Michael Edge

Soft brass wire is a lot easier, I mostly use 30swg in 4mm scale.

The signal box at Victoria was the one from Wakefield Kirkgate, a very large box, not the first one I had built from scratch but certainly the biggest. I've got the photos I used somewhere, I'll get them out and post on here.

The wheels do pick up the graphite, loco wheels look quite grey - but it's conductive dirt, doesn't seem to affect the rolling stock wheels at all. I do clean rolling stock wheels from time to time but it's years since I've done it.

I don't know what the wire you are using for the beading is but if it's soft pull it gently to straighten it, then start at one end and move along. I can't see any advantage in starting in the middle.

I don't suffer from OCD to the extent you do.....

You spent many hours cutting gaps in the pcb sleepers though as I recall.

No, of course I didn't spend all of four years on it but it was extremely difficult (I spent a whole day at the NRM finding the drawings and they don't have alll of them) and I don't think I've got to the bottom of it yet - to repeat for the umpteenth time, until it was painted green there's no way to tell which side or end you are looking at. There is a recent example above of two photos alleged to have been taken on the same day but clearly weren't and the much repeated myth of withdrawal after a fire which clearly took place when the loco was still black.

I always work on the principle that neatness is more important than absolute accuracy.

More likely a bit of re-painting, I don't think any wagons were ever cleaned.

Is that a very young Andy Ross on the right? Geoff Appleyard and his daughter on the left but who's that in the middle? The track wasn't all hand made, we had some very early SMP plain track which was used in the platforms at Victoria. Over the years this gradually deformed, widening the gauge at the rail head - almost to EM in places. I hasten to add this doesn't happen with SMP track now. I built the complex pointwork here, part of it in one piece about 4ft long, our local librarian in Upton asked if she could put it on display in the window, I think it was there for a week or so. We had a lot of problems with the K crossings in this pointwork, we hadn't discovered then that there is an absolute limit to how flat these crossings can be. They would have been better as switched diamonds and would have been OK in 16.2mm gauge but that was far in the future then.

That looks a really simple idea with the inner frames, I'll be interested to see how well this works.

OCD again John.....

I've unearthed another of the track plans considered, I think this was mine. There's a bit missing on the right but I think it was just a single track and loop, this was part of the required separate goods line. There's still a steep gradient to the upper terminus so bankers would have been required. Only one turntable in this design, the upper terminus has a wye (triangle) for turning.

I put most of Herculaneum Dock up again in the shed in March, it had been stored since Train West last year (it wasn't cleaned there at all). All the track and locos still worked perfectly - I haven't really cleaned much since the Southampton show in 2016, just rub over with a graphite pencil if any loco does stall anywhere. Plastic wheels have been banned on my layouts for decades.

Try High Level, you should be able to find anything you want there and the quality is second to none in 4mm scale.

Interesting variation in the cab roof vents but definitely not taken on the same day. At least this shows it running with numbers at the outer ends and at least one window (I think it's a window), still doesn't help to see which side we are looking at though. This loco on its own is more of a minefield than most large classes!

You might find that a lot more difficult than you imagine - and the turned in ends of checkrails and wing rails will be very visible, neither of which existed on MD&HB track. Incidentally I've got all the bogie mouldings done for your LOR train, send me a pm or email with the address to post them to.

Wait a bit, let's take this in chronological order - this was I think the first time any of us had had a full size track plan on paper. This was in the pre-computer age, no Templot, no CAD design and plotting, all hand drawn on a big roll of paper.

All the proposals were the same size - 30ft x 12ft, basic premise for all of them was a complete railway running from one terminus to another with a separate goods only route.

It was fun to operate and you could get a huge crowd round it at shows, did need a large crew of experienced operators though. In those days (1970s) we had more members who were interested in operating model railways - and you really had to work the traffic round this, it wasn't just playing trains at random. It was built to replace our old club layout which was in more than one room in our then clubrooms, tunnelled through a wall (not that this stopped us taking to the Corn Exchange) this was something of an operational challenge as well. We had a design competition in the club before starting the layout, this is one of the alternatives. There were a couple of others but they don't seem to have survived. I built a 1/2": 1ft model of the final design before we started, the only time I've ever done this. This is the original design, after it was complete it was extended slightly in the middle of each side, which is what the first trackplan shows.

I mostly use 30swg soft round wire, I only use half round when it's a bit bigger than most beading. The solder fillet effectively disguise the round wire, all you see is the half round top of it.

One at a time is enough for me - that's why I tell customers I don't build coaches any more. The last one I built was a dynamometer car so that was a reasonable exception. I sometimes get asked if there is a discount for building more than one loco at a time, I tend to say no, the price goes up to alleviate my boredom.

I've been using EM minus2 for some time (about 6 years) now, all the new fiddle yard pointwork was built in it and so is the pointwork for Wentworth Junction. Gibson and Romford/Markits wheels are perfectly happy with it but the old K's wheels (I still have quite a few locos with them) have thicker flanges and are set at 14.5mm back to back so they tend to bind a bit in the tighter curves. Following this discovery some of the fiddle yard pointwork was eased to 16.5mm gauge except for just through the crossing area. This was only on curves down at around 30" radius, there's nothing that sharp on the visible bits of Wentworth Junction and the K's wheels are OK there.

In turn to be replaced by D95xx 0-6-0 diesels, many of which were sold on (at scrap value) before they had done any useful work for BR - plus ça change.

Looks good so far Dave, no idea when we'll be able to get more stock though. We are really busy now but quite a few kits are sold out.