Dunalastair

"Speed restrictions are in place on the West Highland Line until 09:00 on Sunday due to the forecast, Network Rail Scotland said." https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-67846863 But hopefully conditions are better back in the eighties, at least once the plastering is complete. I seem to remember getting plastered (well, tiddly) in Fort William after running a reasonable time in the Ben Nevis Race about then. I don't remember much about the train ride home to Edinburgh ... Keep up the good work.

Did somebody say ice? Personally, I prefer my whisky without, but I look forward to seeing your version.

Exceptions that prove rules. There are still a few maverick sites in the UK using gas street lighting even today. This is Cambridge, where there are quite a few, and I seem to remember some in London - generally on private roads. https://www.hiddencambridge.uk/ And when it comes to internal lighting, I have stayed in mountaineering club huts in the UK with no electric but bottled gas for cooking - and lighting. You have to be ever so careful not to damage the mantles when lighting the gas.

I trust that there have been no Storm Gerrit style landslides on the unconsolidated landscaping or fallen trees on the completed sections ... though I don't think we named storms in the 1980s - we just got on with it.

As one who tends to add too much detail, I was wondering how many cliches you are managing to avoid. The drowned slate wagon is clearly one. Too many animals / birds might be another. I am enjoying the 'less is more' ethos / atmosphere ...

Does this count? Model was primarily NG (the so-called Winchburgh electric railway, a shale line in West Lothian) but I wanted a SG light loco to sit on the short bridge on the SG line put in to link the E&G to the Forth Bridge. A Hornby CR pug with a repaint, handrails and a wooden 'tender' provided an approximation to an NBR 'G Class', as licensed by Neilson. The originals lasted into BR service. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBR_G_Class

So I continued and roughly assembled the diorama components. As a reminder, scale is 1:200 and prototype gauge is 18" so 2.25mm on the model.

Nominally HO, but perhaps a little big? https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/313237623430?chn=ps&_ul=GB&_trkparms=ispr%3D1&amdata=enc%3A1Pu3tmjLcTZWPzoSXxJKOiA60&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-166974-033325-9&mkcid=2&mkscid=101&itemid=313237623430&targetid=2220941621651&device=c&mktype=pla&googleloc=9044886&poi=&campaignid=20825725383&mkgroupid=157123130798&rlsatarget=pla-2220941621651&abcId=9350308&merchantid=7209534&gclid=Cj0KCQiA7aSsBhCiARIsALFvovx7txIYIY2BoUArF7XcGLU9r5eMnnUquFzWu4J8OV-nBXWAn7QfoNMaArEMEALw_wcB Other similar lamps on ebay, sometimes lower cost with free postage. But often from China - hopefully by air given the fluid situation in the Red Sea,

Yes, this is the day for over-loaded dinner plates, even if the circle is usually around the Christmas Tree, but the small radius Rokuhan 180 degree curves did allow me to build a trial N6.5 layout on a mantlepiece (the return track loops under the hillside) ... ... and later to build a fantasy layout with a serpentine track layout running through a subterranean cavern (Walking on Glass). I agree that super-small radius curves are not for every layout, but that they work shows that reduced radius need not be an insuperabale issue, especially with appropriate bogie stock. After all, if it is good enough for the prototype ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_railway_curve_radius

For 6.5mm gauge, trains of 'shorty' bogie stock will happily go around 45mm radius curves without checkrails, but four wheel stock of a prototype outline will bind... The equivalent for 16.5mm gauge would be about 115mm or 4.5" so tight radii are possible with the right rolling stock.

Worth a look at previous discussions, perhaps? Though generally approached from a cosmetic rather than practical angle. e.g. https://www.rmweb.co.uk/forums/topic/142307-check-rails-on-curves/ I would have thought that bending / tapering the checkrail at the ends (as on points) might help.

If weight is the limit, then dense foam based boards might be better for standalone boards (and help avoid ricked backs), though edges (or at least corners) might need protection. A downside is that power feed droppers can be more difficult to arrange - grooves in the surface might work better. I'm not sure about joining multiple foam-based boards - any suggestions?

That would make a change! I seem to remember a Railway Modeller plan of the modernistic 1954 station back in the ?1970s https://www.railmagazine.com/news/network/2023/03/22/feature-reversing-beeching-portishead-prepares

https://www.flickr.com/photos/flash_homer/8619468329 River Garry near Struan

Looks good. Probably an artefact of the perspective, but are those diagonal struts within the standard loading gauge? Or is this an operating ploy to limit the locos used, perhaps.

Latest version of render, scale now increased to 1:200, with 'rails' at 2.25mm gauge. I have now successfully printed the design for the headgear. Do I continue with this guesstimate of the building layout or wait and see if any more information turns up? Some more staring at available images suggests that the orientation of the headgear is probably right, but I'm still not clear about the exact position. And should I model it 'as operating' or after closure, with the yard cluttered with equipment brought up from the galleries?

I plead guilty m'lud when it comes to my N gauge model of 63B around 1970. In mitigation, I have a number of downloaded photos of the area around the turntable at The Fort which show motor vehicles, and I have tried to match to those - see for example https://www.railscot.co.uk/img/4/48/. Also https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/145335090853?hash=item21d6a57ea5:g:F9kAAOSwCY5dDDrB&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAAA4BTfpbKlxXCXQ8FDiIO7OdKhK5MNzl5PFR%2Fsr8v3oVrOzQA4VohLX1IDDu7UEripG4MEkYs%2F8IoVuyh7xTm1hgnpMmHMn56p%2BFj%2BnlRrIINTGRamdw58qhGCv5H2gZu%2BCZGv1XzpNDNgVBgJSS3AHQiyd8YtiYC4A6RlhgL%2Foo1VPRlTJL%2BH8dbwNhp67ge4vQziABZwa2G4C%2Bxr5q%2BEKFhtzD0yhXwbxQNogSTzCd6b7ItZhOV5cmt44djLxigZwdjQ5nNBg9l361hCkCEvWstyRfhyYuOGXr6zVWe8iRWt|tkp%3ABk9SR-SPz4mRYw Perhaps this is the exception that proves the rule? At the original Fort William facility, the goods yard was next to the shed (built on the site of the original Hanoverian fort) so it would presumably be straightforward to shunt wagons across as needed and push them up the bank.

Sadly seems to be true for RTR (an apparent gap in the market), but Recreation21 prints a 168mm turntable. 42' or the answer to life, the universe and everything ... provided you only want to run smaller tank engines. https://www.shapeways.com/product/JN2EAV4MA/t-165-small-turntable-168d-100-wood-1a?key=3356a4467f1c418dcaf49373f3ebd96f Or for a kit try e.g. https://greenwoodmodelrailwayproducts.co.uk/shop/turntables/oo-turntable/#:~:text=Sizes available 70%2C 65%2C 60,Built with Full Indexing Motor. or http://londonroadmodels.com/various_pages/arch_kits.php See also https://www.rmweb.co.uk/forums/topic/149320-42-ft-pre-grouping-turntable-details/

I remember going to Wateringbury by train from Scotland for a couple of summers in the early eighties, driving tractors on a hop farm ... I don't think that those brick terraces would fit especially well with that part of Kent but good luck with your build. As suggested, it can be useful to have a geographical area in mind, to help buildings work together to make a more convincing scene.

There was indeed some try-and-see, but this is how the Stroud gasworks coal tipping dock turned out. And a pigeon's eye view, showing the wagon turntable and more detail of the hydraulic ram. The white boards have obscured the untidy room background, but the overhead light has thrown a shadow. This diorama is much too big to fit in my little photobooth. Indeed I'm not at all sure where I am going to find space for it now!

Or a little earlier - noted as a standby loco as late as 1987 - one of Gordon Edgar's useful images - hope OK to link this here from the original website. https://preservedbritishsteamlocomotives.com/peckett-sons-works-no-2027-bnfl-no-1-0-4-0st/

I'm not sure that Percy Emerson Culverhouse was any more on the right lines. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Central_railway_station Though I used to live in Truro and used that station, the early railways' classical-style termini were for me in better architectural taste (even if few survive), and even recent developments like KX seem to work well. But I am enjoying seeing this model build.

https://charltonchampion.co.uk/2017/11/28/charlton-lane-level-crossing-whats-happened-to-the-footbridge/

I have not used flock for a while, but with static grass, I found that simply painting cheap Poundland PVA glue onto a 45 degree surface with a brush I was able to get reasonable coverage using my flykiller / sieve applicator. Any surplus which ended up at the foot of the bank after the glue had dried was hoovered up with a keyboard vacuum cleaner for re-use. An example : That said, looking back through more recent diorama photos, I seem to have gone more over to hanging basket liner, at least for 1:76 and larger scales.

Did Bembridge and Ventnor across the Solent not both have a similar arrangement, albeit with smaller turntables?