noiseboy72

I can confirm that forgetting to untie the spring line when departing from the quayside does result in your vessel making a sharp turn and rapid return to the dock..

And trust me, they only get worse. I guess they try and pick items we would never have thought of in terms of scratch building. They're certainly not picked by the judges and they don't know what they are until just before the challenge either.

Sorry, no spoilers - and no scratch build challenge items in that shot! I've only shown what appeared on TV on the trailer on Friday night

I second this. You will have to wait until Episode 5 to see our full layout, but it featured in a trailer, so you get some shots of it and an idea of the colours and themes we went for. We put operation at the centre of our planning, along with making the layout visually appealing and ensuring we could pick up the bonus points for having more than 1 train running at any one time, points operating, animations etc. Some might suggest that we were "playing the numbers" in this respect, but looking at the winners so far, we were not the only ones to read the rules

I'm not sure it's repeated, but it's available on catchup and My5.

Spoilers... Can't say as it may be part of the show.

All the stock on our layout with 1 minor exception came from the competition suppliers. Apart from anything else, we repainted or weathered every item, so we would not have wanted to use our own stock!

Quite true. We had to modify our wish list somewhat to fit the available stock. Don't forget also that teams get to keep the stock and layouts, so I'm quite certain that some buying choices are influenced by this. Not us, obviously, the Wickham trolley and Sentinel shunter were key to our layout and don't fit at all on my depot scene...

That was close! I do think the best team won, but I liked the book layout as well, very innovative. Hopefully the Rail Rider's layout was closer to proper modelling and will keep the pedants happy. I thought the speed the scenery went in was very impressive when you looked at the end result.

If anyone saw the trailer this evening on C5 featuring the alien layout and New London Station, that's our layout from Heat 5

I can guarantee you will see more proper modelling that will continue to impress you as the series progresses. As we were in heat 5, we got to have a sneak peak at some of the winning layouts from other episodes that were being stored at Fawley and there's some real stunners. Everybody has really upped their game this year!

That's interesting. We didn't have anything like that - but we were in a later heat. The board sizes and "The Rules" didn't change and once we had submitted out plan, it was approved within a few hours and we were left to get on with it. Was it a case that they didn't like your design, or was it rule changes / clarification for everyone in your heat?

The rules say "All layouts must contain at least one functioning animation. Extra credit will be awarded for height, additional animations, ingenuity, humour and theatricality. The more creative and bold Teams are, the better." That being said, the layout as a whole must appeal to the judges and just having some cool animations that don't add to the layout won't win you points. I thought pretty much all of the animations in Heat 1 fitted the theme and added to their layouts. Maybe it's just the child in me, but they hold my attention much more than a boring, static diorama - however well it's been modelled.

I have to admit, we didn't... We did 3D print some track curve guides though!

I second this. Our team had never built a layout together before and only 3 of us had built anything in 00 - as our modelling interests are quite varied. To do well, you need a combination of traditional modelling skills, innovation and creativity and just as important is the ability to work well together. In Season 1, some very experienced teams failed to progress as they did not have the right team dynamic or ability to work well under pressure, leading to an unfinished or inferior end product. It's also getting the mix of skills right. As an example, you could be the best loco painter in the world, but if you cannot adjust those skills to be able to do this very quickly, possibly using different techniques and materials, your usefulness to the team is somewhat limited. Steve said during the program that he like the fresh approach the Train Set brought. I think they just didn't have quite the depth of traditional skills to win in what has become a highly competitive program!

Having just looked at Kathy's photos from Heat 1, the best team did win! What doesn't come across so well on the show is just how much more complete Corby's layout was compared to either of the others - with lots of detail that didn't make it into the final cut. Have a look - https://www.kathymillatt.co.uk/blog/2019/09/13/great-model-railway-challenge-2019-heat-1/#jp-carousel-16053 and see if it alters your opinion at all.

I think we all had operational points in Heat 5 - and both your team and ours had shunting moves!

Yes, I kind of accept that, but they were shown on the programme attacking the catch point with a jigsaw! That's not just inexperience, that's a little bit foolhardy, but I guess the panic was building at that point... I think there's probably aspects of the build that we didn't see that influenced the judges. The film crews don't know what the judges might have picked up on and are discussing when they are doing the closeup shots post judging,, so it's possible that some deciding factors are not be picked up, so don't make it into the edit. I would loved to have seen them in the semis, so fingers crossed...

In terms of budget, this is very generous and you can supplement it up to a certain level AND supply any stock of your own. It was quite obvious to us that some pre builds have been lifted off existing layouts and not built specifically for the show, but this minor rule bending does give better quality models. We made a point of using construction techniques that pretty much anyone could attempt. Yes, there's Metcalf kits in abundance, but we modified them all. We wanted to encourage people to think differently about model railways and just what can be constructed.

The Train Set lost out because although their scenic elements were good, they simply didn't run enough trains! The marking scheme awards points for functionality of both the animations and layout as a whole. I think that's potentially where Corby picked up points, as they could run trains - even if their smoke unit packed up on the volcano! Getting the track down properly and well ballasted also gets you build points. We spent hours on getting ours as we wanted it, not running trains until quite late on. Stern Steve doesn't like poorly laid track and does mention it during the build - both off camera and on. If this isn't proper railway modelling, I'm not sure what is. The themes are suggested by the commissioning editor rather than the production company. We actually liked our theme for heat 5 and all 3 teams showed a different approach and created 3 very different layouts. I think in this first program, the end results have been quite similar with a lot of overlap in ideas. I know in discussion with the production company they try to get us to build really different layouts to show the widest range of creativity possible. A big well done to all 3 teams in heat 1, may all the other heats be equally entertaining!

The budget was generous - and you wonder what the Train Set spent theirs on, given they had 1 operational DMU and little else to show. I think we managed 5 locos, 2 coaches, 9 goods wagons and a couple of guards vans with the same money!

I'm assuming the erupting volcano was taken into account!

I can only directly speak for Heat 5 - which we also competed in, but all 3 layouts were proper layouts, with excellent scenic construction and good running characteristics - I don't think any of us had a derailment during the presentation stage, but 2 of them were pure fantasy and the 3rd a fictional location, but slightly more probable! All the layouts we competed against featured effects that could be rapidly reset and none of them would disgrace an exhibition hall - certainly given the time allowed to build them. We made a point of producing a layout with a track layout that should be recognisable to many, even if the setting is not quite so ordinary... I am hoping the first episode was a little more gimik focused than the rest of the series just to lure the casual viewers in. That being said, as a 10 year old, who wouldn't have wanted a volcano on their trainset

I enjoyed it! 2 of our models made the opening credits which was great to see, but it was a shame that there was so much overlap between the layouts. Putting 2 volcanoes up against each other was interesting to see the approaches. It looked like all the teams had problems with running and getting all their animations to work. Maybe that's why we were pushed hard in our heat to ensure they were operational. It was good to see more scenic construction and I'm sure that will continue. I loved the smoke effects on the The Train Set's layout, but they were not particularly repeatable, with dry ice being quite am expensive way of creating the effect.

Loving the videos doing the rounds on social media at the moment. They are really pushing this series!