HSB

As requested by CME here is a picture of a coupling attached to the MTH coupler mount:- Having worked out the right dimensions hopefully the rest will be a bit neater! With regards to the bogies the most obvious thing wrong is the brake shoes in line with the sideframe rather than the wheels which is a problem common to most RTR coaching stock. I will simply chop these away on mine. Changing the sideframes might be quite difficult and I think once they are weathered they will look quite acceptable at normal viewing distance.

Rod already has LGB for the garden and has previously had two indoor G scale layouts.

They appear to have made the BG match their earlier productions but GUVs have flat sides and they have used a completely different roof shape on these although the prototype actually appears to have the same roof shape as the passenger coaches!

They have made the roof on the GUV a different shape to the other coaches but while it is a bit nearer to prototype it is still not right! Surely with all the information available on MK 1s there is no excuse for producing an inaccurate model. If it had been half the price I might have considered buying one and modifying it but not at £250 each.

Rod has a shunt in H0 scale:-

One thing I have noticed recently with the MTH BGs is that, although the wheels are described as 'finescale', the flanges appear to be hitting the tops of the chairs. While they seem to roll along alright they are quite noisy on ballasted track. The sideframes appear to be screwed on so it should be possible to remove the wheels and either try and turn the flanges down slightly, or replace them with proper finescale wheels. We've only had one session on the layout this week and the next one won't be till next week as Rod and I are off to Zobland tomorrow afternoon to have a play with Quai:87.

I'm still messing around trying to fit couplings to the MTH BG but I can see the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. The couplers on these are on separate metal castings forming the centre sections of the buffer beams which screw into the floor. There are a couple screw holes just behind the buffer beams which I am trying to make use of. Meanwhile, Rod has been working on his BR open wagon while I have also been making a little progress on the station roof.

We've had a couple of afternoons working on the layout this week but not much to show for it. I've made a little bit of progress on the station roof but have spent most of my time trying to work out the best way to fit Bachmann couplings to Rod's MTH BG. I have the first one screwed in but it still needs a bit of packing to achieve the correct height. Once the first one is done it will be relatively simple to make mounts to the same dimensions for the other end and for my own coach.

We have managed to remove the wheels from the lorry and with a bit of brute force and ignorance last night I managed to part the two front wheels which Rod had superglued back to back and put on at one side at the rear! Rod is cleaning them up before putting them back on the lorry. Rod has also been busy putting coupling loops on several locos over the last week and has now done his Class 04 which he then ran on the layout this afternoon. This loco is a superbly smooth and powerful runner and walked away with twenty goods wagons with no problem at all! Rod bought it when Tower were selling them off for £199 and I rather wish I had bought one at the same time! I have now fitted the roof to the single storey section of the station building after adding a little bit of internal detail. Here are a couple of pics I took this afternoon showing both the building and the 04 at work:-

We had another session working on the layout this afternoon. I have done a little bit more to the station building while Rod has been fitting coupling loops to locos. There is still more stock scattered around the layout than normal following our operating session on Sunday so I took this picture of the station.

I like the sky background in the second shot, Brian. ----- methinks there's a bit of cheating going on!

We had another session this afternoon which Rod spent cleaning the track and generally tidying up in preparation for a running session on Sunday to which he has invited a few local 0 Gaugers while I have been sticking strips of tiles to the station canopy roof:-

When I have tried to go on to the Goods Yard Models website recently a page saying 'This Account Has Been Suspended' comes up! I hope this doesn't mean they have ceased trading!

I have added the roof to the canopy which now needs tiles and gutters to complete. Rod has taken pictures of his truck this afternoon (his second attempt - ones he took at the weekend came out blurred!) which he may post later.

I have had another play. If I settle for slightly less siding space in the fiddle yard I can go back to my earlier station plan with a 5' radius main line. The redesigned fiddle yard will give me three tracks approximately 6' long (long enough for three passenger coaches and a loco) and one track about 4' (long enough for a two-car DMU or a very short goods train). ]

As Rod says I have done a bit more work on the station canopy today and now have the framework in place. I will give this a coat of paint before adding a roof to it.

Thanks asa. I'm planning to start bedding it in at our next session and then planting a bit of grass and weeds around it.

Thanks,CME. The cattle dock has now been weathered but I'm afraid the pic isn't very sharp!

We did a bit more to the layout this afternoon. I did a little more work on the backscene at the end while Rod is still working on his lorry kit. Here is a photo I took today with the view across the Solway Firth to Scotland. The rather pristine cattle dock will not stay that way for long as I began weathering it shortly after taking this shot.

I was thinking in terms of somewhere like Dewsbury where the Midland Railway only had a freight depot (don't know if there was a parcel depot!) as the LNWR, L&Y and GN already had passenger stations there. A former passenger station would be the other option.

Many of the ex-LMS BGs had their gangways removed and plated over in later life. These are probably what are being refered to.

I have now modified my last plan to replace the passenger station with a small parcels depot. By eliminating passenger trains I can do away with one of the tracks in the fiddle yard which, ironically, has meant I now have room for a 5' curve after all. It will also save me having to lash out on a couple of DMUs!

I am now thinking in terms of abandoning the idea of a passenger station and just have a parcels depot and a few freight sidings. My rebuilt LIMA Mk 1s can stay on Ramchester but I do have a liking for non-passenger coaching stock and if I make my 50' LMS BG the longest vehicle they won't look so bad on the tight curves.

I thought I'd better double check the size of the plan yesterday by counting the 150mm squares and unfortunately found it was very slightly oversize! Only by a few inches each way but enough to make my trackplan no longer fit as drawn. The only way I can get it in is by reducing the radius of the approach curve to the station to 4' 9" although this would still take the track rather close to the wall leaving little room for the retaining wall let alone any other scenery. I can't change the radius of the fiddle yard tracks as I already have the points in stock. This will be a rather sharper curve than I would like for sending passenger stock round and I am not sure if it would be visually acceptable so I'll need to do some experiments and consider this further.

Here's another picture I took yesterday looking across the goods yard but before I painted in the distant hills of Scotland.