Northroader

With the depressed foreground, you certainly see a lot more of the layout, very good when there's not much of it anyway. Sort out your puddles before putting the track down, that's a new one! But damn good idea...

They take pictures looking along the railway so that the structures are prominent, you'd have to make a special trip to the overbridge to take that shot. Most of the stretch there is in a cutting or behind trees. Then witter on how the whole area is despoilt. Haven't they got anything else more important to worry about? Do any of them use the railway? It's in a commuter belt, with houses fetching high prices due to the mere existence of the railway. Self important w*****s, we've got far too "touchy feely"!

This line is being made as a small branch line terminal, for restricted space, with no particular place in mind. It's intended to form a setting for running short pregroup passenger and goods trains. Having worked in most scales, N, TT-3, HO, OO, I have now settled in O gauge for about the last twenty years. This is solely because the bulk of an O gauge model appeals to me. To make this comparison I only had matching continental wagons, so you're looking at continental O, 1/45, and HO, 1/87; rather than British O, 1/43, and OO, 1/76; but you get the idea. Modelling in O is more expensive, and having trawled through RMweb I greatly admire the OO layouts, which sometimes are done by adapting from a pool of used and RTR models. The chances of doing this in O are very limited. To keep costs down I do a lot of scratch building, the problem here being the time it takes. Another thing I like is pre-group modelling, generally the 1880 - 1900 period. Trains were compact, well balanced designs and attractive colour schemes. Going back to a time when kids read books, I'm showing my two favourite authors from those days, as they started my interest. E.L.Ahrons ran a series of articles in the Locomotive Magazine way back in the 20's about the late Victorian scene, which were later printed in book form. (As an aside if you can find bound copies of the magazine in a reference library it's a wonderful source of information, a lot of the outline drawings appear in it, for a start) Then there's C. Hamilton Ellis, who did several histories of specific lines, plus various evocative books and a lot of paintings. The main characteristic of the line I am making is that it is very small. I never have enjoyed layouts which sprawl, and I wanted to set a very tight limit on the train sizes running on the line. After experimenting with some train make ups, I decided on a train length of 24". Sorry, I'm old enough to be all feet and inches rather than metric! You'll see for this length it has to be small tank engines only, no tender engines, and either three goods vehicles, or two 4/ 6 wheel coaches. Next post I'll try to explain the design, or perhaps the lack of it.

Out of interest, strictly serious, sorreee, what sort of temperature are you getting up there these days?? I know space heater is loo,, but just wondered??

I would have thought Bristol PW as an objective makes sense as the main depot for the mainline sets, which will be sitting there bottled up, is in the triangle just to the west.

Do the old style wiring trains, of several coaches with flat roofs, still exist? I haven't been around when it's going on, but seeing kit parked in sidings suggests the rail access road type vehicle with cherry picker platforms gets into the act, although I'm still trying to work out what carries the cable drum. It makes sense in terms of getting in and out of worksites speedily, and I can't see H&S liking the idea of men clipping up wires above their heads as the train creeps forward, like wot used to happen.

On the joys of getting off a train and scoffing beans, sausages, and such, please don't overlook the cafe at Redruth station. It ain't just the dining, it's lingering in the hope that a certain divinity may pass through, sit at the corner table, and sip tea whilst in transit between London and her hacienda on the Lizard. I'VE SAT AT THAT TABLE, IN HER CHAIR!! And there was dried mud in the corner where grandad Duck put his rugby boots on the way home from the match! The simple moments in your life when you're part of history.

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Easter is just ten weeks off, Stubby, we're all awake at night worrying....

For adaptability, I like my layouts to have a detachable scenic back, which is just painted cartridge paper clipped to a hardboard support, which bolts to the rear of the b/board. (Curving of which I was rabbiting on about earlier) This means you can alter the "setting" of the place from Dowlais to Wentloog, frinstance, in two minutes. Then removable plug in buildings or bridges can round off the changes, generally in my case for different pregroup companies. My impression of your models is that you work in a great amount of terrific detail which isn't so quickly swapped, so going from scrap yard to coal merchant is more difficult.

More progress with the track work. The far end point is now fixed in, although control switch yet to do, and a track panel for the loop line made and installed. You may notice the dog eared copper clad sleeper ends at the front, the adjacent tracks are fed from feeders at opposite ends, with one being through a switched polarity point frog, so there's a risk of shorting if I'm not careful. With this track in place I can check the alignment of the platform line, now I've got the fourth and final point made. AAR track centre standard is 14 feet, I've knocked a foot off, but still well into the depot platform. You're looking at an 18" wide b/board here; Gordy, you're right, 21" would be better, spec. writers for the Delaware & Hudson layout please note! The trouble is my depot building is a fairly typical type with wide overhanging eaves, so another problem to solve. The dowels locate the base of the building. The curved strip by the new point is a flexi curve (W H Smiths) which I find useful for marking out. I can also finish fitting sleepers to the run out of the first point I made now I know where it's aimed at.

Where's the fjord going then?

Right you are, it's your line after all. Will await developments with interest.

Versines, droppers, who needs em when you can get her to help with the track?

Hope I'm not talking at cross purposes here. I haven't worked on third rail for a very long time, but the collector shoes were all steel blocks, they had to be to withstand the impact shocks and wear. They were suspended on links which allowed some "dangle", and bonded with thick flexible copper braid straps. It was interesting to see the amount of staining around the third rail area shown in your pictures, presumably due to wear. The collector tanks referred to are for another purpose entirely, retaining the toilet effluent after it is flushed. All modern stock has this feature, badly needed. Tanks are pumped out at the depots. More recently I worked at a depot servicing HST sets, which were about the last trains to be built not having this. If a toilet is flushed at speed, the contents hit the track and splatter everywhere with a fine spray, so that the undersides of the set had an even coating of you know what, with tiny scraps of toilet paper stuck in it. Every night in a depot a fair few disc brake pads need changing, and the maintenance staff were working in these conditions, and still are. We could spray the working area with nice smelling disinfectant, but it still ain't the same. Sorry to blunder into your thread with the joys of depot servicing, so could I say how taken I am with the quality of your modelling. At the present time your reports on the sea wall problem is really useful, hopefully it's not in the same league as Dawlish.

This a plot with twists and turns like those Scandinavian TV crime plays that are so popular over here. Sarah Lund not your missus? Very nice shots around the goods depot, really good. Yes, you can make a goods wagon disappear, we did it in a certain wagon shop to a traffic bogie bolster, when the per way people had a badly damaged crane match truck. Much easier pre TOPS days!

Do you need quite so many sidings? 1. Short bay line maybe and room for station building at back. 2. Behind that space for semi-flat buildings, dobbins with carts and carriages, in the space you've gained. 3. Just a quayside siding in front. 4. Splitting into two sidings front and back takes up most of their length with a point. 5. Having so many tracks converging into the sector table will make treatment of the exit "bridge" or whatever difficult. 6. Sector table or cassettes? (I'm a cassette fan, me)

Taking the Stationmasters report on (post 1251) I should think juicing up Reading to Didcot looks do-able by Autumn. There has been quite a lot of heavy ironmongery appeared just in the last month on this stretch. The main substation at Foxhall, on Didcot power station and the National Grids doorstep, looks as if all the bits are in place, although there's no plastic eagle owl atop as the third rail folks like. Masts and cross-pieces quickly fizzle out to the West of here. I'd say well over half of the base tubes are in as far as Challow, using the same "dot and carry one" techniques we've enjoyed watching happen from Reading. Some around Uffington, then there's another cluster past Shrivenham to the Oxford road bridge. It's hard to tell how the Grove/ Wantage Road bridge is shaping, something must have happened in the last month, but quite what I couldn't say. Here in the fair city of Bassett we're looking forward to bridge works starting soon. The Network Rail official site gives a completion date of March 2017! Tell me I'm just a pessimistic old sod.

Really pleased to see a new post from you, it all sounded so black in November. It seems there's still a load of stuff to do, but glad to see you're going forward. Please keep us posted, and good luck with 2016.

"May the Light of the Lord shine right up your Tunnel"

Looks great, more room behind now with a very modellable station building. I've got to admit no knowledge of Newnham, (hangs head in shame) that's a very good link. You're off to a very promising start. Good luck!

This is worse than the Christmas quiz. You haven't left anything for room either side, is it going up on a viaduct? No kickback into sidings in front of the fiddle/ sector table?? Yet there's space for something??? Then there's the ?traverser at the far end.. All very mystifying. I promise to stay awake. Hang on! It isn't a small version of Kingswear, is it? With a quayside at the front.

Ouch!

Wakes up, and starts to take notice.....