Les1952

Ground cover done at last (all but) Evening all....... Apart from a small L-shaped piece at the right-hand end of the row of shops, all of the ground cover is now done- the missing bit needs painted sandpaper to dry overnight so I can lay cobbles up to roadway. I've also decided to turn the Rathaus so it is square on across the Marktplatz. This way it will better hide a line in the cobblestones (smoke and mirrors again...) but it does make the alleyway behind it more of a logical shape. Also done- the third low relief building is finished and attached to the other pair and the lamps have been seated in front of the loading dock. Plus of course the usual set of railings painted but not yet installed- the area behind isn't ready in any area. The loading dock showing grass in front of railway- a surprising improvement from a one-inch wide strip! Also shows the two Brawa lamps I had left over unused from a previous project, which I will wire in even though they are unlikely to be used. The white pillar cap is a real improvement also, considering the size of it. One thing has occurred to me- this is a loading dock for alcohol, so will need a security fence. The pallisade type sold by N-Brass should be suitable. I'll look at it at Doncaster on Saturday and also see what other security-type fencing is available. I can't find a suitable prototype picture so may have to "wing" it...

Productive Monday Just as well - because it is marking again on Wednesday, and Doncaster show plus a visitation from the beloved daughter this weekend.... Jobs advanced- The tramway reservation is now grassed except for the pointwork inserts, which I've not yet tackled. The cobblestones in the Marktplatz are now all laid, as is the road surface between the shops row and the flats Two Portakabins are under construction The first section of railings from the Town Arch towards the town have been put into place. The third low relief house is now under construction. The tree surround has now been painted and ground cover added. This shows progress in the Marktplatz. These are the final positions as the limiting dimension futher along the row is now known. The bank building is getting its extra details and will need to be stuck down as will the low relief houses at the back before anything in front can be stuck down. Hopefully it will be safe to carry the vacuum cleaner out to the workshop tomorrow- lots of grit and salt on the path to it and much snow is now melted. Meanwhile painting railings goes on apace. Only about sixty panels still to do.......

Friday 3rd Hello again. Short day in the workshop today, shopping this morning. Quiet weekend ahead- I've saved up my remaining marking and some moderator research for the weekend so Mr Simon can have an udisturbed bash on Gresby again.. Music today by Status Quo. No interruptions. The tram reservation is now extended to the arch, which has been bedded in now I've made sure trams can get through comfortably. Also added the first of the municipal grey railings and some more people. I'm still wondering whether the tourists should be on top of the archway or oby the Kaufhaus behind looking at the gateway. Looking for a suitable fountain or circular base on the Internet proved fruitless, and fountainless also, come to that, so when I saw a "spare" steel disc on the desk I thought I'd have a go at making something suitable. First viewing- out of focus a little. So far all it has is two layers of stone card, inner one facing inwards and outer one outwards - that obvious I shouldn't have needed two goes at it....... Finishing that, and doing more Roman cobblestones, is Monday's job. Plenty still needs doing......

Thursday 2nd- stairs complete Spent much of the day painting a cheapo flintlock pistol so it looks less like a brown plastic mess and more like a flintlock pistol from a distance. When I finsh this one I've a second one to do..... Music by Slade, Sweet and Barclay James Harvest today. The staircase done, as seen by a punter in a wheelchair. Figures, flowerbed, bicycle and buildings should hide most of the worst of its imperfections. Can't hide the twists, but it is a very old staircase which has merely had its stonework cleaned.... I now need a fountain or flowerbed surround to plant the tree in. Also done today- the Kaufhaus building at the top of the staircase has been stuck down and partly bedded in- the rest to do when it is dry. I've also put down the stone ground cover between the shed and the board front. Some of this will have a pile of coal and some ash heaps, and there are now two Portakabins to place. Plenty still do do before 21st April....

Wednesday 1st- productive day. Two months and three weeks to the first public showing, no panic YET. Today- steps mostly made- need to dry now before setting in street surface behind the front row of shops laid ready for painting. hedge for foot of backscene in town area sourced and trialled. cobblestones in Marktplatz started granite area between railway and loading dock made and some debris added white lines painted on road approaching tramway crossing at top. Took the day off marking exams today as I'm ahead - only 1200 questions left to mark by Tuesday next week- easy... On the negative side I forgot that one of the things I was going to buy today was yellow paint for the tramway crossing itself! The steps part-finished and in situ- tall punter's eye view over the town gate arch. Still plenty to do......

Can't put it off any longer.... Doing the big stone stairway that is. This shows how little of the staircase is actually going to be seen, BUT there is a changing view of bits of it from different angles along the front, seen by punters of different heights. Out of focus but I've moved on a bit since 11am when this was taken. It finally occurred to me that the height and width of the treads could be fixed using Green Scene lengthways. being stone the squareness of the edges and the tread depth doesn't matter too much. Steps are about a metre wide and about 25cm high, scale size. Now the tricky job, cladding them in stome. More later.......

And, latest pictures. The Fleischmann diesel shunts the loading dock with a tram descending the hill. Trying shunting using Rapidos has convinced me that I'll put Dapol buckeyes on the stock and use rare earth magnets embedded in the track. Note also that I've got the missing pillar cap put on the loading dock at last. All it needs is painting white (then 4 more finding for the tram shed............ The shed corner is beginning to look like a railway now. Still lots to do, but progress is now tangible. Still plenty to go at.

OK, a passenger train Testing the passenger stock showed very quickly that some have much deeper flanges than the goods stock- again the train is really running in too fast. Note the extra ground cover since this morning. The BR86 takes quite a while (3 circuits) to warm up, so each time round it was going a little faster than the previous one. I suspect it is full of gelatinous grease..... A kinder angle of the departure, failing to show how much bounce there is over the point leading to the loading dock.....

Another day another video.. Having spent a lot of yesterday testing and fettling the tramway today is the turn of the railway. So far all sections work, with a little track cleaning needed in the murky depths of the right-hand tunnel (where else?) Some ballast needed digging out and I've had to hack a chunk off the right-hand end of the platform where the newer (and smaller!) diesels don't clear it - originally tested with the biggest one, which does (law of Sod again...) The yellow diesel runs through with five cars in tow- this is the longest train that will run on the layout- six don't fit the fiddle yard. Slade repelling visitors....... Work for this afternoon centres on getting the areas between the railway and the retaining wall covered with chippings and foliage as a first ground cover- basic can be detailed later. Portakabin on order for shed area. Hopefully that will arrive tomorrow. Today's post just brought another 50 random people.

Thanks. I'll try- that was by the way of an experiment to see 1) if I could get a video in the first place and 2) if I could get it onto RMWeb. The answer to the second was "no", but I figured out how to get it onto YouTube and link. I'm having fun and games with dirty track- any glue at all and the trams stop, so cleaning is a recurrent nightmare. I did take two videos this morning, so with a bit of luck here's the tram coming back again through the other side of the loop but still too fast...... http://youtu.be/6y5ytW68V-s one thing it does show is which buildings and details are actually stuck in place so far........

Monday Funday... 220 essays on computer access for the disabled later out into the workshop again- another 97 essays to do this evening but the brain was beginning not to cope...... The building for the corner plot next to the tram shed- it isn't really big enough so I'm still one building short. I need a fairly thin one of 3 or 4 storeys. The cream Japanese one is the right size but totally wrong. It is now being cannibalised for aircon bits (for the factory roof), windows etc to improve other areas. Roof of this needs repainting to Furtwangen Ost colours, an interior for the ground floor, and something needs doing to fix or hide a prominent gap where it isn't quite square. The Arnold shed at last- it has taken three months to source one of these. No chance of finding an unmade kit. Just nice for the space, though I've had to file part of the underframe off because the track curves on exit, and the interior buffers had to go. The roof has been repainted. There is a portakabin or two to go in beside it, and those wonky white chimneys want sorting. Came without its doors- I can live with them being missing for now- may add some later.. It does hide the wheelchair users' view through the bridges to the control panel. The rowan tree is more or less where it will end up- but surrounded by market stalls.

Testing trams and points. I've got all the tram points working properly now, and have tried running trams through. Quite a lot of fettling needed due to clearance problems and surplus glue. I'm not sure whether this will work as an attachment, so here goes. Status Quo playing in the background and the tram running far too fast. Now it works I can get on and finish the buildings behind the arch at the bottom then put the two arches back properly. Plenty to do (and still marking exams......)

Friday afternoon The rectifier and 8 points for Bingham MRC arrived this AFTERNOON. Full marks to Gaugemaster for service, but Useless Parcels Service only delivered at 3.10pm 45 minutes after I sent them a rocket because the van had driven past the house twice then gone off onto the A1....... Soldering all done this morning while waiting. The rectifier is the small box on the right hand end of the switches. Sum total of the tramway controls- Modelex hand-held, nine section switches (a diagram to be attached inside the backscene) and five (yes, five) point switches- I decided to do the two on the back as well (numbers 4 and 5, labelled on the points themselves) The Y-shaped motif at the top of the lever is to show point set to curve. The levers are passing-contact type. So now the tramway driver can do everything from his raised seat behind the layout at the end, allowing the railway operator to walk up and down the back. PS- all points threw the correct way first time, clever or just lucky? Exam marking all weekend, finding out what 16 year olds don't know, while Mr Simon gets on with Gresby in the workshop.

Progress, Jan 26th (Thurs) A heavy-duty bash at exam marking yesterday earned me enough of a breather today to get out in the workshop and get some work done. (I got another question polished off as well so a productive day.) Workshop music by Status Quo. The side the punters don't see- looking along the fiddle yard from the tramway controls to the railway controls. Note the tramway loops are on a slope. These hold two trams each. The railway loops are to the right and are level. These hold one short train each. The solution to the switches for the tramway loops. 1 and 2 are the ends of the main loop, same order as seen over the top by the operator, and the white square is for the tram shed. The switches are mounted onto a spare pioece of plywood screwed to the backscene frame and to the backscene itself (through two spacers) at the top. The rectifier should arrive tomorrow morning so I'll get this lot wired in and tested tomorrow afternoon.

Coming back to the falling apart problem- with Microtrains some couplers have a square section trip pin held rigidly in place. These don't come apart- BUT cannot be adjusted side-to-side. Those with circular section pins can be adjusted (which people- including me- seem to want) BUT these are the ones that work loose and fall apart very easily- the Bachmann couplers have circular section wire and lose trip pins much more easily than Microtrains in my experience. My spares tin held nearly a hundred failed couplers, about 80% of which were "MT compatable" rather than genuine Microtrains, and all had circular section trip pins. Turning a metal shaft in a small piece of plastic inevitably weakens the hold. In either way bending the end of the trip pin up or down can cause it to fall apart when too much force is used. Failure due to user error- got that particular T-shirt plenty of times. Do people who assemble B&B or DG couplers blame the manufacturer when a bit of wire they've bent to shape takes a dive onto the floor? My solution to losing trip pins would be to use square section pins to ensure they don't fail and stuff those who want to adjust them...... Fortunately Dapol have a more enlightened attitude to developing their products.

Tuesday - back from Manchester Haven't yet found a decent Portakabin kit but someone is selling an Arnold engine shed kit on eBay- I've been looking for one of these for some time- it just fits the space in the front left corner of the layout. I might have to use an Avis Portakabin and put it mostly behind to hide the fact it is a solid lump. No progress on the DC point supply but I'm working on it and on where to put three bulky point switches in a cramped fiddle yard. More on this when it manifests itself.

Thursday- much better day. Yestarday finished by me dropping and smashing the CD case for the Status Quo double CD- needed two new cases, but the CDs are unhurt- of course I had to test them both by playing them full blast. Unusually free from interruptions today...... Horrible light- the sun is shining brightly in. I've extended the grass track reservation down past the tram shed to the actual passing place. This has had its paving shortened and then the grass starts again aa far as just before the gateway. So far the grass behind the tramway here hasn't been added as the street scene needs putting in first- the grass track will be edged with flowers and a low fence after the surface of the road is done. No more work on the layout until Tuesday as I'm away for four days. Mr Simon will take over the workshop completely to lay Gresby's fiddle yard.

Definitely not my day.. Turns out the transformer at Wendy's is an uncased one. Will have to pay a fortune for one from Gaugemaster after all. Got home and cleaned the track- tram now doesn't want to run- has picked up the little bits. I'll have to think again about how to clean the tramway, especially as much of it is difficult to reach. Good news is that I've sourced the tree for the market area in front of the Rathaus.- a rowan in flower, by Noch. Expensive but I only need one. Vacuum cleaner tomorrow before putting tramway back into its surroundings- I've only paved the area of the actual stop and under the archway- the rest can be grassed as this seems to cause fewer problems.

Wednesday frustration New points have arrived from Japan- with switches. Two problems- both soluble but frustrating 1. I bought Kato switches rather than Tomix by mistake- now all I need to do is work out how to hang them on the back of a flimsy backscene. They do work the points. 2. They are 12 volt DC- guess who didn't factor a 12 volt DC supply into the layout design. Fortunately Wendy has a Gaugemaster 12v cased PSU in stock, so it is off to Kirkby in Ashfield this afternoon to buy it. At least the trams now run slowly through the new points, and I didn't make much of a mess lifting tramway to replace them. However there won't be infills for the new points, which is another scenic issue to be addressed. Maybe a grassed reservation through the tram station may work better than the street track- I'll think about it while I'm away for the long weekend.....

Tuesday- doing bits... One more tree done- the Woodland Scenics pines work rather better if you tear the foliage into much smaller pieces than they reccommend and use Photomount spray instead of the Hob-e-Tac that they make for the job. The trouble with the latter is that bits just keep dropping off. This pine is for the side of the board either behind or beside the end house. I'll see what Mr Simon thinks of where it currently sits before gluing it in place. Another task has been to fix and bed in the second house of the row and paint in the parking places. The big open car belongs to the brewery boss, and the tipper truck will get a dusting of something looking like a brewery delivery. Other jobs- yet more railings done. "Chainmail" has dried to just the shade of gloss grey I want for the railings NOT surrounding the brewery. Some flowery stuff worked into the grassy areas. More people part-repainted. Still a lot to do, though the top end isn't far from a stage where it can be considered leavable....

Monday- spent detailing A bitty sort of day- all sorts of little jobs started, and some progressed, but nothing finished. Sixteen attempts at getting this view and this one is the least worst so far- there are too many places to distract the autofocus on the camera, and with no manual override it is very hit and miss. All of the people, except one are from the Chinese bulk pack, some with repainted hair. Wooden barrels by Faller and PD Marsh, and aluminium kegs by Faller. Bicycles are Marsh ones, painted by me, and the fat bloke with the yellowish shirt is by Preiser. Other jobs tackled today include- getting the first of the tramway masts made- I'll use heavier traction poles and span wires nearer the arches and through the woods. painting the next set of railings in "chainmail", which is a good gloss grey (or dullish silver), another Citadel colour finishing (at last) the walling capping and touching it up twice- because I used the wrong brown first go- brain in house, body in workshop another twenty little people with hair changed to varoius browns and given jeans rather than bright pink shellsuit trousers. chippings laid at track side through railway cutting to finish this area off before the overbridges get stuck down Order off to Gaugemaster for some more Faller walling and cobbles, market stalls by DM Toys and Faller, and a set of tourists with umbrella-carrying guide. Sun now shining straight into my eyes, tiime to stop for the day.

Sunday Morning Out in the workshop early this morning- an hour done before Mr Simon got up, then an earlyish finish so he can work on Gresby. Moody Blues and Shadows failed to keep visitors away, result being a glued figure dropped back into the pot of figures....... First two floors of the brown Kaufhof building populated- i put tables and an assortment of figures into the second floor, then decided it was too much like hard work so the floor below has a display board made from Faller wooden planking and Kibri and Vollmer odds and ends. The bottom floor is set out as a cafe, so I've put some figures in there, and, as threatened I've divided the top floor into two offices. Still unsure as to whether the boss will be bonking his secretary in the left-hand one (which has a restricted view into it.....) The box of 200 Asian figures (all with black hair!) from China surfaced, and I've spent much of the morning painting some and planting others. Its the brewery back yard again. Smokers' corner. The cylinders would be empty of Carbon Dioxide so it is fairly safe. Still some bikes and a little more junk to put in this corner. Just about 3 months left to the first exhibition, so time for a progress shot. Time to get some work done....

If I had a pound for every Microtrains or the Bachmann equivalent I had with the trip pin gone AWOL I'd be very rich indeed. It is a problem with ALL of this type, not just Dapol- I like the idea of the matt varnish, however. I was going to use superglue...

Saturday Quite a frustrating day- still full of cold, not really concentrating to the extent that I came back into the house this afternoon with the superglue palette attached to my elbow.... Mr Simon was out shopping so I got the workshop today- working mainly on the corner behind the city gate. Music by Status Quo (again), Mr Simon has gone out now to work on Gresby- he'll put the radio on...... The gap in the walling is where I'm going to have to build a staircase down- this will test my building abilities, especially as I'm running very short of the Faller walling now. The view is across the rathaus platz, and is similar to the view a wheelchair user will get. Higher angles didn't come out as the winter sun was so strong. Next job is to try to find a pack of 200 cheapo Chinese-made people I bought two years back. They will fill up the town, allowing the "better" figures to be placed where they have the most effect. Most are going to need repainting but some of them will do for brewery workers.......

Friday again... Streaming with cold, music by Status Quo again to repel; visitors.... All of the railings on the brewery walls are now done. I've also abandoned the idea of doing the rest "municipal blue" as I can't get the shade to work in either gloss or matt. However, I've found pics of grey fencing in Furtwangen itself, so I'll try for a decent gloss or semi-gloss grey. shows also the weighplate. Barrels etc added to the loading dock on the left, and I';' stand a truckload of grain on the weighplate eventually. The plate itself doesn't want bedding in as it is supposed to be just proud of the surface and moveable. I've made a start at getting the trees in the back corner bedded in- still some way to go. The hole in the backscene isn't too visible- from this height the buildings are blocking it, and the trees help to shield the view of taller people. I will paint behind the hole green and may yet plant a tree trunk or two to give the impression of there being somewhere else there.... Two horizontals on the backscene are in the "too hard to deal with now" basket. Wheelchair users get this view along the top row, though there will be railings at the front to help distract the eye somewhat. Only the far end building is stuck down, and this is yet to be properly bedded in. Still plenty to do.