Black5

Hi Dad 1, just seen your point made using copperclad for sleepers. That looks a pretty good effort to me. My first attempt years ago certainly wasn`t as clean as yours, i used far too much solder.I drew all my points on waste off cuts of wallpaper using a pencil tied to a piece of string and a knot at the point of radius required.I wouldn`t build points any other way now, scratchbuilding is much more interesting and quite quick once your skills improve. keep it going, you wont regret it. best wishes Jim.

What a difference, well worth the effort. Keep it going. Jim.

Hi Paul, I like the idea of the office under the bridge but i should imagine the light bulb consumption is pretty high in that shady position! The stores manager would probably moan about his bill for the bulbs!!! As for the green facia board, got to be maroon ( or close to it ), can`t have a GWR grass coloured one in LMS country!!! Always a good read. Jim.

Very effective and a nice looking layout.

Coming along nicely Paul. I like your canal feature and the impression of distance your backscene gives you. Best of luck at the exhibition. Jim.

From the pictures i wouldn`t say it was too clean but weathering is something done in stages i find. What looks good one day you may find a little later does`nt quite suit and then it depends how much you may want to change things ( iv`e lost count of the times iv`e looked at my layout and chaged the colour of something). With your layout , toning down the brickwork might help but it`s a good looking layout anyway. Jim.

Nice work Paul. I like the overhead shots particularly as they show the amount of work you`ve put into the layout especially the last one, really sets the scene. Jim.

That`s a lot of work going on there Dan and it`s looking good. I was interested to see that you have a brick wall bordering your layout as well, mine goes down the complete length of my layout on one side. Your backboard was of interest as that`s the route i`ve had in mind to do. Where you have a country style of scenery i need more in the way of terracing type housing but as i don`t have much room for low relief buildings i thought of trying to pencil draw the buildings, colour them in with water colour pencils and then go over them with a damp brush to bring the colour up, as some people do in art classes. i`ll have to have a practice and see what happens. I agree with modelpara about the turntable. I took power from my entry track to the connections on the turntable making sure the exit tracks are wired the same way and it`s all worked so far and believe me , i`m a novice when it comes to the electrical bits. Keep up the good work. Jim.

Although not an N gauge modeller i find that when i visit the forum i always have to have a look at the progess on Foster Street. Some of your comments and frustations make me laugh, i think we`ve all been there at some point. You`ve certainly done a lot so far . Keep it going. Jim.

Hi Iain, Pleased to see things are moving ahead again. One thing i`d like to ask is," where do you find the time to progress as much as you have?" I`m retired ( i`m 73) so i can spend a fair bit of time on my layout but i can`t match you for progress i`m afraid. I seem to be spending a lot of time improving some of the things i did earlier. Good to see you`ve started on the shed. Best wishes, Jim.

Hi Ray, welcome to the world of scratchbuilding. Where possible i like to scratchbuild as well as it can be very rewarding if successful but extremely frustrating if things go wrong! In your blog you said you`ve started collecting your plasticard sheets, well i can say that that collection will grow in the form of other shapes and sizes of plastic that you will need to form relief on your buildings or whatever it is you`re making. For what it`s worth, on some areas of glueing ( mainly larger flat ones ) iv`e used Evostick solvent free impact adhesive. i tried it on some test pieces after roughing up the mating surfaces and it didn`t appear to eat into the plastic. I`ve also used it to glue embossed plasticard brick sheets to M D F on my engine shed and i haven`t noticed any lifting yet. Best of luck with your projects. Jim.

Hi everyone, it`s been a while since i was last on here, mainly because i`ve been trying to progress on my shed roof. It`s been steady but due to the number of bits of plastic that needed cutting, glueing and painting it`s taken longer than i thought. At present the smoke outlets are complete along with my representation of the toplights. I only had some internal pictures to go by and this is what i turned them into. I`m going to put drain covers in what i hope would be an appropriate position. Everything on the top at the momnent is painted in dark colours and is a bit smooth so i`m thinking of glueing some emery paper of a reasonable courseness to the surfaces where a person would walk to represent some sort of rough finish. Again, i have no idea as to the sort of material used up there. I need to break up the colour a little bit just to tone down the greys and black. Next to do are the two walkways at each end of the shed along with the access ladders. Other bits and pieces need to be added for detail as you are always looking down on the roof. After that, i hope to try and fit some lights inside. I did put some detail inside so it would be nice to have a go. Iv`e attached some pictures of where i`ve got to at the moment. Best wishes to everyone for 2015. Jim.

Hi Iain Good to see things are still moving ahead. With what you appear to have coming up with the house etc, it`s no wonder things slowed down on the modelling front a bit. Very nice job being made on the pub.Not something i can fit on mine i`m afraid. Look forward to your progress as and when. Best wishes for 2015. Jim.

Hi Iain, for what it`s worth, my shed sits across a board joint as well. I drilled holes in each corner wall of the shed and drilled and put four brass tube dowels in the baseboard lining up with said holes. I couldn`t do it any other way as my layout has to be put up and taken down again every time i work on it. So far it`s worked, i just have to be careful when lifting that i don`t damage the bottom edge of the cross beam. Jim.

Hi Iain, Great to see you back on the blog pages again. I know what you mean when you spoke about leaving the layout for a while, my break was trying to keep up with the garden through the summer. Now the evenings are drawing in and a visit to the local model railway exhibition re kindles the enthusiasm. I`ve attached a couple of pictures of recent progress on my Camden shed roof. Your pictures of your track ballast were of interest as i have always thought mine a bit on the coarse side, even using several different grades. Look forward to seeing more from you as time permits. Jim (Black5).

Hi Iain, just caught up with your latest blog. the pointwork looks to be coming along nicely. The pictures of the turntable have made me decide to look at mine again and make improvements. Next for me on my humble version of Camden, the shed roof. Look forward to seeing more pictures of your progress. Regards, Jim.

Thanks Steve22, i think i used Humbrol Midnight Blue with a spot of black in it but i`m going back 30yrs so i could be wrong. I just thought the colour was out of the ordinary which is why it was painted that colour.

Thanks for that info, i`ll have to look into that. It might mean making a new chassis because there`s an awful lot of metal in there, the current chassis being made from half inch square brass bar milled out to suit motor and gearbox etc.

Hi everyone, as it`s throwing it down outside and i couldn`t do what i wanted to today i thought i`d take a few pictures of a model i built some years ago that might be of interest. It`s 90% scratch built in Nickel Silver and Brass, the bits i didn`t make being the chimney, top feed and dome ( white metal castings) lubricators on the running plate, the wheels ( Romford and Ultrascale), buffers, couplings, and i made some of the valve gear.Everything else is scratchbuilt. It`s 4mm scale, 16.5mm gauge driven by a Portiscap motor, pickups on the back of the driving wheels. Am i right in thinking i read somewhere that this motor is not for DCC? As i haven`t had a layout till now it`s only been run on a bit of test track. At the moment my layout runs dcc but with problems i`ve been having lately with decoders seemingly playing up i`m thinking of going back to analogue, at least i could run all the loco`s instead of just those with decoders in them. Anyway these are the pictures iv`e taken. Some of the lining on the cylinders needs attention but that`s for another rainy day. Cheers, Jim.

Hi Iain, iv`e put a few pictures here for you to show progress so far on my attempt at something resembling Camden..The track layout i measured off an LMSR ratings dawing drawn at a scale of 40ft to the inch. The drawing is on one sheet and measures 9ft x 3ft layed out on the floor. I had a neighbour who worked for British Rail at the time and i asked the question regarding a track plan of Camden Shed and the drawing i have is what she brought home. It covers the complete curve from the Regents Canal round to Primrose Hill including the whole goods area and Gilbeys Bonded Wharehouse,( now the Roundhouse Theatre), all the buildings,stables etc. The shed is built to fit the space i have, is approx 3ft x 1ft 3ins and covers the five main tracks. Space dictated losing some track and i won`t manage the offices at the end. I`ve been wondering what to do about the water tank, modellers license i think. The layout is 17ft x 2ft and comes as 4 separate boards that hang on the garage wall when not in use. I`m surprised it all works as well as it does considering the car goes in there at night wet and frosty depending on the weather! I`m unsure how to find you when i`m signed into the rm web, i only find you through google under Camden mpd.

Hi Ian, just been looking at your latest pictures. Certainly been some work going on there. I posted some pictures last year under the heading Black5 of the Ash Hoist and Coaling Tower that i`d built. Since then i`ve built an Aqua Duct at one end which is totally wrong i know but i wanted to build in some relief to lose some of the flatness of the layout. Your layout is certainly larger than mine which is why i concentrated on the yard area. I`ll take some pictures of progress so far. I`m half way through building the engine shed at the moment. Regards, Jim.

I know what you mean Tim V, i think i`ll take another look underneath to see if i`ve missed anything but drive free it seems to turn quite well.

Thanks devondynosoar118, i`ll give that link a try next time.

Thanks Andy, still finding my way around the sites

Afternoon all, I have on my layout a Peco turntable which at present is operated by handwheel directly through the side of the baseboard. I`ve tried different types of power sources but none gave a smooth rotation, it tending to be rather jerky. Disconnection from the worm and wheel seems to be an improvement. My question is, has anyone any experience in using the motor/gearbox combination by Igarashi as found in the Expo catalogue?. Also from Expo, i was given one of their airbrushes ,Code AB725 and wondered if anyone has any experience of using one of these. Thanks and cheers for now, Jim.