Gwiwer

Today I have begun to add the detail of the new field. Most of it has been grassed. A new hedgerow has been planted to divide it from the railway where the stone retaining wall has been extended by another whole panel of Vollmer card. Some trailing brambles are already growing from the top down over this. The new hedge also includes living and dead trees and marks out a small triangular area near the road bridge which seems to belong to someone other than the farmer.

Given the popularity of the south western lines and the not insignificant number of BLT / yard planks about the Class 22 should be very popular. They would also sit comfortably alongside the Teddybears for a layout of the appropriate area or possibly the upcoming Dapol /Kernow Beattie Well tanks.

Spent a little of today detailing the Skaledale small pub which sits on the roadway above Treheligan station. Also rebuilt the Cornish hedges (stone walls) along the roadway which can be seen in the top two shots. The roof has been done with thinned matt black paint, the ridge tiles are a mix of red and orange to give the characteristic Cornish vermillion, the lichen is yellow with a touch of red mixed in and the weathering on the walls is stippled matt black on a near-dry brush with extra layers around the chimney for smoke staining. Spare signs from Ratio platform shelter kits have been used as blackboards to advertise food and live music and the two old boys can sit on their favourite bench and watch the world go slowly past. Just need the wooden table and a couple of pint glasses for them now to complete the scene. And looking from the station we can see some new land has also been added. I can still reach underneath to the fiddle yard if required but the new area should improve the appearance of the scene. The hedge on the right hand side is complete with grassed topping while that on the left has the stonework done but awaits the grassing and shows the channel along the top between the card strips where the glue and scatter will go. Meanwhile the operating authorities have made good use of a Crompton which strayed into the area for the weekend; here it is seen working a freight through Penhayle Bay station. And heading off around the cliffs into the west ...

Good to know the 22's are still coming. Just like the real thing all too often they seem to have had a bit of a failure en route but will arrive eventually! Two (one green syp, one blue) have been ordered from Kernow since they were first announced. In due course they will look superb alongside Kernow's own D6xx Warships which are now said to be due sometime in 2011. I'll need at least two of those as well and very likely more.

Then I have got it right! There is no magic trick to this - it is simply a case of getting everything into scale with everything else you are doing. Platforms can be made to look longer than they are if they are narrow as well, though mine are not. The fact that the platforms look longer than they are suggests the eye is receiving and the brain correctly interpreting the information that they are long flat parts of an overall scene. When you count the coaches which actually fit into those platforms you will see that they are not so very long after all. Though granted 190cms (slightly over six feet in imperial measure) is longer than many modellers might be able to fit in. The curves leading into and out of the loop platform are also much easier than fixed radius track which again tends to exaggerate the length of the whole station area. I don't need to use the tight radius fixed geometry track and have used the medium radius points at either end which, in my opinion, give a quite sharp enough turnout.

Dave - you'll get much better views of the "sandy bank" if you go back to post 35 and view the linked videos. Jeff - like the SR it's a case of "maybe one day ..... ". I do have a germ of an idea for a small indoor layout which would link the SR and ER at somewhere fictitious in the vicinity of Moorgate. I could then run the CEP / EPB units in from Kent, the Cravens 105 or a 31 and suburban coaches from Gordon Hill / Hertford North and also have a use for the EFE tube trains. Being realistic I can't see that getting up and running any time soon if at all. My next project for construction late this year / early 2011 has already been announced and it still doesn't include 3rd rails.

Having wondered just how I might employ SR 3rd-rail EMU stock in "Cornwall" I was delighted to find a blue 33/1 Crompton on the doorstep today. I would ideally prefer a pre-TOPS un-named version but 33112 is the best option unless Heljan do a rerun of the sold-out D6520 or release another 65xx with pipes. So here is 33112 approaching Penhayle Bay and correctly showing headcode 62 (Waterloo - Exeter / points beyond semi-fast) coupled to and hauling the Bachmann b/g CEP. Surfers seem to have set up camp on the moors above Nansglaw Head. It's best not to ask how they got there but as one of them checks out (or perhaps worships) the break the train eases into the curves at Penhayle Bay station in the distance. Here it is seen from the path around Penhayle Head Later in the day the train returned up-country this time with the Crompton pushing. The red blanks mean the same as a tail lamp or lights; this is the end of a complete train.

The platforms at Penhayle Bay are both 90cms long. The three main faces at Treheligan are 190cms and the branch bay is 130cms. The "right" length for a platform is determined by the prototype you are modelling and compromised by the space you have available. Most stations in Cornwall have platforms slightly shorter than the longest trains which call, or at best barely long enough. In the days of loco-hauled trains a typical length west of Plymouth would be 7 - 10 coaches as the restaurant car and a few coaches at the London end would have been detached at Plymouth. Nowadays a 2+8 HST will just fit into some platforms or slightly exceed the length of others. What looks right on any individual layout will be a factor of how much space you have. I am lucky to have a 35 metre circuit which gives a lot of space. The image of the loco+13 coaches above shows that although the train is rather longer than the platform it is not out of scale with its surroundings - there is a lot of space around the train and the station itself. On a more typical room-sized oval or point to point the available space is much less and so stations must be reduced in size if they are not to take up the entire area. Shorter trains must be run accordingly which can look very wrong but we are all forced to compromise somewhere. A 2+8 HST with power cars almost touching and running through a station which occupies half the layout will not give much satisfaction to anyone. If you only wish to model a station with its comings and goings then you can build larger but if you prefer to also have a good run you will need to make some compromises. The space I have available allows me to run full prototypical length trains. Not everyone will have this luxury. It takes over a minute at realistic speed for a train to go round the layout which feels longer when you are actually waiting for it to come back! The longer platforms at Treheligan handle 7 Mk1 or Mk2 coaches and a loco within the signalling. Longer trains, and 2+8 HST sets, can stop in advance of the starter if it is "off" and will have a small part of the train off the back of the platform which is often the case in real Cornwall. Branch bays hold about 5 coaches at places like St. Erth, Truro and Liskeard so mine is a good representation of the real thing. Penhayle Bay station sits in quite a tight spot in a corner of the layout and in a location where I have also managed to get a lot of other scenic elements included. The short platforms are served by local trains often formed of a loco and 3 or 4 coaches (of which 3 fit in the platforms) and by dmu sets. An HST stopping there can pull right around through the tunnel to the advanced starter on the cliffs with coaches 5 - 7 in the platform; up trains can draw up to the starter if required which is a couple of coach-lengths beyond the platform. These S-bend platforms fit neatly into the small area and look the part; if they were longer it would look wrong and in any case the station site is restricted by the tunnel at one end and the viaduct at the other. None of the layout was pre-planned except a rough sketch of the tracks and major features. It was built very much as I went along and from a good knowledge of the area I am representing. I have been lucky in that 95% of what I set out to do has just worked. Some of that has been because I have a large space; if I were modelling in a small room then I would need to Templot everything before I even started. I hope that helps answer the question.

Recent images from Penhayle Bay. The summer Saturday timetable includes strengthening the branch train from the usual 1 or 2 cars to as many as 5 which is the limit of the bay platform. Here we see a 5-car rake approaching from St. Agnes formed of a Hornby class 122 "Bubblecar", a Lima class 117 DMBS and a Hornby class 101 triple. The connection with the main line train looks t obe assured as that is only just running in around the curve behind a Bachmann "Warship" The connection with the down train is made safely as well. Barely visible in the distance a class 47 leads a summer Saturday holiday train of 13 coaches (12 are visible in shot) which is the maximum length I can fit in the fiddle yard without fouling the points. 2 locos on 16 coaches will fit and has been run but blocks other tracks. Two GWR150-liveried locos are seen passing; 47079 leads an up passenger into Treheligan station while 50007 waits in the down loop with china clay hoods. As if that wasn't enough the GWR150 chocolate / cream bubble car is also on the branch! Getting three trains in shot with GWR150 liveries would be a rare piece of good fortune! For fans of large logo blue we see another 50 this time in the evening light heading through open countryside near Nansglaw with a down passenger train. And some video footage as well ..... First showing another summer Saturday train as a Western + Warship double-header coasts down the bank from Nansglaw to Penhayle Bay with 13 on, and is then seen heading off through the woods towards Treheligan Video 1 Then jumping forward in time the IC-livery HST set is captured storming up through the forest until it emerges on the cliff-edge above Penhayle beach and runs through the station. Here it is passed by a down set in GWT "Merlin" livery which we see sweeping around the curves and heading off into the west. Shooting a video whilst driving two trains at the right speed and getting them to cross at exactly the right spot isn't easy! Video 2 Finally the large-logo 50 was caught dashing through lowering sunlight with a down express from London to Penzance. This clip has no sound, sorry. Video 3

079 is a superb representation of the original. Just don't be tempted to fit the plug-in snow ploughs supplied; they don't belong on 079 but might be handy for another loco in your collection. Also it's nice to find a pack of etches which actually fit over the decals correctly. The RES-livery 474 double-arrow etches are completely the wrong size and unusable for example. 079 also doesn't have orange ETH sockets as per the supplied pack. Now do I put a few small oil smudges on the white wheel rims or leave a limited edition alone as I normally do?

I don't think it's down to lack of variety or interest, as I have hoped to show, but might be through lack of knowledge of somewhere so far away.

Indeed Peter, not as hot today. Though the direct sun still played its tricks with the points at the farm end for a while A couple more from today. First showing the blue Warship making the rare move of a down train from Treheligan up platform onto the St Agnes branch. This is only timetabled for summer Saturdays when a few cross-country expresses detach a portion here. My track plan, signalling and wiring allows for this on DC. The light weathering I have applied to the skirt and grille areas shows better in this shot than in those above. Then we see a maroon Western + Warship double-header approaching Treheligan station from the east with a long overnight train of mixed vans, sleeping cars and seated carriages. The clay "hoods" are a few years too recent to be an exact match for time but the new-fangled blue/grey livery of the rake in the up siding would be right.

True, Sir, but then I am not a Nanogauger nor an Ordinary Gauger and I have invited your own additions to the list!

As promised here are some modelling links. I don't pretend this is a comprehensive list as I know it is not and I have no connection with any business either listed nor omitted. Others may wish to add links to the many smaller businesses supporting the majors, and to the retail outlets of which there are rather few. http://www.austrains.com.au/ http://www.auscisionmodels.com.au/ http://www.tomshobbies.com.au/index.php/trainorama-products http://www.powerline.com.au/ The quality of most current locomotive releases is at or possibly above what we might expect from Bachmann; the quality of anything to hook on the back is often rather lesser and in particular the Powerline carriages are empty shells when most UK / US modellers would expect a detailed interior, not least given the price. Over the years Lima and Hornby have produced some models of Australian outline stock. The locos from Lima are as good as anything else they ever made (i.e. noisy, a bit rough and little in the way of speed control), those from Hornby are from a much earlier time with all the limitations of the industry 30 - 40 years ago. The Lima carriages are said to be US-outline reliveried / rebadged and I have to defer to others with greater product knowledge to confirm or refute that. A train of fully-badged "Indian Pacific" or "Overland" stock can look quite respectable however. For most Australian themes Code 83 track is probably the best match of the RtR stuff though many local modellers will build their own. Scenic creations are quite well catered for as the Woodland range, which is US-styled, can be used almost universally.

Those illustrate the location perfectly David, thank you.

Had a short running session today with a friend who is in town from Perth WA. We were only able to get about a half-hour together but enjoyed sending several trains for a run around the layout, mostly with WR hydraulics in charge. A blue class 42 Warship coasts downhill past Darras 'box. and continues around the sweep of the curve beside Treisaacs Farm before approaching Treheligan station through the cutting and parallel to the approaching St. Agnes branch unit descending the steep route from the hillside to the station.

Would you have any pictures actually on the Bethungra (or Border Loop) spirals? I haven't managed to lineside either location to date. The gradients are remarkably severe and arose from the need to lay early railways as cheaply as possible by going over rather than under some of the large ranges particularly along the eastern coast. There are tunnels but not so many. The main Melbourne - Sydney line climbs over a ridge at the remote location of Bethungra by using a spiral and passing through two curved tunnels although southbound trains now use a newer alignment made when the line was doubled and drop steeply over the edge of the hill without spiralling. The Short North, the rail route from Sydney to Brisbane, also traverses a spiral and a curved tunnel at Border Loop. This is another quite remote and beautiful area and the State border is actually crossed deep inside the tunnel as the line passes beneath the Great Dividing Range which - on this occasion - it simply couldn't go over. The only passenger workings around the spirals are the Melbourne - Sydney XPT (twice daily up Bethungra), but not the southbound trains, and the Sydney - Brisbane XPT in both directions on the single line of Border Loop. The northbound train to Brisbane and the overnight from Melbourne traverse the spirals in the dark meaning there is only one daylight passenger trip each day at each location, though there can be several daytime freights.

As promised I have dug through the files and retrieved some more images. There are some mighty fine pieces of rail infrastructure to be found and they are not all in our Capital Cities. The Gold Rush brought speculation and, in some cases, considerable wealth to provincial Victoria which was reflected to some degree in its rail network. Here we see the grandiose station building at Ballarat, just over an hour from Melbourne and served usually by Sprinter or higher-speed V/locity railcars. The signal gantry at the western end is no less grand even if a considerable reduction in traffic has rendered most of it surplus to requirements. At the time this was taken passenger services did not venture over the crossing and beyond Ballarat though with the line to Beaufort and Ararat reinstated several each day now do so, as well as occasional freights. By contrast the signal box is rather humble! Moving north to Sydney we see new Millenium M-set M9 (known locally as "Millenium Bugs") emu at the inner-suburban station of Dulwich Hill. This location is a good one for train-watching as it is also on the Metropolitan Goods lines which provide through routes across inner Sydney for freight which is then kept as far as possible off the busy passenger routes. Shortly afterwards the soft growl of a diesel announces the approach of one such freight in this case with one of the diminutive PL-class locos leading; another was at the rear working in top and tail mode. This short-lived Port Link service (hence PL-class) shuttled containers from the huge Enfield Yard to and from Port Botany with the location here at DulwichHill about the mid-point of that fairly short trip. These locos have now been found other work including shunting yards as far away as Adelaide! All CityRail electric trains serving Sydney are double-deckers. They appear in 2, 4, 6 or 8-car formations and combinations though all recent deliveries are 4-car units operating singly or in pairs. Here one of the older style of C-sets dating from the mid 70's pulls away from Sydney Central station on the high-level through lines towards the harbour bridge and North Sydney. 2-car trains are seldom found in suburban Sydney (though occasionally work on the Olympic Park shuttles), only on the Newcastle - Morriset locals and on Illawarra area local workings such as the Port Kembla branch. And a closer view of a similar train, this time at suburban Lidcombe. These sets vary in detail and are identified by letter. C, K, L, R and S-sets have formed the mainstay of the fleet for many years but are rapidly being replaced by more modern M (Millenium) and O (OSCAR, for Outer Suburban CARriage) sets. In between which the slab-fronted T (Tangara) and G (a longer range Tangara with toilets fitted) sets also added large numbers to the fleet. The small "target plate" carried on the buffer beam identifies this unit as an L-set. Tangara set T79 is seen in the high-level platforms at Central. Recent developments have seen these given yellow front ends and doors. Moving up the Central Coast we reach Newcastle at the end of a near 3-hour journey from Sydney by electric train which includes some superb scenery around Hawkesbury River, the tiny station of Wondabyne which is only accessible by boat or bush trail and the severe gradients of Cowan and Fassifern banks. This is as far as the wires go. Here we see one of the popular and comfortable double-deck V-sets which are used on the Inter City runs from Sydney. These are used on the principal trains between Sydney and Newcastle (north), Lithgow (west, in the Blue Mountains) and Kiama (south, on the Illawarra coast); other trains on these long routes are worked with outer-suburban stock. A regular diesel service continues where the electrics end and proceeds up the Hunter Valley main line to Maitland. Here most trips terminate at Telarah one stop around the corner and away from the busy coal lines, while a few continue on the Main North up to Scone or turn onto the "Short North" (which is the only remaining rail route to Brisbane) and run as far as Dungog. Remarkably this service operates just about 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We see a 1940's design / early 1950's build "Hunter Valley" dmu of a type which survived in service until just a couple of years ago pausing for station duties at Maitland. These featured such delights as full-drop windows, open mantle gas burners for heating (!) and embossed leather seats. Back at Sandgate a Hunter Valley set is dwarfed by a pair of 90-class locos on the point of a coalie. This will cross to the branch on the left and run to the export terminal of Kooragang Island. In the last couple of years a flyover has been built here to eliminate this extremely busy flat crossing move. Another "coalie", this time empty, runs through Maitland behind a trio of 82-class locos and heads back to the coalfields around Muswellbrook and Singleton. These trains are very frequent, almost a converyor belt operation, and feature haulage by pairs of 90-class, trios of the less powerful 82-class and occasionally anything else as available. Private enterprise also ensures that other operators get their share of this traffic so a considerable variety of motive power can be seen through Maitland, which also sees all Sydney - Brisbane freights pass through, on any day of the week. New South Wales used to operate electric locomotives on its 1500Vdc lines, hauling heavy coal and general freight trains often in lash-ups of up to four locos. The 46-class is long gone except for a preserved example, and more recently the fairly modern 85- and 86-classes of ten and fifty locos have been sidelined. At the time of this photo most of these sixty locos were dumped at or around Lithgow loco high in the Blue Mountains, with most of the rest even farther from home at (unelectrified) Werris Creek loco. Since then nearly all have been dragged out into the desert to rot at Broken Hill when many have been broken up or stripped. Very occasional work is found for a couple of them including on engineers trains recently on the Bondi Junction line, and several are preserved. Here we see some of the line at Lithgow as another coal train rolls past. Note how new the pantographs appear to be for withdrawn locos. We move across to the small diesel-operated broad gauge suburban system in Adelaide which is entirely serviced by generally unloved railcars. Known locally as a "Pox Box" we here see one of the more recent 3100-class departing from the main North Terrace terminal. These are either double-ended single cars or twins and operate singly or in formation of up to three cars. Only very rarely is a four-car train operated in Adelaide. A 3-car train for the Gawler line (2-car 3100 plus single Pox Box) arrives at the suburban interchange of Salisbury in Adelaide's north in the older orange livery which is now extinct. And a view of the distinctive "Jumbo" sets which are the earlier generation of stock featuring a raised driving position and a full engine compartment below rather like the SR "Thumper" dmu types. This one is also seen at North Terrace curving away to the north with the depot yard tracks to the left and the sun setting through a local piece of artwork. Returning to Victoria once more we see a pair of EL-class locos cresting the summit on the "new" standard gauge line at Heathcote Junction, north of Melbourne. The broad gauge tracks in the foreground are the Victorian Railways route to Albury and Shepparton. Only one passenger service, the Melbourne - Sydney XPT twice daily, uses the standard gauge while by contrast there is next to no broad gauge freight these days. The route to Albury is two parallel single tracks of differing gauges but is under conversion to become a standard gauge only route within a year. Shepparton trains will continue to run on the broad gauge for now. With the camera slightly adjusted the next train south is also captured on film; this is an N-class of the main Victorian passenger loco type hauling an "N-set" of coaches from Albury to Melbourne on the broad gauge lines. This scene has altered beyond recognition since it was burned out by the catastrophic bush fires last February. The green is returning but it will be a few years before the lush growth seen here is back to its finest. Finally broad gauge steam on the "main line" as a Steamrail Victoria-owned K class loco hauls vintage stock over the freight lines of Dynon working a public shuttle to Newport. The train is crossing Sims Street and is about to cross the Maribyrnong River (visible in the background) on a large girder bridge and enter Bunbury Street Tunnel beneath the suburb of Footscray. The freight lines here, as in Sydney, give access to the yards and docks on both gauges while keeping freight clear of passenger workings for the most part.

Some more images from my own files; I promise some modelling links in a later post as well. First we see "glowing" rails and a good deal of infrastructure at the approach to Southern Cross station, Melbourne. This is the main country terminal and is also served by all but one of the suburban lines. On the Queensland Rail CityTrain network we see an EMU set at the Brisbane suburban terminus of Doomben. This is a quiet line which does not have a full seven-day service. The term EMU in Brisbane refers to this class of Electric Multiple Unit which were the first electric trains in the City. Later types are known as SMU (Suburban Multiple Unit), IMU (Inter City Multiple Unit) or the Inter City sets as illustrated above (which are not IMU's!). The Diesel Tilt Train (Brisbane - Cairns) pauses at Ingham in tropical far north Queensland. Two of these sets provided a 25-hour timing over a rebuilt route compared with the traditional loco-hauled train taking around 30 hours; one or other of the sets has been out of service for long-term repairs for many months leaving just one to run a twice-weekly service. The slower Queenslander and Sunlander trains also still run, usually combined as one. Turning to our tramways here is an Adelaide H-class car at the Glenelg terminus. Adelaide has just a single route from City to sea though it was recently extended through the City to link with the main suburban rail station on North Terrace and further extensions to replace diesel heavy rail routes are under development. The H-class lasted over 70 years and one or two are kept for occasional heritage trips on weekends. Their replacements came in the form of the S-class Flexcity trams of which one is seen here also at Glenelg. Most Adelaide running is on dedicated reserved track with street sections only in the City and locally at Glenelg. Sydney has a single tram line from Central Station through the streets to the Casino (Star City) and out to Glebe where it uses the trackbed of a former heavy rail line to Lilyfield. It uses a small fleet of Variotrams which are usually in promotional liveries such as this example departing Central. Melbourne operates around 500 trams mostly on street running routes up to 23 kilometres from the City centre. There are around 23 main routes most of which run all day every day and with some peak variations. There is also a City Circle free tram aimed at visitors and using elderly W-class trams dating back up 50 - 70 years. The main operational fleet is kept renewed fairly regularly and comprises classes Z1, Z2, Z3, A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2, D1 and D2 classes dating from 1974 - 2008. Here we see a B2 doing what trams do best as a passenger is dropped off in Flinders Lane. The fleet livery has since altered and many trams now carry a white-based livery while others wear a drab grey. One annual tradition in Melbourne is the repainting of an elderly W-class tram (these days two are so treated) as the "Christmas Tram". Here is one fresh from the paint shops and seen outside the almost-finished Southern Cross railway station during its rebuild. These trams are used on the City Circle and usually convey a portly gentleman in a red suit, or a pair of attractively-dressed female "elves" in green outfits. Reverting to "heavy rail" we see T-class diesel-electric T377 shunting grain hoppers in Melbourne. These maids of all work were built in some numbers for the former Victorian Railways and have since migrated to other areas as well. Many survivors are still to be found in Victoria such as this one just repainted into the livery of its current owner CFCLA. Railway Heritage is widely respected in Australia with a significant number of operations. Most are only operational on a very few days, often only Sundays, due to the much smaller number of people than the UK preservation movement is accustomed to. However a few manage to run daily of which the best known is Puffing Billy in the Dandenong Ranges outside Melbourne. This narrow (762mm / 2' 6") gauge line climbs through the forests from Belgrave to Emerald Lakeside with one train on most days continuing to Gembrook. This is the last of the one-time network of "cheap" developmental railways laid down to open up rural areas. Here is one of the superbly-kept steam locos at Belgrave station. I do have pictures from the Sydney and New South Wales regions and will upload and post some examples in the next day or two.

RMweb is a truly international community with a not insignificant number of Australian-based members. Outside Australia however it is uncommon to see our railways modelled. While we are a very large land mass with a very small population, and rail operations are often as sparse as rainfall in the desert, there are some significant areas of traffic and the whole country is not without interest to the modeller. Australia runs the longest and heaviest trains in the World (the Pilbara iron ore operations in a very remote and inhospitable region and not linked to any other railway) and is well-known for the dead straight Nullarbor Plain between Adelaide and Kalgoorlie. Australia is home to around 22 million people which is roughly the same number as live in the Greater London region. The majority of our thinly-scattered population lives on or very close to the eastern coast and most then are in the major State Capital cities. Of those Sydney has the largest population and the largest rail network. Melbourne is very close behind in population and potentially set to overtake within 10 - 15 years; it also has a reasonable suburban operation and is famed for having the largest tramway network in, depending upon your source, the Western World, the English-speaking World or the entire World. Brisbane and Perth fall into the next smaller size category and each has a suburban rail operation, that of Brisbane being almost comparable for size with Melbourne. Adelaide has a modest local network and alone among our Capitals it is not electrified. Canberra, our National (Federal) Capital, has the ignominy of being at the end of a single track branch line and would make a decent BLT model and Darwin is at the end of one of the longest and most remote rail routes on the planet. There remains a small freight rail operation in Tasmania though no commercial passenger services. Victoria is the most densely populated State and has a reasonable regional rail service; New South Wales has some inter-city and regional services and Queensland has the coast line to Cairns with vestigial passenger services running two or three times a week on a few inland routes. There are two infrequent regional services operating out of Perth, to Bunbury and to Kalgoorlie. Aside from the passenger operations there is a plethora of freight routes often with extremely sparse or seasonal services based on traffic type. Queensland is famed for its vast network of sugar cane railways. There are three main gauges in use. Standard (1435mm to Aussies, or 4' 8 1/2" ) is used throughout New South Wales and is the gauge of the national interstate routes which basically comprises Brisbane - Sydney - Melbourne - Adelaide - Perth and Sydney - Adelaide - Alice Springs - Darwin. Irish Broad Gauge (1600mm or 5' 3") is used by Melbourne and Victorian regional routes in most cases though there is some standard gauge regional freight traffic in the far west. This is also the gauge of the Adelaide suburban system. Narrow (1067mm or 3' 6") gauge is used throughout Queensland, Tasmania and Western Australia for intra-state workings though most Queensland sugar cane lines are 2' 0" gauge. There is a number of enthusiast-oriented web sites of which perhaps the most useful would be: Railpage Australia at http://www.railpage.com.au/ where the forums will be found to contain discussion, speculation and fact on any topic you can think of. The site has very high traffic and is afflicted in the same way as RMweb currently it with rather frequent server overload outages. If it is offline come back a day or so later and try again. John Cleverdon's Locopage, hosted by Railpage servers and at http://locopage.railpage.org.au/ (note that .org in this url is correct as this links to a different server to the main .com site) which contains extensive listings and technical details, not to mention images, of Australian locomotives. There is a downloadable database attached to the site which allows you to keep regularly updated. The various suburban and regional multiple unit operations are not dealt with at Locopage. As there is a rather smaller railfan community in Australia than some other countries it can be harder to obtain up to date information on the suburban electric and diesel fleets. One excellent source for Victorian operations, and which includes comprehensive details of the trams in Melbourne as well, is http://www.vicsig.net So ..... onto some prototype images of my own:- A sight which may now be unique to Melbourne is the tram : train crossing square. Here we see a Z2 class tram crossing the triple rail tracks at Glenhuntly. Trams run on standard gauge track at 600V dc while trains here are on broad gauge at 1500V dc. At each of the four locations (the others are Kooyong, Gardiner and Riversdale) where this spectacle may be seen there is a control cabin. The controller switches the voltage as required. Many Australian rail lines are unfenced including through suburbia. Here we see an example as a Comeng-built Melbourne suburban train travels beside residential streets near Ormond. Moving north to Brisbane, at the main Roma Street station, we see the driver of an InterCity emu set wearing the regulation shorts in tropical heat as he checks he is clear to leave with a train for sugar-cane country to the north. These trains operate on 25kV ac as Brisbane electrified later than the southern cities and took advantage of more recent technology. The extensive use of painted corrugated tin for roofing and shelters is also a typical Australian feature. Getting the message across Queensland Rail-style In far north Queensland we see a 2360-class diesel electric waiting time at the new Townsville station with a southbound "Sunlander" working from Cairns to Brisbane; this train would at that time have been electrically-hauled south of Rockhampton by a 3900-class. Standard gauge freight on a dual-gauge line; 81-class 8173 and a GL-class loco wait for the all-clear to cross Footscray Road beneath the Tullamarine Freeway in Melbourne and enter the docks complex. The 81 is in a now-defunct livery of NSW State Rail, the GL just shows its more recent CFCLA (Chicago Freight Car Leasing Australia) livery alluding to the open access regime now in force. NR-class locomotive NR75 stands at Alice Springs station with the southbound "Ghan" tourist train. The loco was named "Steve Irwin" at the time but was renamed following the sad demise of one of our iconic personalities. This is the only regular passenger operation on the Adelaide - Darwin route running once or twice each week. The loco is one of the 119 remaining (of 120 built) in the class which are used mostly on heavy interstate freight often with two, three or more locomotives in a "lash-up". Their use on passenger trains is confined to this, the Indian Pacific (Sydney - Perth) and the Overland (Melbourne - Adelaide) none of which operates daily. All are on standard gauge. Victoria has some diesel-hauled passenger services on regional lines though many are now in the hands of modern Sprinter and V/Locity dmu types. One anachronism was the outer suburban line between Frankston and Stony Point. This continues beyond where electric trains stop to link several outlying towns, a steel plant (which generates two daily freights) and a ferry link to some islands. Until a couple of years ago the train was worked, as shown here, by an A-class loco built in 1952 and a couple of former suburban coaches (one of which is glimpsed in the distance) which were mere youths dating from 1957. The signalling was antique as well! A60 runs round at Frankston. The service has been modernised and is now worked with new signalling and axle counters replacing electric train staffs, and sprinters are in use such as this one seen north of Melbourne at Heathcote Junction. Steep gradients abound in Australia as can be seen here. In the New South Wales Hunter Valley you will find Australia's only 4-track main line, between the outskirts of Newcastle and Maitland. Here at the diminutive station of Sandgate, empty and loaded coal trains pass with wagons receding into the distance. The XPT, an Australian equivalent of the HST, seen at Albury station on a Sydney - Melbourne run. Moving back north to Brisbane here is one of the unusual Tri-Bo electric locos of which Queensland Rail runs a large number mostly on heavy coal trains in the Blackwater and Goonyella regions. This one is heading a northbound "Sunlander" train at Brisbane Roma Street which will arrive at its destination in Cairns some 30 hours later!

Threading its way between 1:76 vegetation and the 1:1 version of the backyard (including one of our chicken runs) we see Bulleid light Pacific 34041 "Wilton" on a suitably light train of just two Maunsell coaches. The train is taking the route into the fiddle yard though that is not apparent from this view.

There are some steam ones on the old RMweb once Andy has that reactivated. The link back is in post 1 of this thread. My steam collection is mostly SR rather than WR, an interest which arises from a family connection at Wadebridge shed and the relatively early departure of WR steam from Cornwall which meant I didn't experience it first hand down there.

After a long wait the black livery Hornby 153 has finally arrived. The rendering of the livery is superb and the wait has therefore been worthwhile. For all those UK modellers frozen out of their sheds, snowed into their homes or dreaming of anything but winter here she is making her first appearance at Penhayle Bay ..... ..... where the beach is always popular. Detail of the livery shown to advantage as the unit runs around the cliff section. Finally the year it took Hornby to get the photographic detailing right and rescheduling production is reflected in the quality of the Truro cathedral image seen here.

Keep the faith, jonhants, as it took me 35 years from the first vision of what I hoped to one day build to being able to start building it. And it also took a move to the other side of the World. What you see in this thread is still very much an ongoing work but has been under construction for 5 years and operational for almost 4. They say good things come to those who wait and they also say that the first skill you need in railway modelling is patience. I'll agree with both!

Right here. Cooper Craft Signalbox Nameplates. Fiddly as all **** to make up and get painted but effective.