t-b-g

Back then, he was miles ahead of the vast majority of the hobby. Perhaps the Manchester EM gang had the edge on the engineering side but Buckingham had the edge in design and operation, as well as scenery . In terms of exhibiting a finescale, EM gauge fully scenic layout, I think Peter Denny was the very first person to achieve that. To him, as it is to me, having a model railway is all about creating a scene that allows for the recreation of the operations of the real railway. His layouts, even his pre war tinplate O gauge one, were about operation right from the start. The very first known published words written by Peter Denny are very telling. This was from the May 1931 Meccano magazine, when he was 14 years old. I wonder how many 14 year olds could write like that today but that is well off topic!

You may well be right. Perhaps that are not enough people scratchbuilding things nowadays for there to be a "many". I do know a number of people who do and all of them produce generally more accurate and better detailed models than Peter Denny did, although I still spot little details that he included that make me realise just how good he was. Many of his locos were produced from a drawing done from a photo and a known wheel diameter. How he got them as good as he did with the materials and information he had was remarkable. Nowadays,we have good access to drawings and published material that helps us get things right to a degree that he never could.

Buckingham was always my favourite layout, when it appeared in the press. My late father had a big collection of old magazines going back to the 1950s and anything with Buckingham in it was read and reread and the pages are well thumbed. As far as the quality of the modelling is concerned, Peter Denny was well up there with the very best back in the 1940s. Over the years, standards have improved and there are many modellers who can build better locos, carriages, track etc. nowadays. In terms of layout design and the sheer pleasure of sitting at the controls and running the layout, it is still the very best layout that I have ever encountered. The design and the way the operation of the layout is carried out is second to none, even to this day. It is so well balanced in terms of complexity and operational interest. Every aspect is "just enough but not too much". Me having it now is like being in model railway "heaven".

Buckingham has been run to a timetable/sequence for nearly 80 years now. We run it once a week for several hours. Originally it ran to a speeded up clock but my two operators and I all prefer running it as a sequence, as the times version has places where you are too busy to keep up without running things way over scale speeds and others when not much happens for a while. I do think it adds greatly to the pleasure of operating. Everything has its place and a reason for happening and you have to plan ahead and get things into the right position for upcoming moves. Peter Denny liked to throw in the odd "curved ball", so you will see an instruction to prepare a certain train for departure, then when you get to the card at the time for the train to leave, it will have "with horse box" added as a handwritten note. So it pays to check ahead to be not caught out. The whole day comprises around 100 trains, plus shunting moves and as each session starts where the previous one ended, we always do a different section of the timetable, so even after 12 years of operating the same sequence, we never tire of it. On Buckingham, it does work better if there are two or three operators, especially with the block bells and instruments but during Covid lockdown, I ran it myself and thoroughly enjoyed working it solo. I would prepare a train at one station, then walk the few feet across the room to the other to drive it round.

I find that there are really two types of modellers. Those who really "get" operating and those who don't. When a good operator is really "in the zone" and running a layout well, it is a joy to watch. I see operating as being like many other model railway skills. It is as much a skill to develop and master as soldering, weathering, or painting and lining. You can take the trouble to learn how to really get the best out of the layout you are running or you can just be satisfied that something is running. It isn't really that difficult but it is all about getting those little pauses right between changes of direction, along with trying to make the loco move as if it is many tons of metal, rather than a toy.

There comes a time when model railways can diverge from true prototype practice and be better for it. Victoria Park is really too small for a prototype which would have a pilot loco ready to release a train loco. You do get small real terminus stations without a run round. Eyemouth comes to mind. That was shunted using gravity so only the train loco was needed. I don't see anything wrong with using a bit of modelling license to create a small layout with more operational potential than the prototype equivalent may have had. If you have room for a small layout with only three points and can make it less prototypical but interesting to operate or more prototypical and dull to operate, give me interesting every time.

Without checking dates I can't be 100% certain but the locos on Buckingham have been in regular use for up to 77 years and I think they have probably all been in service longer than the real life ones. Even the ones with long lives on the GCR, like the N5s and J11s, lasted around 65 years maximum.

A few years ago, I had an opportunity to visit the real Dunkirk. At low tide, seeing the wrecks of the vessels still there in the sand all these years later and knowing we were standing in the place where so many died was very moving. It is such a serene, peaceful place now and there are a few good places to visit, which have been made into museums. Well worth a visit if anybody is interested in such things.

What you do get in ballasting is a slight variation in the colour of the stones. There may be exceptions but even a load of stone from the same quarry won't necessarily be exactly the same colour. When I do ballasting nowadays, I either use a ballast that has that variation or make my own by mixing one or more different ballast colours. You also get dark and light areas, which you can see in your photo. The area in the 4ft and between the tracks ahead of the loco is a bit darker than around the slow lines. Commercial ballasts often have too even a colour and too even a shape and size and it can take a bit of work to make them more natural looking with a bit of mixing. So having a degree of variation in the colours of the stones and in the overall shade of the ballast in different areas can add a good degree of realism. Edit to add a snap to illustrate my latest efforts. This is supposed to be grotty ash ballast in a terminus rather than a high speed main line.

I had the great pleasure of visiting Lime Street at its home base a while ago, with a couple of friends. I many respects, I got much more out of that visit than I did seeing the layout in that environment than I did seeing it at shows. There is so much superb modelling that I was able to appreciate and enjoy "close up" that you just can't see at normal exhibition viewing distances. We were there for a few hours and the layout wasn't even fired up and running but it didn't matter. There is just so much to enjoy just looking at it as a static model and chatting about the techniques and methods used to create it.

Most of my buildings are from plasticard. In this case, it is embossed brick on a thicker shell. The brickwork is Slater's embossed English Bond, which is correct for many railway companies, including the LD&ECR. I don't know whereabouts in the world you are but I will be doing a demo on building construction at EXPO EM in May, at Bracknell. I will have the buildings with me and I will be demonstrating my construction methods. Regards Tony

I agree entirely Jol and I have seen and heard similar things. The best demonstrators get that balance just right. You need to be able to spot the right person to open up a dialogue with. You also need to be showing methods that encourage people to have a go when they get home, rather than "look how clever I am" techniques that are so complex you have to be a well practised expert to get them to work. Some of my favourites are simple tips like making a nice tiled roof for a building, or doing the glazing bars on a window. Another is showing people just how quick and easy it can be to file up rails to make a crossing nose or a blade. Such things can make the difference between somebody having a go at making buildings or points or never trying. It is immensely satisfying if you see the same person a while later and they are now confident at carrying out the work. That has happened more than once to me. I never have any delusions about actually completing much modelling at such a show. The best I do is to come away with a few filed up bits of rail, if I haven't given them away. I really enjoy doing demos but it took me several years to learn how to do it in a way that I think suits the situation of an exhibition. It is a skill that needs to be developed and honed, like so many others. My next trip out will be at EXPO EM in May, where I will be doing a demo on making buildings.

I have told this tale on RMWeb before but many years ago, I was at a show in Doncaster with a layout. A mum and dad were looking on with a girl, probably around 8 or 9 years of age. The girl piped up with "My grandad drove the Mallard". I said that I knew the names of some of the people who had driven Mallard and if she told me her grandad's name, I might have heard of him. "Joe Duddington" was the answer. So especially around the right parts of the country, I never treated such claims as suspicious again!

As a regular Demo stand volunteer at shows, although I have cut back to just a couple of shows in the last few years, the idea that you should proactively approach everybody walking by is a bit of a non starter. It comes across as a bit desperate and pushy to me. My approach is to be doing "something" practical but to keep an eye out and spot anybody pausing or showing a bit of interest. Then a "Morning/Afternoon. Are you interested in xyz?" is a good opener. Having a few part built and finished models on show, to show the various stages of the work, perhaps with a visual display such as some photos or a laptop with a video draws people in too. Just sitting at a desk with some leaflets may be a nice easy weekend for the people behind the desk but it doesn't add much to the show.

I have a vague recollection of seeing a photo of an 08 with a shunter's truck attached to it at Doncaster. The wagon type was different as it was a former brake van chassis, which still had the concrete blocks on the ends. It is ages since I saw the photo and I can't remember where I saw it but you needn't feel that it is totally wrong to have an 08 with a shunter's wagon/match truck attached.