Lacathedrale

just some budget LaisDCC decoders - at £15 a pop it's not going to break the bank. The seller (blw technologies?) on eBay seem to be reasonable when I mentioned there was a problem with one. Right now the E2 is on the workbench getting heat-shrink tubing over the joins and a stayalive battery pack. Fingers and toes crossed!

yes please, doc!

Lovely picture! Quick play around and I managed to get Boxhill readdressed but both it and 643 are still a bit i Jerky. I think the track needs a good (first!) clean: for the sake of comparison the E4 is perfect, I think it’s the longer wheelbase: the e2 continues to misbehave, but I think it’s some kind of intermittent short so I’m going to get it apart and insulated with heat shrink.

Yes, it’s a lovely site, but it only really covers the post deconstruction of the layout doesn’t it?

Today's playtime went a little well - both Boxhill and 643 are running as expected, but bizarrely I cannot change the loco address of Boxhill from the default. Sending the commands, the loco reponds with the little motor blips, but then proceeds to ignore it. Bloody DCC! On that note, ex-No.638 "Millwall" has arrived and by complete chance I already had a DCC chip for it in my stash - the last thereof - which was compatible. Clearly, it's in the process of being repainted from the dirty IEG it'd have worn as a pumping engine at Three Bridges into the resplendent lined black livery as "Loco Department" for duties at Brighton Works, and some comedian has painted something profane and inscrutable on the bunker - but it does move nicely!

Re-reading the Narrow Gauge Adventure, what happened between that book and the final deconstruction in 1987? I understand that Mr. Hancock left his Edinburgh tenement flat to live with his mother in a bungalow, had an embryonic 7mm version and a garden railway and then moved into a care home before departing from us - but presumably there was something between the book's publication in 1975 and the end?

Based on the advice in the general discussion thread, I decided to grab the kit built precursor-class 4-4-0 to pull the sunny south special - and after I had pulled the trigger, did I realise that it would need to be stripped and repainted, and potentially some difficulty in fitting a DCC decoder. While that is not beyond my ability it is likely to add to the inertia rather than to help alleviate it, so I also purchased a 2-4-0 improved precedent-class, Lucknow. This is almost certainly too old and underpowered to pull the real train, but for my five coach reduced service it is both prototypically plausible and will allow me to run that service immediately rather than sequestering the LNWR items in a cupboard until the precursor is finished. I should also add that the coaches are in a pretty ropey state and will need to go through the paint shop at least - but they are usable in their current state and the cost was less than buying the kits unbuilt.

Well, I think that pretty much decides it then! Thank you!

I posted in my layout thread but I appreciate that 25+ pages of waffle is a lot for people to wade through and I do have a very specific question: for the LNWR's Sunny South Special circa 1906-1912 would an LNWR Improved Precedent be appropriate motive power, or realistically should it be something like a Precursor or Prince of Wales? (I am aware that for my south coast layout the train would be pulled by LBSCR motive power but I'm willing to fudge things a bit on that count)

@Caley Jim I think the Terriers simply have dirty wheels, but the E2 has gone from temperamental to uncontrollable. I've got a Zen DCC decoder in there that I've used in the past, so I can only thing it's got some dodgy config on it but setting CV8 to 8 isn't working, not can I re-address it. More fiddling required (of exactly the kind I wanted to avoid!) I managed to find a rake of the Ratio LNWR corridor coaches which are for me enough for a representation of a rake for the Sunny South Special. Though I'm fully aware that the train's motive power was swapped at Kensington to LBSCR, I think it would be neat to run an LNWR loco into the layout for some variety. I don't know enough about the Sunny South Special to know if the new(ish) LNWR Improved Precedent would be appropriate (or at least plausible)? I get the impression I'll have to either find or build a kit for a Whale Precursor or even a Prince of Wales? EDIT: I've also updated the thread title to represent the current working name for the layout of Brighton Trafalgar - I'm not sure it'll stick, but I "ET" just confuses me with Eastwood Town.

I have harvested all the information we've discussed and proposed for the layout's locomotives here: https://interlocking.blog/brighton-trafalgar-lbscr/locomotives/ The most significant is (with lots of help from @Nick Holliday) establishing plausible actual locomotives for the layout for the models I have in my possession. And on that note, I've managed to get chips in my other three locos. Unfortunately, this trio are far more problematic than the E4 or Atlantics: Both Terriers are very jerky runners. I had hoped the even power on DCC would improve that from DC, but it looks like I'm also going to need to fit stayalives in them. The E2 has had the tank sides rubbed down and the start of the weathering removal process, but is probably the least consistent runner of any of them - it's almost as if the motor armature is getting stuck, but it could be another inconsistent pickup with the rigid chassis?

😅 to be fair, I'm asking when you will be able to announce the release date, not the actual date itself.

News soon, or model soon? I appreciate you can’t make an off the cuff announcement of course, but do you know when you can?

I have updated my blog (https://www.interlocking.blog/) with a huge amount of consolidated information from this thread and my workbench. I'll still be using this thread for less formal updates though, so if you don't care to go outside RMweb that's no problem. While digging around for the loco info for the blog I went down a Terrier rabbit-hole and ended up swiping a black livereid Hornby A1 for eventual goods lined-black livery (well, technically Loco Dept. but don't tell anyone)

Last update in July - is there any news on this?

@Mikkel it's just a placeholder for now - https://www.interlocking.blog/ Yes, Terry - you've definitely forgotten something...

Hi MIkkel, yes I did - Slajanok has loads of road-rail transport STL's: https://www.printables.com/@Slanjonok - They are ostensibly for 1:148 but scale up just fine. I am sticking with Andrew Stadden for my figures, but for fairly mundane objects and loads that creator's got it covered - lots of GWR stuff there! Well I know from my own experience when I see a 20+ page thread it puts me way off. I'll give it some thought, as I have a blog off-forum that it would also make sense to publish more concise updates there too so refactoring would not be wasted effort by any means. Three down, three to go!

well, in my defence, the intention was to maintain a level of Inertia - but I can see the downsides too. I’ve been going back and finishing up lots of old projects over the last couple of weeks rather than starting new afresh - not just in model railways, but with my wargaming and DIY as well.. So far, the change and tack has been a good one. As an aside, I feel that this thread deserves re-factoring and putting into a couple of blog entries to summarise the work and then closing off, because the ratio of progress to pages is pretty ridiculous!!! EDIT: I appreciate the irony of another no-content post in this one!

Shocking how a little bit more paint can transform a wagon: It'll need a wash and the inside dirtied up quite a bit but I'm fairly pleased given this was my first ever filament print. I should probably attempt a faded 'LMS' and a BR wagon patch, shouldn't I?

@St Enodoc you're right. One of the things I reckon I've identified is that I have a habit of rolling forward work i.e. as soon as one thing is delayed waiting for parts, delivery, paint to dry then I spin up the next piece of work in parallel - and end up with myself in a tangle with so many simultaneous bits on the go. First things first is to chip the locos - in order to faciliate that I've stuck a piece of flex and roadbed to a plank of wood so I can use it to test the stock in my office instead of the garage. I could use that same plank to test the magnet install if neccesary, but let's worry about that another day. Here's the bay platform, showing a horse cart on the 'road' surface and the loading bank behind. I have used different bits of hardboard and foamcore to yield a slightly higher unloading bay then the rest of the platforms, and I think it looks nice. The van behind is still equipped with P4 wheels and re-wheeling all my Victorian stock is yet another 'tuit' project that I'm going to not think about!!

I'd be nervous about burning the plastic with a dremel - luckily I'm staring at a test track piece I did so I can investigate on that first!

Right, well it turns out I already have two 21-pin decoders (For H1/H2) and an 8 pin with a pigtail (for the E2) - so I just ordered a pair of cheapo Next18's for the Terriers and in theory they should all be ready to fit in short order.

Thanks Martin, updated. I do realise this is veering quite far off my original workbench subject matter, but rest assured there is still appropriate finescale Edwardian and Victorian shenanigans to come.

Lovely, but hardly Minories!

With a filament printer (for my other hobby of wargaming and printable terrain) I realised I could join g1-3d.uk and start availing myself of the wonderful models put out their by the community. Can you imagine a clip-together, fully printable Gauge 1 20t Brake Van for just the price of some filament? Well, it's a reality: You can also see an LMS merchandise wagon and the cab of the L&YR battery electric shunter there too - which comes with a fully printable motor mount and gearbox compatible with cheap chinese geared motors. It is an absolutely bizarre convergence of technologies that one can print rolling stock in G1 with freely available 3D models cheaper than buying the styrene to scratchbuild them in 4mm, let alone buying kits or RTR. Clearly using metal wheels, axles, roller bearings, etc. would provide better rolling characteristics andfrankly there are some things I think would be better left as etched parts (such as lamp irons) - but frankly it's just wonderful. I don't think this is part of a new project particularly, other than I had some of the parts printed and with a new reel of filament I continued printing them as I tweaked the settings.