Booking Hall

Hi there, Mine is Recticel which I got from Travis Perkins. I know what you mean, 0 gauge models seem to have so much more 'presence'!

Progress has been a bit patchy during the last week due to life getting in the way of railway modelling! Having got a nice, flat baseboard top, I decided that a little bit of relief would be nice, specifically a culvert running under the railway. Unable to include that with the type of baseboard construction I'd used, I went to the builders merchant and bought a couple of 4ftx2ft sheets of 50mm polyurethane insulation board, and glued this to the top of my PVC planks. Whilst most of the layout will be flat, at least I can introduce some slopes and a gulley for a stream at the front of it. Before I do that, however, I needed to fix the positions of the track so some time was spent plotting the positions of the Peco Streamline Y and small radius points, and joining up the centres for the plain track. I'm using Peco Streamline code 100 but will cut the webs of the base and re-space the sleepers to a more prototypical spacing. I've done this twice before now, and whilst it is a bit of a fiddle, the track appearance is considerably enhanced as a result.

Hello David, thanks for the encouragment. The layout will probably end up being a 'byeway' rather than a true light railway, and I have in mind two geographical locations for it. One is in the LBSCR area, say Hampshire, and the other is Leicestershire/Rutland and a little used Midland branch. I have a couple of Maunsell corridor coaches (although non-corridor stock would be more appropriate I think) and a Wrenn R1 which has hardly turned a wheel in anger since I bought it in 1975! One of Hornby's 'Terriers' would be nice in SR livery. For the Midland area, I have a couple of Stanier suburbans and a Ratio MR compartment 3rd. That would look nice with a brake 3rd to go with it hauled by one of the open cab 'Jinty's'. As you might have guessed, I'm not going for strict authenticity here, rather an impression of long-gone days!

Having been tempted to buy a Dapol 0 gauge class 08 shunter in the Hattons 'sale of the century', I searched for inspiration to build my first small 0 gauge layout by re-reading back issues of Railway Modeller. After several weeks of doodling I hadn't come up with a plan which entirely satisfied me. I decided to put the project on hold for a while in order to build up a few more items of rolling stock and it was then that I came across this plan in the December 1984 issue. Still not what I wanted for an 0 gauge layout, but the simplicity and scope for light railway 'atmosphere' captured my imagination, and I decided to build it in 00, as I already have suitable stock to run on it. I found a suitable piece of plywood in the shed and played about with some points and bits of track, adding a couple more sidings for operational interest. Then I went and measured the back of the car to see what would fit in. The board I had found would comfortable fit in with space to spare, so i decided to go for the maximum length which was 4ft 10 inches x 13 inches, giving me a bit more scenic space. A couple of days later, having sawn up some 2"x1" I had a baseboard frame, but no large enough piece of ply to put on top of it. Lothe to shell out for some I re-examined the shed and came up with some cellular PVC planks left over from refurbishing the bathroom, so they became the top! I've yet to build the fiddleyard board which will feature a sector plate.

Thanks for the kind words TechnicArrow. Glad I could help you out of an 'awkward corner'!

It's good to hear from you again Gerry, looking forward to seeing what you come up with this time.

Taking the quick and easy way out, I could just recycle my previous entry 'Change here for . . .' by sticking a passenger on one of the platforms

Thanks, Jim, it is reminiscent of Airey House construction.

Oops, sorry. I should have mentioned that this is in the UK (Lancashire)!

Whilst carrying out a photographic survey of a location on which we are going to base a layout, I came across this unusual system-built factory (right on the alignment of the line on our proposed layout!). I've never seen this type of construction before, and I was a Building Surveyor in my professional life! As it was on private land I couldn't get up close to identify the wall panel material, but I suspect concrete, or possibly GRP, however, it could be steel. By reference to old maps, it appears to date from the 1950's. Can anyone identify the system please?

Congratulations Kevin, a wonderful piece of model making. Well done!

E-DAY -2 (EXHIBITION DAY -2) Well, I got it finished - at least it looks finished! I didn't have time to weather up the railings which were the final addition to the bridge section, nor to add rainwater pipes and gutters to the factory - but then is a model railway ever finished? It got favourable responses from many of the visitors, particularly from, shall we say, more mature visitors who remembered when the urban landscape looked like this. Not so much from most of the children who wanted to know why the trains ran so slowly!! I also had an interesting chat with a chap who actually looks after a full size version of the Coles 'Jumbo' crane in my scrapyard, at a museum site, so a 'thumbs up' from him too! It more than achieved my aim of making the layout much more interesting to operate, and children had fun waiting for trains disappearing into tunnels and watching for them coming out the other side, and being fooled when it reversed down a different line. Interestingly, many people were not aware that the layout was built into boxfiles, until told, and even then one person insisted on coming round behind to check for himself! At least two people said they had been inspired to try something like this for themselves, which is great.

1 DAY TO GO! (not sure what happened to day 2 ) Canal finished and 'slot in' strips made to hide the gap left where I've cut the front of the box so it will lie flat. I was going to use some hessian as the backing for a home-made scenic mat for this, but I realised it just wasn't going to be convincing, so went for this approach instead. Both the weedy canal bank and scrapyard wall (as it ended up) are constructed on a strip of balsa wood. The wall is one of Model railway Scenery's downloads. The disused railway bridge has had its security fence (suitably holed by urban explorers) added, and the track given some light vegetation. The scrapyard crane, which is an old Matchbox Toys 'Coles Jumbo crane', has had windows added using PVA, been weathered and a hook and cable installed. Telegraph poles add some typical railway infrastructure. Almost there!

Thanks both! 3 DAYS TO GO! Today I've built up the scrapyard and added some of the soft landscape. Last job tonight will be to put another layer of varnish on the canal.

Thanks Martyn, it's amazing how an immovable deadline aids productivity!!

4 DAYS TO GO! Today I had a major weathering session with the airbrush.

5 DAYS TO GO! Today I've painted the cobbled Street (Which I've called 'Eagle Street'), above the boiler house, made the second canal tunnel entrance, made the corrugated shed which screens the exit to the fiddle yard and added some detail to the factory flat roof. Oh, and done a bit of ballasting and started painting the 'scrap'.

Although not yet complete, here's the first shots of the the two additional boxes connected together.

Progressing well now! Track ballasted, canal basin stonework made, painted and fixed and scrapyard ground area painted. I've also collected together and primed some 'scrap'

Today's work has seen some further detail added to the back street, the lower section of the factory glued in place, the elevated roadway made and bridge parapet added, and some dilapidated corrugated iron and sleeper built fence made and fixed.

Chimney now built. I used a Scalescenes Boiler House one as I already have two square section chimneys on the layout and a round one would be a nice contrast. Rather than score the base layer to produce an octagonal stack, as per instructions, I carefully rolled the former to give me a truly round, tapering section. After covering it with the specially printed, curved brickpaper, I added a stone projecting cap and some reinforcing bands. Before I finish the factory, and fix the lower section in place, I had to construct the back street to go in front of the terraced house flat at the back of the box. I made this as a unit to be glued in complete. The base is more polystyrene pizza base, as is the stone sill section for the railings. I indented the roadway base to give that characteristic twin groove effect, often seen on cobbled back streets where they are worn and sunken in by iron rimmed cart wheels. The cobbles were again the DIY chain wallpaper, with potholes dug out, painted with tester pot emulsion wash and grotted up with modelling ash and real coal fire ash. Some suitably distressed Ratio spear point fencing complets this item.

Construction work on the factory has progressed quite well over the last couple of days. The chimney belongs to the boiler house in box 2, so another one will have to be made. The ground levels in this box 5 have been built up using the foam base from supermarket pizza. I made the siding a bit long here, so the rails will have to disappear beneath the dirt when I landscape the area. Use of foam is good as it's a) free! b) it recycles it, and c) you can dig holes in it, create ruts etc.

Not happy with the arches either, the angle looks wrong. Enough faffing! - back to my original idea!

Yet more mock up planning! I'm really struggling with this end of the second new box. I want to have the trains go 'off stage' behind something, but I can't quite resolve how to do this yet. This version uses a 9ft high sleeper built fence to enclose the proposed scrapyard, and the angled arches give me a bit of real estate above to create a street. The triangular building is an earlier proposal to put at the lower level for the trains to pass behind, but i didn't feel it was tall enough. Got to make a decision soon though, only two and a half weeks to the exhibition!

Well, that's the warehouse just about finished. It needs weathering, along with all the other structures, and I would like to add more detail, but as of today I only have three weeks to complete the extension to the layout before it is required for an exhibition, so I'd better crack on with the other major scenic components. These are 1) the tunnel/bridge exit to the second fiddle yard, 2) the scrapyard and canal infill, 3) the building (large factory?) which will project into the scrapyard and partially screen the exit to the fiddle yard and 4) the back street facing the railway at the back of box 5.