Mikkel

I really like your work with the Evergreen. Very neat and well detailed. And the tanks look beautiful. This is going to be a brilliant layout!

Impressive. Those end loops are particularly stylish, looks like great craftmanship.

Yes, whoever said modelling was a relaxing hobby?! :-)

Thankyou Gents, it's nice to be back in the modelling world :-) Yes those pre-printed sides really do look the part from most angles. In fact I find that it's only when you shine a light directly at them that they look wrong.This one's from the PC/Wheeltappers range. There's a bit more about it here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php/blog/75/entry-1150-low-tech-pre-grouping-stock/ Agreed that Aunt Augusta must have been a formidable woman! In fact the skull is from my son's Warhammer range - which also explains the rather large head she must have had! Dunno what Gradgind is up to with the sack - he always seems to carry it around. Maybe Hamlet will have to make do without a skull in tonight's play! I think the stories will need to be put on the backburner for a while now. Fingers are itching to model some trains :-)

So that concludes this little story. Apologies for the long delay, it's been a rough summer and there hasn't been much time or energy for this sort of thing. But things are looking better now. Much kudos to Ian Smith, who among all the hillarious suggestions came closest to guessing the outfall of the, er, murder riddle:

The men stood in silence and stared at the broken crate. It had fallen on its side and the contents had spilled out. There was no mistaking it: There in the middle.... .... was a human skull. Station Master A. Woodcourt was the first to speak: "Well it may be a murder, but it's hardly a recent one!" At this point the director of the travelling theater company launched into a major outburst: "A murder? Are you mad? We use that skull for Hamlet! Didn't I tell you we were playing Shakespeare? And now I really must insist that your men hurry up with the unloading, or there will be no play tonight at all! And with that, they all got back to work. All except T. Gradgind, the carter. For a long time, he stood looking at the skull: Those cheekbones, that forehead. It strongly resembled his aunt Augusta. Augusta, the would-be actress who disappeared under mysterious circumstances a few years ago. Should he tell someone? He decided against it. They wouldn't believe him. They never did. Meanwhile, Station Master Woodcourt had returned to his favourite spot at the end of the bay platform. He was thinking that it might be time for a toffee (and that he rather deserved it) when one of the men interrupted his thoughts. A point failure had developed at the entrance to the carriage sidings. It was being worked on, but the problem was what to do with the Slip coach off the 15:55: It was still sitting in platform 3, blocking the up main. Would it be acceptable to store it in the bay for the time being? That sounded good to Woodcourt, and so the handsome Toplight Slip was propelled into the bay siding.... ....with the trusty No. 835 and driver T.F. Oberon in charge. This particular Slip was a compo to diagram F15, originally introduced in 1909. Like the other Toplight designs, it clearly signalled the modern and functional style that was becoming apparent everywhere on the GWR after the beginning of Churchward's reign. As the coach came up against the buffer stop, a new problem became apparent: The coach would block the exit to the run-round when the first branch train arrived tomorrow morning. Uncharacteristically, Woodcourt decided to deal with the problem tomorrow. It had been a long day and he really was feeling his age. Perhaps tomorrow would be better. Tomorrow was June 28, 1914. That sounded peaceful enough. THE END

Hi Pete. Looks good as ever. Am very impressed with the lining!

You make it look so easy, Pete - but we all know there's skill and neatness involved in your work. Great stuff.

Hehe, I suppose Orwell's mistake was that he thought the surveillance would be imposed on people - rather than something we seem to want and even happily *pay* for :-) Farthing update due very shortly :-)

Hi Hayfield, a belated thanks for this input. Yes the C+L timbers are a bit on the thin side in my opinion, but worked out OK in the end. I haven't tried the Exactoscale products yet, but it's good to hear you seem to be satisfied with them. I'd like to try out a direct comparison at some point.

Dan/Dave: Apologies for my lack of response, I haven't been much on here for quite some time and hadn't noticed your comments. Thanks, and that book on GWR murder mysteries looks interesting!

Hi Chris, lovely buildings. I thought you had gone to 4mm but it looks like you got sucked back in :-)

Hi Pete. Very neat build, and a very interesting material. Tomorrow I will go to the local DIY store and ask to see some grilled lime. If there's any doubt I'll tell them there's a chap in Barcelona who uses grilled lime for serial layout building. That should clear up any confusion ;-)

Very nice painting and relaxed poses. Surely the moral of the story must be that it never pays to work too hard? ;-)

So subtle, yet so superb. Glad to see you're still at it :-)

Looks great! It has just the right mix of futuristic and present to be realistic, I think. You ask about ideas for an appropriate train. Here's a thought: How about a train that has cameras on it, which record whatever is going on in the train and can be watched by people sitting in a control room elsewhere!!? Oh, but wait....

Oooh nice! You really have a knack for adding atmosphere to things. The quality landscaping and photos make the RTR stock look really good. Thanks for sharing!

Looks great. It was always a very nice livery and you're doing it full justice, I think.

Just a quick note to say that I haven't forgotten about this! Life is just being a bit brutal at the moment and so the hobby is on standby. Will follow up in due course.

Hi Mike, I know what you mean about how modelling teaches us patience. Your one-hour-a-day approach sounds good, maybe I should try it. Maybe it will also keep the doctor away :-)

Thanks Will, all working now. The tractor is so nicely weathered!

Excellent as always, Missy. The crane is coming along very nicely. You've made me want to build one in 4mm right away! :-)

Superb. I especially like the embankment vegetation! (PS: Some pics are missing as I write, looks like a flickr issue.)

Hi Paul, thanks for the close-up of the vacuum pipe method. I have seen it before but never actually tried it (using ready made ones done in the same way), but it looks doable enough.

Gulp! You've done all this already?! Amazing and impressive, you work really fast Mike. Great to see the Penhydd trackplan being put to a different use here. Looks as if it's going to turn out fantastic. I agree with Pete about the low level shots, looks very promising already. I know what you mean about the S&W chains. But it's great how the couplings actually work, I was as pleasantly surprised as you.