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I have seen real point rodding stools mounted on either timber bases, very likely the same timber as used for sleepers, or concrete bases. I would guess the concrete is more recent. Expansion is a problem and real point rodding has compensators and use the way the cranks are arranged to create equal amounts of "push" and "pull" along any given run. When Malcolm Crawley fitted rodding to Thompson's End he spent quite a while working out not just the best places to run rodding but also where compensators would be needed. Is it a problem on a model? I couldn't answer as I have never fitted any. I have always chickened out. It is much easier if the rodding runs, gaps in ballast etc. are arranged at the design stage and even if bases for the stools are added at ballasting stage. Perhaps on the next layout I may actually get around to it.

All packed up and ready to go. Always one of the most enjoyable shows in the exhibition year and I am really looking forward to seeing everybody there. Tony Gee

A good friend of mine is brilliant at communication with viewers when he operates layouts at exhibitions. If he sees a youngster watching him doing some shunting, he will start asking them which trucks he should shunt next and where he should put them. So the bad trucks go in the naughty siding, the good trucks go in the nice siding and so on. The youngsters have to decide which trucks are good or naughty and what the different sidings should be called. I get engrossed watching him in action and he always has the crowd totally hooked. I am not convinced that it is truly prototypical but it works for me.

I agree that your layouts are in the category of those that I find interesting but you 2mm folk have a huge advantage. Giving a 2mm, a 4mm and a 7mm modeller a space of around 4' or 4'6" will allow the 2mm modeller to create a nice overall scene, the 4mm modeller to model a tiny place or a corner of something bigger and the 7mm modeller a decent radius crossover. My comments were aimed more at the 4mm potential entries as in 2mm, operational interest in that sort of space is far easier to achieve. When I saw the competition, I thought of my Sutton Dock layout. It has a scenic section of just over 4'. The baseboards are 4' from the floor. If it was any lower, you could see the tops of trains sneaking back to the fiddle yard over some buildings. I have had parents of small children and people in wheelchairs walk past muttering comments about the layout being no good for them. It has a facia with lights. It is not integral as we carry it separately and bolt it on at an exhibition. It has a fiddle yard some 18" long, which is also not integral because there was a thought about joining Sutton Dock to another layout one day. It is OK to operate at exhibitions but wouldn't sustain interest for long at home, not when I have a nice big layout to play with. So it strikes me that Sutton Dock is not a cameo layout now. If I took the bolts out of the lights and fiddle yard and glued the lights and fiddle yard on and stuck an extra 12" onto the legs, it is! I wouldn't be able to operate it as I wouldn't be able to get my arms over the backscene. If I made the layout higher, viewers would be able to see the top of the backscene so I would have to stick another 12" on top of what is there, which would mean that I couldn't see over it from the back unless I stood on a box. So I am looking at the competition and finding it all rather contrived. If it sells a few books and inspires a few modellers to build a layout they wouldn't have done otherwise then there is nothing wrong with that. I have enjoyed reading Ian Rice's articles over many years and he has done no end of good for the hobby as far as I am concerned. I would have preferred it if the competition had been clearly defined as for Iain Rice inspired layouts, so high, so long, with certain features and given different overall sizes for certain scales.

It seems to me that a cameo layout is the same as a micro layout but higher up and with a built in (as opposed to bolted on, although I can see no sensible reason why) lighting system and a fascia that acts like one from a theatre stage. I have very, very occasionally seen one that held my interest for more than a few moments. There are only so many times I can enjoy the operational potential of a small tank loco or diesel shunter shuffling 3 trucks about no matter how good the idea or the setting. The only recent one I saw was "The end of the line" but that was at a sensible height so probably doesn't count. Many seem to be linked to whatever has just come out RTR so over the coming exhibition seasons I fully expect to see lots of industrial efforts using the Hornby Peckett. Too many Huntley & Palmers shunting yards really would take the biscuit.

I like the sound of that! I have some old controllers that are worked by big levers that sort of look a bit like regulator handles and I always preferred them to a round knob. I have thought once or twice about having a dummy cab interior on the control panel with one of these type of control levers and perhaps a dummy lever reverse to change direction. I am not anti technology in any form and the next layout will have a lever frame with each lever having a microswitch. These will work relays, which will move servos for points and signals and put power to the track. Not quite cutting edge technology but quite advanced for me, especially if I make up the drive boards from MERG kits. It is really an updated version of what Peter Denny did with Buckingham, where most tracks are isolated until the correct signal is pulled. I just find it a bit amusing to see people operating their layouts via a laptop/tablets or a mobile phone. In my view, these items seem to be playing a huge part in everyday life and some people seem to be totally unable to function without them. It is as if they spend their whole life looking at little screens and can't even stop when they build a layout.

That is my idea of model railway hell! I know some people actually like doing as little as possible to operate their layouts and others who like to run their layouts by spending their time on their mobile phones or computer keyboards. There are others who actually enjoy pulling levers to change points and signals and then enjoy driving the trains. Neither is right or wrong but I am firmly in the second group. The satisfaction from carrying out complex and challenging operation on a well designed layout is a big part of why I enjoy my hobby and computerisation and automation are not something I will be doing any time soon. Anyway, me, spending my time chatting........never happen!

That all depends on the operator being happy standing for a whole weekend! The baseboards on Buckingham are around 2' 7" from the floor. Operating that from the comfort of an adjustable office armchair for several hours at a time gives me no problems at home but I would agree that is a bit low for a show. We exhibited Leighton Buzzard (around 3') at one show that used rows of seats as barriers. The number of people who actually sat down, watched the layout for ages and then commented that the combination of that height layout with seated viewing and operating was enough to convince me that sitting to view and operate works for me. I appreciate that it is not always possible at shows but a barrier to lean on can give the watcher a lower viewing angle and allow an operator to sit comfortably.

The subject of layout heights has been discussed many times on here. The only resolution to the dilemma is to accept that there is no "right" answer. I won't be submitted an entry to this one. I see enough youngsters and people who struggle to see layouts that are so high up even at specialist shows. To suggest that a layout could have a set of high legs for specialist shows and a set of lower ones for general shows is just wrong. It is saying that those in wheelchairs and youngsters are not regarded as being wanted or expected at timescale/specialist shows. I find that sort of idea so opposite to my own views. Over the years I have built layouts between around 3' to 4'of the ground. When they have been lower, I have been able to give youngsters and people in wheelchairs the chance to join in and have a go operating. I remember once seeing an advocate of high level viewing exhibit a layout so tall that I couldn't see the track. It was, according to the guide, P4 but for all I could see it could have been Hornby 3 rail. He had to stand on a box to reach anything. It was very funny but as an exhibit it was totally ineffective. My theory is that it is a lot easier for taller people to get nearer the ground than it is for shorter people to get higher up. Usually anyway. Anybody else remember the Goodies? Is discrimination against less tall people called apartheight?

I saw your PM before I saw the thread, so I will also answer on here. It was not too much of a problem as long as we were careful with what locos we chose for shunting. The 9F (not the big 2-10-0 but the GCR 0-6-2T variety, LNER N5 was OK shunting chimney first but bunker first could give some buffer lockeng. There was one set of carriages that buffer locked too, if they were shunted from the arrival platform to the departure side, so we just put another loco on the other end and ran them out ECS or as a departure from the same platform they came in on. It wasn't the radius of the Y point that caused the problem. It was the reverse curve through the preceding RH point (which is a B7 so is quite gentle) then the immediate change in direction via the 4ft radius Y. To be fair, some of the stock, including the ones that gave trouble, were built many years ago by others and some of the buffers don't line up very well even on the straight. The layout never did get finished as once it was exhibited a couple of times as "work in progress" I got distracted by other projects. It may get finished one day but not until an 0 gauge version has been tackled! This was as advanced as it got. At least the GCR motive power appeared, if not the stock. The building was a mock up based loosely on Chesterfield Market Place.

I can't even pretend that b and y are near each other on the keyboard! I just don't like to make things too easy.

The 4mm model is by Geoff Taylor and there are photos of it on his GT Buildings website. Go to Yarmouth Junction 2 and activate the slide show using the link on the photo bottom left of the page. It is a superb bit of modelling and well worth a look. If I could work out how to do a link on this device I would!

You have my utmost admiration taking a big layout to a one day show! I did it once but never again. I look forward to seeing you there as I went last year and thoroughly enjoyed my day out, so I will be back this year.

Perhaps I am cracking up then. I was sure I saw some 7mm scale GWR plates that you were selling off at the recent Scalefour Society do at Wakefield that were marked "Shawplan" or Extreme Etchings or something like that. Many apologies if I got that wrong as the memory ain't what it used to be. I am fully aware of the distinction between Brians. I have known Brian Hanson for many years and do know that he does some commercial etching for other people.

That is fair enough. A bit like an 0 gauge modeller looking at the line up for Expo EM and deciding not to go because there is not much of direct interest. There would have to be something of specific personal interest to make it worth going. These specialist society events are mainly aimed at members plus other interested parties. If there is nothing of interest, then not going seems a much better option than spending a day and some cash and coming away feeling that you would rather have stayed at home. I went to the 0 gauge do at Leigh recently. It was good for trade and a couple of excellent demo stands plus lots of good chat with people but the layouts let it down for me. A couple I had seen before and no less than 3 big toy train/collectors train sets. Others seemed to like it but it wasn't my thing at all!

The 0 gauge shows are quite unlike most others. There are several over the year and they vary from almost 100% traders through to a conventional show. Doncaster is probably in the "trade and demo stands plus a few layouts" category. I really enjoyed it last year more for the social side than the layouts and I managed to pick up a couple of well priced kits second hand. I will be going and have arranged to meet a few friends there, which is what most shows are about for me now. The work involved in lugging big 0 gauge layouts, (which are either shunting planks or big due to the nature of the scale) to a one day show doesn't encourage large layouts attending. That doesn't stop such shows being a good day out.

To follow up on the comments about Buckingham I would largely agree that each individual aspect of the layout has been surpassed. There are some parts of the layout that do show their age and some aspects, such as the tight radius of some of the curves and points that are less than ideal or realistic but without such curves the amount of railway in that space would not be possible. There is one aspect in which I don't believe the layout has been bettered by anything before or since and that is in the design of the electrical systems and in the sheer pleasure of sitting down for a running session. How many layouts can sustain the interest of an operating team (usually 2 or 3) for several hours twice a week? All of us always look forward to our operating sessions and after a few years we are still finding new ways to carry out the various moves. So a museum piece it may be but when we run our 70 year old scratch built trains well, to time and without making a mess of it, the satisfaction is much greater than I have experienced with any other layout.

Just for once I can tell where a "mystery" photo was taken and others have beaten me to it. The B16 is just pulling out of one of the up sidings (which were more loops than sidings as they were connected both ends) and is about to run along Platform 1. The brick building top right is the station announcer's cabin situated at the North end of platforms 1 and 4. The trainspotter is standing on what has been known as the cattle dock for as long as I recall but it is many years since it was used for that purpose. The sidings were known as the cattle dock sidings but I don't know if that was an official or a local name.

The Denny method was to have the whole body as a lift off, so each wagon has two bodies, one full and one empty. It also allows different liveries to be applied to the fulls and empties so although there are only 12 wagons in the usual coal train (plus a couple of others that work in the pick up goods) there is an appearance of there being more. I don't know where you got that information from and I am sure I have seen it somewhere but it is not how the Buckingham (GC) coal train is emptied now.

I hardly remember steam, so I model what I wish I had seen rather than what I remember. I can understand why people model the BR period but for me, I prefer to model them when they were at their best. In many ways, preserved railways are closer to the pre-grouping era that I model in terms of smart clean locos, with a dirty one being a rarity up to the start of WW1. But each to their own. One of the reasons why I chose that period is because so few people model it and my models are not the same as the BR 1950s/60s ones that everybody else seems to have.

Liveries are very much a personal choice. Nobody can really say that a particular livery was "the best". All anybody can say is which one they like the best. I can't help but think that a K3 in pre-grouping GNR Green livery would make those two above look distinctly drab!

There will be people on here much better qualified than I am to answer those questions but I have a recollection of hearing of an A1 on test that had a drawbar horsepower of around 3,000 measured for a short while. That was measured starting a heavy train from a stand. A diesel loco which has a quoted horsepower doesn't, as far as I know, have that full hp available for hauling trains as some of it is needed to move the loco and to power electrics etc. O S Nock once calculated that the Deltics, with engines producing 3,300hp actually had a drawbar hp available for hauling trains of around 2,750. I don't know if Tornado has been measured but it is more powerful than the original A1s due to the change in boiler pressure and cylinder size. So Tornado is probably nearer a Deltic than a Class 47 in short bursts. The ability to sustain that output over a long period is another matter altogether which is why high steam power outputs are usually over a short time period.

I will be bringing along a collection of models from Buckingham, by the late Rev. Peter Denny as a static display. This year is the 70th anniversary of the start of the Buckingham layout and some of the models I bring will be the original locos and carriages built back in 1947. It is also the centenary of the birth of Peter Denny, so it will be a double celebration of the man and his models. Tony Gee

According to the report on the telly, she kept two firemen busy on the test run. That would be an answer rather than oil firing or mechanical stoking.