Ch4lkst3r

Slow progress, as usual, on the layout due to work etc. Here's a list of what's been going on! Base card for the town area has been put down in the area of the terraced houses. I've done this to provide a nice smooth surface for the roads and also allows me to remove some to provide a void under the buildings to run lighting cables. Spent what seemed a long time watching Chandwell Youtube videos on how to use Inkscape to design roads. Have now managed to sort out the awkward corner junction area and print that out and stick it down. Spent more time playing around with the image for the road off into the horizon in Inkscape and Gimp. That is now stuck on to the backscene. Added the chimney pots onto the low relief buildings and now that the road surface and backscene were in place they have been glued into place. Lighting wires have been run through the baseboard so next job will be to go underneath and connect them all up. Here's a little picture of the buildings, road and added backscene section. The Boots low relief roughly joins up with the Boots on the backscene. It's near enough for me anyway! The rest of the corner junction does look a bit strange at the moment but once the pavements are in it will hopefully make sense!

The roofers have finished and the shopfitters (or should that be pubfitters?) have been in and The Great Eastern pub is nearly open for business. Like the other side of the road the only thing missing is the chimney pots but I'll leave them until later so I have less chance of knocking them off! Now to work out the back gardens etc.

The other side of the road is now nearly done. The roofers are in putting the tiles on. Shopfitters are due soon to put the windows in the pub and then the building for the other side of the first of the town's roads will be done. Once that's done I can finalise that part of the road layout and design the backyards for them to fit. After that it's on to yet more buildings for the main high street of the town. Other tasks are to have a little tidy so that I can run some trains around again!

Work slowly continues on the town scene with the construction of the terraced houses for the opposite side of the road. The finished buildings for the opposite side of the road are now mounted onto the pavement and I've built a little gate between the two sets of terraced houses. The two sets can't be one long row as they'd go over the join in the baseboard and the backscene doesn't have an appropriate image at that point so it seemed easier to cover it with a gate!

Think I've found the answer here (https://www.rmweb.co.uk/forums/topic/19581-hattons-announce-lms-twins/). Looks like the lined green version was only around for a short while in 1956/7. Then they got the large white stripe as per 10001 but without the yellow warning panel till withdrawn in 10000 case. The announcements say that those are the liveries for now so hopefully we'll see the twins released in green with white stripe but no warning panel in a future announcement

Going to have to buy the twins! Quick question for those that know these things. Would 10001 with small yellow panels have run with 10000 in lined green or had 10000 been withdrawn before 10001 was repainted?

Well I've now returned from the land of Oz but not the one with witches and a yellow brick road! Unfortunately a return to modelling was delayed due to me picking up some kind of bug that knocked me about for a couple of weeks but thankfully I'm now over that so can get back to the layout. I've started on finishing the buildings for the town section. First was to build a few more low relief terraced houses followed by a corner shop to end the road previously seen in photos of long ago! These are now pretty much finished although chimney pots need to be added but I'll do those when they are going to be installed to save knocking them off! Photo shows roughly where the new buildings will go. Before they can be permanently fixed I need to add the road and pavement but I need to get a few more buildings built first to finalise the road layout. Next on the build list is the terraced houses on the opposite side of the street. Fortunately now I've built a model shop I won't have to go as far for supplies 😂

Just a bit done on the layout this week. The loop line platform starter bracket signal, complete with a disc signal on the ground for access to the shed headshunt, has been planted and ballasted in. There is a bit of a hump around the base of it as I've had to raise it to give clearance under the bracket. Behind that you'll be able to see the barrow crossings I've installed to give access to the steam shed which will run from the end of the island platform. The island platform will be in the big grey gap in the centre of the photo. The town area has been cleared of tools etc. ready for some planning of buildings. I've got a partial plan of what is going where but there's plenty of buildings to be built for the area. That's all going to have to wait for a few weeks as I'm off on holiday for Christmas!

The diesel shed is in place and blended into the hardstanding which was slightly awkward as the building can still be removed. A couple of lights have been added in front of the shed. One of my recent additions (the lovely class 128 by Revolution - thanks @Revolution Ben) takes fuel alongside the shed. Now that's finished it's onto the town above the retaining wall where all the glue/scatter currently sits!

It's been a quiet couple of months in terms of layout progress. I've been busy with other hobbies and any model railway time has been spent running trains for a bit of a change and to finally get the locos run in. A lot of stock has been in the box since purchased with the exception of a quick test run. Anyway over the last couple of days I've finally got the hard standing for the diesel shed completed and the fuelling point installed. The shed is ready to be placed onto the pins in the hard standing (made from cocktail sticks!) which will hold it in position but enable it to be removed for access. A trip to the Warley show yesterday enabled me to get a few finishing touches for the area.

The work on the diesel sidings continues when time allows. The diesel shed building is now built. The picture below shows it sat on the layout roughly where it will go although the hard standing needs to be put down first before it can be permanently installed. Round the back of the shed I've installed a little pump house along with storage tanks. The plan is to have a couple of tank wagons here as a supply for fuelling the locos. Now to sort out the hard standing and ballasting of the diesel sidings which will complete the whole of Northbridge steam and diesel depot. Then it's on to the rest of the town above the tunnel which I've kind of got planned in my head but if it's like the rest of the layout it will end up nothing like that plan!

Bit of a stretch to get to the late 70s! They're a pair of old Poole Farish ones that I use for clearance testing. The HST from which they came went via ebay a long time ago but kept them for just that purpose.

Well again it's been a while since the last update on activity at Northbridge. That thing called work getting in the way again! Not much has changed since the previous post. The coaling stage has been completed and point levers installed on the tracks behind it. The area for the diesel shed and sidings has been the main area of work. The sidings were laid before but I wasn't happy with how they were looking so they've had a little bit of a re-jig and a pit has been installed on one of the roads. I've also finally got some locos out of their boxes and given them a little run. They're now having a rest in the shed. It highlighted a couple of track issues that weren't there before ballasting/weathering but have thankfully now been resolved. Work continues on the diesel depot and items for that area then there'll be somewhere for the diesels to go!

Hi all. Thanks for the responses. The proposed area is attached to the already build steam shed (pictured below) which also has a coaling stage and turntable etc. My use of the term stabling was probably the wrong word so if I could slightly reword the query for further advice. The area of 3 sidings is linked to the established steam shed so was thinking that they may have built a new diesel shed for the new incoming diesel replacements. Would this have been likely in the early 1960s on the Western Region or would they have been using the steam shed for maintenance etc. Thanks again for your replies

Hi, my layout under construction is based in the early 1960s Western Region somewhere in the Midlands around Birmingham. I've got an area that will consist of 3 sidings for fuelling/stabling my hydraulics. My question is when did BR start building purpose built diesel depot buildings such as the Scalescenes one below? Hope someone might have an idea as to whether this type of building would be prototypical at that time or whether it would be too modern and that the stabling roads would just be plain sidings with some hardstanding. Thanks in advance for any advice