rcmacchipilot

Also on a side note, I started where you are now about 4 years ago. There is plenty of good advice on this forum. I also know that there will be a number of challenges ahead as you want more out of your railroad and you want it to evolve. Feel free to PM me any time you have a question. If I may, I can also recommend 2 really good books by Iain Rice, realistic railroad modelling (an excellent book that gives you some really good solid info to get you started in most aspects of the hobby, written extremely well, It also has an excellent section on couplings to get your grey matter going) and shelf modelling for model railroaders (its for American layouts, but the thoughts and concepts in tackling a railroad are excellent). There is also another one on realistic layout design which I believe is also very good, however I haven't had a chance to read it. I wish you all the best of luck in your endeavour.

In terms of wiring advice, there is plenty on the DCC concepts website as well, which is well explained and there are plenty of diagrams.

Hi, I was hoping someone could help me out here. I am reasonably certain that the S and D used the standard 20T brake van as made by airfix, but could some one please confirm that? I am thinking of getting some of the kits and building them.

Excellent. I will be eagerly awaiting further instalments . I really like a good somerset and dorset layout.

This looks exciting. Correct me if I am wrong, but the aim here us to capture the Somerset and Dorset?

Somerset and dorset comes to mind to for short trains with big locomotives.... as they say its not about the size of the train its the way you use it

I know coming from half way around the world I don't have much of a say in anything within this. Although I am following it with lots of interest. The ability to run a group of modules as a full railway really appeals to me. Anycase just a thought - With DCC being adopted and the potential for DCC controlled points, is it worth setting up a register of turnout numbers, so those that choose to operate points via dcc decoders don't rock up at a meet and have sets of points being programmed with the same numbers? May have been mentioned before, and I am not entirely sure what the range of available point decoder numbers are, But just a thought which might prevent some pain in the future.

All this bear talk makes me want to go make some more....

Wonderful Julia. You have a real eye for scenery and making everything blend in naturally. Tell me, how did you do your fences? they look fantastic Owen

you know its good looking when you struggle to tell that it isn't a larger scale .

In terms of the cobbled path its a continuation of the lines that make up the edge of the road. However if you really want to make sure that it makes sense at all angles puting a curve in it so that it curves behind something will help maintain the illusion.

the only creatures that australia doesnt top the posion list on are scorpions.

Hi Sigtech. I have had experience with both dinghams and kadees. As far as height goes, dinghams, knuckle couplers and indeed any coupler need to be set up accurately to get accurate coupling, so there is no real argument there for either of the two. On to the couplings. Previously I had fitted both hooks of the dinghams to each end of the locomotive. If you are operating fixed rakes, then both ends of the rake get a loop coupler and problem solved. Although if you want to double head you are going to have to fit three links onto both ends of a locomotive so that they can couple up to each other. The problems come when you are trying to break up and make up goods formations. When this is the case you basically need loops on both ends of all your goods stock and the reliability goes down a bit. Also getting the delayed uncoupling to work in my opinion is a bit of a pain in the arse. It is do-able however but you need to have good technique with the soldering iron for it to work. Finally if you go down this route the brass needs to be polished to a high sheen almost to get rid of any friction as it becomes really difficult for it to work. The advantage's over the kadees however is the magnetic system is much more straight forward, and frankly they look awesome too by far the most realistic automatic coupler for 4mm. Kadees loose the looks that dingham provide but frankly I feel that once set up they negate the dingham issues. Note that dingham couplers also have the potential to buffer lock on tight curves that don't have a transition curve when propelling. Food for thought. Also worth looking at (Sorry to muddy the waters ) are Alex Jackson, Sprat and winkle and D&G couplers. All these offer a delayed uncoupling service. If you are not worried about delayed uncoupling there is another option and that is to fit an iron arm to the back of the tension lock uncoupler. This means that the tension lock uncoupler can be operated with magnets. Have a look at automatic magnetic uncoupling for shunting layouts on youtube. Hope that was helpful. Owen

Sasquatch how did you cut out the disk so well?

I have been following this blog for a while now. Your track work is looking fantastic. cant wait to see more

lovely work. please keep posting as this looks like it will be an interesting blog to follow.

im guessing you use an airbrush. what paints do you apply when? to get the finsih that you have?

If i may ask, what is your ballast / rail - sleeper paint combination? it looks quite good.

Looking very good david. I cant wait to see empire basin up and running.

Well done, you have captured the strata of the rocks very well.

I would go with the photo stiching backscene if possible. Fantastic work on the layout. One would think it was S7 if they didnt know better

thanks. Its one of the biggest advantages of a shelf layout is that the room can still be used for other pursuits. Sadly a garden with almond trees and no sweeping vista is outside of the window. A backdrop will be put up that covers that.

Tony, This is a completely different way of using templot templates but might be of some assistance. cut a zig zag line along the borders. Martin has cleverly put datum points on the border edges that can be used to accurately line up all the papers. I then use a UHU glu stick ( or bostik or whatever the school kids have ) and glue along the edges to create a big plan. Kids glue sticks are really good for this process because they are cheap, stick really well and don

I would love some close up shots of the monty's figures The layout is looking very good John, I really like your work on the roundhouse. John, I am definatly borrowing that Idea to use on my water tower. Finally a hose that is posable and looks good

Using cobalt accessory decoders?