Harlequin

It's probably a good idea to have some storage, workshop space and tea-making facilities(!) on the same floor as the layout so that you don't always have to go downstairs and back up again when you need such things...

Hey, it just occurred to me that this situation is a bit like that TV programme, "Your House Made Perfect", where the homeowners are shown concepts for re-doing their house using Virtual Reality headsets. The competing concepts are practical and radical in varying degrees and you can never predict which the homeowners will choose. (I usually like the radical ideas from the cool hippy architect, even though they can be a bit bonkers sometimes.)

It's a good book that collects information together in a very accessible form, including new material (the author's personal experience of many of the classes) and notes about which are preserved where. The RCTS publications are listed in the Bibliography (as Clearwater pointed out to me.)

My first idea is to use the space to do something really panoramic using two of the walls and one of the "lobes" of the room. The other "lobe" would be devoted to all the support facilities, storage, reversing, workbench, kitchenette (what a lovely word...), boxes full of stuff, etc. Like James I too suggest bridging the stairwell with simple double track (boxed in, close to the wall) so that trains can simply run around the room without reversing and/or get back to storage without having to appear on scene again. I also suggest not fixing the main scenic area to the walls but having it freestanding with a usable access space behind, maybe 768mm wide. This would do a lot of good things: Access from both sides allows the scenic baseboards to be wider than most people can manage. (You have the room so why not use it?) Moves the layout clear of the mansard slopes. Backscene can hang from ceiling (cloth or vinyl) some distance behind the scenic baseboards allowing clever lighting and thus avoiding the problem of shadows of scenic elements being cast on the background. Vastly increases the photographic potential. (I like some of the suggestions above about modular design and movable reversing loops as the layout expands, BTW.)

Hi Neal, The book that Clearwater and I were referring to is, "Great Western Moguls & Prairies" by David Maidment, published by Pen & Sword.

My brand new Lode Star has a lump in it's motion (cue Mr Williams). Every few revolutions of the drivers it goes "clunk clunk", the sound of the wheels bashing the track. I've stripped it down and eliminated everything but the last two gears in the gear train* - the one on the driver axle and the one above it. I've examined the teeth on both and I can't see any that look different from any others. There are no bits of moulding scarf on the gears, which is what I was half expecting to find. When I move the chassis by hand with the motor disengaged from the gear train I can feel it jumping up at regular places as if riding over a lump on the track. The track is fine and just to make sure I've slid the chassis to another area of track where the same "lump" can still be felt in the same positions. So my only conclusion is that both those gears are very slightly off-centre on their axles and when the off-centres line up the driver axle is pushed away (it can move because the plastic keeper plate can flex). What do you think? Is that a reasonable diagnosis? Is this a known problem? Can you suggest a fix to get it to run smoothly? (* I think I've eliminated everything but the gears.)

It's plan No. 43, "Electric Heaven", from the Peco "Compendium of Model Railway Track Plans". It is OO. Size is 15ft 9in by 9ft 6in overall with a double-track circuit of the entire room and the part shown here is the high level terminus which sits 4 inches above a large hidden fiddle yard... The idea is it can cope with Southern Region EMU sets ranging from 2 to 10 cars.

Yes, Longdown fits for Photo 12. On this page, search for Longdown (it's near the bottom): http://www.cornwallrailwaysociety.org.uk/teign-valley-branch.html You will see a photo of Longdown Signal Box taken from the opposite angle. The building and the surrounding features seem to match up.

Very interesting... It certainly makes a change from the usual fare on here! Here's a plan with a 305mm grid to allow for comparison with other plans. (The space is roughly 36ft square for those who still think in Imperial.) (Scaled up from 4mm to actual size that would be roughly 838m / 915 yards square.) Do the stairs rise towards the centre of the space or towards one of the walls? Do the mansard roof slopes mean you can't stand upright near the walls in places? Would they impose restrictions on the height of the baseboards or height of backscenes anywhere? This space is going to take a lot of time, effort and money to fill! Will you be working on it alone or will you get helpers/workers in?

Just for the record, there were two very brief shots of a broad gauge loco (an Iron Duke?) in the film, The Man Who Invented Christmas. The scenes involve Charles Dickens' parents traveling to or from Devon and the loco is only seen standing simmering in the station. It seems like this production did it's research and used an appropriate period loco - presumably generated by CGI.

Photo 7, Moretonhampstead: Pre-1950(ish) because the glazing in the train shed roof has not yet been covered up and is allowing light through.

Do you remember little Jimmy Scants? I think he was in the class below you and his knees were always grazed so everyone called him "Scabby" Scants. He squeezed under the fence on the same day and he brought his daddy's Agfa 44. Even though the train was moving quite fast he managed to get this:

It's your baby but turning the single slip round is a very simple change to make at this stage and it would make your station identifiably S&C, make the operations more authentic and avoid lots of tedious justification when you show people your layout in years to come.

The crossover from the far track into the yard incorporating a trailing slip to the near track is characteristic of MR practice. Goods trains would always set back into the yard, from either direction. The double slip in the yard itself is fine - it's just that they avoided facing points in running lines wherever possible.

These lovely photos suggest a couple of things you could try, Chris...: 1. Mirror at the back of the canal bridge to increase the apparent depth. 2. A carefully shrouded and dimmed orange LED casting a wisp of sunset light across the (imaginary) fields onto the abutment wall.

This photo and the following show pep pipes dangling from Pannier footplates in different ways: https://rcts.zenfolio.com/steam-gwr/5700-class-0-6-0pt/hB934CD29#hb934f906 https://rcts.zenfolio.com/steam-gwr/5700-class-0-6-0pt/hB934CD29#hb934f9a5 But the majority of photos of working locos don't show them at all. I wonder if it was only when they leaked that they needed to dangle outside the cab?

Youchoos can usually be relied upon: https://www.youchoos.co.uk/Index-Shop.php?L1=Project&Item=GWR94XX (Recording of 9466)

How are you controlling it? DC or DCC? Sounds a bit like a DCC feedback problem because of the interference suppression components...

The fall plate is movable on the new Lode Star, as advertised. It's just very stiff - which you could say is a good thing.

Ideally you want the sound project to be based on a recording of the relevant class of pannier tank but if you can’t get one then another pannier would probably be the closest match and very few people would be able to tell the difference. Then there’s the question of sound quality. The project that sounds the best might not be the “correct” pannier sound for the model - and that’s a subjective judgement only you can make.

Merry Christmas and a Great Western New Year! (It's an old line but a good one... ) Thanks for letting us visit your beautiful little world, Kevin.

Here's Caerphilly Castle's 3500 gallon tender at Steam in June 2019: And look what happens underneath:

Merry Christmas and a Great Western New Year!

It's a lovely concept but the position of the trans-shipment shed is a worry... Imagine you are a photographer of the period, setting up your huge mahogany camera on it's tripod and about to insert a glass plate. If your particular interest was trans-shipment sheds you might compose the scene like that. However, if you were interested in the railway, the canal, the people going about their business or the wider yard scene I think you would move the camera so that the trans-shipment shed did not dominate the centre of the photo. How about replacing the corrugated depot with the trans-shipment shed? That would open up the scene to make all the other elements more visible, would give the scene a more homogeneous palette of materials and the more solid trans-shipment shed would be a better view blocker to hide the join between the model and the backscene on the left. (That assumes that the trans-shipment shed would become railway oriented.) Or maybe just remove the trans-shipment shed leaving the dock wall in place? Maybe put a smaller structure in the foreground of the scene (not in the middle) for interest and to partially obscure railway movements - something made of corrugated iron? (P.S. Is the loading bay siding long enough for 5 wagons?)