thegreenhowards

Thanks Ian, It’s clear that ‘blue is the colour’! But I haven’t seen that circular design before. I was intending to go for the more conventional design in John’s post earlier. Andy

Hi Stuart, That fits with my understanding. I think two six coach trains can pass at Glenfinnan, but anything longer won’t fit in the loop. I also understood that the run round at Mallaig would only take six, but I can’t remember where I read that. The Jacobite now runs to seven coaches so presumably the run round has been lengthened. Would pilot engines have come off at Glenfinnan? I’d have thought that they would work through from Mallaig to Fort William. It would be an interesting thing to include on the layout sequence if it did happen. Regards Andy

Like this you mean? In case the resolution is too poor to let you see, the coach numbers are in line with your list: 4643 4243 9312 (the transfer seems to have fallen off the side you can see - another one for the to do list!) 4050 I have a fifth TSO, but that won’t fit on the viaduct which is the only part of my railway which ‘over-winters’. From your description of the livery, I should probably darken the rooves. They are due some weathering anyway. Andy

To be honest Andy, when I posted that question, I was hoping that you or Rob would leap straight in with, ‘this is what I used’! I hadn’t heard of the Rainbow Railways colours but thanks for steering me away from them. I’m glad it’s been a a useful debate for more than just me. Thanks again Stuart for your input. Andy

Six coaches would take it past the platform starter, but not as far as blocking the loop the other way. Two six coach trains can pass at Glenfinnan…just. I'm modelling 1985 for my West Highlander - the first year of the green and cream Mk1s. It looked red in the black and white photos, but I’ve now found colour ones on Google which suggest blue would be correct for 1985. Should have done my homework more diligently. Thanks! Andy

Pleased to be of ‘service’!

Thanks, The darker green there looks quite washed out. Two other interesting points I noted were how far forward the Black 5 stopped at Glenfinnan. Well past the home signal. And the colour of the West Highlander headboard, which has a blue background. I was about to order one from Narrow Planet with a red background. Now I need to do some more research! Andy

Thanks Stuart, That’s a very useful summary. The Tamiya yellow green looks spot on, but I’m not convinced by the Tamiya park green. It doesn’t look ‘blue’ enough. But that maybe the effect of weathering. As for the station seats being black, that may have been the case for the NBR, but they look green to me in the 1980s photos. Any more views? Andy

I’m loosely working on a late spring (May-ish) timeframe with Rhododendron and goose in bloom. I suspect that’s too early for the crocosmia, but so be it! Anyway on that basis I think I can get away with raspberry and brambles looking very similar. I may add some tiny white flowers for the blossom. Andy

Sounds tasty! Would they differ much from brambles at 7mm scale?!

Meanwhile, I’ve been working on the unkempt grass areas on either side of the station. I’m now pretty happy with them. The basic theme is over green grass and weeds with lots of gorse, bramble and Rhododendron at the back. The red tipped plants near the steps are supposed to be Crocosmia - probably left over from when the garden was cared for. I’m sure I’ve seen a picture of them in that position somewhere, but I can’t remember where! Andy

I need to get my colours right for the station infrastructure. When I commissioned my buildings, I didn’t appreciate the change in colours which I now realise must have happened about the time the museum opened at Glenfinnan when the whole station seemed to be tarted up. But in my era the station buildings were in a mix of two shades of rather tired yucky green as shown below (Flickr photo from Ernie’s Railway Archive). I’m starting with the station benches which seem to have white ironwork and the darker green woodwork (see in background above). I’ve had four attempts as shown below. The one on the left is Humbrol 101 ‘mid green’. For the others I’ve tried adding various amounts of Humbrol 104 ‘Oxford blue’, to make it more ‘turquoisy’. I think I like the one on the right best, but I know my colour perception isn’t great and even I realise it’s not quite right. So my question is, does anyone have a recommendation for the correct WHL colours? I’m after the two greens and the cream used on bits of the signal box as below. Thanks Andy

If you were being commercial it would be (2) every time. It’s just not worth the time to do anything else. Anything more is for love and I can’t see you putting much love into a Lima loco, so it’s still (2)!

Hands off - We need Ellis to continue to concentrate on O gauge! Andy

Correct me if I’m wrong (I’m a bit rusty these days), but this was a fair sized train from KX, splitting at Hitchin. So the pacific power would be justified for the first half of the journey. The other similar train got a pair of B1s I think. Andy

Hence the existence of P4! Lights blue touch paper and stands back!

If you know what you’re selling and are prepared to invest some time, I’d say ebay or the GOG bring and buy for this sort of item. I suspect that when a widow has to dispose of an estate the temptation to chuck the lot at an auction house is too great. I’ve just taken on an estate for the widow of a former club member. I’ve got 20 badly renumbered pannier tanks (amongst other things) to sell! I can’t face listing them all on eBay, so may have to do a stand at a toy fayre. Andy

Tony, I’ve no idea what a RTR Castle costs….nor do I want to know! But I do know that a new Bachmann V2 is around the £200 mark. Sadly kits don’t go for so much in my experience. I recently tried to sell a Nucast V2 on eBay, beautifully built (not by me) and running well with a Portescap. I even included a video to prove that it ran well. But no interest at £120. Sadly I think unbuilt kits go for more! I’m sure you manage to sell nicely built locos for more, partly because they have the ‘Sir’ seal of approval from a running perspective. But in my experience the market for second hand kit built locos is quite limited unless there is no RTR equivalent. I keep bidding on DJH A1/1s and losing! I hope I’m wrong but that’s my experience. Andy

Thanks Stuart, That largely makes sense and is in accordance with what I’ve done But the use of lever 8 to control the points to the loading dock is not something I’d seen before. This picture shows 6,7&8 as spare and on that basis I’d assumed that the loading dock point was hand controlled. I’ve actually put a point motor on it and controlled it using lever 6. If you’re sure of your source, I may change that over to lever 8. I’ve actually arranged a visit to the Glenfinnan museum on 14th March, so will see what I can find then. regards Andy

Tony, At my club we use a similar method to you, but with a more engineered fixing slot which positions and provides electrical connectivity. Possibly, the most significant difference is that we use nickel silver strip for the connectors. I believe this is more springy than brass. This works on both our exhibition layouts, Oakbourne in 00 and Smithfield in 0. I don’t have any photos to hand, but will take some next time I’m in the club if that would be useful. Andy

Very definitely cream Bill! I actually posted the image on my way to the match and it never occurred to me. And thank you Southampton…although you left it rather late! I actually don't think either Huddersfield or us will go down. There are plenty of other teams freefalling into the morass.

Rob posted the green and cream coaches on his WHL4 thread recently, so I thought that while I have some baseboards up, I’ll show what I intend to do with mine. Here we have the new Ellis Clark Black 5 which will become 5407 once I have some transfers. I have 5 of the coaches but only two would fit nicely on this board! Here is the full train on the EKOGG test track. I’ve obviously got some sorting out of lamps to do! Andy

Can I echo @mallaig1983 ‘s thanks to Jeremy. This signalling technical stuff is a complete mystery to me, so very useful. How far I’ll go down the locking bar modelling I don’t know. But at least I’ll know what to do with the rodding! Andy

The glue has dried on yesterday’s work and I’ve cleared the debris for a few photos. I’m trying to create this area. The scene is very different today, so I’m going on a limited number of old photos, some of which I can’t show for copyright reasons. This is where I’ve got to. The steps are a bit of a compromise because the ground should drop off more but I didn’t do that for baseboard integrity reasons. I also need to put in much more weed undergrowth. But I hope you can see that it’s getting there. The barrow crossing is also new. Andy

Thanks both, I wondered about the point lock but couldn’t see why it went beyond the point. Now I understand!