SonOfMike

Ooooh, yes!

It was my birthday last week, and I decided to finally pull the trigger on another impulse purchase that I have been mithering over for several years; a Rivarossi Heisler. I love geared steam locos me, and I already had a Shay... 2 down now and 2 to go (I'm considering a Dunkirk as different from a Climax because a) it is, and b) the ideal number of locos to own is always at least n + 1). It needs a touch of weathering etc. and I will fit the supplied Oil Bunker conversion when I get round to it but It's a beautiful model and I'm very pleased with it. It runs superbly and will happily trundle along at a barely perceptible crawl. I'm having a rather nice time playing with it today. Happy Johnny 🙂

I think so. This one is also an excellent runner and capable of smoothly travelling at very low speeds.

Crikey! He's Back! Actually I never went away, I've just been lurking for a bit but I must confess I have neglected the layout for a while. I've been indulging in one of my other hobbies recently and I just don't have the space to indulge in more than one at a time. Anyhoo, I was in Sheffield a few days ago and popped into Rails, where I discovered a second hand Alco FA-1 which I was immediately drawn to and, after seeing it run, purchased. I'm not usually one for for impulse buys; I generally plan acts of spontaneity for months in advance but I'm glad I went for this one. Yes, I know, the PRR livery is all wrong for where Apocrypha is meant to be but I am considering repainting and re-lettering / numbering it. MoPac had some FA-1s I think, and L&N had some FA-2s in plain black (I can live with it being the wrong variant for the sake of an easier paint job). On the other hand, I may do it as a Jemima & Gulf loco or even leave it as it is - it's my trainset after all.

I've got one too. The kit was a 16th birthday present from my Mum and Dad back in 1984. I built it as soon as I got it and it's still exactly as it was - I have never modified it or repainted it (it's got "natural" weathering in places where the paint has worn off). It's very noisy but otherwise runs fine, despite not really having anything other than a test run until a couple of years ago, and now I use it on my layout regularly. I must have been one of the lucky ones because I have read so many accounts of poor running. Maybe it was the smaller fingers and better eyesight of my youth that helped.😂

I think it is more to do with the fact that modellers (especially in the UK) often do not have room for large layouts. Houses here usually do not have basements and space is at a premium. Layouts therefore often need to be small and or portable, which in turn means that they require small portable baseboards. It is simply cheaper in some cases to use a laser cut baseboard than buy the wood to build one. Some baseboard kits are designed to fit inside brand-name storage boxes of certain sizes, which also makes them popular. Boxfile layouts suit some modelers because they enjoy the challenge of working within a set, confined space and because the boxfile itself is an easy thing to store - a boxfile layout is a micro layout which is already built inside a storage unit. Boxfile layouts can be stored on shelves, in cupboards etc. so they can be ideal for modellers with little or no space for a conventional layout. My own layout consists of a couple of small modules built on commercially available floating shelf units. When not in use they can be stored safely in the top section of my wardrobe. I used the shelves because they were much, much cheaper than buying the wood to make something the same size myself.

Well, I've now replaced as many of the missing images as I can. There are some that I can't do because they weren't uploaded by me and a couple that I just can't find (I changed laptop some time ago). There is still a chance that one or two of the older images may reappear - I know that images over a year old were still being re-indexed but I decided to re-upload those that I could find anyway. I can live with a few missing pictures - it's great to have the site back and it does seem to whizz along these days... which is nice. Anyway, onwards and upwards! I really should be thinking about doing some more modelling and uploading some new stuff. In the meantime, here are a couple of old photos which have been made to look like older photos. I found them whilst looking for the ones that seem to have escaped.

Is he named after my kid brother?

A rare sight - the entire fleet of Lamy Lumber Co steam locomotives, plus the two Jemima and Gulf RR consolidations simmering in the sunlight at Apocrypha. Good job I had my phone with me despite all them continuum shenanigans and wotnot. I had to climb up on one of the Anneka buildings to get one of the shots; that's not going to do my sciatica much good...

Seeing as it seemed a nice day for it, I jumped into my time machine and did a bit of railfanning around Apocrypha and Turpentine. Apologies for the poor focus - I think my phone camera was being affected by the disturbances in the spacetime continuum thingie and all that. https://youtu.be/b0xxWJiwOTs

Someone has repurposed an old desk for use as a workbench. It'll probably turn up on "Find it, Fix it, Flog it" next week and be upcycled back into a desk.

.

.

.

.

'

.

.

There now follows a series of random snapshots of the Turpentine module. The eagle-eyed observer will notice that, amongst all the other rather wonky stuff, the lamp outside one of the buildings is at an unintentionally jaunty angle on a couple of the pictures. This was rectified during the session by utilising the technique developed in Germany, known as "fingerpoken".

.

Good grief! What’s this monstrosity? It’s almost as if somebody really wanted to build something like a class A Climax but only had a conventional 0-4-0 chassis available… Fiction: Whatever it is, it was acquired second hand many years ago and, like Le Vieux Bancal, been repaired and rebuilt several times. Rumour has it that it was originally a steam dummy, but the superstructure was mostly destroyed in an accident. Some of what’s left of the original body became part of the cab that we see now. The rest was replaced by the log bunkers. Maybe we will never know the truth, but it’s still working the line between Apocrypha and Turpentine in spite of the laws of physics. Fact: I just wanted another small loco and worked with what I had to produce something that I hoped would have some of the charm of the narrow-gauge logging engines that I love, but in standard gauge. I was indeed inspired by class A Climaxes, the rather odd class B(?) kit that MDC Roundhouse produced many moons ago. I had also seen some photos of second-hand, rebuilt steam dummies (basically steam trams) that were used by logging lines so these too became part of the inspiration. The rest is just fantasy; the result of my own twisted brain-wrong. “The Shed”, as it she is known, is scratch-built using a similar chassis to the other 0-4-0, but this one had a much wider motor and no front end. It’s mostly plasticard and some modified Tichy Train Co doors, with a few brass castings and lots of found material / scrap. The boiler is a PrittStick tube and the handrails and coupler cut lever are made from guitar string and thin wire. Bell, generator, air pump and reservoir are all made from odds and ends in the same way as the other loco.

A bit of off-topic diversion is always welcome when there is some great modelling to look at .

I have a joke about Nepotism.. But I will only tell it to my kids.

I know what you mean. The large bunker was a necessity to conceal the motor. I had considered a pony truck but whilst trawling the internet for sources of inspiration I found a number of USA saddle tanks that had an "overhang" to the rear (e.g. https://images.hattons.co.uk/products/81811-LN_3251941_Qty1_ruler.jpg) so I decided to leave it as it was and save myself another job. It's not so obvious in the flesh, as one tends to see it from more of a top-down point of view, but I might still add a pony truck in the future. I have another similar chassis in the parts box - I have an even crazier idea for that one .