brynnydd

My two metcalfe kits came in! Gosh are these lovely kits, they look so great and are really fun to build. I've almost finished the first one (just need to paint up the plastic staircase). Here it is on the layout with some added signage cut from a bag of flour.

The FLR was very kindly featured in this year's spring issue of the Micro Model Railway Dispatch on page 58. You can read it here: https://micromodelrailwaydispatch.com/ Thank you Ian for all your great work in creating this lovely magazine.

Middlefork Dockyard has recieved some new rolling stock! Firstly is Emily, her likeness is my favorite steam locomotive, and while she can't do the inglenook puzzle on the layout with her tender, she can run without and shunt wagons and vans just fine. With her is a purple moose brewery wagon. I sadly wasn't able to get a non-weathered one, but I'm very happy to have it regardless and may try de-weathering it some. Emily went straight to work and delivered a flat wagon containing a tractor from the FLR (their forestry operations are giving way to conservation so this old tractor has been sent to the docks to help out). It's a Trumpeter tractor kit I saw and thought it looked cute. I had a lot of fun assembling it and painting it up in FLR blue. Not my best paint jeb (I'm still learning how to paint machines) but I think it fits the layout. Currently, I'm looking around for some stuff to make a load of coal for one of my plank wagons, and figuring out the cargo for the other. And of coruse, I'm waiting for a package from the UK with two metcalfe kits to fill out some of the empty space on the layout. Thanks for looking!

I will let you know. I do live in a wet climate, but it is sealed in with a layer of pva glue, and then a layer of varnish. I will keep an eye on it regardless.

Sounds like a lovely little layout! I can't wait to see what you make.

Thank you very much! Oh wow this is superb information. Thank you very much for your reply. I now have a bunch of ideas to ponder and see what I can make. :) That is a very good point, thank you very much. I shall keep that in mind. Thank you! I used quinoa. I used some white glue to affix a mound of quinoa to some foam board and seal the quinoa. I then made a wash with some brown paint and put it all over. Once that had dried I did an over-brush of a khaki, and finally a dry brush of a light khaki. It was pretty simple and quick to do. What a macabre cargo! Rubbish in general a very interesting idea, I'm now debating about making a compost wagon. Thank you very much.

Thank you for the info but, I'm not looking for accuracy in the exact wagons, just their loads modeled. I'm just having fun building my fictional railways and I think the privately owned wagons are a lot more creative and cute.

Very cute! I love the charm and warmth you have captured in your layout. Thank you so much for sharing.

Hello, I read a few months ago in my LNER book that sugar beets were often transported in surplus coal wagons. I took that inspiration to make my own load for one of my wagons as while I love the look and character of coal wagons, the coal itself looks a bit dull. I was wondering if anyone would know if any other goods were carried in these wagons? Hopefully with some photographic evidence? I've got two other coal wagons I'd like to fix up and am just really struggling to find any information about this topic at all on the internet sadly. Thanks very much!

It has been quite a while since my last update, life always seems to get in the way. Progress continues though! I built and painted a Dapol plastic railway buildings kit that seemed to have very old tooling that I got in my last package from Hattons. The loading gauge needed it's own anchor point and a bit of a lift up, but the water pump, coal office (I've pressed into service as a station office) and tool hut came out well enough. They go along rather well with my scratch built signal, the back of which is seen here. The cutting at the board in front is to eventually make a border of the docks, and that forward section will have some water effects and maybe a boat or two. I'm still not sure on that. However I also painted up my AHM warehouse kit finally, and I found a pricing sticker on one of my dog's treats from a local brand. I thought it would be fitting to trim off the barcode and price and use it as a little sign. I may make a black back for this warehouse, it was originally a "working pipe loader" model kit from who knows when found at a thrift store and play-ability seemed to be more of the focus than looks. I am waiting though to shuffle these buildings along into a place I like before making a backing for it however. I have a lot of experience scratch building (trash bashing really) fantasy and scifi terrain for rpgs, but my my skills aren't in this scale, or really of this precision. However I am keeping an eye out for things that would work, and here's an attempted power or transformer building of some sort made out of a chessex dice box and some odds and ends. I think it looks alright for now, and certainly better at distance. Finally, I have firmly decided on an industrial dock scene with the side the viewer looks in from being the coast, rather than the layout working as a peninsula. I've ordered two Metcalfe building kits to fill out the empty space and I hope they can come in soon. I'll probably get up to some other little odds and ends as well.

I made some small progress today. Last night before bed I was reading the LNER150 book and read that they carried sugar beets in coal wagons. I thought this would be a great idea to fill up some of my wagons while adding some variety. So I used some white glue to affix a mound of quinoa to some foam board. I then made a wash with some brown paint and put it all over. Once that had dried I did an over-brush of a khaki, and finally a dry brush of a light khaki. I think it turned out pretty well! Also, the building behind the wagon in this shot I scratch built as a loco shed for my last layout, but felt very out of scale. So I'm hoping it can work as a dilapidated warehouse/shed/etc for this one.

I find doing some shunting helps me think, so as I was doing so I noticed the decoupler I had made for my OO9 layout (A paperclip attached to an old pencil) was struggling with the tension lock couplers. So, I looked around and found some interesting "shovel" type decouplers people had 3d printed. Lacking a 3d printer, instead opted to carve one of of a stick which didn't take long at all: Seems to work very well! I'm currently debating on if I want a full-size inglenook or not, and am leaning towards the former as I do have some lovely wagons. I may change up the track plan some though to have a bit more space for scenery.

Well thank you so very very much for all your posts, this has been very helpful and given me quite a bit to ponder about. My last layout was a minimum inglenook upgraded to a ginglenook (4-2-2), and while it turned out really well, having more rolling stock on the layout, and the added complexity and length of puzzling was something I wanted to do with this layout. However, after looking at your drawing and your explanations of different siding uses and such, i am now wondering if it might be worth it to make this one too a minimum inglenook with the passaround loop, it would certainly give me more things to model and work on, besides just a yard. I will certainly check out the Sheep Chronicles to see their inspiration. I sadly don't have room for a fiddlestick (structurally or space-wise) where my layout lives, so that is also a limiting factor. It's definitely something to think about though! My track is "pinned down" but it's just track nails in insulation foam, they pop out easy enough with a slight tug. It's mostly to be able to test out the track plan without the torque and weight of the 08 pulling the fishplates of unsecured track apart as it trundled past. And wow, do I love that idea of the hole in the wall for my layout. That 04 in that first photo looks absolutely perfect, squeezing between those buildings. I most certainly will use that. :) I will also check out that ebay store for some buildings, I certainly need some. Again thank you very very much for all your advice and help! I think I'll be spending the rest of this weekend messing about with trying to replicate something near what you've drawn me.

I recently got my first OO locomotive and figured it would be a good start a layout so it can have somewhere to work. Space, as with my last layout, was the main limitation so I got a 48"x12" (actually 47.70"x11.7" for some reason...) board as that was the maximum size it could be. The layout will be on the top of a metal shelving rack, with my old layout on the shelf below. I really wanted a layout I could puzzle around with, and really enjoy the inglenook layout, and while I could fit a full sized one in OO on this board, I'd seen a different setup that involved a reversing loop that I thought looked very fun: But sadly no matter how much I fiddled around with my second-hand atlas track, I couldn't get the pass-around loop to fit on the board, while also fitting a full capacity inglenook. So somewhat sadly, I returned to a normal inglenook. I did briefly consider just making the layout just a pass-around loop, but I don't think that would fit with my dockyard theme, nor fill my desire for shunting puzzles. (My full stock of wagons and my one coach are in photo too): For the look of the layout I wanted a way-side dockyard that had seen better days. A typical concrete dock. I chose the name 'Middlefork" as it sounded nautical, while also like an out of the way place. Next was putting some foam to cover the wood to have a better surface to work from. I initially tried foam-core board, but it warped itself it uselessness and wasn't thick enough. Instead, I had some insulation foam and began to cut it into pieces to cover the board, but every so slightly not enough for full coverage. I then mixed up a bunch of different greys and brushed over the top of the board for the concrete surface. Following that I used track nails to pin the track in place. (One section of the main siding is missing in this photo, it is now on the layout though): And this is where I've been able to get to with it this week. I am thinking of putting up a divider on the right side of the board as a fiddleyard area so I don't have to try to hide the wiring, and also to hide the lack of insulation foam in that one corner. Otherwise right now I have a small storage building I need to paint up, I need to make some buffers for the ends of the track, and from there ponder what next I can do to make it more dockyard-ish. There's plenty of work to be done, and quite a bit of thinking and pondering to do too. I'd appreciate any suggestions anyone may have! Here's the layout up on it's shelf and my 08 happily shunting away:

Between the 500 error i get connecting to the website, and my brief look at their preowned OO wagon page before so, something is going on. Like, all the old, plastic wheeled, scuffed up, chewed on, missing buffers and couplers, wagons are just gone. I feel like those would be one of the last things to sell? Edit: Looks like I can get on the site now, and that stuff is showing in stock. Seems to be more website issues than vanishing stock. People are buying up anything decent quickly though.