Tim Lewis

A little bit more progress. The substrate to allow the gradient down towards the goods shed has been made, the Templot plan laid, and some sleepers are slowly creeping towards the station. No more rails as yet.This is what it looks like from the other end: the yellow felt pen marks are to remind me to lay 12" timbers rather than the normal 10". I was going to start building a turnout this weekend, but then realised I didn't have all the different types of chair that I need: hopefully I'll get some at Wigan next weekend.

I agree, though it might make the ballasting a bit fiddly: some of the sleepers are close to touching (prototype spacing as far as possible, using NER plans) I wish...... Not moved yet, although still browsing RightMove and the local paper! I think we'll probably put our house on the market in the spring, and see how it goes. So, for now, Coldstream doesn't have a permanent home and I can only put up one or two boards at a time for working on.

A tiny amount of progress...... When I laid the track a while back, I stupidly forgot to attach electrical connections (must have been assuming that the trains would run on will power alone ). So, I now have the slightly delicate operation of attaching droppers to track with plastic chairs. I had intended to use Bill Bedford fishplates with tags to achieve this, but as these need to be cut down to 2-bolt plates in this area it would have been asking for trouble: there's just no room to get a soldering iron in between the chairs at the (real) rail joints - guaranteed meltdown. So, I used the nifty little etches from Palatine Models at locations with wider sleeper spacing and some dinky hair clips as heat sinks as shown below.... Despite some very agricultural soldering, this seemed to work quite well: didn't melt any chairs at all. For future track lengths however, I think I'll attach droppers before laying. I've also laid more sleepers on the other lines on this board: Very soon now I'll have to bite the bullet and start making my first turnout

That J73's a long way from home isn't it? Looking good though. I've got one in the drawer which I'll get around to one day. Compared to some kits, I guess it should be a fairly quick build, because it's accurate and well-designed (and fairly small).

That would be the idea, yes. Hopefully that would encourage me to spend more time on it in those odd 'free' half-hours, which can add up to real progress over time. At the moment my study (which doubles as a 'workshop') is crammed full, so it's very difficult to work on it at all (even if I did have time). The difficulty seems to be finding a house with a suitably large railway room (and kitchen - that's the deal ) that is still close to town and is affordable . And of course we haven't sold our house yet etc. etc.

Oh, if only there were some progress to report! Modelling activity for the past few months has been limited to putting P4 wheels under a few Bachmann LNER wagons, and buying one of Arthur K's Q5/1 kits (which will probably sit in the drawer to mature for a while). Combination of busy work and domestic stuff, including thinking about a house move (at least I may get a decent railway room).

I too heard this story from George, and I too resolved to make a model of 61952 for Coldstream (although it will of course have to stop just short of the station ), but given my rate of progress I suspect you'll beat me to it!!

There is a picture somewhere (Robotham I think) of 67489 in the Tweedmouth bay at St. Boswells. I think it 'filled the gap' time-wise between the C15s and the standard 2s.

I've seen a picture somewhere (can't remember exactly where) of the C16 in the bay at St Boswells on a Berwick train.

Looking very nice indeed. Hope to see more posts soon.

Slow progress (i.e. none ) on the track building front in recent weeks. However, I think I've now finished the final tweaks to the Templot plan, that I've mentioned needed doing before: it's only taken 2 and a bit years from identifying they need to be done to getting round to doing them! Anyway, now finished, so all I need to do is print it off again and build the track. Although it took quite a while to faff around with the changes, it doesn't look radically different from before, but that's because the changes were to sort out minor things like alignment and spacing of some sidings, alter some turnout angles etc. I don't expect you can see many differences between the new example section shown below and its' equivalent further up the thread, but there are a few. Right, better get on with it!!

North Shields: mainly because everything has a purpose (and just happens to be fantastically well modelled into the bargain) Bramblewick: mainly because it's a work of art Pulborough: mainly because of the realistic timetable/train movements Difficult to pick just 3!!

Only just found this thread. Wonderful scenic work: very convincing. It's good to see that you're not tempted to 'cram too much in', which I personally think is the downfall of many a layout.

Wonderful! Thanks for that. Glad to see you've got the correct number of hoppers for the loco: as I understand it, the Q7s could manage 7, the O1s 8, and only the 9Fs could manage 9. What do you think you'll use for the load?

Nice to see a model of Coldstreamer (60873 for those of you not aware). When I eventually get around to building a V2, I was wondering whether to build that one, though it might be a bit too 'obvious' (given the station I'm modelling)

Fabulous pictures as always. Show us yer hoppers!!

Well, hopefully you haven't been holding your breath since September, but here's a bit more progress. I've made the sub-base for the gradient down into the up yard (the bit without any track/sleepers yet), and also made a start on track-laying of the two main running lines. And I couldn't resist posing some stock on it... Sorry about all the sundry detritus. It's not too obvious in the photos, but the track here is on a gentle curve (something like 26ft radius IIRC), which should look nice when there's a bit more of it. I wouldn't hold your breath for the next instalment either, but hopefully sometime in the next few weeks.

Looks like there's actually two catch points within the turnout: one protecting the line that disappears behind the DMU, the other protecting the line that goes to the right of the goods shed. I guess there just wasn't room to put only a single set of switches because the turnout is so close to the running line. Never seen a formation quite like that before!

Good to see those pics again Rod. I worked on the same project as Rod, but visited Bulawayo and Vic Falls a bit later: May 1984. All steam then. Had a footplate trip on a 15A from Bulawayo as far as Sawmills then retired (rather sooty by this time) to a wonderful wood panelled sleeping compartment, nice cotton sheets etc. Woken up just after dawn by room service with a cup of tea: lots of antelope and other wildlife to see out of the window. Happy times. I've got some slides that I haven't seen in ages, including some from Wankie (stop sniggering at the back) Colliery with green liveried Class 19s (IIRC). One day I plan to get them all scanned, but it won't be for a while yet. Good to see that the railway is still running anyway!

Now this may not look like much to you, but I've waited a (very) long time for this. This is the first length of track to be laid on Coldstream, all 46cm of it. Don't hold your breath, but hopefully more to come over the next few weeks/months.

The axleboxes and springs were separate castings that Dave either did himself or had commissioned not too long after the kit came out. I got a bag of each which I'm still working through. I have a feeling that they might now be available through MJT, but I could be wrong (on second thoughts D&S rings a bell, in which case they may have disappeared, although some of his whitemetal stuff did get taken over by somebody). Might be worth an e-mail to Dave to see if he still has any (they're not on his price list, but some of his 'bits and pieces' never are). The buffers are (I think: it's a long time since I built them) standard RCH ones: can't remember which make, I have Gibson, MJT, 51L and ABS all in stock! Some of these buffers look a little 'squat' to me. On the third of my hoppers I have currently used the longer RCH ones (really for fitted stock, from ABS), but these look a bit too long, so I might change them.

Thanks for that Mark. I might 'upgrade' to that at some point (Bachmann 'plastic' is a pain at times isn't it). I suppose what I should have done is use the Bradwell underframe that's been lurking in my to-do drawer for some time now, but it's fiendishly detailed, and I needed this van in a hurry!

Not a hell of a lot been happening on the modelling front recently (not much change there then ), but to show I've not been completely idle, here's some pictures of a few wagons I got ready for Railex (to run on Lower Soudley). Firstly, a couple of RCH 5-plank steel floor minerals: The numbers on these are slightly arbitrary: I know they're in the range allocated to Chas. Roberts, but I've no idea of whether they're correct for these wagons (haven't been able to find any pictures). If anyone knows any 'correct' numbers, please let me know. I also painted these before I realised that ex-PO wagons weren't painted grey until after about 1958, which is a bit late for me really. So, one day, they may get re-painted, but not just yet. I also did a couple of Bachmann BR 20T brake vans: One of these is straight out of the box except for replacement P4 wheels, a bit of weight and a rather clumsy re-numbering job. The second one has had a little bit more effort expended: re-painted footboards, concrete end weights and roof, and some basic weathering/texturing to tone it down a bit. This is the first time I've tarted up an RTR wagon. I was pretty impressed with the quality. The doors should have four windows rather than two (at least for this batch), but I can live with that. They run OK: would probably benefit from springing, but would need some fiddly carving of the floor and re-attachment of brakes etc. to fit commercial W-irons in, so I haven't bothered so far. Finally, several people said nice things about the last steel floor I did (see earlier in thread), so here's a picture of the second one (sorry it's a bit out of focus): more rusty this time. Looks a bit orange in the photo but OK in the flesh. That's all for now: might get round to doing some more modelling one of these days!

B16s allocated to Tweedmouth - are you sure? If you do have any numbers/dates I'd be really interested to know (I don't have the RCTS Green Book or Yeadon for the B16s). I always thought that they spent their time south of Newcastle.

Now that's interesting: never seen a picture of a B16 that far north before. Any idea of the date of the picture? And anybody know whether they were regular visitors to the line?