Will Vale

That's got a great flow to it, nice work!

I'd seen one of Brian Harrap's earlier P220 layouts (I forget the name, it was a small shunting plank) but not MiniZOB. I've just been through the pictures from the 2008 (?) SWAG members' day - wow

Definitely something to aspire to/be inspired by, although I don't think I'll be going that far - it looks scary. Plus I really want to be able to use standard wheelsets. Not that I'd know how to turn new ones even if I wanted to, mind you...

6.5mm gauge.

I'm really getting excited about the photo prospects from such a simple layout, although I'm not sure this specific view will be doable without a smaller camera as I'm pretty sure I had it sitting where the biggest rock is going

Thanks Tom, I haven't registered but I have found/followed various threads on there. For some reason I find it *really* hard to split my attention across multiple fora so I'm trying to stick to RMWeb

See what you mean about the gears - I think you're right. Can't be long now until you've got it trundling up and down the bench!

I've just been back over all the bits of this that I'd missed. I think the whole project continues to be incredible, and as James said, the paint looks good to me.

I can't get over all the detail you put into the various nooks and crannies of the fuel tanks and underframe, and now these cabs. Love the 'phone cord!

"Is that the steering wheel mister?"

I think the folds look amazing, much better than my squidgy efforts. It looks like the widths of the walls match perfectly with the bricks as well - you can see the joint between the stringers in the middle of the wall's thickness.

DCC in Z scale scares me a bit - I'm sticking with analogue. The LED headlights generally come on brightly at reasonable speeds, and for a single track working layout like this one anything else is probably overkill!

I did see a good DCC-in-Z demo a few years back with a decoder in the loco and a stationary sound decoder with the same number. Quite effective.

I took the same approach as you for Whitemarsh, and was quite pleased with it - glad to hear someone else doing the same thing. The double slip on mine was what provided the impetus - I kept messing up and shorting on it...

For shows it might be worth having a list of what goes into each macro in case something bad happens and you have to reset the PowerCab - then you can reprogram the macros and carry on.

[edit] For the "which way" thing I set 1 to be the straight-through route, and 2 to be the diverging route always, which gives me a good chance of getting it right if I have to throw an individual set of points.

I walked past an SKF logo on a sign in central Wellington last night (we still have small-scale engineering shops in the CBD, amazingly) and recognised it instantly from your axlebox. Very nice work!

Assuming you haven't cunningly filed all the teeth off the gears, great action shot! How are you going to paint all these bits - will they be sufficiently hidden by the sideframes? (If I've asked this before, apologies. Memory like a sieve...)

Very much indeed, thanks for posting. That Simplex is a beauty!

I think I'd still add the diagonal bracing. It will reduce any possibility of warp.

I think you're probably right. Plus it gives me an excuse to go to the art shop - it's an Aladdin's cave in there.

I need to see your Doctor...but more importantly, what's in the adjacent bowl...looks interesting

I made Caldo Verde with bits of sausage in it - a sort of heavy Portugese soup with spuds and greens. Very nice, just right for the cold weather we've been having

Foamboard is such a pleasure to work with

Yes, I completely agree. I feel a bit bad because I do like woodwork, but I'm not great at it and it needs more time and space really. Plus as you say the end result can be quite heavy.

One thing which has given me pause for thought: I was planning to just slap 50mm of foam on top to give me the track level, but I scaled the bridge I'm after from photographs and it looks like I need the lower track level 70-80mm above datum, rising another 20mm or so to the RH side!

Which makes me think I'm going to need to build gridwork or profiles or something to support the raised bit securely - stacking up layers is going to get expensive and heavy quickly.

That's really beautiful - I can see why you couldn't resist! I like the way the lines of the running boards and mudguards transcend all the extra fire engine equipment on it so it still reads as an elegant shape.

Nice paint job too - the metals catch the light without being unrealistic. I suspect a black and white shot would make a very realistic period photo.

Nice pictures, particularly the second. I've been musing about getting one of these since I'm sure I've seen a picture of one pulling or banking IR2216, and the Z gauge "demonstrator train" set comes up cheaply enough on eBay.

It's quite coarse, unfortunately - . I think it looks OK when ballasted properly, but that's true of most track. Here's some during the building of Igelfeld:

There's a guy in the US who uses incredible-looking hand-made track:http://1-220.blogspot.com/2007/11/good-track-key-to-improved-overall.html

Oh no, and now I've started thinking about it and turned up this: http://www.proto87.com/z-scale-track.html. I'll try and find out if you need to change wheelsets - if so, then it's definitely a no go. I can see that using the fine track on the visible section would be nice, and the return curves could stay as code 60, which is nice and reliable.

That's right, the rear half is a fiddle yard on two levels with an inclined link (the line rises left to right in the scenic section, so it has to get back to ground level!). I think the detail will be interesting on this one - looking at pictures you tend to see rocks and trees and not much else, but some of the videos show all kinds of little details, both around the track and in other areas. I don't want to litter it with cameos or anything, but I think there'll be plenty of interesting things to add.

That said it might be tricky running different eras if there are too many details - they tend to be a bit specific.

It looks great! How deep is the under-board framing, and how was the rigidity end-to-end? I'm considering making a 6' by 18" board in foamboard as one piece having had good luck with smaller ones.

Thanks for the comments chaps. I agree entirely about the vertical aspect - I really want to capture that and I'm thinking of a scenic area around 250-300mm deep, 300mm high at the moment. Maybe a bit higher, but I don't want to have a lot of visible sky since I don't think that'll give the right impression. I think the hardest thing will be managing any foreground features at the RH end which come in front of the track, since the prototype rock is really high there.

@James: The track will be raised up. I was going to put a slab of Styrofoam over the entire board, but I think that's not actually going to work since I doubt I can sand a smooth level ramp from that. So cookie-cutter might be better.

@Jon: Yes, it's a re-railer. In this scale it's pretty much vital! I was thinking that (assuming I don't go for cassettes in the fiddle yard) I'd attach a stub of track to the free end of each slip (visible on the right in the plan, I left a switchbox on the left-hand one) and attach a re-railer to this permanently. For "serious operation" mode it's necessary to swap locos to the other end of their train, and the railer should help with that. Thankfully the large Märklin "fish hook" couplings allow you to lift a loco without taking the train with it.

I have done a little bit of Z before - the layout I built for my dad - but that was much smaller, freelanced, and pastoral rather than epic. This is definitely a bit different - I have a fair bit of research material this time around.

One interesting question is which season/period to model to. At the moment I'm thinking that summer 2000 would be good - lots of greenery to soften the rocks, slightly overgrown track, and the odd colour light signal. I don't think that would be too offensive when backdated to the '50s with road vehicles and rolling stock.

That sounds like what Neil Andrews was demonstrating at the convention in Christchurch last year - I made one too Quite satisfying to do, but the floor ends up covered with little bits of green plastic coating from the wire.

I didn't do the bark with flour and water though - do you have any pictures of a painted one to show how that comes out?

It looks amazing. I was looking at the pics and thinking "I'm sure Jo's a 2mm modeller, but isn't this 4mm - what's going on?"

I managed to find a prototype pic to compare to and I think it's very close - I was going to comment that the underframe seems very dark compared to the body, but the prototype is like that Two things that *might* be worthwhile would be dulling the white of the rear left cab handrail a bit, and maybe a gentle drybrush with mid to light brown on the underframe and rear steps on the left side of the loco - IMO the RHS looks lighter (which I prefer) in the pic with the MOA.. But take that with a pinch of salt - I've only seen a couple of pics of the real thing.

The faded blue is just gorgeous - it retains that odd turquoise warmth of the real thing.

Looking really good there Pugsley. I think the shadows and highlights are a worthwhile addition to the underframes since they don't have quite the separation between parts on the model that the real ones do - it all looks better-defined as a result. I tried to do the same thing (much more crudely!) with acrylics on my ballast wagons.

The streaks are nice and subtle too. Is this close to what the military modellers would call a filter?

I like it too - lots of mass and presence from the front, and a charming, slightly ramshackle quality from the side. Great stuff!

I wonder if the prevalence of the "prototype or bust" attitude in UK outline modelling is because in a small country it's hard to reasonably 'hide' a fictional railway system? I guess in the current period it would be feasible to create fictional TOCs or leasing companies now that the ownership of the infrastructure and stock are separated. Hmm...

I'm glad Tanis caught your eye - I built it for an A3 competition and it was really interesting to see what you can get into the space (and time - 3 weeks to build it!) I sound like Dr. Who now. The minimum gauge gives you a lot more room to maneuver in a large scale than you would get with standard or even some narrow gauges in a smaller scale - worth bearing in mind.

One of the ideas on my back burner list (from whence Tanis came) was to do something in 1:35 with a Cold War theme - some section of a Soviet ICBM silo with a bulky-looking tramway for moving missile components and technicians around. I doubt it'd be very prototypical, but I think it could be made to feel "right" and I suspect that an airfield tramway could work in a similar way - I hope you manage to build one because I'd love to see it

(This editor has lost my post once and crashed Safari on the iPad a couple of times - hope it works...)

Thanks for the warm welcome back - it's really kind of you all! More ramble follows...

I agree that Whitemarsh has to be finished, I like it too much and have too much relevant stock to just let it fade away. I'm a bit worried about the amount of wood butchery required to make all the legs and frame and lighting rig etc. which would turn it into a proper exhibition layout, although I can see that would be useful effort for other projects too with a bit of care..

It's also fun to see that people like the idea of Tanis - it gives me so much pleasure every time I take the cover off that one - it's not very true to scale, or well researched, or anything like that but it's a nice little scene.

I think maybe the thing to do is to delay the decision a while longer and try and build one of the planes for Tanis, and some of the part-built stuff for Whitemarsh like the Ipswich shed and possibly a wind generator I think might work well there. That gives me some kitchen-table scale projects to fiddle with and one might spur me on more than the other. I can think about a plan for Tanis's extra bit at the same time.

The Hollentalbahn does call to me though - I have all the track I need for that, and most of the sundries. It'd be very nice to finally have somewhere to run my Z stock, which was the first train set I bought as an adult returning to the hobby ~8 years ago. Again, I'll try and work up a plan for that and post it here.

Thanks again!