TangoOscarMike

And finally (let us hope!), a tiny castle using only the basic Busch oval. This would fit on a 70cm x 50cm baseboard. I reckon there's still some scope for further shrinking.

Thanks Grovenor In fact I completed the bogie model (based on Gibbo's drawings) some time ago. Making it generally available is being held up by modelling technicalities, specifically: The 3D print works nicely with a built-in conical axle bearing. I've made a version with sockets for metal top-hat bearings, but I haven't tested it yet. The NEM coupling pocket arrangement is a little flimsy. Cheers Tom

@All - I'm not sure of the etiquette here. Should I take my doodles out of Prototype and into Modelling? Here is a doodle of something that could be achieved in OO6.5, using the Busch Feldbahn track. The red-ish lines show the outline of the real Tudor fort, plus the beginnings of the Palmerston wings. My shrunken Tudor fort (greyish colour) has the whole inner courtyard at about the same size as the real inner tower, the two landward bastions missing, and a correspondingly shrunken central tower. The miniature Palmerston wings (sandy colour) could probably accommodate three guns each. The railway (green) exits the fort in roughly the right places, similarly to yours. In real life the railway doesn't run through the Tudor fort, but that doesn't bother me. The real structures are pretty large - I think it would be possible to adjust the height (by a combination of removing storeys and reducing their height) to keep the proportions consistent. This would all fit in about a square metre, whereas the real castle is about 6m long in 1/76. It would of course be possible to model more of the spit (coastguard cottages, inn, lighthouse and pier) and extend the railway to visit those other features. But having drawn that, I'm now thinking that something much more compact could be achieved using only a basic oval of Busch track. So it's back to the drawing board for me.

Maybe the word "expecting" was a bit strong - I have no right to expect anything! I guess I was imagining some of the interior, maybe from this point of view. But you've captured the feel of the exterior admirably.

Yes. That's not what I was expecting, but I like it. The bulk of the castle doesn't appear, but the walls the shingle, the water, the grass - they all evoke the real thing. And the railway looks right in that setting.

I think I speak for everybody when I say: if you have pictures, then please, please post them!

Several month later, I have found my Hurst Castle book: "Hurst Castle An Illustrated History" by Jude James. It had been "tidied away" by someone in this household...... On the topic of proposed (or, at least, contemplated) railways, we have the following, from around 1840: Thomas Legh ..... wanted to establish a large coal depot on the spit and run a tram road along the whole length of the peninsula to connect with the mainland 'at Milford, Hordle and Keyhaven etc,' Then there is a discussion of Legh's bitumen building-material project, followed by: Arthur Watson ..... also mentioned Legh's scheme for a railway to convey the finished product to the mainland. And this: Mr Hignett ..... goes on to describe Legh as 'a very eccentric gentleman, and fancies he can make a Rail Road from a certain point at Hurst Beach, across the mud to Lymington or Keyhaven'. And finally: Legh ..... at once pursued the idea of his railway from Hurst across the marshes to Lymington. We should recall that the railway line from Southampton to London had only been opened in 1840 and there was not to be a link with Lymington until 1857 ..... The Admiralty, however, stepped in and scotched the idea in its infancy because in its view no bridge should be erected across the entrance to Keyhaven Lake... I never knew it as Keyhaven Lake - it was always the River to me. But Google calls it a Lake. From all of this, it sounds as though Legh was contemplating different routes at different times: I suppose that Rule 1 applies to railway speculators just as it applies to railway modellers. And then, for the real narrow gauge line we have the following: In about 1895 the military constructed a narrow gauge (1 foot 8 1/2 inches) railway from the east pier into the castle. This greatly eased the supply of heavy materials into the fort. An additional, short tramway was constructed from the Camber [the bay at the end of the river] to the Castle Inn which facilitated the movement of beer and fuel from the boats to the inn. Remnants of this tramway remained until about 1975. It's not clear, but since the Castle Inn was well to the north of the other buildings, and supplied from the river, I would guess that this tramway was not connected to the military line. Modelling Possibilities? A fun model of the real or hypothetical railways is likely to be pretty fantastical. Also, in 4mm scale, one would need 6m to accommodate the full length of the Palmerston fort. So how about this: A drastically reduced fort: The Tudor towers with smaller diameter and one less story, plus much smaller Palmerston wings (two or three guns only on each side). The lighthouse, inn and other buildings, close together and closer to the fort. All of this on a much smaller spit. A OO6.5 railway (courtesy of Narrow Planet, Busch and whoever else makes relevant items). The gauge is about right. This could follow a shrunken route based on the real military railway route, plus whatever extensions can be crammed in (and linked to the Castle Inn tramway). Either or both of Legh's possible routes (as I've imagined them) as standard gauge, OO9, OOn3 or 7' broad gauge (why not?). For people who like a tunnel leading to a fiddle yard, the spit could be shortened and Hordle cliffs brought much closer. Since this is all pretty daft, why not give it a mild and tasteful steampunk flavour? A paddle-wheel ironclad moored at the east pier, an airship tethered to the Tudor fort.... Right. You can all hand your homework in on Monday morning, or before.

That was mostly successful, although a little glue did leak out, which will call for a bit more tidying up. So for the second side I glued on (then sanded back) another plasticard shim, to make a snugger fit. This is the overall result: I made different choices, on the two sides, of windows to turn into blank panels. It's nice to break symmetry once in a while. Meanwhile, I have thinned down one of the rain strips on the roof of the 6 wheel coach, and I've started work on the other. I'm using masking tape to save the roof from getting scratched. I stick a piece of tape over the rain strip, then cut along each side with a scalpel and peel off the resultant thin, curved strip.

Very nice! My conversion, along similar lines, has been in progress for just over 18 months. So many pieces of plastic, so little time.....

And this is what I did: I used my set-square as a flat (ferrous) base, and held the body down with magnets. The side-piece is held in place with tape (and trapped below the plasticard strip). Glue applied on the inside, but only at the bottom (not very visible here). The roof and more tape, to hold everything in place. After the bottom glue had set, I applied some glue up the sides of the joins (on the inside), and then used an aluminium strip to keep the inside surfaces in one plane while it dried. The aluminium foil is an attempt to minimise the effect of any leaks.

Thanks Huw I'm not completely sure yet, but something like that. I'll probably have two gluing phases per side - firstly gluing the bottom with the roof in place to hold the top, and then gluing the top. There is a tiny bit of asymmetry between the two sides, and my top priority is to avoid a kink in the horizontal beading around the long bottom panel. In any event, I'll use masking tape so that it'll come off easily. It's a 0.25mm (10 thou) on each side. It's still very slightly loose, and I could add another layer and sand it back. But I won't bother with that, because I know that I need to apply filler afterwards in any case. Nooooo! Don't be sorry about questions! The only stupid question is the unasked question! I wouldn't have attempted this without poring over the work of Nile and Corbs and many others here. And caution is right and proper. I use mainly the cheapest RTR items (these coaches and the 0-4-0 tank engines) as my starting point. But although they're cheap compared to Hornby's expensive offerings (or compared to, say, a yacht) they're still not cheap compared to a loaf of bread. A little bit of caution keeps us from being wasteful.

While all our minds are boggling, I need to add something to this. Many years ago I made a wooden castle for my daughter. And (since all Britains knights are in hacking-each-other-up poses) I sculpted a 54mm prince and princess out of polymer clay, and cast them in metal. I had the luxury of working the an armature, and since I was using polymer clay I could add and remove material as much as necessary, only stopping when I could no longer make improvements. And I reckon my 54mm faces are about as good as snitzls 20mm faces.

Meanwhile, in other news, the parts of the 4-wheel luggage/brake coach are ready for re-assembly. I have: Filled some windows to make panels. Removed unwanted (or to-be-moved) glazing from the roof. Added plasticard to replace the material lost to the razor saw. Scraped away the beading where the duckets will go. Scraped away unwanted door ironmongery, and the moulded GWR crests. The plasticard strips in the body are to help locate the panels when I glue them back in. Which will be tomorrow, if all goes according to plan. It's rather bendy where the sides are missing. So as much a possible, for gluing, I will put the roof back on so that the glazing can hold the two ends in their correct relative positions.

Indeed. I've had OK results with ordinary acrylics on FUD, but only after a lot of work on getting rid of the waxy scum. I've also had some warping of a FUD part, although it was rather long and thin...... I'm really looking forward to your Edward. But don't feel you have to rush for my sake - there are always Nile's pictures to keep me going! I like marzipan, but I prefer it when it's incorporated into some kind of pastry.

I enjoyed the forum post - thanks for all these construction details.

That's a good idea - a little bit of an optical illusion.

Rain strips. I think the curve is OK, although maybe it should be shallower. But I should have used thinner strips. These are 1mm square. And 1mm corresponds to three of those old fashioned inches, or 76.2 shiny new millimetres. So they are more what you might call rain timbers than rain strips. I will try to reduce them with abrasives of some sort. I will also try to be more careful next time!

I'm trying to imitate the style of the 4-wheel coaches' lamps and ventilators, rather than make something realistic-looking. So, plastic discs cut with a leather hole punch, thick on one side and thin on the other: Holes drilled through the thin discs all the way through the roof. I tried to get them vertical, rather than perpendicular to the roof. And plastic rods through the holes. These were all cut somewhat over-length, then levelled with a piece of sandpaper stuck to a flat wooden block. Rain strips next.

I didn't like the thread title when I first read it: Get creative? How dare you? We're all creative here, thank you very much! Clearly I was wrong. Shame on me.

Not to worry - this has happened before, so I'm inclined to think that it may have been a gormless choice of user name!

Tom, not Mike! As a teenager I knew two sisters of unparalleled beauty whose father had (I think) recently studied for some kind of radio license. He (practising his alphabet) gave me this nickname, and these days I use it in a couple of places on the Internet. I did consider laminating thin plasticard. But my first roof was made of the two original coach roofs, cut to size and joined with a curved bridge of laminated plasticard. After the initial satisfactory gluing this ended up warping over time. I thought that this might have been caused by excessive use of solvent, and it made me wary of lamination. But I'll probably try it if I make another roof (or if I make another coach like this - I still have an unused chassis kit).

I've put a coach-size-comparison picture in my own thread, so as to provide a coherent narrative for future archaeologists.

How time flies when you're procrastinating! I haven't actually made anything yet, or even designed anything. But I did buy a Peco coach in order to get a better idea of sizes. I wasn't especially surprised to find that the Parkside/Dundas coach really is a bit on the small side (but not so much that it looks out-of-scale). The N-gauge chassis is barely longer than the Peco coach, so perhaps it will be fine to put two compartments on it, instead of two-and-a-half.

I hit a procrastination snag, as follows: I decided to make a roof. To match the original roof, I chose to use 1.5mm plasticard. You can't bend this thick stuff round a form and apply heat - it's too stiff. I had to: Put it in the oven, resting flat on the curved form. Put a piece of thin card over it, weighed down so that when the heat softened the plastic it would be forced down over the form. The form was a bottle (I poured out the dregs of the nasty plum liquor that came in it) with a few layers of thin card on top, to increase the diameter. This caper required several iterations, adding layers of card to the bottle until I was happy with the diameter (heating and cooling every time). But in the end I wasn't happy with the diameter - it's a little too big. After all the effort I was loath to start again, and unsure of how to proceed. So I did nothing. Last week I picked it up again and decided to attach the roof. It'll do for now, and if it starts to annoy me I can always make another. So here it is: Those end pieces are a snug fit, and they keep it in place pretty well. I might add a magnet, as per some of Nile's coaches. If I shelve the lighting part of the plan, then I have only to add the rainstrips, ventilators and lamps. It might be done by Christmas!

This picture interests me. I've been using my Parkside coach kits as a size reference for my tentative plans, but with a strong suspicion that they're a bit on the small side. I've just acquired one of these Peco brake coaches (a green one with buffers), and indeed it makes the Parkside coach look rather titchy. Not necessarily out-of-scale, but definitely a bit cramped for the poor passengers.