Jesse Sim

2025 yeah?

Apologies, some people would have seen me post with just photos.... I accidentally clicked "submit reply" and I hadn't typed anything out yet......

Alright, the last of the updates before moving into describing each individual train. We are in August last year (2023). My workbench looked like this, a right mess after a recent rebuild; new bench and fascia which allowed me to add another kick back siding for the Down lines. After getting back into watching Everard Junction's YouTube videos religiously I noticed he employed a workbench modular design on his own workbench and I started investigating for something similar that would keep my undiagnosed autism and OCD in check. Unfortunately I could not find something here in Australia and had to source the same design from the same manufacture as Richard from Everard Junction. The Hobby Zone workbench modules are brilliant and I was able to tailor their products to suit my needs using their designer on the website. It was so much fun. I eventually decided to bite the bullet and purchased the lot through Hattons, my last purchase from them, not that I bought all lot from them. The postage killed me... It went together really easy, each section comes with magnets and that is how the whole thing is held together. I'll post up some photos later this arvo with how the workbench looks now. Something else I worked on in August was the patio at the front of the "Train Room". Some of you may remember my room didn't fare well in heavy rain, flooding on numerous occasions, with one really bad one that stopped progress entirely for a few months. This was due to the room being at a low point of the entire property, I was gifted this room by my Grandfather and I didn't want to whinge but something needed to be done or I would risk losing what I have spent my early adult years building. The solution was a drain that wrapped around two walls and this has worked perfectly, over the top for a garage but for a train room.... it was needed and I am forever grateful. This leads onto what was accomplished in August; some new concrete to replace the paving job I did myself, that's being a bit unfair to myself but it wasn't the best and the heavy rains had washed away the pavers in some sections, so the solution: Looks a bit bland doesn't it? My Grandfather, Charlie, who worked and lived on this property, as I do now, was known for his love for gardening and took out many Local Council awards. Myself and my family have kept up his gardens and take pride in our home/workplace so it was only fitting that I made the front of the train room just as nice. The railway seat is from the Hawkesbury River railway station, how long they were in service I am not sure but I remember them as a kid when I was travelling by train to skateparks with mates. September/October my lovely partner, Rachel, and I did a little road trip South in to Victoria, along the Great Ocean Road and into South Australia. A few photos of the trip... if I may? One of the first stops was Sovereign Hill at Ballarat, a place rich in early Australian History, particularly the Victorian Gold Rush when local miners revolted against the British administration of the Colony of Victoria, mostly it was down to taxes being handed down onto miners. It was known as the Eureka Stockade and occurred in the early 1850s. Sovereign Hill (pictured) is Victoria's answer to Beamish. I visited many times when I was a kid, so it was good to be back. Couldn't help myself somewhere along the road between Ballarat and Apollo Bay, came over a bridge and I saw two locos parked to my left, quick u-turn sorted that out, Rachel was thrilled as always. Another photo of the financial mistake (a 4WD) at Robe, South Australia. Down along the South coast of Australia is absolutely stunning. Lot's of shipwrecks also. Before long we were in Adelaide and I was sniffing out railway museums... and Rachel was absolutely thrilled!! If I am honest, the photo above was staged, she is very supportive of my hobby. Right, that brings us almost to the end of 2023, I did some railway work over the Christmas break so I'll post that up a bit later.

I run my express’ around twice but the slower trains just the once. I stole mimicked this from Grantham.

Can’t wait to do the shutting in both directions next Easter (2025). I’m glad I’m not the only one that does this, no wonder my back feels 50.

Over the past week I have painted the three conflats I worked on at the Forrestville show, lettered the five dia 2 wagons and repainted the LNER Flat T. If that wasn’t enough I also decided to start another project: manure filled wagons. One of the trains I’ve chosen to model from a 1937 Working Timetable is 71 Down, a pick up goods. This carried manure out of London for Three Counties, Arlesey & Langford, Biggleswade & Sandy. I originally intended to tarp these wagons but it was pointed out by a friend/mentor that the LNER would not have wasted a tarp and they would have ran open to their destinations. So, after reading a very informative thread from RMWEB user ‘Mikkel’, on using Humbrol Weathering Powders, clumped together, as horse droppings, (which can be found here), I set about recreating it on a larger scale. I started by making a false floor for the wagons, made from palstikard, I glued some polystyrene balls in with the powders and painted them different shades of brown. I mixed in some plumbers hemp to represent straw and placed the entire thing inside a few weathered wagons. I’ve made up a total of four and they are now glued in place. I chose to glue because I prefer permanent loads. If I ever decide to model anywhere else that doesn’t require poo filled wagons these can be simply tarped over. The wagons are from Rapido, show below: Oxford: and lastly, one of the Bachmann wagons I altered into a near enough representation of an LNER dia. 2. I’m quite happy with the way the dia. 2, I’ll post the rest up soon.

We need a disclaimer before these type of pictures

Some further shots of the rebuild. I think this was around about the time I was re-wiring everything. I made up new control panels, this time choosing a white background and black ‘lines’. Two seperate control panels, North and South, same as before. The work all finished with some stock in the fiddleyard. I’ve moved some trains around, some are in different spots, for example the Pullman cars are now in the Up lines as the Yorkshire Pullman. Looking the opposite direction towards the lift out section. What I might do, to regenerate interest in this thread, is go through the sequence describing each train and from what fiddleyard line they hale?(hail?)?? from. With plenty of pictures. What do we think?

Right, after some track removal and a new board inserted in the front section, one of the first things I did was add a curved point at the start (or end) of the Down fiddleyard. This corner is very tight but only the smaller trains traverse this section, it works. The next shots should show how much better the new down sidings flow. One of the advantages of this rearrangement was the addition of an Up line, which you can see just below the roll of paper towel. Even though I lost a Down train it’s much more suitable having the extra Up train. The gap in the middle has since been fixed. These photos are from the middle of 2023. On the extreme right from top to bottom we have; Up slow, Up Main, Down Main, Down Slow and a kick backing siding. A last look at the finished project… More tomorrow…

My dad said the same thing 🤣

On the weekend was the North Shore MRC’s exhibition at Forestville which I attend as part of the BRMA (British Railway Modellers of Australia). It was an excellent show, the best in my opinion over the last few years. It was also an excellent turn out for the BRMA; Six demonstrators on Saturday and Five for the Sunday. A few photos from the weekend: Here’s our stand at some point on Saturday. Clockwise from myself (far left) we have Charles Rudder, a photo bomber, Bruce Wright, Rodney Vanderwaals, Lee Styger and El Presidente John Nuttall. I took a few models with me, I like to show a mix of my capabilities (without sounding pompous). From L-R from the top: Three weathered Bachmann wagons and a suitable loco for them, a heavily weathered Bachmann O4. Various wagons: A whitemetal lowmac with a Langley Models horse drawn carriage roped down, a DS GNR Vent. Van, a Parkside fitted open followed by a Bachmann wagon, both tarped and roped properly and lastly the scratchbuilt Flat DV. Next we have a DS artic, very happy with how she turned out, then a Craftsman C12 I built, painted, lettered and weathered. Lastly, the loco that children and adults liked to touch, a Hornby A1 altered to one of two that received the ACFI water feed gear; 2576 ‘The White Knight’. Children I can understand, they don’t know better (but they should), one parent decided to give me a filthy look for raising my voice at her children than teach her children not to touch. But I had one adult in particular go straight up and pick it up…. was it that bad years ago at exhibitions of old or has it gotten worse with the little shits that are around these days. Enough of little shits and stupid adults, I spent the weekend getting some conflat wagons built. These are from, you guessed it, Jonathan Wealleans and Graeme King. I’ve had these a while now and really need to get them finished, so I decided to do the tedious work at a show….the punters see a soldering iron, brass etches and small white metal parks and immediately think you’re a wizard practicing a dark art, so you get a kind of satisfaction from explaining and demonstrating a very simple job. So we I worked on a conflat V and two conflats for the insulated meat containers, I forget the type. I took along my recently finished DS GNR Luggage Brake and three finished conflats and their respected containers to show the finished product. Lastly a boastful picture of myself to finish off the post.

It’s been some time since I last posted and if I am honest Little has been accomplished on the layout. However, some fiddleyard work was undertaken in the middle of last year. The work involved altering the Down sidings. When I planned the layout I tried to use as much of the old layout, Brighton Junction, as I could. I also, misjudged the tightness of the Southern fiddleyard entrance. Some of the heavier trains don’t like to traverse the tight corners and some express’ have a slight drop in speed. Apart from these limitations the layout runs and works impeccably and I am happy to live with the limitations listed above as they do not affect the overall viewership of the layout as a whole. But, the fiddleyard still needed some work to help with the viewing. I have attached the before shots of the fiddleyard, I’ll most likely spread the job across a few posts. So, here goes. Here is the old view of the Southern end of the layout. Tight corners, with two very tight and short kick back sidings. Sweeping around to bring us on the straight. Now in the centre of the layout, I added the crossover to be able to send a third line to the right, close to the control panel…. Lots of wasted space I thought! Here’s the edge of the board with the lift up section…well…up. Various wagons everywhere- I think I was getting ready to pack everything away. I didn’t take a photo of the lift up section- but that changed very little. I’ll post the next instalment later.

Then why does Geoff West and I always get yelled at during the running sessions?

Speaking of, I have this photo, also from Harrogate, showing the cock holding area. Sadly only the one cock in sight. Is this the reason I don’t get invited anymore? I was under the impression this sort of behaviour was encouraged.

Jonathan must be sleeping or he's shy... I have a very nice photo of his dick from the Harrogate show last year.

Looking back on those wagons I would have agree, if another tanker was to land in front of my brush I don’t think I’d go so heavily on the staining. Live and learn. As I said on the phone Tony, they are of no use to me as they have red solebars and I already have enough tankers in the correct livery. Although, I do fancy @jwealleans’ dick, so I may ask for the transfers so I can create a similar dick to his. I hope Jonathan posts a photo of his dick in reply to this so we aren’t banned. Anyway, they’re a gift, do with them what you wish.

Did you make some transfers up for the Flat T without telling me? 👀

I’m the opposite, I have dyslexia but with numbers/mathematics, dyscalculia I think it’s called…anyway, same thing, got told in school by my Maths teacher that I’m lazy for not learning my timestables and that I won’t amount to anything if I didn’t and also that I wouldn’t have a calculator with me on my person all the time. You can imagine how good I felt walking up to him last September, at a reunion, and showed the calculator on my iPhone…. I think the words “what the f**k’s that then” came out of my mouth 🤣. But I run a business with my family, I organise all the stock, the ordering, I look after the first stage of the accounts and invoices for my customers Australia wide…. Plus any grammatical or spelling mistakes were flogged out of me by Tony at Little Bytham the last 7 years. To summarise; you’re never alone.

The sister is getting afternoon tea sorted for tomorrow.

It’s got my thinking I might do the same, it looked much better in grey, just like my Sulphate wagon.

Something I’ve been working on lately are these Bachman wagons that I’ve converted into an LNER Dia. 2 open wagon. I noticed the similarities with a pair of these wagons, although a smart livery and it’s a shame to repaint them, they are unsuitable for my layout. The main differences with the real thing is the overall length, the Bachmann wagons are a few millimetres shorter and also the top plank isn’t wider but the same size as the others. The first thing I did was pulled the wagons apart, removed the brake levers and the thick outside V hangers. This is to make cleaning up and painting much easier. I forgot to take photos of the next part, but you get the idea… I stripped the lettering off with a scalpel and various fibreglass pencils. I then made up door bangers out of plastikard, glued them on and began painting the bogies. I also noticed that there were other Bachmann wagon that were exactly the same but in black with different companies, so I began stripping them down as well. So far there are five wagons on the bench, with a few more awaiting the same treatment. Three of the five will be tarped over, which is a good way to hide the smaller top plank, but the other two will be open/empty. However, the Bachmann wagons come with a steel floor, so out came the planked plastikard (my new favourite thing) and new floors were made up. I’ll hide the lazy grooves with some scrap timber. I then began painting the wagons, I’ve tried to paint them in all different colours to show how batches of paint often varied. I’ve already letters these, so another update shouldn’t be too far away. I have a running session in a couple of weeks so the workbench is on. It’s running, cleaning and testing at the moment. Something else that’s almost finished is the LNER Flat T, here she is pictured awaiting her load. There was a debate on its livery, being a steel underframe it should be black, but it just didn’t look right. So I’ve opted for some rule 1 perhaps? I’ve painted her black, with her headstock grey as it’s timber and painted the top of the solebar or the edge of the timber deck grey- the black really drowned out the entire model. The photo doesn’t really show it very clear, I’ll take another tomorrow.

Ahem…

Have I missed the "the hobbies dying off" conversation? I'd like to throw my two bobs worth in. I don't think the hobby will die off, it may dwindle down in numbers, but I think there will always be people wanting to build/run model trains. I think what we are seeing now is, unfortunately, the heyday of model railways dying off, with the people that remember steam or the good old days of diesels reaching the end of their lives. The railways do not have the variety anymore they once possessed, I think in 40 years time modern image modelling will be a lot different, not just British modern image but Australian, USA, etc and this will effect the market and peoples interest. I believe model railways hit their peak in regards to availability of kits, what the RTR boys have to offer and technology, in the last 10 years. We may have better RTR locos, stock or advanced technology in the future but the kit manufacture's of old will cease to exist, they are dwindling at the moment and it's only a few new comers that are willing to kit build. At the same time those new comers will be the ones that keep the hobby alive and thriving beyond the box openers. Don't get me wrong anyone can be in to trains or model railways but I think there is a difference between someone that's into model trains and someone that's a railway modeller. I'm positive that the likes of myself, Dylan Sanderson, Lewis Shields, Jack Pederson, young Jamie who's building Tuxford North (forgive me I don't know your last name) and even your friends grandson Jack, to name a few, will keep the hobby going in the future. Even if it is a smaller community, I think it will live on. Just some young Australian ramblings........

Some update’s will follow over the next few days on a couple of things I’ve been working on… First up is the DS GNR Compo-BK Third Dia. 198, it’s now been lettered and getting her first of a couple coats of clear. I’m really happy with how she’s turned out, I have another to build but I might make two six wheelers instead. On the workbench at the moment is a L&Y Family Saloon, this is a commission, my first kit building commission actually- this is almost finished. The owner will be painting and lettering it.

It’s all fun and games until you’re under the table trying to coax her out.