Craig Watson

Done, pretty pleased with this one!

Decals arrived today, replacement loksound select fitted too. It now has a coat of varnish too, another coat tomorrow then reassemble before Ayr exhibition at the weekend?

I managed to pick up a Kato Amtrak P42 a few weeks ago with a faulty sound decoder, I had been on the lookout for one for a while. The plan was to create one of the VIA Rail vinyl wrap P42's that have been liveried for the Canada 150 celebrations, I ordered decals for it a while ago when ordering a batch of other decals from Highball Graphics. Unfortunately on checking the decals today I noticed that I'd ordered N gauge ones in error so an order has been placed today for the proper HO ones!! Anyway, I stripped the loco down and made a start, the roof colour isn't correct but it'll be weathered down anyway, the vinyl wraps on the real things don't cover the roofs! The loco also has a new sound decoder on order, my hope is that it'll be fully finished for West Pickering's appearance at the Ayr exhibition in a few weeks time. The loco being stripped down, the kato models come apart really easily. The stripped bodyshell in primer. Masking the VIA logo, the blue roof had already been done and masked off before the silver was done. Some progress pics. Varnished and windows refitted temporarily while waiting on the decals and sound decoder. I'll post more when the decals are on! Cheers Craig

In addition to James sporting his new t-shirt above he's also going to be busy with his own layout "Heavy Traffic", Steve Grantham's micro layout creation from many years ago which James now looks after and exhibits! See you all there!

Thanks guys, Yes, it was sprayed, the humbrol dust wash is ready to spray from the jar, a few light coats is really effective, I also used it on the GTW GP38 below along with some rust weathering powders with some pretty good results. I used this pic for reference. Craig

Posting this here so it doesn't get lost in the 10 or so pages of my layout thread! I recently underwent an operation to remove my gallbladder, the two weeks recovery since has seen a few projects completed to aid my recuperation! When Conrail was bought over and split between CSX and Norfolk Southern in 1999 GE C40-8W locomotive 6089 was transferred to CSX, when transferred the loco was quickly renumbered to 7316 but was not immediately repainted into CSX livery, in the end it was not repainted into CSX until 2009 running in patched Conrail livery until then, although it picked up a few odd CSX coloured panels over the years during maintenance etc. I picked up an Atlas sound fitted model of 6089 at the Perth exhibition last year, at £95 it was a no brainer and a quick bit of research showed as above that it had kept its livery until 2009. A few weeks ago I ordered a Microscale decal pack which covered the CSX patched units and started work on the model, the first thing that was apparent was the real loco's paint was really faded, I was able to replicate this by lightly spraying the loco with Humbrol dust wash, the weathering and decals were applied then covered with a few coats of satin varnish. It joins the West Pickering fleet as one of a handful of US locos which appear in the area from time to time. 6089 straight out of the box as bought. Wheels removed for weathering and microscale patch applied. Humbrol dust wash, darker CSX A/C unit done and weathering applied. Chassis fitted and weathered to match, grey replacement CSX panel can be seen too. New identity! In traffic on West Pickering.

My son bought the Scotrail 68006 at Model Rail Scotland after clearing out a lot of his older stock last weekend, took it out to the garage last night to give it a try and as soon as it was placed on the layout there was a dead short! Took the blanking plug off and placed it back on the track and all was ok, tried another blanking plug and it ran fine as loco 0, then tried a Bachmann 21 pin decoder and all was fine again so thankfully it looks like it was only the original blanking plug that was the problem! Have to say its a cracking model, James is now clearing out more of his older stuff for sound and some mk2's!!

The location of the last pic hasn't changed much, the lay by is where myself and donny4472 accessed the tunnels when we walked them a few years ago. Here it is on google maps. Cheers Craig

Looking good, I've got two ordered! (1x BC & 1x CN).

Enjoy the show guys, had hoped to make it down but will have to content myself like Paul above by playing with the real things! Maybe next year!! Craig

This dropped into my inbox with the latest newsletter. I'll definitely be ordering one or two for West Pickering! http://rapidotrains.com/ho-dash-8-40cm/ "Wife approved pricing" Thank you Jason & Co! Cheers Craig

Followed this thread with interest for a while, myself and Donny4472 walked the tunnels at Glenfarg a few years ago. I was catching up tonight in between working on buildings for my HO layout getting it ready for Glasgow and remembered I have these diagrams in my collection which were saved from a skip in HQ by a colleague many moons ago, I think they are of relevance to the thread! I dug them out tonight and grabbed a few quick pics of the relevant sections. Hope they are of interest! Craig

Highly recommended, placed an order for some HO stock on Sunday night, arrived first thing today (Tuesday) Cheers Craig

Haha, managed to resist, still just under two weeks to go though so who knows!!

I noticed a few grade crossings on the Lakeshore East line last week heading into the city, on having a quick look on Google maps there are eight between Eglinton and the Pickering side of Rouge beach. Saw the LRC loco in the flesh today in George's trains, I've bought 4 of the coaches since coming out here last week but the loco is out of my timeframe!! Craig

The coach at Camden can also be seen on streetview, it's pretty much the same view I have in my pic. Cheers Craig

I have family who live in Narellan and I've stayed there a few times, when we were there over Christmas and new year there was a coach on the old station site at Camden and you can trace parts of the trackbed between Narellan and Camden as well as a tiny bit near Campbelltown, I have a pic of the coach somewhere. I used to drive down Narellan road most days to get the train at either Macarthur or Campbelltown into the city. Cheers Craig

Glad it arrived safely, it looks good on the layout! Cheers Craig

Both depots of the Falkirk tramway system still exist, the depots are only a few hundred yards apart on Larbert Road between Camelon and Larbert, the original depot is part of the Larbert depot of First bus, and the later depot is now an auto electricians, as the system closed in the mid 30's pictures of the depots in use are pretty rare but a search on google comes up with a link to this pic of the one which is now the auto electrician, http://collections.falkirk.gov.uk/search.do;jsessionid=C4492519ACF06FD92937C94E48745EAD?id=178494&db=object&view=detail And a link to this pic which shows the original depot which is now part of the bus depot under construction, http://www.scran.ac.uk/database/record.php?usi=000-000-492-755-C Here are pics of the depots from google streetview as they exist today. Some information on the system can be found at http://www.falkirklocalhistorysociety.co.uk/home/index.php?id=57 Cheers Craig

The club gave me all the buildings they had (Station, Goods Shed and Canal warehouse), there were no backscenes either. I did think myself that the signal box was a bit overscale, I will probably look at replacing it at some point. Cheers Craig