wiggoforgold

"Marriage" of Diddington and Juniper Hill is going well. Mark and I have shared ideas over the years, so there was already a bit of Juniper Hill in Diddington, and a bit of Diddington in Juniper Hill. Some of Juniper Hill's stock has visited Diddington in the past, so it knows where it is. The main differences in the layouts is the point work, which on Diddington is PCB and on Juniper Hill is Peco code 75. Both layouts make use of Bachmann/Hornby mechs so no running problems. The other difference is couplings. Diddington uses DG couplings, and Juniper Hill uses the Hornby/Bachmann tension locks, so no coupling compatibility. Trains between the two will make use of stock from their parent layouts, except for services originating beyond Diddington, which will use Diddington stock.

I can now reveal that Diddington is to make an appearance at the RM Web members day in Taunton at the end of April. I'm very excited about this. Some months ago Mark Branson (46444) and I discussed the idea of using his layout "Juniper Hill" as the terminus of the agricultural tramway that leaves Diddington, and the purpose of the joining section "Middle Fen" which I have been working on over the last few months is to link the two layouts.

Trains now run between the two stations, Juniper Hill has acquired a set of legs to make it the same height as Diddington and new LED lights, and I'm currently putting the final touches to the presentation.

I've built a fixed back scene for Middle Fen, as my original idea for a roll up cloth back scene meant that fixed scenic items such as the fencing and telegraph poles would be vulnerable to damage during transportation. The new back scene is cut from a sheet of 3.5mm ply, screwed to the back of the layout, and the wings and proscenium which were removable are now screwed to the layout and back scene as well, to make a secure unit for transportation. Ive taken some pictures to show what it looks like now:

Back in Diddington station, heres a picture of D8233  moving in to the private siding.

I've been doing a bit of test running, and this revealed that the coal depot which I'd installed was slightly too close to the track to allow some items of stock to get past it. I did check the clearances before I installed it, but not with the items that caused the problems.

So, I bit the bullet, and removed the back from the coal cells, using a combination of cutting disc in the mini drill, a scrawker and a scalpel. Once off (it broke into 3 pieces) I reduced the height of the back by removing 6mm from the bottom as I felt it was too high to allow wagons to be unloaded into the coal cells.  I  then removed about 2mm from the end and internal walls, after which the back was refitted. The resultant gap between the coal and the back was filled with plaster, painted black, and sprinkled with coal, after first retouching the sides and back of the cells with Tamiya NATO black. Some items of junk including an old car body were painted up and fixed in place by the coal cells, before adding some static grass and a couple of coal men. I still want to add a lamp by the coal cells, and an old pair of coal scales among the long grass.

Here's a couple of pictures of the results.

The effect I'm trying to achieve might best be described as "rural decay". Diddington is modelled at a time when the line was under threat of closure. The turntable has already been removed, and the loco shed closed.  The rest of the line will follow suit in a couple of years or so. Not everyone's favourite period I know. Steam has gone, and the decline in the railways fortunes is a time of depression and disillusion for many.  It makes for interesting modelling though and it's the time I remember from childhood, and the model is an attempt to recreate that.

I've been following this thread with interest for a while as it brings back a lot of childhood memories. I like BR steam ECML layouts with lots of green Pacifics; indeed I've thought of giving it a go myself, but I'm looking at something a little east of the ECML. Your pics of the 9f bring back a memory I was going to ask if you could recreate. I remember a sweltering hot day in about 1961, I was at Wood Walton watching a 9f which had stooped at a signal struggling to restart a northbound train of mineral wagons. Every time it tried to start it slipped, and the crew were hanging out of the cab to get some respite from the sweltering heat. I think in the end another loco had to be sent back from Peterborough to rescue it.

Keep the pics coming, looking forward to seeing what comes next.

Watching this with interest as its my local viaduct. You can see my garden wall through the arches in Higlandman's photo. Let me know if you need any pics.

Alex

Jack

I was thinking of about 2m x 1.5m self contained for the Cornish BLT. The trackplan would be based on "Elan" in Iain RIce's "Model Railway Layout Design - Finescale in Small Spaces" (Which I'd recommend if you haven't already come across it.) Setting was inspired by elements from Looe, Fowey and Cotehele Quay (not all railways). I've put it on the backburner for now, though I've brought a loco.  I've used the plan before  - the farm on Diddington was on a previous layout which used the Elan plan. It sat on a jigsaw section of board,with a hole cut in it to allow it to fit over one of the hinges for folding the layout. With the building in place on the layout, the hinge was inside the barn. For this reason the model has a false wall about 1cm behind the front windows, so the hinge could not be seen through them.

You're right about the J15. It's for somewhere west of the Tamar. This time it will be a prototypical location not a million miles from Diddington, but set about 10 years earlier.

Alex

Hi Jack. Uz Cornish folk need to stick together. Mark may have told you I have given some thought to a small Cornish terminus, so I looked at your layout with interest. However, the forthcoming Hornby J15 has put that on hold.

Alex

Wrong headcode on the loco though!

 

Stewart

Wrong headcode on the loco though!

 

Stewart

The fat clergyman and the thin clergyman took a trip out to Middle Fen today to look at the trains. They had arranged to meet leading railway photographer Jonty Chambers, but he had stopped off at Juniper Hill in the East Midlands, and had been so fascinated by that line’s Austerity 0-6-0 that he missed the sight of Brush type 2 D5500 heading  across Middle Fen with a parcels train.

As for the models, D5500 is a Hornby model, renumbered and weathered.  The Morris Traveller is a Classix model.  It has been sprayed with Vallejo matt varnish, after which a very light wash of burnt umber oil pain was applied to the lower body panels, most of which was immediately wiped off with a cotton bud.  The lower edges of the body were sprayed with Tamiya matt earth.  Tyres were painted Tamiya dark grey, and the front wheels were turned by cutting the axle in the middle and bending the axle using pliers at a point just before it enters the wheel. The axle halves were then glued back in place with superglue.  The clergymen are from Monty’s Models, painted with Tamiya colours.

Spotted an 04 at Juniper Hill this morning..

Work on the joining sections been continuing over the Christmas period. I've been helped by 46444, who made the fences and telegraph poles.  I'm going to add a few more bushes and a couple of figures, but I want to keep the scene fairly uncluttered.  There's some work to do on the bridge, and I'll post some pictures of that when it's done.

Oh, and its acquired a name "Middle Fen" (because it's a fen, and in the middle between two stations.)

Back at Diddington, D6723 is shunting a horsebox into the horsebox siding for unloading.

I've done some more work installing the bridge on the joining section. The bridge is a concrete girder bridge, based on the one over the New Fen drain on the Wissington railway..

The abutments are blocks of 60X30 PSE, covered with styrene sheet. The abutments were painted, and surrounded with a lattice built up from strips of card. This was stuck together using a hot glue gun (the one I lost earlier in this thread). The lattice was then covered with squares of dress stiffening fabric, soaked in plaster, once dry, this was painted with an earth colour mixed from artists oil paints (Which I had to hand, having recently come into posession of a load of old oil paints.  This has now been covered with static grass, which is now drying.

Apologies for any typos in today's entries. I went to the Eye infirmary this afternoon for a routine checkup, and as part of the process they put dilating drops in my eyes which means the screen is currently very difficult to read!

Alex

I'm conscious it's nearly a month since I added anything to this.  I have been making models though. Internet has been a bit intermittent lately so I haven't done any entries, and when it has been up I've done a bit of modelling rather than sit at the computer. I'm envious of my friends who not only manage a prodigious modelling output, but then have time to take pictures and post about it as well.

I've been working on the joining section. I wired everything up (not a long job). When I laid the track I installed droppers to the rails to carry the power, only to realize when I cam to solder up the feeds that I hadn't left enough space between the baseboard frames to get my hand in with a soldering iron to fix everything up.  Lesson learned for future reference.

Work has progressed on the layout lighting. I've just discovered LED lights, thanks to another poster on here who wrote about them in his layout thread.  The lights are on a flexible strip, which is brought in rolls. Mine was 5m long and is easily cut to length. The strip is sticky backed, so installation is easy.

Before installing the lights I rebuilt the proscenium, as in the original construction the bottom edge of the proscenium was too high above the layout.  The idea of the display is that the proscenium acts as a view blocker, and hides the top edge of the back scene.  The bottom edge of the proscenium therefore needs to be low enough so that a person looking at the layout cannot see the top edge of the back scene. This arrangement does mean that the layout must be operated from the front or side, as an operator behind the layout would not be able to see it.

Another advantage of the LED lights is their weight. In the past, I've used florescent tubes, but these are heavy and fragile.. The LED set up is much lighter and much less vulnerable.  As a result I plan to replace the existing lighting on Diddington with LED's, hopefully in the New Year. (Before I start saving for a Hornby J15). The lights run off a small power unit, which is installed  behind the proscenium.  I'm totally sold on the system. Its lighter and easier to install than my previous system. It gives a consistent overall light which isn't too harsh, and doesn't have any unwanted shadows.

There's a funny story about that glue gun. I got all the tools ready before I started work so I could take the photo.  I went out and bought a supply of glue sticks.  I came home and couldn't find the glue gun. I looked for it for about 48 hours but no sign of it. (I still haven't found it). I convinced myself that either my son had borrowed it without telling me, or I'd simply lost it.  I used your glue gun to do the scenery. It was fine, but I've used all the glue sticks   I only realized that the glue gun was still in the house when I saw the photograph this evening.

I'm building an extension to the agricultural tramway out of Diddington at the moment. The idea is that there is a small agricultural tramway/light railway across the Fens from Diddington station to a yard out in the Fens. I haven't finally decided on the principal source of traffic, it could be fruit, sugar beet, or perhaps grain, which would give an excuse to have some of the Bachmann grain wagons when they arrive. It's inspired by lines such as the Wisbech and Upwell, or the Wissington light railway.

I've started with the joining section, which is  a 1.4metre length of straight track with a bridge crossing a fen drain at one end, which gives me the opportunity to model a length of roadside line.  It occurs to me that in the future this board my serve as a photographic "plank" as well.

I described the initial construction of the board in my blog. I've now laid the track, which is SMP, painted before it was laid in a bed of PVA glue, and ballasted with a mixture of ash and chinchilla grit, sprinkled in the wet PVA. When dry, the excess was shaken off, and the track given a light coat of  Modelmates mud brown and sooty black sprays, and a final spray of Tamiya matt earth from the airbrush.  I've attached some pictures of the track laying, and finally a picture of the state of construction when I finished last night (apologies for the quality)

Hi Anthony

Thanks for the steer. I used to live in Hemingford, but apart from a visit to St Ives last year to do a cycling event, haven't been in the area for nearly 30 years, so I'm working from memory.

I can remember Grafham Water being built by damming Diddington Brook and the farms being submerged under the water. At that time the project was still being called "Diddington Reservoir" I think.

Here's an overall shot of the layout, which may be of interest. I'm currently working on an extension to the agricultural tramway which leaves Diddington station at the right hand side of the picture.  There's some pictures of the board in my blog. More will follow as construction proceeds.

In the meantime I've edited my signature to give a link to some earlier pictures of the layout I posted in my gallery.

Alex

I can't believe everyone has been able to resist the temptation to post this, so here it is:

(BTW H Goering isn't in this clip because he does a runner earlier in the story)

I really like the gunpowder van. How does it compare with the Rastio one?

Very nice Mark. I paticularly like the changes you have made to the Wills goods shed, and how did you do the fence?