Moggs Eye

Ongoing work to Station Road level crossing. I decided to lose the canopy over the ground frame, I hope the crossing keeper won't mind. Meanwhile the Army Air Corps Gazelle helicopter is almost complete. It will be positioned on the edge of the cricket pitch after an emergency landing.

Work progressing on the Carnival Bank level crossing with the Stop board for down trains installed. It's a resized photo taken from the board protecting the crossing at Ferry Meadows on the Nene Valley Railway.

The Cottleston crew (both of us) enjoyed a very good curry at Shagorika on the sea front on Saturday night. Highly recommended.

Taking for granted the place where you live is easily done. We're the same in Lincolnshire. I was there with Cottleston, in the smaller of the halls beside the American narrow gauge. Cheers, Ben.

Here is the evidence of the reinvigorated signal 43 doing its thing. Despite sickness meaning I was short-handed for Perth Green, I had a very good weekend up there. The layout behaved itself, the club were perfect hosts and we were in excellent company layout-wise. My next outing is to the GCR in June with Emsworth, but my main effort presently is finishing Holland Beck. As Cottleston is still getting invitations it will be having a general refresh later in the year.

I wish I could have spent more time watching the trains and enjoying the detail on this layout at Perth Green, but I was operating my own. The thought and skill that has gone into the build of Troutons are very impressive; even if there hadn't been trains to watch it is an absorbing layout. As a fan of single car DMUs, my favourite moment was seeing a class 153 trundle along the main line. Its inclusion in the stock list just made the layout more rounded and complete. Great work, I wish you well on the replacement.

A few more pictures from Perth Green. First appearance of a loco in Platform 1 for ages. An Acrewood bound service trundles past the abandoned brake van on the disconnected siding behind Moggs Eye box. Another Acrewood bound DMU passing platform 1's starter signals. Something in the sea air Up North added so boost to my signals; number 7 (showing clear for the branchline) doesn't usually get up so high! 43 was the same and I have no idea why.

Perth Green is the furthest North I've been with my layout and I had a thoroughly good weekend. The standard of layouts was impressive, they were very friendly hosts and I am a convert to the lovely coastline between Sunderland and South Shields. The modelling standards on display were inspiring and I wish I could have spent more time looking into the details, but operating must come first. Great show, thanks.

Moggs Eye signalbox. My new van; a Parkside VEA with Railmatch transfers. I haven't made a van kit before, thanks Si for sowing that seed, and thoroughly enjoyed it. For those who haven't tried I can recommend Parkside, this van was a pleasure to build. It's probably the wrong era for Cottleston, but I'm prepared to overlook that. I have a Cambrian OCA to try next. More MoD manoeuvring.

153382 ticks over in Platform 1 awaiting its departure time to Nottingham. It must be the Branch Line Society getting right up to the stops in this 153. I can't think of any other reason why it should be in the Loco Siding!

A couple of pictures from Saturday at Perth Green. 50033 Glorious heading North over Crow Lane level crossing. 08847 and 47829 having a moment in the exchange sidings. A different traction line up in the sidings; MoD Thomas Hill Steelman Royale (not a Hornby Sentinal), 37114 and 60007.

After having had a good time at the Lincoln show a couple of weeks ago, Team Cottleston is heading North to Jarrow this weekend. We'll be gently bickering with other and driving Cottleston at the Perth Green Exhibition this Saturday and Sunday. If you're passing come and say hello; we'll be instantly recognisable as Southern tourists as we'll be wearing coats!

Thanks, JDW, The teeth came from an old Revell Sea Vixen kit I never got around to building. I've been operating another Knightwing shunter on my other layout, Cottleston, where it masquerades as an MoD shunter. They do need some weight adding to get the best from them. Cheers, Ben.

I have enjoyed the new series of Doctor Who, I liked the transition to Jodie Whitaker and the casual way the gender change was handled. I don't see any problem with the assistants; the mix of people seems very ordinary .Like I said, enjoyable. I have watched Doctor Who since the latter episodes of Jon Pertwee and only gave up when I left home and lost interest, about Peter Davidson's time. When Christopher Eccleston came back I watched again out of loyalty to the brand and was impressed enough to keep watching. Since then I haven't missed an episode, but have never been so blown away that I'd buy a box set and revisit them - it's comfortable, undemanding viewing. The Rosa Parks episode was the first one that brought a lump to my throat. The moment where she quietly refused to give up her seat and was led away under arrest stayed with me long after the episode finished. It inspired me to read up on her uncomfortable story and the uncomfortable story of the civil rights movement in America. Ultimately Doctor Who is a fantasy for children and young adults. Whether or not there will be future, time-travelling racists matters not - we can't predict that - it's just a hook to tell a story and is no more or less improbable than many of the hooks that are used extensively in fantasy fiction. Is the whole thing political correctness gone mad? What does that even mean? Why is changing language or terms or visibility to reduce exclusion so difficult? We're living through a period of social change and don't have to be uncomfortable with it. I've worked in some big, public service organisations that have been traditionally seen as socially conservative which have gone through significant changes in their cultures and I can't see or feel the damage in them. Back to Doctor Who, I'm looking forward to the next series.

Without trying to get in your head, where it's none of my business anyway, the feeling of deceit may come from your own perceptions about the person your talking with suddenly being smashed up. Much of our socialisation comes from identifying whether we are talking with a man or woman, we often alter our behaviour, speech, etc based on our initial assessment of gender. Claudine Griggs, in her book S/he, makes the point better than me, but when our preconceptions are challenged it makes us uncomfortable. That discomfort may be intensified if, when talking to this woman (who we might find attractive) we discover the person we're attracted to has male biology. Remember the film, 'Crying Game'? I suppose there is a measure of deception involved, in that the person you are interacting with will have gone to a lot or soul-searching, pain, social ostracisation, time, effort and expense to show the world the woman they want to be, but none of that is intended to make you uncomfortable or trick you somehow. I think we'd be asking a lot of a potentially very vulnerable individual that in the moment after they have shaken your hand there is an expectation that they must reveal their biological gender to you. On the wider theme of transgender in railway modelling I take my layouts to a reasonable number of exhibitions and tend to notice more TG people, on both sides of the barriers, each year. I think it says a lot about the broad shoulders of our hobby that we can make it a welcoming space.

More electrical work this afternoon - work may stop for the pre-Christmas panic of cleaning and present wrapping now, but the layout is in a good place. Trains have run, points have been thrown and the full range of movements exercised across the layout. In electrical terms all that is required to do is wire up the lights in the crossing keeper's hut, those on the stop sign on the truncated branch and the crossing gate lights. The gates will have to be weathered before i can install and wire them up. There is now a flashing white light to show drivers of Down trains that the crossing is functioning. Health and safety requirements in the Humber Logistics Services site mean their locos look like something from Close Encounters. It has orange strobes at each corner and a beacon on the roof. A service from Lincoln to Barton slows for a station stop at Holland Beck. And a short while later heads back towards Lincoln. Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope you have a good holiday and an excellent new year.

Like many modellers I can't help myself putting out some models so I can visualise how the layout is going to look. This shot is looking towards New Holland and Grimsby with Station Road level crossing in the foreground and the workshops concealing the control panel off to the right. Hopefully tonight I'll get the panel wired up and get some stuff moving.

Today's main effort has been the frustrating, fiddly, but ultimately satisfying job of wiring up the warning lights for Carnival Bank level crossing. Apologies for the poor quality photo, I did take a video because I was so excited, but it was too big to upload apparently and wasn't that exciting anyway. The parts are taken from the Wills Modern Level Crossing kit, the module that controls the timings and flashing comes from Train Tech and the micro LEDs come from Express Models - the LEDs supplied with the Train Tech module were much to big. The joys of threading 6 hair-thin wires down each post was nothing compared to going on to work out which wire belonged to which LED and then which was positive and which negative. Then I had to solder a thicker wire to the filaments in order to give me a fighting chance of making the required connections to the sound/lighting module. The exercise has made me realise that my fingers are too thick and my glasses too thin for that kind of work. Afterwards the whole nest of flimsy wires looked so untidy and so vulnerable that I fastened a tupperware box over it. Electrics are something akin to witchcraft to me so I don't understand why the single, white micro LED I wired up to one of the flashing red LED circuits wouldn't work, despite being fully tested. I need the flashing white light working with the flashing red lights so a train driver approaching the crossing gets an indication that the crossing is working properly. That white light sits in the tall, signal looking structure just to the left of the road. In the absence of a more rational solution I'm going to add another module. The control panel has finally been installed in the back of the workshop building. Once it is wired in I should have full electrical control of all the track, signals, lights and equipment - fingers crossed.

One of those modelling sessions today where I've spent a fair amount of time at it, but haven't got that much to show. The main effort at the moment is to get the layout electrically complete so I can finally get stuck into the scenery. I confess I have been shying away from this for some time due to the perceived complexity of connecting the signals to the servo controller and wiring in the micro LEDs in the signal lamps. Happily the controller is programmed, the signals are tested and two of them are now installed. Here is the Down Main Home, signal number 5. I will have to do something about the brightness of the LED, though if you compare it to the picture below of the Up Sidings Shunting Signal (number 7) which is fitted with the same type of LED, the same resister and is a much more realistic light. This signal is now in its new position where it protects the level crossing for both exchange sidings and signals trains from the sidings onto the main line. Finally for now is a picture of locomotive number 2 of the Humber Logistics Services. Exposure to the corrosive, salt air along the River Humber is taking its toll on the paintwork.

Great to see this layout today, very impressive and eye catching work. My lad couldn't get enough of it. Well done.

I watched a bit - not my cup of tea, but I don't like Bake Off either. However, I wish it well and hope it does do a little stereotype busting, gets some more folk interested in the hobby and maybe give the people who feel that their talent ends with Metcalfe the confidence/inspiration to try something more.

A view of the road side, which will face the layout's viewing side. Sadly the platform side will be largely hidden by the overall roof. This is the end that is still extant, without the outbuilding to the left. The station building is all but finished now. I was absolutely knocked out to see it complete for the first time on Monday.

Wow - and that was 2018 gone. Our last show of the year has just gone, Emsworth was dusted off for a trip to Bury St Edmunds in the back of the Land Rover. Unfortunately, despite the pre-match warm up, a point motor failed in the yard resulting in the Chief Engineer spending much of the morning crouched under the layout, scratching his head, getting in the way and swearing under his breath. For any of you who wandered past in the morning and wondered why the same pair of 66s and a lonely 31 hadn't turned a wheel in the loco yard, I apologise. A limited shunting service resumed in the afternoon when I gave up trying to replace the point motor and clipped it out of use. The main lines ran well and we had a good day. I can have a break now before I start panicking about Holland Beck's debut next year. Cheers, Ben.

We had a very good at Shenfield last Saturday - very friendly show, good quality overnight accommodation (with the best breakfast I've had in awhile) and the chance to give Cottleston a drive again. Happily, the layout is running well and I'm looking forward to it's tenth anniversary shows next year. As always, we're happy to answer any comments or questions coming from visitors, particularly: 'You can't run those electric trains, there aren't any overhead wires." 'They're being towed by that diesel.' 'Why has the level crossing got gates and barriers? They wouldn't have it like that really.' Gates and barriers! It's elf and safety gone mad, mate! Somebody tell the Daily Mail. Never get tired of my Cornish 153. Why does nobody ever ask what it's doing on an East Midlands layout? They must assume I'm taking Rule Number 1 to extremes. Finally, a light engine me over the level crossing - the fiddle yard there isn't long enough for anything else. Cottleston will next be on show at Lincoln/Newark next February. Happy modelling.

Here's a Kingfisher Scimitar I mounted onto a Hattons Warwell today. It's a nice little kit, resin and white metal, that looks better than the Airfix ones.