gc4946

In the past week, on the "Glensley Celtic" 1920s-30s era football ground module, I completed much of the construction of the main office/changing room; the brick walls around the ground; set out the road layout including provision to bed the structures into the ground, all now awaiting painting. However I've still to construct the large exit gates.

Quite rightly Peco's starting with a clean sheet. Maybe they've realised 1:120 TT will provide better looking and running models than N, but leveraging expertise with their GWR structures range to kickstart their plans. Peco can resize their former N 2251 0-6-0 loco as a start and possibly develop other stock originating from their Ratio brand. I suspect Peco are also attempting to secure part of a market for TT track in continental Europe.

It dawned on me something was missing from my 1920s-30s football ground setup. I needed to model the club's office and teams' changing rooms. While having the Wales v Ukraine World Cup qualifier on TV in the background I began work on the large building, it's a long hipped roof structure between the turnstiles and the toilets. All these structures on the board are scratchbuilt.

Base now being scenified.

I bought a kitchen door from B&Q 715 x 297 mm to mount the football stand representing Glensley Celtic in the 70s and 80s. Road, pavements and car park added from 1mm and 2mm thick mounting board.

Tonight I made progress on the toilet block, it's now incorporated into the football club's boundary wall. I also cut the wooden stand's roof to size. This week a Hornby TTS J36 sound chip arrived in the post to fit in my LNER loco version. I bought an example when it was first announced to encourage Hornby to produce a "Glen" class (which they haven't done yet).

Progress made on interwar era structures. (Top from left to right) both non-VIP stands in wood and concrete, enclosed VIP stand (Bottom from left to right) turnstiles and toilet block. A set of signs is being produced. The wooden framed stand had to be painted before the roof was made, otherwise it would have been difficult to gain access to paint the interior. Glensley Celtic FC in the 1920s and 30s, despite support from the LNER, never had a huge pot of money to spend on infrastructure, so the ground features a mixture of building styles.

Glensley (note revised name) Celtic was established as a football club by ex-North British Railway employees somewhere in the Central Belt of Scotland. Unlike its English Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway's Newton Heath team, it remained as a non-league Scottish outfit, but still supported by the NBR, later LNER. It lost its "sponsorship" by the railway on nationalisation. I realised three years ago I attended a Farsley Celtic (Leeds) home match so I decided to change the name from "Glensford" to "Glensley".

I'm naming the football club Glenford Celtic, its team colours are green and white. On aother note I noticed Astrobase are offering a cloth printed as a combined 8-lane athletics track with or without football pitch in the centre, for those playing with Subbuteo. However its dimensions are 220 x 160 cm, much bigger than many of my layout efforts! https://www.astrobase.eu/product/athletics-track-and-pioneers-pitch/

Tonight I rigged up a Hornby TTS class 37 chip in my modified Lima body/Hornby Railroad chassis of 37 111 Glengarnock. Here also is my recently TTS sound-fitted LNER D49 2753 Cheshire (Margate body, Railroad chassis) My small collection of Scottish allocated stock will be sound fitted.

Three models of older football stands for an un-named club under construction. All being scratchbuilt from styrene offcuts and reused sections. From left to right: Wooden framed stand (roof yet to be constructed) VIP stand (roof yet to be constructed) Open concrete terracing

My Hornby TTS 37 chip is now on its way from Olivias Trains. The reason for the flurry of work in building all these football stands, and their location, will become clear soon. Some years ago I built two modules describing the evolution of a fictitious athletics club. Now I'm doing the same for football.

Made more progress on the Subbuteo-based stand. I bought more acrylic paint to mix up enough to paint this stand in various shades of concrete! However I'll need to clean up joints and bases before painting.

After an abortive attempt, I resumed construction of football terracing using a pair of Subbuteo terraces which approximate to OO scale, for 1970s-80s era. I'm also working on a smaller version for the interwar 1919-39 period. Even though I have no room for more modules, nevertheless I'm modelling part of a football stadium as it could have looked both in the interwar 1919-39 period and the 1970s-80s. It means a lot of styrene offcuts from abandoned projects are used up in the process.

A spare Hornby TTS class 37 chip was identified and ordered to fit into one of my 37s (Lima body, Hornby chassis) which will arrive soon. The TTS A3 chip was installed in my D49. However when inserted correctly with the "1" pin lined up in the corresponding pin on the DCC socket, it caused a short but worked OK when fitted the other way round. It means the loco runs backwards when it should go forwards, but I'll tweak CV29 to rectify that issue.

While Hornby's TTS sound chips are affordable in today's economic situation, they don't cover all my wants, so need to rely on the likes of Howes, Olivia's and Digitrains to acquire key sounds. I'm only intending to sound equip a small proportion of my collection, with preference given to DCC ready stock.

Recently I bought a secondhand Hornby R2931 London Midland class 153 unit. It wasn't clear from the eBay description that it was sound fitted (it just mentioned DCC) I was pleasantly surprised when tested so it's reignited my interest in sound-fitted locos. My last purchase of sound fitted chips was in 2010 due to the expense, but today I ordered a bargain Hornby TTS A3 decoder to fit into my LNER D49 (Railroad chassis, Margate body) because they were 3-cylindered to see how the TTS decoder stacks up against the Loksound version.

Things have been quiet for some time but I realised there was no space at home to store all my efforts. Several modules are now scrapped, but I salvaged many parts, sorted and bagged up for future reuse. A two track terminus in BR 1980s era seeing better days last worked on during April last year in the first UK lockdown (never finished) "Westgrove Stadium" Network SouthEast through station (never finished) "Brassey Engineering/MJG Engineering" (never finished) "Old Oak and Brent" Silverlink, circa 2000 (complete, but board was of non-standard size) "Priory Ground" LMS, ex-LNWR (complete, but board was of non-standard size) All modules standardised at no longer than 715 mm and of the same style baseboard.

I wonder if the NBR and LNWR versions are released this year because of the nature of batch production ... and Hornby have matching locos up its sleeve in the next year or two?

The Royal Mail coach and wagons were surprises for me. I'd like Hornby to release a Royal Mail coach separately because I already own the R3810 pack and three open carriages. A 2nd class coach would also be welcome (basically a roof added to an open 3rd design)

My final speculations before Hornby's announcement: HST in Midland blue livery TfW driving trailer and class 67 Last run of Mk4s in TfW livery before retirement of the tooling Last run of Pacers in Northern and TfW liveries before retirement of the tooling and finally, as Hornby often produce oddball locos, either a Turbomotive or LNER V4

I don't know how much Hornby monitors eBay trends, but if they think auction prices matched or exceed their costs of producing certain items they might consider announcing them in order to get a share of the cake

Much as though I like a NBR Glen class to be announced next year, I think either a D49 or a K4 will appear instead. It's too soon to announce a BR Standard 2MT 2-6-2T following on from its tender version. There could be a Bluebell 1960 train pack featuring new-tool Terriers Stepney, Fenchurch and the Maunsell BCK and LSWR lav 3rd in blue.

Maybe an all-new LNER D49, modelling Shire and Hunt versions properly for the first time with correct details and tenders for the appropriate era.

A Urie S15 may also appear, this year would have been the centenary of its introduction, but model held back to be released next year. Mk1 BCK could be on the cards with liveries including InterCity swallow charter livery with white roofs also applied on the FO and RBR.