Rowan

many thanks @Hal Nail. I have to say, I am very tempted with the kit but thanks for posting the photos.

@Nick Holliday You are quite correct - I did mean 'Bramley'. Apologies and the original post has been corrected.

Thanks for the info. I suspect I have most, if not all, the photographs of Cynwyd station. Sadly, although they give a very good overview, none are detailed enough to enable a 'brick count' survey of the building. Can I clarify, I am not replicating Cynwyd station in its entirety but only using the station building - the layout is just a figment of my imagination.

As many of you are aware I live in Malaysia and am currently building an 00 gauge shelf layout of a fictitious country station somewhere on the Ruabon/Dolgellau line set in circa 1910. For inspiration of the station building I am using Cynwyd, which no longer exists. However, based on photographs of 1910, it appears to be a generic GWR station building very similar to Malvern Wells and Bramley (Hants). I am not sure if Malvern Wells still exists but Bramley (Hants) certainly does. I know of no one who lives in the Basingstoke area so my question is, does anyone have an array of photographs of the main building of Bramley (Hants) station sufficient for me to scratch build a model. I can work up elevations, etc. as templates using AutoCad by counting bricks (I was an architect in a previous life!). Thanks, Rowan.

I have just started making the Ratio 531 kit and my already diminished head of hair is even more diminished! In all my years of making kits of various types and materials from various manufacturers I don't think I have ever encountered such badly written/drafted instructions! There is no substantial guidance as to the optimum sequence for assembling the kit. I am not even halfway and already I have had to dismantle parts many times to enable me fit other parts in place. My guess is Peco have made the classic mistake of not having a someone unfamiliar with the product test both the kit and the instructions. Can anyone kindly point me in the direction of some clearer instructions I can download? Thanks.

That is not my experience! I am still waiting for a response to an email last November and resent in January!

Many thanks, guys, for the extremely useful information. Does anyone have any feedback on the Peco 'Prince' and 'Princess' locos? Cheers, Rowan.

Hi Guys, A bit of pre-planning here. Can anyone kindly point be in the direction of a list of FR locos operating in about 1910? In about a year's time (God willing) I will be starting an 009 model loosely based on the FR. I plan to have 2 locos, one pulling coaches and the other slate and returning with general freight. I am considering Machmann's Fairlie for the passenger train but am confused over the colour - maroon or green? I would like to use a non-Fairlie for the slate/goods train, DCC ready preferably. Any suggestions? The time period for the model is 1910ish so I can use surplus figures, etc. from my current 00 gauge model which is similarly set in the Edwardian era. Cheers.

@The Stationmaster Mike, I'm not sure if you know the answer to this. If not, as the saying goes, can you kindly point me in the direction of 'a man who can'. I intend to fit Accurascale screw link couplings to both locos and all rolling stock that were fitted with screw link couplings in the prototype. Although largely cosmetic, Accurascale screw link couplings can be used to hook locos and stock. Can you kindly point me in the direction as to how to fit these to locos as the like. Do I remove the hook on the buffer beam and form a slot to fit the Accurascale coupling or do I drill a hole in the existing buffer beam hook to take the 1st link of the screw link coupling. Advice would be most welcome as I really don't want to mess up a loco experimenting/learning how to fit them. Cheers.

@KeithMacdonald Many thanks for posting. This is educated guesswork. Looking at the Cynwyd bridge, I think the deck structure fitted within the depth of the lower panels. Bearing in mind the bridge would have been built when this section of the Ruabon/Dolgellau line was constructed (1885ish) I recon the basic structure would have been short span brick arches between riveted iron 'H' or 'T' section beams. I doubt these beams would have spanned abutment to abutment but spanned the shortest span from plate girder to plate girder and would probably have been located at the plate junctions where the girders would have been at their strongest. The roadway above the arches would have been formed of crushed stone in layers, each one getting finer. In 1910, there would have been no macadam surface, just fine gravel. In the photo, the plate girders appear to be supported on corbeled padstones. These appear to corbel out to increase the width of the abutment rather than reduce the span of the plate girders, which I find a little strange.

Many thanks @rovex and many thanks to everyone else. Brick arches between lateral H beams makes sense, reinforced concrete as a structural material not having been developed until after the 1880's when the bridge would have been built. I doubt I will be building the bridge soffit (not seen) but it does give me an idea as to where the road surface would be in relation to the side plate girders. In the model, the bridge abuts the end board so I will only be building half the width of the bridge.

Hi Guys and Gals, Maes y Coed plan originally had a 'road over' plate girder bridge at one end but I scrapped that idea thinking in wildest North Wales in 1910 they would have used other materials. Instead I went for a Wills SS53 brick arch bridge thinking it would be more fitting to the location and era. Once built, I realised the kit was useless both it terms of its overall construction and its detail so that got cosigned to the scrapyard! The next idea was a simple level crossing as used at the other end of the model, which I would start building after I completed the station building. Then I found this - Cynwyd station in 1912. Cynwyd is on the Ruabon/Dolgellau line as is the mythical Maes y Coed so it's back to a plate girder bridge! However it's all going to have to be scratch built. Can anyone kindly point me in the direction of where to find the construction of GWR plate girder bridges? I am guessing there will be girders/RSJs between the plate girders plus some form of planking to support the roadway (gravel in 1910). Why were the plates split horizontally? Any ideas? Mr Google has failed me in this instance so any advice will be greatly appreciated.

As a retired architect, nothing raises my blood pressure more than kits/building sheets that are incorrect and it is inexcusable when the correct sizes are so easily obtained. Living in Malaysia, I cannot just pop down to a model railway exhibition or a model shop to see a product before I buy. I am totally dependent upon the manufacturer's information and I have to assume the manufacturers know their business. The problems manifest themselves only when the kits/building sheets arrive at my door. By then I have a simple choice - wasted money or waste hours of time making something I know to be incorrect. Wills are, by far, the greatest offenders. All their brickwork kits, components and building sheets seem to operate on the basis that British brick coursing is three courses per foot. It is not: it is four. But Wills are not the only offenders. Slaters paving slab embossed sheets are incorrect in both the slab size and bond. Standard paving slabs are 3'x2', 2'x2' or 2'x1' and are laid to a 1/3rd bond. Their 0419 stone courses embossed sheet is not correct for OO gauge either and I will have to re-order the sheets I need using their 0420 sheet, which they state is for O gauge. All the Wills brick components and building sheets have been consigned to the bin and all their brick building kits have been used a templates to scratch build. All the Slaters paving and stone courses sheets will be used only for reinforcing. Turning to the other subject of this thread, the Malaysian climate is particularly harsh on plastics - they all go like a prawn cracker within a few years! That said, the softer plastics used by Slaters and Ratio cope reasonable well. I have yet to find a successful way to prevent plastic from becoming brittle or a method of restoring it once it has become brittle.

@dpgibbons Spookily enough, I read the self same section of the GWR Modelling web site this morning so a big thank you for highlighting it. That website is very useful and very user-friendly. I would repaint with Phoenix Precision paint but, living in Malaysia, I have no means of shipping enamel paint. So, the sad truth is my older wagons have faded in the watery, Welsh sunshine and my little Welsh workmen originally mixed their paint to the 'some and plenty' formula! {;-) As @turbos succinctly points out, most of the care was lavished on the public face of the company.

Hi everyone. On the subject of GWR Freight Grey, I have a question. I recently bought an RTR Rapido Trains 16T Toad. The grey seems very dark. I have some older kit built wagons which are painted with Railmatch GWR Freight Grey enamel paint. They are a significantly lighter grey. Can anyone tell me, which is correct? Cheers.