GWR57xx

Nice to see the canal, it doesn’t appear very often. You’ve packed a lot into Dewchurch and it’s all well done. Super layout.

There’s another example here: https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrsh1117a.htm

Another possible issue I see with your plan is that every train that arrives in your fiddle yard will have to have the loco removed and moved to the other end of the train for the next journey. That means a lot of handling of locos. Might cassettes be an easier option? edit: unless of course all your trains are top & tailed.

If you haven’t already seen it, I’d suggest having a read of @MAP66’s thread, as he’s using very similar sized helix to you and explains some of the issues and possible solutions. E.g gradients, train lengths, curve radii, basically how long a train can your locos pull up the inner spiral?

A little bit more progress to report. The doors are painted: All over brown (tint #4, chocolate) would have been a lot easier but they're done now and look quite stylish. A batch of low walls with chamfered engineers blue brick headers have been built and painted, ready for mortar: Difficult to see the chamfer from this view though. The interior end walls have been mortared and painted, now ready for assembly: Still a long way to go...

Nice crane! Is that from a kit?

Also, if this is a goods only sidings then the turnouts would probably be controlled by ground levers, so no need for a signal box or point rodding. Also probably no signals.

My understanding is that facing point locks are to protect passenger carrying lines, so if you have no passenger facilities nor a through passenger line then they would not be needed anyway. Saves you having to worry about leaving them out!

The revised shed arrangement looks great 🙂. Sorry, I’m not knowledgeable enough to comment on the signals.

Just a suggestion: you could keep the left hand board to 1200mm if you don’t mind having the centre of the leftmost crossover straddling the join. Perhaps have a very short straight between the turnouts on the crossover track to avoid cutting the turnouts themselves.

I should have remembered about the Silhouette cutter, since I’ve been following your topic for a while. I blame my memory and old age! Using whatever tools you have to hand and are able to wield successfully is not cheating in my book. I use a laser cutter and 3d printer and don’t understand some folks attitude to them. I enjoy learning new stuff, and the 2d and 3d CAD programs took quite a while to get to grips with. It certainly isn’t a case of just pressing a button and sitting back, there’s a lot of work involved in getting to that point. Your buildings are all looking great.

Really good scalpel work there to cut the frames out so perfectly. Are you a surgeon by any chance? 🙂 A question (as I have no idea what the Banff railway practice was): in your CAD drawing you’ve shown the open window as hinged at the top. Is that correct? I thought signal box windows were always sliders, but there always seem to be exceptions.

That’s quite a transformation on the wagon.

They can go over or under. There has been a few discussions previously on RMWeb, such as:

A sad end to all the previous work, but I’m looking forward to seeing the new layout develop. It’s a pity all the earlier photos have been lost from RMWeb.

Freudian slip? Or a spell checker with a sense of humour?

A “Quintessential Panoply of Panniers”, or QPP for short. PS you might suspect a tiny bit of bias on the topic, given my call sign 🙂

Can I ask how SunLu ABS-like compares to Elegoo’s? At the moment I am getting good results from Elegoo ABS-like, but maybe I should give this a try? Would you say SunLu is e.g. stronger? More flexible? More rigid? Better detail? Other? Thanks

Very kind, thank you. I’m enjoying following your Tribute thread - you’re making much faster progress than me. Most impressed.

You could also try simulating either red or blue engineering bricks, which would not be out of place used for lintels. These would have a much more uniform colour than that on your brick paper.

In the UK I obtained sheets of XPS from an underfloor heating supplier, where it is commonly used as insulation. No idea if XPS is used for that purpose in Oz?

First batch of eight windows (outer frames yet to be added, just waiting for the glue to fully set): These panels are kept pressed between two sheets of glass and weighted to make sure they stay flat while the glue sets.

Progress is being made, honest! Slow I admit, but some progress is better than none? First up is doors: These are the eight doors for the front and back entrances, in primer. And partially painted: I got off to a bad start, as you can see bottom left. After masking across the middle(ish) I carelessly painted the top of the door in "Tint #4" rather than the bottom so had to get the IPA out and start again. I was more careful after that! Next is the internal front & back walls: These have been painted white and sealed with matt varnish, now waiting for mortar and then the bottom five feet (up to the window sills) to be painted black. External front & back walls: These have been painted, now waiting to be sealed then mortar added. Lastly for this update, Windows. I'm making each window up from four pieces of white card plus the glazing. That's glazing bars each side plus outer frame each side. To help get these accurately aligned I printed a little jig (the glazing piece is a little oversize, needs trimming): Then to align this window panel on the wall panels I made another jig: The window panel drops into the central cutout then the wall panels fit into the end guides: I will have a lot of these wall panels to make, so these jigs should make construction a lot easier. TTFN

Doors redone as described in the book (I think). These need a bit of touching up yet - my painting ability is a bit rubbish!

Hope there were no injuries among the Basel passengers 🙂 Nice trains.