katwigan

Thanks Appollo, yes mate I will be modelling the " steps up" bit, actually I was having a look last night as to how far 'up' it went vs needed to go and along you pop with a photo showing the steps ! ( in plenty of time , this time ) I hadn't seen the view from the County end before either, it is a bit of a nuisance living so far away having to rely only on photos and people's memories. Actually we have a lighting trip back home for a wedding in June (?) unfortunately it is in Cardiff but I'm hoping to catch up with Wigan for a couple of days at least (maybe a pint could be in order). Because King St now swings through approx 70 deg it is taking some time adapting size and shape of the buildings, fortunately I have enough space to be able to model them at scale size which helps. Cheers for now Kev

Oh cheers for the pic, having determined that it was a picture of the pointwork that I had just re-laid to include the curved diamond crossing now you show me a trailing point adjacent to the guards van (?) in the picture. As it is the first pic I have seen looking in this direction including the pointwork I guess it's a good job it's only pinned down and not glued and ballasted. Anyway I have been knocking up a few buildings adjacent to this shot for the back of King St. Most of the buildings shown are built up from photos of the original buildings several hours spent cutting, pasting and correcting perspective on the computer before printing out on self adhesive label paper and sticking it onto a sort of plasticy fluted board. Because it is 'plasticy' it doesn't seem to have the predilection for bending quite as much as foamboard that I have used previously and of course using the self adhesive label paper negates the requirement for pva glue or similar that also wants to help thing bend because of getting it 'wet' on one side only. A couple of the buildings had to have educated (?) guesses in determining size shape and colour as they have been long gone or the pics I had were b&w, long distance or old aerial shots, all in all though I 'm quite happy with the general appearance / layout of them in an undetailed sort of way. ( Wigginers among us comments please) ( derisive or otherwise ) Deb and I are having a major clean up in here at the moment as it is way past looking like a bomb has gone off ! Anyway with it being mid 30's again this week gardening will be out of the question so I may get a few more done before she we finish tidying up. Cheers all Kevan

Nice looking work Peter, I particularly like your impressive reproduction of the flooded River Douglas . Oh sorry that's a smoky glass table it's sitting on - errr isnt it ? Seriously that whole farm area looks great the trees and the brambles below on the other side of the wall Kevan

Hi all,Gee it doesn't take long to slip along way down the listing on here does it? down 10 pages in a fortnight. Anyway I've been pottering around in the corner at the back of Wallgate shops recently. After seeing the article on bending points and diamond crossings I decided to have a go at re-laying the pointwork in the area below Wallgate that has been irritating me for sometime. I have a number of photos of the area all of which appear to show a predilection for ripping up full scale pointwork and relaying it in a different configuration. This photo shows the area in question The end result of bending the diamond to fit on the curve certainly looks a lot better than what I had there previously. In actual fact I'm very happy that I found the top photo because I'm sure there is a single slip shown in that position in one of the other pics and I certainly didn't fancy trying to bend one of those. A view across the tracks in the same area should have the Wigginers asking "Wurst Iron Bridge" Answer is it's half built,but has been sat to one side for so long it's now all bent and bowed A picture taken during initial build Fortunately if I can't straighten it at least the Silhouette Cameo cutter can cut out all the lattice work for me again. If anyone is wondering why there is a brass hook sticking up alongside the County Playhouse it's because that whole section that in the corner that I am working on can be lifted out by that hook as the boards either side of this corner are 3' wide making it impossible to get at the back area in the corner. The whole corner area is made of a combination of foamboard and a plasticy sort of corrugated cardboard. Both being very light and quite strong if supported / reinforced adequately. I will have to come up with a way of disguising the hook once I get the rest of the buildings on there. I have been working on one of the buildings the last couple of days (The bank on the corner of Wallgate and King st ) lots of cutting and pasting of some Google Street view photos, I was reasonably happy until I tried to print it out! Irit # 1: I recently installed Windows 10, the new driver to suit my Epson printer is B hopeless from a facility and sizing point of view! Irit # 2: I think the new non-original Ink cartridges that the man said were equal to the originals AREN'T The photo ( PAuse at this point while I calm down having just lost everything I had written - then I found " View Auto Saved Content" Oh frabjous day.) As I was saying the photo below shows the difference between a printout using non-original ink on the left and Epson ink on the right, the photo doesn't do the actual prints justice ! The poor one looks even worse than shown 'in the flesh' and the better one looks better than shown ! That will teach me to be a cheapskate, I'll put it together and see how it looks and find my camera instead of this phone. Anyway it's been to sodding hot to get out in the garden recently ( awww ) and with any luck it will be back in the mid 30's again this weekend ( Awwww ) Cheers Kevan

Thanks nhdesigns, I am so pleased that you like my offering, I am afraid however that whilst the outcome was what I was after the 'modelling skill' required was fairly minimal. Each of the items in the shop is an actual photo of the item printed at 180 dpi onto self adhesive label paper then stuck onto a piece of 0.015" clear styrene. Most of them I was able to trim the styrene to the profile of the sofa etc. The 4 standard lamps in the background are all stuck onto 1 piece. The main points I guess are finding suitable subjects on the Internet ( eg, era, alignment size etc ) getting them all to scale size ( normally I try to size them using the resolution rather than image size, increasing the resolution reduces the size generally ) and then moving them about until the scene looks 'right'. If you look at the suite in the foreground you can see a line of the top edge of the styrene between the l/h armchair and the sofa (Damn ) In real life this building is viewed from about 3' anyway so the styrene is not obvious at all. The photo below is taken from a different angle and you can see the general idea clearer having not had the other wall fitted yet. This photo shows the rest of the block done in the same way ( and not finished either ! ) Just out interest the chap trying out the sofa in the original looks remarkably like Boris Karloff's, "Frankenstine's Monster", didn't know he lived in Wigan. Cheers Kevan

Don't know if you class this as a 'modelled' interior however it is an interior. Kevan

Broxton Ave. it was Apollo, we lived in Coniston ave. which was a continuation of Broxton if I recall correctly. I remember having to almost walk sideways in to the shop to get served it was that small ! Received the photos, thank you I have a couple of them ( v. poor copies though) will add them to my growing folder of info. I guess because I was only 10 when we left Wigan I am a bit sparse on info regarding the build up of trains etc that passed through, So anyone with info regarding that sort of thing would be greatly appreciated. I do have a Mainline version of "orion" that was circulating with 6 or 7 carriages behind, haven't converted her to DCC yet though since going down that route. I'll have to look up Bank Hall motive power. Off out to see the man at OZ Rail for a bit of what the ladies call Retail Therapy Kevan

Hi, Judging by these map extracts ( from the History Shop I think), it looks like Pagefield Ironworks may have been a possible target. Kevan

Hi all, Whenever I had shown my mother whatever it was I was working on or if I said I wasn't happy with something I'd done because it wasn't quite right she would say " well who the heck will know the difference anyway all the way out here (Adelaide Sth Oz )" Now I find I've got half the modellers from Wigan on this site, Oh Great ! BUT Thank you all for the encouraging support, it is truly appreciated. (That's got the crawling out of the way ) Wigancg Haven't got the recipe but wouldn't it be great to have the room filled with the aroma,hmm mind you it's a good job that they're not easy to get out here otherwise I'd get nothing done! Apollo, Yes I do remember 'talking' with you, however similarly having changed computers I could'nt find your email address. I have pm'd you with mine. I would certainly appreciate the Gas works stuff, havent done much in that area yet but I did get a few very grainy copies from the History shop taken in the late 40's just as the new, larger retort house was being built. Speaking of pies we came to Oz in 1964 leaving from Orrell, in 2005 I brought Deb my second wife back home we drove to Orrell and the smell & subsequent taste of the meat and potato pies in a small bakehouse near the top of Gathurst rd was exactly how I remembered it, amazing after all those years!! I think it's been closed down now I had a quick look at your Wigan & Leigh Railways link , there's some wonderful history all over there, great stuff. I like everyone else I guess haven't managed to achieve much over the last week or two but as we have now had the last of any get together's and Deb is working tomorrow ( and I'M NOT, aww ) I am planning a trip up to the best of only 3 or 4 model railway shops around Adelaide, unfortunately it's about 1 1/2 hour drive from here, but he has a good selection of British Outline rather than the predominately American HO scale stuff all of which the Australian Railways look like. Just a quick one before I go, this scene absolutely cried out to be modelled exactly as shown, found the photo of this building on Wigan World, had to model it anyway. In the original there are two people with shopping bags stood below the workers looking up at them, 'elf and safety, nor in't fifties mate! Cheers Kevan

G'day folks, Michael, sorry while it looks like 4 lines going north the two outer ones I think were showing the extremities of the embankment, unfortunately I still havent been able to find the better trackplan which is somewhat clearer (well it's certainly not b. green ) I think trying to get the turntable in would make the boards somewhat too wide, so I may have to lay just part of the approach road to it, havent really done any trackwork in that area yet. I will have to have a look for that book, We are coming to the UK in August for a wedding (In Cardiff ) I am hoping to get back home though for a few days then . I must tidy up the whole layout and get some updated though still sparse photos Ian, there is a bit of a mix of scalescenes brickwork and actual photos of building gleened from many hours of trawling through the web. Coops ( the large yellowy coloured building) is a result of many many hours cutting and pasting on the pc , the whole building is developed from one good sized photo of the main entrance section of the building The wall sections are multiple layers of card and if I hadn't come across the Silhoutte Cameo cutting machine I dont think I would ever have attempted to do this. The coloured outer skin was the photo printed onto self adhesive A4 label paper and stuck onto the card layer, because the program with the cutter can also drive the printer it picks registration marks up after printing and when loaded into the cutter cuts the window, doorway openings exactly where I had drawn them in the program. ( Or is all that another clear as mud description ) Have a look at " A guide to using the Silhouette cutter" started by JCL in "Scenery, Structures & Transport" on here , sorry haven't figured links out yet All of the window openings were cut out on it each layer having exactly the same sized opening while the layer behind were in exactly the spot but were smaller. The window frames themselves were drawn up and cut out of the same A4 label paper, so far none of them have tried to lift off the clear acetate glass material The colouring of the window frames was achieved with a product I stole from my wife's side of the workbench called " distressing ink" this was applied with a fine sponge while all the frames were still attached to the full sheet of paper. The ink appears to be applied almost dry comes in a range of colours and out here is available from paper craft shops ( usually full of a selection of ladies all chatting until " arggh a male has entered our shop" ) This one is also developed from a photo of the building itself, then I got carried away making 1948 Bendix washing machines etc, ( Deb kept looking at me and shaking her head, I dunno, do you?) Thanks to all for the interest and comments, hopefully I can keep the drivel down and the pics and progress up. Cheers Kevan

Hi all, thanks for the comments, jpendle, I am basing the model around late 40's Nationalization time, enabling me to run a mix of LMS and BR liveries. I have had to take a couple of liberties in the layout design besides bending the whole thing abnormally I have had to omit a small bit at this stage ie: the line heading for Liverpool so unless I can convince SWMBO who shares the inner area of the room for her Paper Tole and card making activities it may end up being " deemed totally unnecessary" well in advance of Dr. Beeching's activities . Barry O I was in communication with Michael Edge a couple of years ago, he sent me a load of his original photos of relevant buildings etc unfortunately at the time he couldn't find any of the model, would love to have seen them. Manna, Cheers ,hopefully I can keep it moving along. ( Hey they got real adventurous with the street names around you didn't they? Sorry mate I had to look Booborowie up, I bet it got a bit warm up your way recently) Mezzoman, Had a look at your Burnt Mills topic, I can see why the reference was made from both a track plan and atmospheric point of view. I am trying to approach this as a model of Wigan that just happens to be centred around Wallgate station. 5BarVT How could I build Wallgate and not have this in pride of place ? And if you obviously know where Uncle Joes is you'll know where Coops building is. ( Must try finishing these buildings before starting more ) Eventually I am hoping to model as far West as what was Walker Bros. Pagefield Ironworks, coming into the station past the Prescott St Engine Sheds and out to the east side to the Gas Works and the junction with the WCML and the line to Manchester. I have managed to find a track plan, not the one I was looking for but if you stare at it long enough all will become clear ( or Green in this case ) Cheers Kevan

Hi all, Thought it was about time I put pen to paper so to speak and let you have a look at what I am ( for the fourth time ) attempting to build down here in Adelaide South Oz. Having left Wigan in 1964 as a ten year old I have always had an interest in Railways particularly as my Grandad was a driver based at Prescott st in Wigan. This is the fourth attempt at building a model of the ex L&Y Wallgate station each one so far has been terminated by a house move and each one has also graduated to a larger sized room ( not a bad thing ). This ( and THE FINAL build ) is in a room 20' square built for the purpose when we ( my wife Deb and I ) built an extension on the back of the house to house both my Mother in a granny flat and the Railway ( In seperate rooms ) Wallgate station is the typical arrangement modelled in profundance, Railway in the foreground , street at the rear, Main road crossing over the top etc This photo shows the approach from the Southport / Liverpool direction with the station building over the line on Wallgate itself in the distance. (Unfortunately no detail re the photographer is available, no ownership is claimed and it is being used for illustrative purposes only ) My version, even given the 20' length of the room required some degree of modellers licence to achieve what I wanted in that if you got hold of the aerial shot below and bent it downwards at each end that goes someway to describing ' what happened'. The line that snakes across from top left to lower right is the WCML passing through Wigan NW station, the other line from the lower left is the line I am modelling, so if you can picture what is at left of scene running along the left wall , the platform area along the top wall and then to the east of the station building being bent around more to run down the r/h wall with the Gas works in the lower r/h corner of the room. Clear as mud I know, somewhere on the two computers I do battle with is a drawing of the trackplan, I will find it. Due to construction projects ( full size ), assorted Grandchildren's arrival, A wedding (mine) ,illnesses ( not mine etc, etc there have been some delays resulting in not a lot of progress over the last 1 1/2 years. HOWEVER things touch wood are starting to move again, A couple of older pics, View roughly in the same direction as the top photo. A number of the buildings in this pic are from previous versions or are mock up's that are currently being replaced The layout itself is built using a ' dogbone' approach, in the photo below the loop that can be seen below the main level is connected to the lines that leave the station area to the left of shot, while the lines leaving to the right of shot loop back in the l/h corner of the room. A train that leaves from platform 1 can run for approx 120' until it arrives at platform 2, then a further 120' to bring it back to it's start point. My intention as the two loops and their approach and departure line consist of approx 40' by 2 line each was to use them as a 'fiddle yard' of sorts that would allow trains to be stacked one behind the other then indexed along as each train ahead is called out to complete it's lap. All of this is going to be automaticish if only I can figure out how. At the time of starting this version I lashed out and bought an NEC Procab system that now having completed the main line run I have to come to terms with. Enough of my inaugural drivel, More sorting and photos to come asap. Happy New Year to all. Kevan

Hi, it's good to see the young un with his high viz vest on, can't be too careful when in charge eh? Even better,inspiration from Wigan, I thought the same as Bamfur. re the familiarity, off to a good start here. I'll be keeping an eye on progress. Here am I in South Aust. about to put pen to paper ( so to speak ) regarding my under construction model of Wigan Wallgate and find half the town is on the Forum. Kevan (ex- pagefield st )

Thanks for the input guys, Jack the only thing with the mat shifting idea is that after cutting the first 'opposite hand , bad one' it moved down the page and cut the next original hand one ok, then went bad again. The idea of the blade offset causing the problem seems to be logical, although it didn't show up on the other section of bridge that I did and I think ( scratches his head and tries to remember ) I mirrored that one also. Jason, no I haven't run it again ( see first line to Jack ) as I got two good ones and two bad ones alternating down the page. I did however achieve a new 'low' by cutting 0.2mm wide bars,although many of them didn't survive the removal from the extra sticky cutting mat trauma and the ones that did got treated with disdain. Oh the small items on the r/h side of the file work fine to produce a set of steps, gluing a plain and a slotted section together to allow steps to be inserted into the slot. actually probably needs the slots to be opened up a bit to enable use of 0.010" or 0.015" material. Cheers Kevan

Yes rich, it suddenly dawned on me that I needn't have mirrored the design so I went back and reproduced it with them all the one hand, and other than it being a bit of a task to get them off an overly sticky cutting mat all was ok. Jason the DXF file was created on a program called EMS , a free piece of software that while limited in some respects is very easy to use, has some good features whilst not having shown up any limitations to what I need. iron bridge part b.DXF Oh, just tried to upload the studio file also, it says I'm not allowed to ??? I am not sure if the problem is software or hardware generated, when I redid the file to 'all one hand' everything cut fine, straight lines, no excess rad's in the corners. It's all a bit odd really. Anyway bridge building continues. Kevan

Hi guys,has anyone had a unit do this before? I'm in the process of doing the foot bridge for Wigan Wallgate, drew this sidewall (?) section up and decided just to copy / paste / mirror the original drawing as I needed several lengths to be done. The first cutting attempt was going well until I noticed the apparent difference between the L/H and R/H versions. Cutting was on 0.005" styrene 1/33/ "using about 225 deg on a cb09 blade" . As you can see the upper set of bars are only half the width of the lower set, infact they are only 0.2mm. there is also a bit of cutting distortion evident at the joint with the outer edges. The DXF file I used when measured shows both the sets to have the same width bars. I have tried not mirroring the set and they all cut out the same! Any thoughts ? Cheers Kevan

Ron, that bridge looks fantastic. I think that this / these machines have enabled modelling to be pushed into a whole new level, don't you ? No one could have produced the accuracy of that detail by hand before, certainly not at home! Awesome stuff...... now where did I leave that styrene? Kev T

Errrr Mike , I wasn't aware that Brass was attracted to any form of Magnet, that MUST be some rare earth type. . Irrespective that coach side ! I would hate to try and cut those window frame inserts out by hand Same goes for Andy G's, wow there should be a complete thread on the full job there mate! Hopefully my CB09 holder and 60 deg blades should turn up shortly, must also try the styrene out too . This has to be about the best thread running currently ,certainly is the most informative, perhaps it should be kept a secret, shhh, there's somebody coming. Kev

That's pretty impressive work there Ron, haven't quite got that size or complexity, however I have about 30 of these to produce to go around the larger gasometer of the two that will feature in Wigan Gasworks. These are made up of two seperate sections forming the lattice and a top and bottom plate all cut from approx. 0.012" card. JCL - do you write this sort of article for a living? so professional, so clear and descriptive. Hope nobody minds us jumping in here and there Kev T

Mike T, I have a 1/2 a cubic foot of those things that I offered to Allan a while ago and even his Avatar went a funny colour

Thanks for the comments / ticks guys. JCL, can I call you J for short? The program I have been using to draw up the windows etc is a free cad program that can export in DXF format that as you are aware can then be imported straight into the Silhouette package. The program, emachineshop is a fairly user friendly and still relatively basic system. I also use Auto CAd Lite at work which is massively over qualified for the silhouette, emachineshop has some nice facilities for copying repetitive sections and at zero $'s hasn't caused any major qualms (as yet ) Still catching up with your in detail post. brilliant. Cheers Kevan

Hi all, I have been using the cameo for about 6 months now and am still finding it's capabilities out. It does however allow me to tackle projects that I wouldn't have even been game to attempt by hand. The panelling is part of the platform buildings on my layout of Wigan Wallgate ex L&Y station, 5 various buildings in all. The trips to the chemist for plasters would have far outweighed the cost of the machine if past efforts are anything to go by . The building below had all the window openings cut by the cameo and the windows frames were cut out following a design done in a slightly better cad program than the one supplied, the building itself is developed from a couple of photos of the actual building in Wigan. All of the above were either printed onto or cut directly from self adhesive label paper prior to sticking onto a thicker card and then cut or in the case of the windows clear sheet. Haven't been game to try styrene sheet yet but given the in depth info provided here I had better give it a go. Great thread JCL thanks for starting , will keep up with interest Kev T