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Clem: - 'Anyway, to cut the story short, the Halls used the Bulwell Common-Basford North-Bagthorpe triangle to turn after that. The Halls used to come up on the Poole-Bradford on Saturdays about 4pm if I remember correctly and run back light engine about 4-50 ahead of the 5-15 to Marylebone usually headed by a Scot in 1964.' I'm not building a Hall for Basford North! Anyway, in the era I'm modelling, I think they changes at Leicester... Tony

I think the TO open brake was mine, I can't remember what set it was on, we we are going back over 15 years now, and we did what we could with the information that we had at the time. It might have been on one of the long distance semi fasts. As I say, most of the sets were based on photos and the CWB, and also we did what we could with what was available then. The GC at the time did seem to have a habit of putting odd coaches in. I personally would have preferred the layout to be fixed in 1959, with no pacifics, but it was a group effort and we all had stock to contribute from our own diverse collections. The layout never really fulfilled it's full potential with operating the sidings and developing the sequence, and stock. Yes - it could have become more 'accurate', but so could any layout I guess. Time moved on, as we did, on to other projects and away from the proximity of the club. Getting a team together for any show became almost impossible, I still think we put a reasonable show on with it when we did go out. At least the layout lives on ( not to my taste either ) and all that effort didn't end up on a bonfire. I too, prefer the everyday, mundane, although I've rather shot myself in the foot by having three locos with names! Maybe I can balance that off with 7 grubby 2-8-0s. If I'd stayed on in 4mm, I'd have built something based on Bulwell Common. That would have gone nicely in the space I have now. One of the reasons that I moved to 7mm, is the more realistic appearance of the loco's, I found the narrowness of 16.5 track and the chunky wheels difficult to live with. Like Tony - if I was starting out again, I'd have done it all in EM.... Regards Tony

I based my passenger sets for Charwelton from the carriage working book ( late 50's I think ) and photos, we had some good time with that layout. It's difficult to do the London extension in 7mm, unless you have a very long railway room. So my railway project is based on the GN Derby line in the suburbs, compromised and compressed of course, but I hope it will capture the atmosphere. The main thing is I get to run all my favourite types of locos from Annesley and Colwick. Great to see so much GC content on your thread Tony! Regards Tony

I'm catching you up Clem! I've also incorporated a long crossover to increase flexibility. I'll soon fill it up, then like Tony will probably start to add all sorts of kick back sidings!

Somehow I managed to fit brakes to my Nucast V2. I managed to drill the whitemetal frames ( that would have been by hand ) and I scratch built the brakes and hangers by soldering six blanks together and filing them to shape! It did run ok, but I sold it on when I acquired my Proscale V2s. I think 60890 is still around, running in West Wales... I've not been able to find a photo of it unfortunately. Regards Tony

Nearly there then, fallplate, coupling, sandpipes, backhead and tidying left to do. AWS pick up and battery box now fitted and that pesky front step on the smokebox door. It's mounted on two spigots of 0.5mm brass wire. I needed a few more bits from Ragstone, and they came the next day and were fitted within an hour of arriving! I wasn't happy with the profile at the ends of the tender frames, so all the bottom steps came off and I made that little cut out with the piercing saw. The step upturns are from some left over rivet strip from a David Andrews 2P kit! Axleboxes and springs, filler and dome, Buffers - all Ragstone. Just need to tidy up some of that excess solder...

A prolific output of locos! I've taken a leaf out of Tony's book and I have been horse trading. A friend printed the banners for my Templot layout plan, which would have come to a substantial sum. My part of the bargain was to finish a part built K1 for him. Here it is nearly done, about two and half weeks work on and off with all the other distractions. The tender is all my work! Did K1s run on your section of the ECML Tony? I know there were some in the south - March shed for sure. Regards Tony

A few more details added, there was no provision for the support bracket under the cab, that was made up from some scrap etch. I also added the lubricator linkage below the running plate. Some subtefuge will be require to make the continuation into the motion bracket. Injectors added from the spares box, modified Mercian J94 ones I think.... Front end detail. As always, the hoses come with no positive means of fixing them. So I drilled them at the back and added 1.1mm copper wire into the sockets. That turns up behind the buffer beam and acts as a sort of clip. The AWS bang plate had no means of support so I added two small strips of brass that dog leg up behind the buffer beam. I don't like butt joined detail, that you know will just get knocked off. Smokebox door still not glued in... The spec on this loco is to have pick up from the tender via split axles. The Slaters axles were made up by a good mate - the late Clive Neale. So I've laid out the development here to make sure verything lines up. I didn't like the tender axlebox and spring castings, so have replaced them with Ragstone ones, but they needed the hornguides cutting out. That does give the gap between the axlebox and the keeper as well. The tender detail and brake gear is a bit basic compared with some other kits I've built. The brake gear looks what youd expect in 4mm scale. Having said that, Mike of DMR was very helpful when I needed castings and etchings for other projects, so this is a kit of a certain era. I can't think of any source for replacements so it will have to do. Hopefully its only me and Richard Lambert that look under a model first! On with the upper works and all quite straight forward really. I replaced the etched beading, which looks too flat with soft 0.81 half round brass wire. The lamp housings were easily drilled for the conduit - and the junctions were made up with segments of brass tube.

Is it a white metal chassis on the V2 Andy? I remember the Nu Cast kit I had in 1977 ish came with one. I did manage to get it working somehow! Regards Tony

Buzzing along nicely now and a bag of goodies arrived from Ragstone, and the snifter, sand lids and lubricators were fitted within an hour of arriving in the post. Just the AWS box, injectors and pesky cab doors to fit now. Smokebox door just shoved in at the moment. The chassis and basic body had already been built by my friend. The white metal castings are nicely made but boy do they give off some dirt when filed up. All depends on the mix of the constituant materials I guess. I've found that it does vary.

Generator cable clips and join made, more pipes. I discarded the white metal oilers and used ones from the spares box. I filed everything off the electric light housings and made up new irons. The cast sanders feeds are sort of ok, I've filed them to reduce the chunkyness, some are a little out of shape. I replaced the white metal cab step with a scratch fabricated brass one. The front of the smokebox didn't look quite right and I found in the etchings a spare boiler disk. I wanted to represent the door ring, which is a pressing and it should extend slightly beyond the edge of the wrapper. So I rounded the edge and soldered it to the front disk and it looks a lot better. Scratched up lamp irons. The front part of the handrail is seperate from the sides soldered in to the first handrail knob. It is shaped and reshaped until it goes into place with no applied pressure. The cab step has a nice 'T' shape andit was worth the effort to fabricate that. I've cleaned and cleaned the outside, but the innards are looking tarnished... That bent handrail needs looking at.

It was time for a break from track making, and in the 'to do' queue is a DMR K1 that needs finishing for a friend. The chassis and the basic body have been completed , so the first task was a cleanup, and then on with the detailing. For a modern engine there are lots of outside pipes, it s nice at last to be working on an NE engine. The washout covers are Finney7 with German studs ( GHW-Modellbauversand ). The positioning is slightly low, but there is not much I can do about that due to the half etches in the boiler. The electric lamps are nice castings, but they do not have the full width backing plate and the lamp iron is too far forward, so all that detail was taken off and a new mounting plate made up from strip. The atomisers were three pipe and had to be modified to two pipe. That also meant taking off the top feed and moving it in to the middle - fiddly work. The cover plate on the top of the boiler was full thickness etch - it looked too chunky, so I made a new one from thinner sheet. Not all K1s had this. I've wound a spiral pattern on to the electric feed, on the prototype, they rarely seemed to be straight. So a straightforward build is turning out not to be. At least the handrail knobs went on without modification.

Morning Chas - I should have said - it's O gauge. Another one of those models I've made for someone that I would have liked to have kept. Fortunately, I'm concentrating on some of my own projects this year. I'm very impressed with that printed V2 Tony, it looks just right. That coach certainly looks like a GC one Clem, I wonder if there is an O gauge version...... Regards Tony

I abhor those glass fibre brushes and I never use them. The fibres get every where and stick in my fingers ( Tony would probably say I'm soft anyway! ) I tend to use emery sticks and a miniature circular wire brush in the mini drill. And my painters are happy, Paul Moore painted this for me. It's a CPL GW horsebox I built for a client. I keep saying to him if he doesn't want these terrible models, I'll keep them. No luck as yet.... Regards Tony

Tony Gee found this - proper track laying:- https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=7&v=vwHKOMq5WzI&feature=emb_logo

Andrew - Clem - I also think the commercial freight greys seem a bit dark. So these days I usually mix in some white when I'm painting them. We all see colours differently, but maybe the real thing faded quickly in use. Even so, apart from the one on the right, these tipplers from an early batch of mine still seem too dark:- Regards Tony

Ha Ha - I've got posh cast brass fishplates on the scenic section! No such luxury for the non-scenic area though!

That got me thinking about the 7mm Finney V2 I built - 60886. I couldn't remember, but the lubricators are not in line! Phew! I'm sure the splashers are there as I recall they were tricky to fit. Magnificent engines aren't they? Regards Tony

I made a mistake with part of my original design of the Eastern approach to the station, so Jim kindly re-worked it for me. It's simpler. The local printers are still closed, so I've resorted to A4 prints. Which with care are manageable. This re-work also means that the Bulwell Common line can be hidden behind a retaining wall. The straight sections can be seen just at the bottom. The fan takes shape, and I'm going to approach it from the other end now. Does anyone know where I can get bullhead rail joiners? I'm nearly out of the very nice SMP O gauge ones ( Markits are out of stock ) and the Peco SL-10s don't seem to fit C&L rail very well.

David - Antex - yes 450 is a bit hot! One of the reasons I moved away from Antex was poor heat transfer, when they changed the style of bit a few years ago. I do use a tip tinner/cleaner occasionally - it comes in a little tin pot, can't remember where from though, Squires? You could try using some fine emery on the tip to revive it, but once you break through the outer layer it will erode as a fast as an Austin 1100... That looks like a 2.5mm tip, which is probably best for electrical, there is one at 3.2 I think which will hold a bit more heat.. I always used the larger tip as any large area of material will quickly cool it. Old style tips with collar: 2.5, 3.2 and Massive... Sorry about he picture size for some reason my iPhone has decided all photos must be huge.. Regards Tony

Meanwhile I'm working in the other direction, whilst I agonise over some more decisions on the scenic side. The fan into the storage yard. I needed some long curved turnouts and unfortunately, the Peco curved point is 6foot on the outside radius, so that would not do. At least the ones I made on copper clad can be knocked up quickly in a couple of hours. They just need packing with some cork to match the height of the plain track. Slow progress 'cos 'er indoors keeps putting me on outside jobs.

LNER era is not my interest, though I thought 4527 with the teak coaches on Bytham looked lovely. I was interested in Archie's copper clad turnouts. It's years since I made any of those. I needed three for my storage yard and turned them out this week. They are nice and quick to make compared with the detailed C&L ones.

And the single slip is now in situ:-

I've been out in the garden a lot, but I've completed the next assembly, an outside single slip. Getting the electrical breaks in was a challenge as some short sections of rail needed section breaks, so I've had to resort to nickel silver baseplates at strategic places to maintain integrity. This also allows the use of flux cored solder as N/S will solder nicely with that without having to resort to flux.

I was experimenting today with my camera and tried some low level shots to see what they would look like. This would be the view looking up from Vernon Road although the down platform would be in the way of the wagons on the right... I originally designed the layout to come to pieces, but for certain parts it is just not practicable to do so as several turnouts will straddle board joins and I've been agonising over various solutions.. I had to call on the expertise and highly regarded opinion of 'er indoors. 'Why would you ever need to take it to pieces? - Don't over think it and just do it!' I can think of many layouts that are not designed to come to pieces.. looks like I am joining them...