kirmies

YORK will be making only its second ever public appearance next weekend at the Steam Museum, Swindon Railway Festival. Details can be found here: https://www.steam-museum.org.uk/event/swindon-railway-festival/. Hope to see you there!

There has been some progress on the layout since the York Show at Easter though mostly what's happened since then is me catching up with all the things I didn't do in the earlier part of the year when I was spending pretty much every waking hour getting YORK ready for York.

The main visible improvements are the awnings on the open air sections of the platforms (viewable through the ends of the overall roof:

And W.H.Smiths, which was well stocked at the York Show at Easter but rather lacked customers and staff now has both:

Just got back from the great success that was York Show 2023. Thank you SO much for all the kind remarks about the layout both in person and online. It meant a GREAT deal.

The Lord Mayor of York liked it so much he came back for a second look!

The layout was so popular that, for large parts of the weekend, there was quite a crowd around it:

Apologies of this meant you weren't able to get as good a view as you have liked. YORK will be at STEAM in Swindon on 9th & 10th September and Leeds Model Railway Exhibition on 28th & 29th October and at 3 or 4 shows a year around the country after that.

We had nine trains on the layout for most of the 3 days of the show and, considering this was the first show almost all of the stock had attended, everything ran really well with remarkable few problems. This was a massive relief for me as it was the first time I've ever exhibited a 2mm finescale layout: I've been having nightmares for weeks about everything failing by Monday.

As the number of trains increases, the return curves get quite interesting to watch:

There's room for around 18 trains so, once I have that many, there'll be trains going in all directions!!

Now that YORK for York Show 2023 has been achieved, I'll keep posting stuff about the layout here every so often but will mostly be getting the website fully running and up to date: www.this-is-york.com.

Once again thanks for all your encouragement that has helped get me this far and for all the kind words about the layout.

Two weeks today and YORK will be at York! Final testing is under way and, by way of a taster, here are the latest two trains passing through:

The Silver Jubilee is John Aldrick's work (apart from the loco) and the eleven coach trough train is mostly mine with a couple of John's coaches thrown in for good measure. 

Hope to see you in a couple of weeks!

The very observant will have spotted that the September 1937 issue of The Model Railway News is available at W.H.Smiths on YORK so no time travel devices needed:

The model is now nearing completion and is installed on the layout. Not quite sure would have been on the back wall of the kiosk so that has been left blank for now (and the clock is still at the repairers!):

Avid and prompt readers of Railway Modeller will have already seen that YORK is April's Railway of the Month:

This is largely to promote the return of the much missed York Show but also shows the layout in quite a favourable light. I'm pretty pleased with the way the article has turned out and I hope it encourages a few more people to come along to the show.

Even the unobservant will notice that W H Smiths is looking a bit understocked:

The text of the article explains that this is a job yet to be done. Well, it was at the time I took the photos but, being right 'up front and centre' on the layout, it has been a priority task to complete before Easter.  The last few weeks have seen a considerable improvement in stock levels:

These are all custom decals drawn on CAD or images of contemporary newspapers, magazines and books manipulated in Photoshop etc.

The piles of these on the counter were built up from numerous tiny offcuts of 10 thou plastikard:

With decals of the front covers applied one by one:

I know everything in 2mm is tiny and fiddly but this was borderline ridiculous!

Decals for the actual W.H.Smith's signage are still awaited and toning down of the sheen and bedding down onto the platform surface will happen once they've been applied. The clock on this side of the signal box is still at the repairers!

It's been a while since I last posted a video but I'm now at the stage where things that look something like trains are running through something that looks a bit like a station:

What (I hear you say) a Great Western train running through YORK?

Two reasons:

• They actually did: this is the Port to Port (Newcastle to Swansea) train which alternated between GWR and LNER coaching stock. It was pulled by an LNER loco on the LNER and a GW one on the Great Western.
• Trains by all 4 grouping companies passed through York in the 1930s and they will all be represented on YORK.
• The second reason is that the coaches are John Aldrick's and have run at several shows on his layout Ivybridge (which uses the same return curves as YORK). This makes it a good first train for testing as, if it derails, it's probably the track rather than the stock.

The plan is over the coming weeks gradually to go through all the trains I have put together (and the other one I've borrowed from John) and test and test until I'm as sure as I can be that they'll stand up to the rigours of the 3 days of York Show (around 20 hours of operating) and largely stay on the track!

Much of this week has been spent doing a photoshoot of YORK for the Railway Modeller. Steve Flint has kindly agreed to feature the layout in the April edition (due out in mid-March) as a way of promoting the return of the much missed York Model Railway Show. Here are a few of the out-takes:

A similar view but now with the roof reinstalled:

fitting the roof is now an even more nerve-racking process than it was before: previously, before the platforms were painted and detailed, all I was trying to do was avoid damaging the roof. Now, it's a matter of avoiding that AND not doing damage to the platform surface, people, furniture etc. Progressing slowly and carefully with regular breaks seemed to work (this time anyway!).

The back wall is now seated better than it was but still not perfectly, I suspect the only solution is whatever is the architectural equivalent of skirting board all the way along. This can only be done when the roof's off so will have to wait. Most of the time it's not too obvious:

The whole scene is really starting to come on!

The figures are now painted and today has been spent fitting them to the layout: (note that the roof, apart from  the bit attached to the back wall, is not in place at the moment to allow all this platform detailing to be done: the holes in the platform are where the columns fit):

Painting the figures was repeated thin washes of military modelling acrylics (Vallejo, Ammo & AK Interactive) gradually building up the colour and shading. This may seem a long, slow process but using acrylic thinners rather than water to make the washes meant that, by the time I'd finished applying one wash the first figures treated were dried and ready for the next.

I'm very pleased with the result though, as I said before, the quality of the Modelu 3D prints is a great place to start!

As ever, a photograph immediately reveals faults the eye has missed - the back wall, which I thought was now properly seated on the platform, still needs more work if it is to appear 'grounded'.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

It is exactly two years since I started this thread and a huge amount has been achieved on YORK in that time. Back in early 2021 I was convinced I would have the layout finished and ready for the 2022 York Show. Quite why I thought this was ever possible I'm not sure but it was never going to happen and, as history proceeded to record, the 2022 York Show didn't happen anyway!

Now with around 100 days to go to the opening of the 2023 York Show I am quietly confident that YORK, in some vaguely complete looking form, will be there although I'm sure there are many as yet unforeseen hurdles to get over.

In the meantime I'd like to thank everyone for their positive and encouraging comments about the layout's progress both on this thread and elsewhere: it has been a great help especially when the going gets tough which it has on various occasions.

So, THANK YOU!

Keep that positive energy coming - over the next 3 months or so I've a feeling I'm going to need it!

Meanwhile, the latest thing to hit the workbench is a batch or around 50 Modelu figures:

I've been aware of Alan's great work with 3D scanner and printer for ages but this is the first time I've come up close to some of his figures and they are breathtaking in their detail and realism even at this small scale (craft knife included in the photo to show just how small they are). I find them slightly unnervingly real but then....they are scans of real people and all previous 'model people' have been sculpted by somebody (some rather more successfully than others). Even a scant knowledge of art history tells you that making a sculpture of the human form is VERY difficult so it's no great surprise that previous attempts at castings/mouldings to populate our layouts have had varying degrees of success.

The problem now is how to paint them and I tend to think, in this diminutive scale, the secret is subtle washes of colour to bring out the inherent detail in the models rather than any attempt to paint them 'accurately' - they look pretty convincing to me even in the grey primer stage seen here.

I'll let you know how I get on and, once again......

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Progress is being made on several fronts simultaneously: as well as the platform furniture and the weathering of the ballasted track and platform surfaces, I've been fitting the window frames to the entrance buildings and back wall.

As discussed in a previous post, these were etched in 0.1mm (approx. 4 thou) stainless steel. This brings the minimum 'permissible' dimension down from 0.3mm for my usual 0.25mm thick nickel silver to 0.18mm enabling the glazing bars to be rather nearer to scale. The reason for using stainless is that it's much harder than nickel: window frames made from 0.1mm N/S would, I suspect, be almost impossibly flimsy. As it is, the stainless ones are pretty fragile so my idea of getting lots of spares etched proved both worthwhile and necessary. 

But, now they're in place, I think the results speak for themselves:

I can't think of another way to get these so fine and so consistent so I'm well pleased!

It occurred to me a while ago that this layout has a huge area of platform surface which means I'm going to need large quantities of platform furniture. Over the last couple of weeks I've been assembling a first batch, all custom etched:

• 26 NER platform benches
• 20 NER porters' trolleys
• 2 NER departure boards
• 2 LNER ticket collectors' booths
• Some LNER barrier fencing for the station entrance
• And, obviously, a partridge in a pear tree (though this is hard to see as it is only there for comic effect)

In common with all things 2mm, they are VERY, VERY small! Here they all are ready for priming:

MERRY CHRISTMAS ONE AND ALL!!

Work carries on gradually detailing the station area. Platform walls have been brick lined (about 60 actual feet of platform edging cut on the Silhouette cutter) and the walkway between the centre tracks added. This appears on photos until at least the 1950s but I'm not entirely sure what it was used for - if anyone knows please shout!

Most recently the epic job that is ballasting:

A really useful tool was one I made to a design in the excellent 2mm Association book 'TRACK: how it works and how to model it' (p96-97). It can be seen just in front of the margarine tub (which has the ballast in it). Basically it's a very soft bristled brush mounted in a block of wood and its purpose is to brush the ballast off the top of the sleepers into the gaps between them. It's adjustable (as the setting of the brush height is pretty critical for effective working) and once set up works brilliantly. There is still the need to go along with a small brush to move the last few grains but it quickly and efficiently sweeps a good 95% of the ballast to where it needs to be.

Friday was gluing day using the time honoured mist spray with water (with detergent to allow good wetting) and then drip in a 50/50 mix of PVA and water (again with detergent to promote flow into all areas). After 3 days to dry thoroughly, this morning was the crunch moment: out with the vacuum to see how much of it has actually stuck. Answer: virtually all of it:

Barely half a teaspoonful collected by the vacuum. So the result (whilst needing considerable weathering down) is excellent:

RESULT!!

FIRST STOPPING TRAIN AT YORK:

Finally, after several weeks of tracklaying and wiring then testing and adjusting, the first train through YORK has finally been caught on film. The roof is removed at the moment to allow easy access to the track and the footbridge and buildings are temporarily postioned to give context but this is DEFINITE progress!!