Pete Thorpe

Here are some more pics of E.A.Hellmuth's distribution depot in Hercules Road. The model is a combination of guesstimation from the original photos and limited space at the front of the layout so the photos don't align with the originals as well as the two above.

During the 1969-1984 period when Caroline was in Blue/Grey, did she work with just SR EMUs and locos with push/pull equipment? I was toying with the idea of running a B/G one in the West Country with a Class 22 or Class 25 circa 1970-72, but I'm guessing that this would be highly unlikely or even possible.

What he said...

What's an Awe ramp?

That would explain why I had trouble pinpointing whereabouts at Reading it was; incorrect caption on the website.

My mistake, 59282 was the trailer buffet in those sets. 50741+50688, 50738+59299+50693, 50739+50695, 51573+59296+51582, 51574+51583, 51579+51588 were loaned to Reading in the 1960s for short periods. Class 120 set 503 (presumably 51588 + 51579) at Reading Sept 1968

https://www.railcar.co.uk/data/vehicle/ will give a history of the required vehicle including dates of depot allocations, and Reading had sets L571, L426, L592 and maybe others allocated there. I intend building one of these units in N, specifically one of the last batch with 4-character headcode panels and in blue with small yellow warning panels, allocated to Laira over the period 1968-1971, and https://www.railcar.co.uk/type/class-120/ has been an invaluable mine of information, enabling me to pinpoint which vehicles meet all these requirements. Some nice detail photos of the inner ends Jamiel, and thanks for the heads-up on curtains; I'd forgotten about them! Pete

Hi Tim, I'm down the club twice a week now working on Camford Junction on Mondays and the bridge layout on Thursdays, though I was repairing the bridge this evening...

Ian Morgan has set up pages for both Basingstoke Bodgers' layouts, and on the Brunel one he explains our delay as follows "The reason we were not able to start laying track as early as the judges would have liked was that a considerable amount of carpentry work was required first. The central board was lowered about 4 inches to form the basis of the river that the bridges would cross. Then, the raised level for the N gauge loop had to be constructed." The Maidenhead Bridge also needed building before we could consider laying the track let alone running trains! Callum, sorry for the mini hijack of your thread.

One of the commonest comments I hear at exhibitions is "I couldn't do/make that" to which my response is "Why, what happened when you tried?" Of course, they often haven't tried but when I explain how I've built something or got a certain effect the reaction is usually "Oh, it's as easy as that?", which I think is great because they will now go away and hopefully have a go themselves with a knowledge they didn't have before, and the confidence to have a go at other aspects of the hobby.

It's actually only 50% of the length it should be, not sure about the height of the structure but it will be the correct scale 100ft above the river. I can't claim all the credit for creating the new layout as Rob has done a sterling job using his carpentry skills to adapt the layout baseboards, and I hope to get some assistance from some of the other team members with other aspects of the build.

I'm sure if we ask nicely he'd let us borrow his sleigh and a slack handful of reindeer for the weekend.

I think it may have been mentioned earlier but we felt we were more in competition with the clock than the other teams, shown by the fact that we helped each other out where we could and from what I've read on here that happened in the other heats too.

Why not? We built two layouts, one of which (our heat winning layout) will be on Peco's stand, and the other...

Robin did say in the narrative when presenting the layout that it was to give the impression the trains were farther away in the distance.