slow8dirty

I first spotted this thread when you were at the planning stage and somehow haven't kept up with it till now. Remarkable progress, lovely looking layout, a great interpretation of the scheme. Look forward to more.

Not much in the way of physical progress this week other than cutting fiddle board timbers and fitting alignment dowels for that joint, however have just laid my hands on the RM article explaining how to kitbash the Ratio Midland box into a something resembling WH style, so that has made me very happy. A lot of this project is going to be a challenge for me so that will be a nice way to ease myself into things before scratch building the station building. I now have a trio of appropriate type 2s for the core traction, but couldn't resist ordering an Accurascale 37, so might have to build 2 versions of the main buildings if I understand the station paint scheme time line correctly (well that will be good practice then, and I don't expect to get it right first time anyway).

Life is stranger than fiction https://internationalsubmarineraces.org/

Hi everyone, I hope you are all keeping well during these "Interesting times". Time to start a construction topic after a 5-6 year mixture of lack of modelling mojo, being away from the hobby and near terminal prevarication. The number of guitars I seem to have acquired over the last few years has blown any argument for staying away from the hobby due to cost completely out of the water so over the last year or so the number of just supposing layout scheme sketches has multiplied until I've been spinning around in a never ending merry-go-round of prevarication. Things finally started to firm up last summer and I finally settled upon the Roshven plan from the "Modelling the BR Blue Era" book, in N gauge. The planning thread and thoughts behind it can be found the layout design area. In summary Roshven was the originally proposed destination for the extension from Fort William which died a death in parliament due to landowner opposition, leaving the way open for the subsequent successful plans to Mallaig. This layout will be primarily set in the late 60's allowing for the interesting transition of liveries on traction and stock, Mixed trains along with the last years of fish traffic at the harbour side, marine fuel and the last few dregs of a freight service will be the operating theme. I was always a Large Logo/RETB period fan from childhood but the more I research from this period the more fascinating I find it. The astute reader will notice the planning thread is for an N gauge layout. Yes, well not sure what happened there, it sort of just growed. Before Christmas last year I realised there were some very nice OO type 2s around the corner, coupled with the poor availability of a lot of N gauge kits spurred the change. There has been a bit of a pause due to temperature in the garage and lack of time but this is where we are today. Still very messy, but one more board to build then I have room to tidy things up a little. Track work will be on a raised bed to create the harbour area. Given the floor is very uneven with a gradient to boot, I'm very happy to have everything aligned and level throughout. Track plan is here, fairly simple. I know it all fits but exact dimensions are still up for interpretation as we go. So apologies for maybe posting things a bit early in the process, but my god it feels good to have a project underway again after so long.

Are the IIB 'fish' the interfrigo vans that were trialled? Very useful topic by the way.

Very impressive, I didn't realise it was N gauge on first scroll through!

It's a great plan Rich, so look forward to news of any progress. Stay safe, happy modelling.

Big thank you to Rails for the speed and efficiency they handled my recent return. Latest Heljan 27, not opened until my birthday, where I found the fuel tanks stayed in the packaging as I lifted the rest of the loco out. Very quick turn around from return to replacement, and it was evident the replacement had been unpacked and checked prior to dispatch. Other half whose order it was(under direction) was impressed.

Hattons have just sent me a notification saying on or after Friday 31st. That's for D6114, I assume its got company.

Centre Board up and roughly in position. As always the design gets slight tweaks during the build process. Minor things like size, number of boards, scale modelled in. Just minor tweaks, hardly noticable! My 2mm:ft mojo has been satisfied by my efforts in american switching shelves on the other side of the garage of late, so somehow Roshven has morphed up a scale, duno maybe I prefer my Sulzers to have Danish DNA? Sizewise, will be a slightly thinner and longer version of the original plan in the book now, maybe, it's kind of designing itself at the moment!

Really good news Rich, well done for sticking with it.

Google Hannants.co.uk, they're the plastic modellers equivalent of mainly trains or hattons, if a set exists they'll stock it. I'd link but not on a great connection at mo.

Well you've convinced Google mail, my notifications for this topic are being sent to the promotions folder, under travel!

Definitely N, I wa in pretty much the same boat when my boy was 6. We started with a farish starter set(generic jinty style tank engine with a few small wagons) Not only was it sturdy enough he was better at putting things on the track and coupling up than us adults! After that experience I've no hesitation in recommending N for a family layout

And finally, almost a year after posting, I cut the first timber for this, but things are off, it is no longer a pipe dream. I've failed on two points, it obviously hasn't been a quick return, and it hasn't kept me out of the garage, but it will very soon actually exist.

Thanks for posting, first I've seen in green, The West Highland Lines Post Beeching has a picture of 25109 at Mallaig cited as June 1980. The caption states May or November were the usual periods for them to appear.

Very nice

Roshven in the real world, was originally mooted as the terminus for the West Highland extension, but landowner opposition amongst other factors led to Mallaig being chosen, and the rest is history. The back story however this line was built first with the Mallaig line being built later. In reality this would not have survived so I envisage a similar feel to the Ballachulish branch for this model. However the plan will allow me to run green 27s and 29s at first, through to blue 25s & 27s & maybe blue 37s into the 80's. Not forgetting class 20s. The RETB and large logo era will probably stretch plausibility too far, but that i doubt that will stop me. some very useful threads have been written on here over the years, including this http://www.rmweb.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=24258 One of the 4x2 boards from my old OO layout is the foundation for this, so construction officially starts when I strip that and modify it slightly. West Highland Chalet (Glenfinnan) style buildings will be what I'm after, still gathering decent plans at the moment. Whenever I've sketched this out before finding something decent for the ferry pontoon has stumped me, but this time i think I've found it; LangleyLaunch & Pontoon Set (N Scale 1/160th) Ref: 58102 http://www.langleymodels.co.uk/acatalog/Online_Catalogue_Boats__Ships__quayside_walls_etc_63.html Their quayside walls look appealing too, but I'm not yet sure what height I'm going to build the jetty at yet, think I might just build from sheet material. Oh, and I bought my first bit of rolling stock the other weekend too, a Farish mk1 BCK, so thats all the passenger services sorted then. This about wraps up the planning stage tbh, I did contemplate N finetrax for quite a while but have decided to try and crack on with walking before I try to fly! Invernevis by David41283 has proven to be very inspiring and useful regarding the finescale option and also to just how good an N gauge layout can be in this sort of space, go check it out.

Hi Rich, hope your well. Roshven certainly seems to be gaining traction, but I am lurking round the North Devon threads with intent don't worry

This looks like it could be interesting to them kinda sort that seem to hang about round ere . https://www.amazon.co.uk/Freight-Devon-Cornwall-David-Mitchell/dp/1857944739

Didn't seem to be improving things much tbh! Quite interesting to see from a modelling perspective though, and the comfort of the computer desk.

Just seen the manor leaving Minehead, not a nice day to be working tender first!