Taigatrommel

I've got a mild obsession about correct signalling, and this small detail is strictly a part of that. It's probably obvious, but these little objects indicate a point's position. I made a simple crank from rod and scrap etch, working out the throw distance from the tiebar's movement. I didn't get it quite right first time! The cosmetic details are Auhagen, and happily are ready painted- I do not have steady hands. They also have the lever for hand thrown points, but I'm not even going to try and make that move. I drilled a hole in the bottom of the indicator to take the rod, and in the baseboard a short length of tube holds the rod in place and allows it to turn freely.

Probably, it's built to be portable. It'll depend upon how well it can be protected for transport once OLE and signals are in place.

Though Porthcawl is a long way from me, I'll have to give him a call to find out what he stocks and see what his prices are like!

I've been attracted to TT scale for a long time, being a firm believer in the old Berliner slogan of it being "die ideale Spur". It's small enough to produce an entertaining layout in a reasonable space, but large enough for fine detail to be visible and not too fiddly to work with. It also has more "presence" to me than N, somehow the models just seem to look weightier and sit down on the track better. Continental TT scale is 1:120 scale, unlike the 1:100 used by Triang and the following British convention. This puts the 12mm track gauge within 0.042mm of scale, close enough not just for jazz but me as well. Contemporary models are up to the expected standards of any scale, having flywheel drive, DCC sockets, NEM coupling pockets etc. The older Berliner coupling has given way to a newer, more compact design that allows near buffer-to-buffer coupling when a suitable mechanism is fitted. As TT shares the same coupler pocket as N, Fleischmann Profi couplings can also be used if delayed action is desired. There are a few makes widely sold, though you're unlikely to see them on UK shop shelves. They're also still less common in the west. Tillig have the widest range, having taken over the old Berliner TT Bahnen in the early 1990s. The quality varies - some are simply rehashed BTTB models from DDR days, and even the more recently tooled models are variable. I have locos that are up with the best H0, and coaches that I can barely put up with. Roco have a small selection, all high quality. Piko have a selection of more budget models, generally basic in detail but good representations. Some more recent locos have been very smart indeed. Kuehn have a range of good quality models, not extensive but useful. There are other smaller makes, perhaps the best place to get a sense of just what is available is Modellbahnshop-Sebnitz, who are situated right next to Tillig's factory. There isn't such breadth of product available as H0, although if your leanings are towards DDR modelling I think the choice is slightly better than in N. As far as my own modelling goes, I have a long term project to model the major features of the Rübelandbahn in a Portakabin on my inlaw's farm. This is a slow mover, and as I wanted something to watch the trains go round on at home and have more than one class of loco to look at, I have started on a 21st Century layout based upon City Classic's show layout. I've made a few changes to it, and the size I have for TT makes it larger than it's H0 inspiration in prototype terms. I'm working with a 9' x 2'8". A lot of my inspiration comes from the Industriebahn Feuerbach, street running through the industrial area of a city. Other inspiration came from the tracks in Dresden's Industriegelände, where I found myself staying in June. I tried to plan things accurately. I really did. All that happened was that I got a migraine. In the end I extended the width of some H0 boards I'd built for a Fremo module and topped them with ply. Then I laid the scenic section's mainline. Hang on, there's gradients and different levels. I'd better cut some ply out so I can fit point motors more easily. Then I steadily plugged away at tracklaying and putting in the ply for the slopes. I had to come up with an interesting solution for a run-round loop (the original design only has one on the main) as the most obvious location was on a slope. I like the effect of having a crossing in the middle of it, it gives a more industrial character. Now I'm waiting on some more track to finish the last few bits that need laying on the scenic area, and I think signalling will be the next step.

Going back a few posts, what is the source of the TT scale VW Golf?

My wife bought me a Piko 612 "Regioswinger" for my birthday. I've got a peculiar soft spot for the real units, and they run over the line which I am modelling for my new layout (KBS 510), so it was a wonderful gift. While DCC Ready to me generally means that it's plug and play with an appropriate socket or plug, Piko took it a step further on this unit. On the circuit board there is a pair of movable jumpers configuring the interior and destination screen lighting. As supplied, everything switches on with F0. By moving the jumpers, you can set them to come on via decoder output C on pin 3 of the decoder or by soldering leads to marked pads on the board. The destination screen and interior lights can be set to come on together or independently of one another. Further to this, a removable jumper enables me to bring a ready fitted resistor into play, which ensures that the interior lights are not too bright on DCC. All in all, good stuff! By the way, this model was released in 2002...

I know what you mean, I just have a desire to make things as accurate as I can within my own knowledge and ability. For now the focus is a scenic refresh, stock comes afterwards. I have really realised lately that save for glaring errors I'd rather spend my time on scenic work than stock.

With Bad Horn attending STORMex on 4th August, I figured that I should attend to some of the wear that's come about from long distance transport and simply sitting on display in the living room. Grass has been the main victim, with some patches looking pretty bare. Also, the fine appearance of static grass fibres has never quite matched my own vision of scrubby verges alongside the railway. Hanging basket liner was in the back of my mind as a solution, and searching the web I found a few good looking uses of it. Of course, it's also recommended by no lesser a modeller than Barry Norman. Taking my mother to the garden centre on Monday I picked some up (at £3 a metre it's a cheap material as well!) and set about trying it. At first I was a little generous with the PVA, and in places it soaked right through to the backing layer making its removal difficult, and the remaining fibres hard to tease out. I've gradually got the knack, and I'm letting the odd bare patch be my cue for adding other plants such as brambles. I'll try and bring some flowering plants into the mix somehow, and I'm studying photographs to ascertain a suitable mix. I'd love to find a scenic specialist shop to have a good browse of available products. Lichen isn't cutting it for me any longer. If only it had been on my mind while I was at Intermodellbau... still, it's Thornbury on Saturday. Below is how the hanging basket liner is looking so far. Lots of teasing and trimming yet... I'm torn between courses of action to achieve homogeneity between station details and stock. At present, the station furniture implies post 1994, and hence DBAG. This does mean the only real visual discrepancy when I run my ex-DR stock is the signalling. I could get 100% match with my Bundesbahn stock by simply putting DBAG decals on them, and that would be good for the era. Only a BR 220 would be out of place, and that looks too big on Bad Horn anyway. I do have some Bundesbahn orange station furniture which I could replace the existing stuff with, but then the discrepancy when I run the ex-DR stock is even greater. I could also just ignore the issue, as I'm keen to make a start on something wholly new... but that's another story.

Although TT has long been the dominant scale in Czech railway modelling, there's been a glut of new items lately- Goggles from three manufacturers, Type Ys from two, 749s, 372s and Regioshuttles from Kühn... good times. And a lovely layout to show them off on, it really looks the business.

No, it's off the north siding, heading away from the main line. I can't post the picture owing to copyright. I'm pursuing the paper lines of enquiry, although naturally this is a little slower than web inquiries. It's feeling really good to have found a sector era scheme that's captured my imagination!

Natalie, can I just clarify something? That the line I have marked as "I can't see where this goes to" enters Baverstock depot? I'm at the point that I'm decided this will be the basis for my next layout, I can worry about the exact operation later, but for now I'm onto physical planning. Has anyone seen the TeleRail program on Chilmark, and if so, is it worth a watch? They're a bit expensive as railway DVDs go, so I'd like to know I'm not wasting my money!

Thanks Tony- I may have some of those magazine myself, I'll have a good search!

I'm starting to make sense of this now. Where the picture is taken at Dinton is a good mile and a half from where the MoD line deviates from the path of the former up line to enter the site and a further quarter mile takes you to the sheds at Hams Cross. The sidings at the bottom of my illustration are presumably Baverstock sidings. Any idea what traffic these were for? The site of Dinton Sidings appears to be quite overgrown, so I'm struggling to work out the siting of points to take measurements in google earth. I'll dig out some stock, I think I should be able to infer the length from a 47 + wagons. Thanks again everyone, I'm feeling quite inspired!

I hadn't realised the main line was single track at this location, I've sketched up the visible plan in paint. On the track marked "1" sits what I presume to be an MoD Sentinel on open wagons, with the loco at the left. On the track marked "2" sits a 47 captioned as forming 6L10 to Salisbury, seven VAAs or similar and a continental looking tank wagon. The tank fouls the turnout ahead of the MoD shunter. The sidings with the fence may carry off somewhere, foliage obscures the view. Now I look closely I can't see any signals controlling the crossover on what I had assumed to be the main lines, so this would correspond to the former up line being a long siding.

I've been searching around for a prototype freight facility for some reasonably varied traffic and perhaps a bit of shunting, and stumbled across a picture of Dinton in "Railfreight since 1968 - Wagonload". This view suggests quite a short loop (it appears to be just long enough for a 47 and and VAAs or similar), and also the same ilustration implies the curious operation of MoD shunters across the main. I was wondering if anyone could point me to a plan of arrangements as they were in the 1980s, and likewise if anyone has any knowledge of the rail operations I'd love to read it. Thanks in advance!

Presumably, the Micro-trains under track magnet would work with these as well? This is one of those products that really adds to the appeal of N, for a long time converting the couplings has put me off, but with a NEM compatible magnetic option, a lot of time can be saved. I'd be tempted to see how well they fit European TT stock as well, as they use the same pocket as N.

Of course, with me at the controls, it's less than smooth. Next time I should concentrate on operating and have someone else film. I'd also like to add a soundtrack of real trains. [media=''] [/media]

Therein lies the problem... Bad Horn uses DB Hp light signals! I can identify with both sides of the argument as far as deadlines go. I don't think Bad Horn would have been completed in anything like the timescale it was if I hadn't been invited to a show. On a small project such as this there wasn't too much tedium, but if I had a large layout that needed ballasting or all the track painting it would be a different story. The next slot at my local exhibition is 2015(!), so that's a deadline to complete something really impressive by. I suppose if nothing else Bad Horn offers me a fallback should a follow-on project not be completed in time! At this moment there are three contenders for the next project: trains running through a landscape in N, an H0 depot (I'm watching ebay for Fleischmann turntables at the moment!) and an O14 canal restoration scene. I may work on two (or all three) concurrently to give me an escape should I hit a wall on one.

I did get a 298 in the end- cracking runner, and really looks the business on the layout.

I've had my house in Cheltenham since September, and Bad Horn has pride of place in the living room. It's running reasonably well, and survived the journey from New Zealand very nicely- the only damage was a wire that had come away. Now I'm fairly settled, aside from the question of the next project, I'm undecided on whether or not to exhibit or not. Bad Horn is very easy to transport, fitting in the boot of a family sized car and only needs three people to make a full day/weekend of running an easy experience. I'm uncomfortably aware of how high modelling standards have become though, and I'm not sure whether my little BLT would stand up to scrutiny amongst the discerning crowd here in the UK. There are many missing details and a few anachronisms. If I run with my ex-DR fleet, the signalling is plain wrong. There's three questions really- firstly, whether exhibition managers would actually be interested in it or not. I know German doesn't pull a crowd the way a British outline layout does. Secondly, whether I am willing to spend to buy the couple of locomotives I need to ensure I can operate realistically and reliably over a weekend. And thirdly, whether I really want to get tied up in the "scene" again- I've found much greater satisfaction the few years I've been out of things. The first question is easily answered, I just have to ask around. The second- well, if someone wanted to have Bad Horn on display, I think I'd jump at the excuse to buy a couple of locos. The third is tricky. I really enjoy anonymity, and going to Warley without having anyone talking scene politics at me was great. If I don't exhibit, Bad Horn doesn't really have a future with me. I'm itching to build something new to a higher standard, rather than the budget approach I took when building BH. I've learned rather more about work order, and about the finer details of German railway as well. I don't have the space for multiple layouts at the moment, and as Bad Horn was not expensive to build I'd lose little sleep over scrapping it. But I can't forget the fact that it's the first layout I've built for exhibition with no-one else's help, and for that I should be proud. And it would be quite a buzz to say that I've exhibited it in both hemispheres! Anyway, I've recently attempted to address an issue with running Bad Horn. The trackwork is Piko A-Track, which has plastic frogs. The double slip is troublesome for my Roco BR 364, as it is possible for half the wheels to be on plastic at any one time while crossing. Stalls were frequent, and I'd pretty well given up on using it. This left me short for my Epoch IV fleet (that which Bad Horn was built for!), so I really did want to try and sort her out. At Warley I picked up a DCC Concepts decoder with a Stay-Alive module, and installed it in the 364. After a little head scratching, I realised there was space alongside the cardan shaft without risk of fouling, and so got it fitted. Then came testing. I did film it before and after fitting, but I'm afraid the "before" film has terrible heavy breathing on it, so I won't share that. Anyway, I'm not totally sold. Although not as prone to stalling as before, there's still stuttering over the slip and it can stop entirely. I'm aware that I can add further Stay-Alive modules for enhanced performance, but the enhancement falls some way short of demonstrations that I've seen of Lenz USP with Power 1. That said, it's a lot cheaper. The video below is with Stay-Alive. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugqvrhXzXNM

I hope you're proud- it's looking great. With some trees it'll really start to get that Black Forest feel