artizen

Yes - I remember this one! Looking good now - keep it up. The buildings and the street scenes particularly set the scene nicely already. Your efforts with rolling stock are looking good to me as well (I am also of the school that it's better to have a go than to constantly dither about rivets). Good to see this one on the forum again.

I just lurk in the background waiting to see how this all shapes up. I am waiting for the breakdown of the parts used as I would really love to apply this technology to both my 1:43 layout (diecast road vehicles) and my 1:24 layout (the Emhar 1:24 Bedford truck). Keep going!

Stumbled onto this by accident! What a great concept. I have already bought a cheap RC toy car with the idea of butchering the chassis from it into a diecast 1:43 Morris Oxford or similar. Not sure if the weight of the diecast model would overpower the toy motor though. Worth a try just for a laugh really. Keep this thread going - I am currently building a small Gn15 diorama and I have 1:24 Bedfords I could use for RC - that would be a neat trick for shows! Let us know what you use for control - I am completely hopeless at electronics but want my layouts to have more interest than just an occasional locomotive movement. Now that we have the beautifully detailed rolling stock I think it is about time we had equally realistic road scenes to complement.

Very nice. Always wanted to do the Bill and Ben bash! Are they digital out of the box? For the money I would have thought not but as I am digital now it is important to know if there is an extra cost for chipping. The cheap wagons look surprisingly good as well. Interesting that 4mm wagons are only 2mm different from 7mm scale stuff. In our freelance world, that means absolutely perfect! Close coupling helps as well. If you want to know how to make cheap grass tufts, just ask and I will reveal all. Back to making bricks for my Gn15 layout today.

Huge!!! Am I right in thinking that this is the layout with the spiral that uses threaded metal rods to create the right gradient and spacing? I might be confusing this one with somewhere else - too many forums! If the uprights on the spiral are indeed metal rods I would suggest putting safety caps on them in case you stab yourself (don't ask how I know this). Love the quantity of rolling stock - my budget would never run to even a quarter of that lot. I swore I would only run two diesels and one steam loco on any of my layouts but so far I have succumbed to temptation and have at last count six diesels and no suitable kettles. Looking forward to the scenics making this a fantastic visual feast.

Isn't it interesting how the camera lies to us. In one of the first photos of this thread, the track behind the loco is definitely straight as a ruler but in the later pic where the ballasting techniques is discussed, the track looks like a dog's hind leg. Just as well we're not using the photos to find faults with the build!!!!!! I remember this layout from the previous RMweb and I have to say that the ballast painting technique certainly overcomes a lot of issues with the type of material initially used for ballast as the paint will almost completely hide what was glued down - be it stone, crushed walnut shells, or something else. The results are certainly worth the small extra effort. After all, time spent on the track and making it operate and look as good as this is repaid in the future with a more believable operating scenario. I suppose you are preaching to the converted as I am in the middle of laying all my track as I type this with hand cut sleepers, hand laid track and spikes. Oh the dreaded spikes! Only another eleven metres to go! Then I have to work out how to electrify the thing.

Hessle Haven and Eastwood Town. Sigh. What a choice!!!!

How big (long x high) does your backscene need to be? I have the ID Backscenes here but they might be more suitable for the larger scales. The biggest problem I have with all of them is the height. I believe a backscene directs the viewer down into the model and therefore should be at least 600mm high to achieve that.

This week's plan is for a 7mm scale narrow gauge vaguely Welsh preserved steam railway. It will be a railway in a landscape as I find the scenery side more interesting than counting rivets, particularly as most of the rolling stock will be based on or sourced from 0n30 bases with suitably modified passenger coaches and diesel locos. For example I can buy the Bachmann 0-4-0 diesel critter with DCC for only $65 US and 3 sets of bogies and underframes for a further $41 which gives me the basis for a passenger train at minimal cost. The alternatives such as accurate steam locos for this model will come later when I have cut my teeth on modifying the Bachmann stuff. Looking at the modern preserved railway in the UK, the coaches appear to be individual designs so I can freelance happily and hopefully create something feasible even if it is not accurate. I am going to hand lay all the track using wooden sleepers (still waiting) and Kalgarin 82/7 rail with spikes from the US ($30 for 5,000). Should keep me busy for a few lunchtimes! At least it will be a place to show off my collection of Morris Minors and tractors (of the farming kind).

Good news. Today was a deliberately slow day at work (I work from home) because I had my boy home due to a lack of cars to get him to school. Did he want to help me build my new railway empire under the house? No, of course not, he just did the Top Gear marathon and ate the kitchen clean. So, I have now built the support structure for the platform that will support the layout when it is stored under the house. Tomorrow I will clear the existing storage out of the space so I can get the platform inserted and then I have to build more storage because we are incapable of throwing anything away. Anyway I have to clear my half of the garage so that when my car is finally fixed it has its home back. I decided a long time ago that the rule has to be that you first of all determine the maximum space you can have and then design the layout to suit. In my case, the space appears to be around 4.8 metres long x 1.4 metres deep. The layout will need to be split into six panels of 1400mm x 700mm so they all fit through the door. As I have decided to make the total height of the layout 850mm high so that I have a decent backscene height, I do not want to be tipping boards on an angle to get them through doors etc! I am trying to take photos of the build for posterity so when I have finished I can show the sequence. Hopefully if I get time to start on the baseboards, I will have something to post for everyone's enjoyment. Wish me luck!