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Thanks for that. It pretty much fits in with the information I have. The loco shed diorama still exists and I have taken it out on display a couple of times. Peter told me that he used to give talks at model railway clubs and took it along with him. I have been trying to work out whether the loco shed was a "left over" from one of the versions of Buckingham (possibly modified into a two road shed) or if it was built specifically for the diorama. It is probably mentioned somewhere in Peter's writings but I can't recall seeing it. I haven't been able to find out what happened to the Mk 1 Leighton Buzzard, which was a very small, easily transportable layout. I can't see any buildings from it on the present Buckingham and most buildings were re-used when a layout was dismantled. So perhaps it was disposed of complete or maybe it was totally demolished. I like to think that it is still around somewhere as I found it highly inspiring as a concept. Tony

Do you have any further information on the appearance of Buckingham? As the custodian of the layout, I have tried to put together as much "history" for the layout as I can, helped by a wonderful set of copies of all known information provided by the Denny family. This includes things like brochures for exhibitions and mentions in model railway magazines of show appearances. Up to now I haven't been aware that the later version of Buckingham was ever exhibited and I have been telling people that it never was, so I would have to re-think what I say to folk! Also, can you remember if it was as a working layout or a static exhibit? Thanks, Tony

Sorry if I wasn't clear but I wasn't referring to your comments when I said that I disagreed. I should have said that I have seen comments on other threads saying that there is no difference between a model designed and drawn on a computer and then printed and one built by more traditional methods. Both approaches require skills but I was just emphasising your point that they are different ones. Apologies for the confusion! Tony

I also model the railway scene of long before I was born. When people ask me why I don't model what I knew, I reply that I can remember what I knew so I don't need to build models of it. I build what I wish I had seen and modelling is the only way I can get to see the locos that I would have wanted to see pulling trains. I have very mixed feelings about the new technology though and I do disagree with people who say that 3D printing is the same as scratchbuilding from sheet metal etc. It is a very skilful thing to be able to do good 3D CAD design but it is a completely different skill to using a piercing saw etc. to cut metal from a sheet. The only thing the "builder" may have touched before he or she has a 3D model in their hands is a keyboard. OK, it is just a "tool" but it is a real game changer in terms of the types of skill required. 3D printing does not require a steady hand or the ability to mark out and cut a dead straight line (the computer and printer does that for you, all you have to do is tell it where to cut). You don't need to be able to mark out and measure a dead 90 degree corner, as you tell the computer that you want 90 degrees and you get it. But when it comes to complex curves and the arrangement of parts in relation to one another, some of the work done on CAD is simply stunning. Turning a drawing and some photos into a 3D CAD drawing is way beyond me and I am full of admiration for those who can do it and when I see some of the wonderful drawings that appear on here on in the press they take my breath away. But the skills needed to produce such works of art must be quite different to the ones I use, otherwise I would be able to do both! Tony

I think a number of people, myself included, sometimes refer to our layouts as "train sets" more as a term of affection and as a nod to how we know the rest of the world sees us, rather than out of any attempt to turn the hobby into "toy trains". Before pretty much every operating session, somebody always says "Shall we go and play trains?" We don't play! We try to operate a layout as well as we can in accordance with a timetable, using as near correct operation practices as we can. When we have finished, we often comment on how much fun we have just had "playing trains". The idea that having fun somehow reduces "proper" model railways to toy train sets is not one I can get my head around. As has been said on here before, most of my friends take the modelling very seriously but never ourselves. I would add a few more words to Jol's list of terms to describe the building of models. These world include challenging, sometimes frustrating, educational and perhaps most importantly, enjoyable. If it wasn't, I wouldn't do it.

While I am on this thread, here is a snap I took a few weeks ago of one of the layouts that has had a fair share of mentions. I have only just spotted the track repair equipment (needle file) between the tracks, so please ignore that. So this is what the terminus at Buckingham looks like nowadays.

I might be wrong as I don't have the magazine to hand but I recall that a layout with that name is one of the ones mentioned in a write up that Cliff Parson may have lined up for his "AIMREC" model railway centre in Ashford. It was certainly a very similar layout name if it wasn't that. Tony

You are spot on with that comment and it is one of the reasons I prefer (personal choice - other variations and opinions are available!!) to build my locos rigid, as I don't think that anything else is necessary for working in EM. I find the construction easier, checking clearances in splashers and for brake gear is easier if your wheels can't move up and down and you don't need any more than a minimum clearance in the crankpins. In many ways, you can build things with smaller clearances between wheels/splashers etc. if the wheels can't move about. I tried to explain to Malcolm that it was not possible for the K2 to be built in the way that I normally work but all he said was that I should change the way I build things and do them his way instead! I have some old spare Romford wheel that I use for assembly and testing and then I put the "final" wheels (usually Gibson nowadays but I do have a stock of Sharmans from way back when for some projects). Building the K2 rigid with the cylinders on and then swapping the wheels would have been impossible, although a rigid front axle secured by a keeper plate would do the trick. That would need modification to the kit parts and I quite understand that many folk don't want to start doing that sort of work although it is not really that difficult to make a slotted bearing and a means of holding the axle in place. I do feel that some kits have rather more parts than they really need and I often look and wonder why somebody didn't do a half etched detail overlay rather than put in 26 small detail parts to attach. It is almost as if some kit designers sometimes just like to show off just how small and neat they can draw things for an etch! So I fully agree with your design aims! Tony

I remember sitting opposite Malcolm as he designed the K2 artwork and I raised similar concerns as the design developed. Every once in a while he would listen to my ideas and alter things but not this time! In his words, it was designed to have the wheels removable using compensated or sprung axleboxes in hornguides and if anybody wanted to build it rigid that was their problem! I have one stashed away and when I get around to building it, mine will be modified as Tony (W) has done. Malcolm didn't really approve of the idea that somebody might actually want to modify and even, dare I say it, improve one of his kits! He was good at many things and a great friend for over 30 years but admitting that he might have made an error never came easily to him! I think I have seen one running in GNR livery on a layout and I have run Malcolm's model but there are not as many about as there would have been if it had been a bit more straightforward in design. Tony (Gee)

I would just like to congratulate you on the lovely Tilbury tank model. The photo that was put up earlier in the thread was one I built a while ago, which was painted by Mr Rathbone as I chickened out of the livery. I particularly appreciate the ways you got around one or two of the little pitfalls in the kit, which was not the most straightforward but as you have shown, can build up into a truly lovely looking model. Tony

Puffers had a kit under development (many years ago now) for the LD&ECR 0-4-4T loco. It got as far as a test etch built up and displayed on their exhibition stand and I know they had many castings/turnings prepared. I would be very pleased indeed if that resurfaced. I might even have 2! It will also be very good to have the various GCR carriage kits and bits available again. Tony

The reference to the world smelling of fresh paint was probably in relation to the various visits made by royalty, rather than to their home life. Everywhere they went seemed to have just had a new coat of paint. Not just in pre-grouping times either. As for whitewashed coal on Royal Trains, it certainly happened in pre WW1 days. A quick internet search came up with a photo of an LBSCR tank on a Royal Train with what looks to be white coal in the bunker. I even remember reading a reference to a Royal visit to a coal mine and the stacks of coal there being painted white. The only point to it was to try to impress Royalty with the amount of work that had been put into preparing for the visit. Unless somebody can tell us that whitewashed coal in a loco made for a nice white exhaust......

Should this information just relate to wheel sizes or should they list all the compromises, such as cab side sheets or brake pull rods being over thick as plastic has been used? Will we ever see the day when any manufacturer, in any field, will market their products with a list of compromises and faults that they have included. Probably not! I have seen it from time to time in kit instructions "such a part has been made undersized to allow adequate clearance round curves" etc. but to expect it from the likes of Hornby and Bachmann is asking a lot.

Once you accept the OO gauge is not P4 and you need larger than scale flanges, and that the thickness of the material used for the splashers is over scale thickness, then the RTR manufacturers have two options. They make the wheels too small or the splashers too big. My personal choice would be for the wheels to be too small as real wheels were turned down by around a couple of inches before scrapping replacing the tyres but either option will always upset somebody and if smaller wheels had been fitted I am sure somebody would have been moaning about that too. Let's face it........ They just can't win! Tony

In the late 70s/early 80s my brother was a member of ASLEF and was out on strike at a time when we had a layout at a show. He turned up on the Saturday morning, announced that he couldn't drive any trains without breaking the strike, pulled out the plug for the power supply and placed a 4mm figure with an ASLEF banner in front of the model station entrance. After some short sharp negotiations, he was persuaded that he wouldn't be blacklisted and normal service was resumed but the bloke with the placard stayed for the weekend.

The LNER painting specification doesn't quote the actual width of the black part of the boiler band lining as it was whatever width the band was. The quoted widths for other lining is 2" for the black with 3/16th" white either side in most places. So the white lines should be tiny in comparison to the black. As Coachmann rightly says, the white shows up far more than the actual line widths would suggest and it isn't easy to get it right on a model. Looking at prototype photos, to my eye the white and black look quite balanced (despite the greater amount of black) with neither really overpowering the other. On many models, the white is far too prominent. Tony

That is looking very nice. The only thing that perhaps could do with a slight tweak are the boiler bands. Rather too much white and not enough black methinks.

Going from modelling the GWR to American is but a small shift to the dark side. Please nobody take that remark seriously. It is pure tongue in cheek mischief! Best of luck with you American project and I hope your book finds a suitably appreciative new home. Tony

This cropped up recently and a number of very handy drawings came to light, including the ones already offered above. I haven't worked out how to do a proper link to another thread but if you put LNWR Oerlikon Dimensions into the search box you will go straight there. Tony

That actually makes me feel quite sad! A modeller with no further use for the Buckingham book. For many folk, myself included, that book was the biggest single literary influence on my modelling for 40 plus years and it would be the last one from my collection that would go. So I have a very well thumbed copy but I can thoroughly recommend that somebody without one in their collection makes the most of this opportunity as you don't see many around.

I didn't say what others should do, just what I would have done to avoid confusion. If I was building a layout, either of a real or a fictional location which had been used before as a layout name (especially a really well known one) I would call mine something different. I wouldn't want anybody to ever think that they couldn't build a model of a place just because somebody had done it before. It would be a sad day when people start registering layout names like trade marks. Following the example, if I was going to build a model of Ashburton I would give it a name like "Edwardian Days at Ashburton" or suchlike. It just needs a little imagination and thought. Tony

Before my involvement with the layout, I would have travelled a long way to see it at a show so I can appreciate your feelings. I have put a clarification on the relevant exhibition thread. Tony

Very little work is actually taking place on Buckingham at the moment other than "fettling". Now that most of the layout is operational, we are just having fun operating it and fixing things as we go along. Some jobs are progressing and the block bells and instruments between Buckingham and Grandborough Junction were put back into action a couple of weeks ago (no more shouting "ding" across the shed!) I was planning to reduce exhibition outings for Leighton Buzzard down to perhaps one a year as the fiddle yard (which was cobbled together from offcuts and scrap bits of wood for a "one off" appearance at the MRJ show) is rapidly deteriorating as the timber twists and sags! However, in view of the big EM gauge anniversary this year, I have been persuaded to do both EXPO EM at Bracknell in May and EXPO EM North at Manchester in September. As for the "other" Buckingham layout, I would have thought that exhibiting a layout and giving it that name would be bound to lead to confusion. If I have built it, I would have called it "Buckingham North Western" or "Buckingham LNWR" but I can imagine a little smile on the faces of those who have built the layout as they discussed such matters.......

If it is, it is news to me! I have pondered long and hard about the possibility of exhibiting Buckingham. Like most things, it is technically possible but the sheer amount of work involved to move it and the very high chance of doing serious damage to it mean that I have pretty much ruled it out. Last time we moved it, dozens of old brittle soldered joints broke in the track and the wiring and it took many months to sort out what wire went where and where we needed to repair a dry but otherwise sound looking joint. So moving the layout and getting it up and running on a Friday before a show would be miraculous to pull off. I have seen references to another layout called Buckingham, so perhaps that is what is going to Leamington but it isn't the one in my shed! Thanks for mentioning it in case others think about going to Leamington expecting to see it. Tony

Got a new camera for Christmas and had a play with it this afternoon. Somehow the "sepia" colour option seemed entirely appropriate.......