Johndc120

Sure thing, just got to remember which photos they were So start to finish this is the primer, it’s Vallejo grey primer which looks very light. The key is to clean the top of the rail between coats the next stage is to spray the whole thing in German camo black brown this has had 2 coats following this is rust layers, using the paint colours ‘dark fleshtone’ and ‘filthy brown’ Lastly the concrete colour for the concrete pots and rodding parts was touched in using Vallejo ‘stone grey’

Jidenco models did a lovely 13t S&T open wagon which would look lovely in that train

Hi All, We’re getting closer and closer to SWAG now, prep work on the locos and stock is beginning to happen. If you don’t know we operate Shwt via phone and tablets for complete hands free control. If you’re interested and want to have a play on the layout/take some of the operating duties off us!!! You’re more than welcome. please ensure you download withrottle for iPhone/ipad (the lite free version) engine driver for android devices Look forward to seeing you all there Shwt

Thank you, yes they are indeed herring wagons, they’re all Cambrian wagon kits which are okay but a bit awkward to build. An interesting thing is the herring wagons and ballast plough are set up for centre drop only, same as the catfish, the GWR plough could not spread anything laid outside the rails from a dogfish John

2 locos on now on trial the first being 5189, this is currently pulling one of the larger passenger trains that arrive at Elmore, this consists of 3 older collett coaches and usually a tail load 7218 then arrives with a ballast train, the ballast train as well as a couple of other oddities gives us the excuse to run some more unusual and larger locos on the layout. this is a special working from quarries in the Dean Forrest up the branch line to drop ballast and plough (see the one end brake is actually a plough van)

Another couple of locos ready for duty on Elmore the 5101 class is a good loco for the layout as it’s a good all round mixed traffic engine able to pull the heavier trains up the hill. Although with it’s larger wheels, it may still require assistance with heavy stone trains from the resident banker/yard pilot. this one being in this livery might well get more use on the larger passenger train The 72xx is a bit of extravagance for us, it would be an extreme situation to see such a large loco on a branch line and we’ll give you a clue as to what that situation might be, this little project has been on the go for a while and it’s about time I got it finished!!

A good evening of work yesterday. This has been more work on the platform. The main platform edging has gone in, the V2 version has worked well and actually it’s been the easiest platform edge I’ve done in a while. Hopefully this will be a nice contrast to the bullnose edging on the bay platform After finishing the edge slabs it was then time to look at the cattle dock, this was built from plasticard with wood blocks underneath. We have drilled through the board and screwed it down from underneath so it shouldn’t go anywhere now finally the section behind the buffers including the end loading dock have been tied into the now finished platform. We’ve glued on the metal ramps temporarily to see how they look. We have a range of stock that can use the end dock from CCTs, mogos, lomacs and of course the Rotank wagon

V2 of the paving slabs ready to go!! this should be enough to do the 1.4m of platform

Last night we made good progress on the bay platform laying the edging blocks down to the end and round the back of the buffer beam. underneath the edge blocks we have also added the stepped courses to build out the support under the blocks. finally we started to look at a 3D printed option for the main platform, these are 2’6 x 3’ slabs, they come out perfectly to the structure gauge but just a touch thick, also I would prefer a little bit more detail on the mortar gaps. V2 will be coming next week!!!

Thank you Geoff I found this one when I first started doing research on it, my boy has been to didcot a few times so it was a good excuse to make another visit where I took lots of photos. It’s all well and good having the diagrams but sometimes you need to actually see it to translate them

More progress on the platforms this week Since the last post the tops were clad in 40 thou, the sides then had the first layer of English bond added. I then realised I’ve completely cocked up the measurements and the platforms were 2mm too narrow!! So a bit more cladding to each side to bring out the platforms nobody will ever know!!!! so after the brick sides were stuck on the edging could then be added, on the bay we are using bullnose stones which would have been the originals however on the main platform we gone for a rebuild using large edging slabs. Once these are all in we can then add the stepped courses to support underneath the edge We’ve only added 3 of the edging slabs so far just to check for clearance the other project on the go at the moment is a rotank wagon. This was a nice little project thought up because we don’t have any milk facilities on Elmore but we do have the end loading dock. It’s a Hornby chassis with 3D printed too. It’s not perfect especially on the tank as I’m really struggling to find detailed pictures or diagrams but hopefully it’s a good representation

This evening I’ve had fun a Bachmann Wickham trolley! First challenge was to convert it to EM gauge, not too much trouble on this one as the existing wheels could just be pulled although under the cab there are wheel protectors which have sadly had to go, along with some of the footboards. I’ve had to 3D print some resin packing washers to stop the sideplay. The next challenge was where to fit a DCC decoder, I’ve chosen to fit it above the motor but to gain the room I’ve 3D printed some sleepers with a cutout made for decoder which will be a TCS Z2. They were simple shaped sleepers which I’ve glued some C&L chairs to (keys removed) The last jobs have been to weather the model plus just give the ballast a bit of wash with black and dirty brown now to fit the chip and a modelu crew

A couple of bits of progress this week, firstly the platforms have had the plastic cladding cut down to the correct profile. This is now ready for the top surface to go on and then we’ll start adding the brick an old kit for a 54xx has now had a chassis built for it, this is an Alan Gibson chassis and wheels, it really does look different with the 5’2 wheels, this loco is intended to go on the autocoach working when finished also under construction is a Jidenco models of the later twin tank gas wagon. This will be used for filling horse boxes and just another wagon to be shunted about on a mixed goods

Back to work on the layout and the first job is to redo the platforms as they were plasticard and the heat had got them causing them to warp and we just weren’t happy so version 2 has now started, these are solid wood platform which we are now starting the cladding process with 40 thou plasticard

A new(ish) loco for Shwt, This Heljan Class 17 is not at all new as I picked this one up second hand even before we finished the layout. Unfortunately it was an early model which were known for running issues. This one was certainly one of those and despite having a decent chip fitted I couldn’t get it run properly so it went in the too difficult pile! however the time has come to felon at it, this included the purchasing of a new 5 pole motor which is much less notchy than the original, the biggest job in replacing that was the removal of the flywheels and fitting them onto the new motor shafts the other job was to completely strip both gear trains removing all of the horrible grease and replace it with a thinner lubricant. Taking great care the gearboxes were reassembled ensuring they ran freely and didn’t cause any resistance. I am glad to say that it’s been a successful job and it now runs really smoothly at very slow speeds and hopefully will be a firm favourite on the layout as it has a lot of character

A couple of beautiful photos taken of Shwt by fellow modellers at the show taken by Richard Street taken by Rod Mackay

Thanks Dave, it was lovely to see Bridport again, it’s a while since seeing it last at warley and it left an impression then. I love the concept of the L shaped layout and it runs so well John

Well we had a brilliant weekend with Shwt at Alton (febex) layout ran well, lots of nice comments from people, a few invites, a very nice curry and few pints of beer. What more could you want?!?

The cars are packed, everything on the list found and ready to go for the journey tomorrow. The stress of getting everything ready to go is over, now we can relax and enjoy the weekend

Less than a week to go before febex. All is quiet on Shwt, all prep completed and ready for trains to commence Photo by Andy York

An interesting evening of Show prep, first challenge was to produce a demo piece for our static grass work. this is a step by step guide building up the layers which we can just quickly show people the following shots are each step in turn plain baseboard a base layer of paint to hide the baseboard 2mm fibres as a ground cover 4mm fibres to pick out longer grass areas 6-12mm fibres for long grass and bushes Foliage added to the long fibres The next job was cleaning stock and sorting a few jobs. This included adding some braking to the sls coach rake (they run too freely for kadees) my class 73 couldn’t pull itself let alone anything else so it’s been stripped down, cleaned oiled and now with a lot of lead (a very lot!!!) inside to help with traction finally a swap out of the chip in the Jinty, I’ve never been happy with it’s running performance so a bit of open heart surgery later and the lokpilot chip is no more and now replaced with a TCS M1 decoder with a stay alive

A week and a half away from febex, organising the troops and prepping the layout is well underway. Look forward to seeing you there

Eddington adventures, we had a lovely weekend at the Eddington show (SDJR trust), nice to be next to Rob (NHY 581) with his beautiful layout sheep dip. we were running a layout called Quarry Lane which is a modern image EM gauge layout which did okay, no major issues with it and kept people entertained. one difficulty we had was trying to load the cassettes all the time, trying to put the stock into the cassettes and then railing them is not always easy as you can’t see the wheels. Also the stock doesn’t bump down the track on the sleepers if it’s off. so this ended up being designed during the show on paper and drawn up in CAD then on Sunday night. it’s a railing ramp which slots into the end of the cassettes so you can just run them in instead of placing stock in, hopefully this should make life easier the design needs the corners filed off to get it to fit into the cassette further but already it works really well

Eddington adventures, we had a lovely weekend at the Eddington show (SDJR trust), nice to be next to Rob (NHY 581) with his beautiful layout sheep dip. we were running a layout called Quarry Lane which is a modern image EM gauge layout which did okay, no major issues with it and kept people entertained. one difficulty we had was trying to load the cassettes all the time, trying to put the stock into the cassettes and then railing them is not always easy as you can’t see the wheels. Also the stock doesn’t bump down the track on the sleepers if it’s off. so this ended up being designed during the show on paper and drawn up in CAD then on Sunday night. it’s a railing ramp which slots into the end of the cassettes so you can just run them in instead of placing stock in, hopefully this should make life easier the design needs the corners filed off to get it to fit into the cassette further but already it works really well

I used the existing axles and wheels just pulled out to 16.5 back to back, they still fit within the splashers and breakgear, infact the breakgear helps reduce any side play. the biggest issue was the pickups, they use a plunger pickup arrangement rather than a brass wiper like Bachmann. I replaced the pin on the plunger pickup with my own brass ones which I made up using some scrap brass. Something I think rapido should think about supplying for conversions. But then a lot of RTR manufacturers don’t bother