61666

As the photos show, Haverhill South is a little gem. 2mm fine scale, depicting a real location between Marks' Tey and Cambridge on the Colne Valley line.

Good to see Club layout, 'Elliott's Bluff' in the latest Continental Modeller. This year's exhibition marks its debut. The Bluffers, as the team are known, have been working hard rehearsing the sequences, checking stock, track etc, while the layout now sports an impressive hand painted back scene, produced since the photos were taken for the magazine.

Time to introduce the traders now. Hopefully, there is enough to suit everyone, with specialists and more general dealers. As the backbone of our hobby, do your best to swap some of your hard earned in exchange for their wares! ABC International Models - American and Continental trains/accessories AppleJ-ax - model shop in Hythe, with railways and a lot more Aspire Gifts and Models - wide range of items in various scales and gauges coming up from Dorset Branchlines - specialist kits and materials for 4 & 7mm scale, including narrow gauge Coastal DCC - all you need for computer control & more Debris of War - scenic items for railways and war gaming Doug's Tools - as per the name Euroscale Models - continental outline Finishing Touches - wide range of weathering and specialist material, plus ready made models Footplate - probably have most of what you need to build a layout Golden Arrow - specialist tools, bits & pieces Harrison Brown - buildings, kits, vehicles, DVDs and much more Invicta Model Rail - Kent's premier model shop, seen all around the country Andy Lynch - quality second hand/pre-owned models Ray Morris - as above Plus Daughters - N gauge specialists and a lot more Railbooks - huge range of reading material on offer Rochester Games & Models - our local emporium - railways, but war gaming too. Roneo Models - broad range of items in most scales Supercast - Mike Pett's miniature figures in 4 & 7mm scale, plus signs and plaques in wood. Also attending are: Sittingbourne and Kelsey Light Railway Society EM Gauge Society Gauge 0 Guild British HO Society

Super show and the venue is just the bee's knees. Very well organised & great hospitality - very much enjoyed taking Arigna Town north again & the M! re-opening early made the journey home fairly painless. Mention must be made of all the friendly people who I spoke to - not every show has visitors this engaging, while it was lovely to see a group of Ulster modellers who had come 'over the water' for a weekend visit. Many thanks to the organisers for making it such a fine weekend.

Shannon has now been given a proper clean up. First dusted, then with T-Cut, which has really brought the paintwork back to life. Some of the boiler bands needed re-fixing and the coal in the tender has been replaced with better stuff. Otherwise, it is as it was built. Just a lot fresher now. Working with the loco showed me what a fine model it is, especially at over 40 years old, plus it still runs well too and is certainly something to treasure.

City centre modelling at its best! Re the overhead wiring - never tried it myself, but might be something elsewhere on RMWeb & failing that, try a Google search. Am sure someone will have done it at some point.

Halland is our next layout - 00 gauge in 20 x 5 by John Gay. Some narrow gauge too, as you can see and on several levels, which always adds extra interest.

So, we continue to add different scale/gauge combinations, with LLantrevelyn ‘009’ 6ft x 4ft, by Adam Saunders.

Yup, Branchlines they are indeed Dave. Pretty much the whole kit for the opens, though I leave off the etched headstocks, but also get rid of the truss rods and brake levers for the vans. Being 21mm gauge, I fit Slaters 0 gauge wagon bearings, with a 1mm hole drilled in the bottom, then make my own axles from 2mm brass rod, pin pointing the ends against a heavy duty slitting disc in a Dremel. Crude, but effective!

The last few weeks have focussed on wagon building. Four opens and three more brake vans to add to another I'd built earlier. The opens were a real trial of endurance - hundreds of rivets on each one, plus lots of strapping and other details. The problem with open wagons being you need to model the inner sides too. They are for coal traffic - two full and two empties, to be swapped off scene in the exchange sidings. The brake vans use my own resin castings. Two are in crimson lake, two are in the faded red/brown colour that this weathered to over the years. All the wagons are hand lettered, using a dipping pen and acrylic ink.

A tremendous bit of work and one to follow! Really bold approach to show trains snaking their way through an urban environment.

Looking forward to bringing Arigna Town to Derby. Last time I was in the Roundhouse, I was in short trousers, visiting on a Derby Works open day, back in the '60s! Not many Irish layouts around that are proper broad gauge [5'3] and even fewer in 7mm scale, so hopefully bringing something a bit different.

3mm scale next, with Andrew Shilleto's Wantage Tramways. Little, if anything in the way of ready made in this scale - particularly such an interesting and unusual prototype.

Royalty takes up residence at Arigna Following Richard Chown's death last year, his vast collection of models and layouts were made available for purchase. For those of you who don't know about Richard, he built Castle Rackrent in his bedsit in the early 1970s. It is 16' long and eventually was developed into a vast system around 200' long. Various stations have been sold off, including one which will be at Cultra this year and, I believe, then take up residence in the former barber's shop in Enniskillen. Given that I have often said in these pages that, apart from Richard, I seemed to be the only person around doing proper [36.75mm] broad gauge in 7mm scale, it was only right to put in a few bids for locos and stock. It was tempting to go for his model of Lissadell, which ran on Arigna Town at Manchester in December 2016 [when I was privileged to meet the great man], but already having two SLNCR 'Small Tanks', I didn't really need a third - even if it did come in early Sligo livery with a polished brass dome. Instead, I cast my lot for one of the original Castle Rackrent locos: Waterford, Limerick & Western 0-6-0, Shannon - and much to my delight my bid secured this historic model locomotive. Shannon is quite an old lady, appearing in Richard's article in the March 1975 Railway Modeller & have included one of Cyril Freezer's photos from this. She is therefore well over 40 years old and, according to the short article, was Richard's first ever scratch built engine. Given her age, she is in pretty good condition and seems to run well. Indeed, she was part of the regular Castle Rackrent running sessions up to June last year. The photos show her in 'as received' condition - more than a bit dusty and with paintwork a bit scuffed, but not bad for her age! It is going to be interesting to examine how the loco was built. First impressions are there seems to be a high quality motor [maybe and RG7?], plus what appears to be a speaker in the tender. Not sure if the loco is DCC though, it may be something like a Pacific Fast Mail analogue unit. If anyone out there knows, please tell me. Am hoping to include Shannon on the Arigna Town operating sequence. She fits on the turntable [just!] and came with three brake vans. All have Alex Jackson couplings, so it will be interesting to see if I can work these with the magnets I have for my Dingham auto couplings. Any info on the brake vans will also be welcome too, please. Will aim to report on my findings over the next few weeks, but what I would also be interested in is what folk think about possibly updating Shannon? I don't intend anything major to the bodywork, just a general clean up and maybe touch up the paintwork here & there, but there is a gaping space between the frames that is begging for working inside valve gear, as per my Sir Henry 0-6-4T. Is that something I should be doing, or should I respect this historic model's heritage and keep it as it is?

Ville a la Campagne next - 7mm narrow gauge from Barry Langford, which packs a lot in a relatively small space.

Now something brand new. Elliott's Bluff is an American outline, N Gauge layout started by our late President, Alan. A small group from the club got together to finish the layout in his honour and it makes its debut at our show. It will also feature in the June edition of Continental Modeller. Photos by another club member, Stephen Long.

Thanks, Dave. A really historic layout and looking extremely well on it too!

Solden is HOe Austrian narrow gauge, from Chatham Club secretary John Morgan

Ruxley: a large EM gauge layout from Epsom & Ewell Model Railway Club Photos courtesy of Chris Nevard & Model Rail.

Developing the scenics Work over the last few weeks has revolved around moving the scenics outwards from the back scene. I started with the road surface and pavement, then made a stone wall to separate the road from the station yard. A crossing gate, based on the ones at Brookeborough & at last I could get out the static grass machine. Further work involved improving the ballast & [especially] the baseboard join, where the crack was of earthquake proportions. A couple of trees have been made, following Gordon Gravett's book. One is hopefully a 'signature item' intended to mask the liberties I've taken with perspective on the back scene. It is currently only at the 'skeleton' stage, until I can get some more scenic matting. The other helps to hide the hole in the sky at the front edge of the baseboard. This is also aided by a large, roadside advertising hoarding - the latter suggesting there is indeed a road running along the front of the layout, but just off scene. In answer to the question about a track gauge, a fellow club member kindly turned one up for me on a lathe, from a piece of brass bar. A basic roller gauge, I used it for both points and plain track. Am now going back to rolling stock and have started work on a rake of CVR open wagons, so will report on these later.

19 layouts now confirmed for the show. The list as follows [those marked * are from the Chatham Club, or its members]: 1: Wantage Tramways (3mm Finescale), Andrew Shillito(1800 x 450mm) 2: Fulton Terminal, Andrew Browne, (HO)* 3: Arun Quay (O gauge), Gordon Gravett 4: Admiralty Exchange Sidings (EM)(12ftx 10ft) 5: Hazel End ‘O gauge’ Wimbledon MRC (13 ft x 2ft), Mark Hedgecock 6: Melton Mowbray (North), ’N gauge’, John Spence, ‘26ft x 8ft’ 7: Cherry Orchard, ‘O gauge / Narrow Gauge’ ‘38ft x 6ft’ 8: Halland ‘OO Gauge’ ‘20ft x 5ft’ John Gay 9: Coldharbour Lane ‘O gauge’ 20ft, Andrew Jones 10: Haverhill South ‘2mm Finescale’ 4ft 3in x 2ft, Martin Allen 11: LLantrevelyn ‘009’ 6ft x 4ft, Adam Saunders 12: Ville a la Campagne, ‘7mm Narrow Gauge’, 5ft 4in x 14in, Contact: Barry Langford 13: Elliotts Bluff (American N) C&D MRC* 14: Arigna Town, 7mm scale, Gauge: 36.75mm irish 5ft 3in. David Holman* 15: Solden (HOe), by John Morgan* 16: Roberts Junction (OO), by Luke Roberts 17: Ruxley (OO), by Epsom & Ewell MRC 18: Hotch Feldberg (Z), by Glenn Allen* 19: Haveago Junction (OO), C&D MRC* More pictures to follow, along with a list of traders

Gordon Gravett's new layout, Arun Quay makes its debut in Kent. Completely stunning - whatever scale or gauge you model!

Arigna Town [sligo, Leitrim & Northern Counties Railway] made its debut at the former Chatham Show in 2014 and returns this year having added a lot of new stock since then. Currently, it is the only exhibition layout using 7mm scale & 36.75mm gauge in the country.

Buildings almost finished Having completed the low relief structures, the last few weeks have seen attention transferred to moving outwards to ward the front of the layout. The main job was the warehouse - at last painted & with doors, windows & roof to brighten the raw scribed DAS clay. A fair bit of time was spent on the road surface and pavements. The latter have slabs cut from self adhesive address labels, while the former is talc on gloss paint - both techniques in Gordon Gravett's books, and very effective too. However, when I sanded the road surface with fine wet & dry, it resulted in the sort of patterns you see on a drying tarmac road after a rain shower. Given Ireland is well blessed with liquid sunshine, I've tried to enhance the effect by giving it a coat of Humbrol 'satin cote'. Other work has involved making a wall to separate the road from the station yard, plus a gate [based on those at Brookeborough on the CVR mainline].

Early notice of this year's Chatham & District Model Railway Exhibition on 2nd & 3rd June. Venue is the same as last year - The Victory Academy, Magpie Hall Road, Chatham, Kent. 18 layouts booked so far, with similar number of trade stands, plus societies. Highlights include Arun Quay, Gordon Gravett's new layout and Melton Mowbray North, best layout at Manchester in 2016. There will be several new layouts, also the return of a couple of favourites including Andrew Brown's Fulton Terminal [American] and David Holman's Arigna Town [irish Broad gauge]. Following comments from last year, we will be running a minibus service from Chatham Railway station, while extensive free parking is available as before. Further details will be posted over the coming weeks.