Leon

Not a great place for a name to go ??? Deffo need some more 56's thou, there were plenty of steel ones in South Wales. Maybe a few coal to..

Maybe I will model 56013 then seen as its pretty much ready, however can only find a few pics of it , was trying to find a pic of it around Wales. In one pic its on its side in a hedge ! Why did Hornby produce this one? It looks like it never got up to much except crashing.....

Found it... Now did Hornby ever produce a DCC ready one......

Nice one Lewis that saves me alot of researching, was it ever based or worked around the South Wales area? I do remember seeing a few blue 56 on Iron Ore tippers between PT and Llanwern but I was young then and never took any dates or numbers...My house backed onto the south wales mainline in Cardiff when freight was busier, wish I could go back to the 80,90s much more interesting mixed freight trains.

Thanks Lewis, must admit the era I was to model was pre class 66 but I do like them and as you said they are a welcome splash of colour, looking to get a blue 56 next I think.

Had an hours break from decorating today and added a few floodlights to the depot building..Nothing really exciting happening at the mo sorry guys.

Hello Richard, yes they also do a few other usefull bits for depot area's like I said though the platform was very awkward to build. Tricky to fold and glue. Is your layout on here? Regards, Leon.

Sorry Richard, did see but yes forgot to reply, No Simon, the platform was by Ten Commandments and I hated every minute of building it, stuck all my fingers together and in the end Lisa had to help me finish it....Ive not even attempted to put the wheels on yet.... Hopefully there will be ready made ones soon, maybe Bachmann can make one...

Thanks Georgie, good to see you back on yours..... Im having a few days away from it now, had too much false lighting and areosols the lastweek. My wife was showing everyone the photo's of my layout the other night and seen my one with the knightwing fuel point and said OMG theres even a bus stop....! classic. I like the fuel point addition on Springs, George.

Thanks all for the kind comments, and a big thanks to the RM team for running the website, I'm sure many will agree that without the encouragement of the other modellers and seeing there pictures for inspiration I would not have got the layout as far as I have. The pic was a bit of a lucky shot....lol, took about 40 and that one just came out spot on I think. Thanks again all. Leon

Hi Jack, no bother, there is a rough drawn one on towards the bottom of page 4. Cheers Leon.

Hi Rob and thanks. Like I said earlier all the trackwork is laid and pretty much ballasted, just needs a bit more weathering then all thats left is to improve all the bits im not happy with then start to get some rolling stock to play with, also need to lay the fiddle yards at each end but that should not take long as there not going to have ballast or weathering of course. Hows things with you ? Just done a little on the 56 & 60 adding the nameplates that have been here a while. Few pics of a Crew 47 delivering a TTA and 56032 on shed after having its name fitted.

Thanks mud, nice to hear that from someone who has a great layout. Orchard Rd is looking very good. Just adding the name plates to 60062 Samuel Johnson and 56032 County of South Glam. Does anyone know if either of these locos carried a Canton plaque? I can't seem to find any pics. Many thanks Leon.

Thanks Branchie, most of the wagons I want are all pre order such as Railfreight HEA and BDA, POA scrap wagons and OTA timber wagons. Might have to buy another class 37 instead.

Just a few more of locos on shed.

Alawys welcome Simon, anytime. However not got any fiddle yards at ends yet, thants the next job. Pretty much finished ballasting the last piece of the layout today which is the area of track entering the layout and the fueling area. Now I can start tweaking and improving as alot of the layout was "that will do" also I can hopefully start spending money on rolling stock and loco's. Added some pics, hope you like

Thanks Simon, I did look at a rolling road but thought they were a bit pricey, not as pricey as a fitted 56 I guess, lol. Are you ever in Cardiff ?

I think the fact that i was running it against an elastic band prob didnt help, then the burning smell and smoke. Maybe I cooked the chip ????? I have a spare 8-pin somewhere I will try that.

Hi all. Dave love the idea, off to the shed to get my old wheels... Need some help. As I have not run my locos much as Ive been building the layout I thought today I would run some in so I screwed an elastic band across the track and run my Hornby DCC fittted 56 against it. After about 15min it started to burn and smoke so I quickly removed it..after 20 min on the window sill cooling I tried it back on the layout hoping it was still alive..... It burst into life..... but, would not stop for anything.... The only way was to hit the STOP button on my Dynamis... would not respond to declatrating the speed. I have even deleted the loco and still everytime it touches the rails his whizzes off ! Have I cooked something? Any help would be great as I love this loco.... All the other loco's are working normaly. Sorry about bad spelling in a rush.. Thanks in advance Leon...

Thanks for the wishes about the job guys, really nice. Not getting a huge amount of visable work done just yet as im waiting for my last payday to get paints and parts etc & maybe a redundancy pressy..., roll on Friday. Need to get an airbrush with compressor I think, keep running out of propellant whilst weathering the track. The pair of 37 had the snowploughs fitted, just need weathering now and also added some sinage to the service shed. All the best guys and thanks everbody, Leon.

The weathering of the 09 has to be put on hold as the numbers and "Dick Hardy" name will not come off with thinners, going to have to paint over them I think. Anyway here is a grubby 37 to be going on with. Pheeeew its hot in the atic.....

Hello All, After droping the wife and friends into town I poped my head into the atic armed with a beer, started off well until the 2nd beer... Done some work on the M4 & A48 nearly ready for painting and road surface. Added some pics for you.

Could do with some idea's from you guys, The lenght of track in the corner next to the wagon works is going to have a motorway bridge over it to hide the corner and act as a backscene, (see pic earlier of class 60 & TTA). the track its on was just going to be a headshunt for the depot being long enough to back TTA's down to. Now though I am thinking about turning it into a second siding for the wagon works? or have it disapearing into a tunnel to give the impresion it goes somewhere.. Any thoughts, basically, do I put buffers on there or not...? lol Cheers Leon

Thank you very much Claggy, and thanks David and others for the job wishes. Cleggy. Opperation wise, I am going to break it into three areas for a potential three opperators. Fiddle yards at each end of the layout. The shorter wall of the attic is were the main curved yard is and can be worked by one shunter, readying trains and moving wagons to the wagon wks/depot & docks as needed. There are also two sidings in the yard I have used to stable departmental stock and a much more overgrown siding that holds stored/withdrawn stock. I have yet to work out how much the 8 sidings in the yard can hold. There is the depot area that could be opperated by a second person to fuel loco's etc and getting them ready for work, there is also an area for TTA's to be unloaded for the depots fuel tanks, the depot has 5 roads in total an can hold up to 12 locos. At the other end is a steelworks which hides the branch to a hidded docks/fiddle yard. I thought that having a pretend dock would add greatly to the types and amount of railfreight on the layout (takes away the fact its and end to end layout ish, the trains have a purpose and destination not just a fiddle yard to go to.). A third opperator could be in charge of the second 08/09 docks and steelworks shunter, tasked with tripping wagons from the docks to the yard & steel transhipment shed or wagon works as required and also would be used to shunt the two sidings in the steelworks. I have loosely based the docks on Newport & Cardiff so am able to have a pristene EWS 66 .. just off the boat.... The fact that there is fiddle yard after the yard which acts as the docks means I am able to use mainline locos to pull heavier trains from the docks to the rest of the rail network, trains such as steel, coal, pretoleum, boxed wagons and timber etc. obviously any smaller trainloads would just be tripped down by either the yard or docks shunter. I think at times and once I get more rolling stock I will opperate the sidings as "busy" full, and also on the "decline" empty.. I have also been trying to think of a way to have Intercity and RES Class 47's on the shed, Pasenger trains are imposible for the area modelled, maybe they could just stable/fuel there at peak times?????? However Im sure once on the net I seen a pic of a RES 47 at Ebbw Vale steelworks..? Hope this makes sense. Kind regards Leon.