Powerhaul 70 Pey

Thanks Mick. I have been on the docks this afternoon and both Colas 70s are out of the ship. Nowhere to take a photo though unfortunately.

Building looks great Marcus!

Hello everyone. A little bit more done on the landscaping. Here you can hopefully see the land dropping off into a valley where the river will be using Woodland scenics realistic water. Another view Two views of the station area. I have made 3 more thinner low relief industrial type buildings than the two I have made previously to go behind the signal box as space is very limited! I have also made an low relief IKEA building to fill a corner in the layout. I have put some Tarmac signs up on the wagon loading tower. Here is a view of the sidings and TMD. As it is still early in the year the glues are taking over 12, sometimes 24 hours to go off fully so I do not want to do any ballasting just yet. The good news is that the track is now nailed in position and everything seems to run ok over it.

The cutting and bus depot sounds like a good idea.

That level crossing shot is fantastic! I have used your grated crayon method to simulate wild flowers on my layout, hope you don't mind me copying your ideas.

With a lot of my track work passing close to the back boards of the layout I am going to need quite a few low relief buildings. So I had a play with some off-cut MDF pieces cutting them into building type shapes. Then placing them next to some low relief Metcalfe factories that I have already made. DRS 68005 passing by on the freight only line heading towards the yard. The old mill car park is a good place to photograph freight workings and light engines! DRS 68005 passing by. I also need some low relief buildings in the aggregate area so I had a play making some with MDF again. The loading tower is Bachmann Scenecraft. I will add some more detail to these and weather them and then make a decision whether to keep them or bin them. I have also made a bridge to break up the back board that you can just make out in the photograph. I quite like this as it gives the impression that the trains could be longer than they are. I should have taken a closer photo to show this.

I have not posted any photos here for a while so here is one from yesterday. Freightliner 70015 powering around the curve at Boars Head, Standish in Wigan, Lancashire with the 4S44 Daventry to Coatbridge service.

The 68 looks smart. I do like the Chiltern livery but opted for DRS.

During the week I painted the remainder of the rock cutting and took a few photos of it with my new Dapol 68 on a nuclear flask train passing by. The plan is for the rock cutting to drop down into a river and have a farm either side of the river. I have got 4 Dapol girder bridge trusses ready for the bridge that will span the river and cutting.

With the scenic side of the layout being so bare I have made a hillside in one corner on the countryside section of the layout. I need a rock cutting as the track is close to the back wall of the layout. Having tried various techniques in the past on rock cuttings when the layout was in the attic I have gone with making formers from spare MDF which are covered with wiremesh then covered with mod rock then a layer of polyfiller. Here is a photo half pained and half at the polyfiller stage. Tonight I have been scribing out individual rocks ready for painting later this week.

That photo of 68005 is superb. So realistic as others have already stated. Great stuff!

Fantastic photos. The 37 down in the deep cutting looks brilliant. The Dapol 68 looks the part. I'm happy with mine, 68005. It runs fine on my track work and looks smart. I am not too bothered about the well documented faults with the model. Great set of photos here.

That is one impressive station interior! Looks ace with the bus stop right outside the front of the station and the modern vehicles in the photos. Great work.

Hello Peter and thank you for visiting out layout thread. I didn't seem to have much of a problem with the track work luckily, mind you, it was never actually nailed down. I never got to that stage of fixing the track down and ballasting. Hopefully, now that it is in the garage I can fix the track down and ballast the track work. I am hoping to do this in summer when the glue mix will dry quicker.

Great pics of the Dapol 68. I've got 68005 and very happy with it too!

Looks good. I like the large logo 47 and that bridge as the track work narrows and passes underneath. Are they point levers/switches for point motors that I can see on one photo? I am contemplating using motors on some of my hard to reach points but never attempted them before!

The Dapol 68 looks great on your layout, I have also had 68005 delivered today and I am very happy with it. Probably the heaviest loco I have got and runs fine over the track on my layout.

A few new additions to the fleet. Two Freightliner HHA coal hoppers that are factory weathered. Thats now a half decent rake of 6 HHA's now and thats about my limit due to the length of sidings in the yard. The rake of HHA's in the sidings. A view of the sidings and main line passing to the left. Here is my other new addition. A Dapol DRS class 68 and what a beauty it is. 68005 Defiant. It is a DCC ready model from Hattons. I thought I had a problem with the compatability of the Hattons decoder and Hornby Select controller so I swapped the decoder for the one in my Freightliner 66. For some reason both now work fine. I thought the fault would swap from the 68 to the 66 but I am pleased to say I have no running issues. I have read a lot of negative comments on this website about this new model but to be honest I am made up with mine. I have no intention to inspect it against the real thing to find fault with it. It is a solid loco with a good weight to it, looks smart and runs smoothly over my layout so that's good enough for me.

The 58 looks ace. Looks like it should have been at springs branch component recovery center all those years ago.

Hello everyone. I have a problem with my Hornby tts sound flying scotsman. The sound works fine when turned on with f1 and drives OK with the sound altering due to speed. However, when the locomotive is stopped and you go to set it off again the locomotive does not move and sound is stuck on steam idle. I do not have a problem with any other locos. The strange thing is that if I turn off the Hornby select controller then back on the flying scotsman operates normally until stopped again when this scenario repeats itself. I assume that when I turn off the controller and back this resets the fault without moving the loco to a different position on the track points toward the wheels and track being clean enough. Has anyone else encountered similar facts please?

I need try out weathering at some point as all my stuff is pristine. Its just that the stuff to do it can cost a few quid and then there's the problem of me messing it up. I could try it on wagons and my model diggers first before doing a loco!

The night time shots look great and look forward to seeing the Class 37 repaint. Nice one.

Thanks for your kind comment. I defo think that my second attempt is better than the first. I need to try and make my own because it will cost me a lot of money to buy the amount of trees I probably need. I think my second attempt is better than the ones that I bought.

I have made my mind up to have the TMD by the yard sidings. Here is Freightliner 66952 having just arrived at the yard with the TMD in the back ground. It will be a bit further back but I need to buy some more track for this area. So this has freed up the top R/H corner of the layout for a aggregate site which i need more track for as it will be two sidings. I have also included a level crossing over the freight only lines which will be the access road for the TMD. The station track work is almost complete now. 6 platforms, 4 through roads and two bays for light engines and DMU services to terminate. Had a go at making a river on a test piece of wood using Woodland Scenics realistic water. Also had another go at making trees. The two trees to the left I have made. The latest version of tree is the far left tree and the two trees to the right were bought from shops/online. An overall view of the layout so far as of last night.

The Colas 70 looks ace on the Sinfin tanks Jim.