€ an hour later on..." I wandered in to my office/studio/landfill. Lo and behold, we'd had a visit from the family, this was apparent to start with some chunks of ply on the floor and corresponding steel rule sized dents in the board I'd built and wired last night and painted up this morning... So the radar is on now, hunting... And I found the loco what I'd been painting up not where I'd left it and had finger marks in the smooth layer of varnish along the tanks... Yep, my nieces! I don't have any trouble with my adoptive family, but the family seem to have the biological failings of the eyes and the fingers being the one and the same thing. It also leaves me with a delay in the layout I was talking about this morning, as I've got to go in to town (next available day for that is Saturday), to get another section of ply for the top and this is where it becomes problematic. The more I leave stuff, the more I think about stuff, and the more I think about it, the plan changes and may end up completely different to what I had in mind. At least tomorrow, unless the rotation changes I'm going to spend some money, err... No, I'm on a run in Barcelona for a couple of hours early on, and a visit to Barcelona is very dangerous as I always end up with some ballast in the bottom of a lens case! And that in itself can be a bad thing, as I've been known to scrap a whole project for a new bit of shiny...

Since I'm not going to be able to get enough foam board in sufficient time to construct the layout that I was going to do for the local arts fair in November (though my other half's uncle is on the case as he works in construction and the next insulation job they do, he's ordering me a 5x5m area), I've had to revert to my plan B. In short this is going to be a build quick, temporary layout (so temporary, that I'm using old stocks of ply sheet fastened with double sided tape to the board, ditto on the track, so I can run the ham knife under them to pull them out), and everything is being built on top of that; but in a way I can just lift the scenics off, and the temporary boards and mount them to something more permanent if I decide to keep them on. I would show some photos of the street area what I'm looking at doing, but... I can't find any on line representing the era and I know of only three or four reference photos from the time showing the railway up the main street. And to make it a little more tricky, a lot of the older builds have been replaced by more modern (post railway closure) along the street, so I'm going to have to build generic building facias referencing other buildings of the time frame and amalgamating the ideas. Motive power wise, there are plenty of interesting little things that ran through here, and these photos I found (on Flickr of the area) show a few of the motive power units. the model of which is available RTR from Minitrix (minus air tanks on the cab roof), and also there is a Fleischmann that is close to the design with only needing a few modifications. And these can be found secondhand for less than the price of a new coach or wagon, because they were also in the 'initiation' sets, and the market is saturated. one of the local manufacturers do a RTR of these, albeit with a 'standard' buffer beam. Then there is this... There are a lot of other different things that can be added in to the area, as each company in the region (of which there were many) had their own locomotives, stock and 'oddities', and when the railway companies were amalgamated, a lot of different things came in from all areas. Scenic wise, the buildings across the back are going to be built in partial relief, with a quick 'box' made from 100mm x 5mm balsa sheet, reinforced with 3 x 5mm hardwood strip, and the fronts/sides/roof are going to be thick card based, textured, and glazed, using the box for the main support. I'm not going to post a track plan, as it's not hard to envisage, as there's a piece of flexi-track with a bit of set-track on each end to keep it level. If I don't have the mess around with a job I'm on later, I should be able to get the boards, basic scenic mounts, etc in and photographed (must remember to post photos!).