Black Marlin

A tiny modicum of progress, and an equally minor setback. The setback concerns the Oykish viaduct. The weight of a train left sitting on the middle span was causing one of the viaduct sections to lift and twist. This can be easily resolved, I think, by inserting a plasticard shim between the 'steel truss' section and the 'masonry arch' section, and supergluing the lot together. It's unlikely to be an issue when the bridge is in layout use (apart from anything else, the masonry sections will be anchored to the baseboards) but it annoys me a little that my inner civil engineer is required to have his wrist slapped by the inner quality controller... On the progress front, after some slight faffing with Hattons (who had accidentally cancelled my order), a PLA Janus and 6 PLA wagons are on their way. They will make an excellent quayside train, especially when tailed by a red Bachmann Toad-E brakevan I found on Ebay (split, I think, from the 'Jack the Saddle Tank' trainset - who knew there would ever be anything of use to come from that concoction?). All it will require is some decal lettering and that train will be good to go. I've also spoken to DCC concepts about their Powerbase product. Because my gradients will be hard work for the locos (a rise of 8" is a lot, even in 20+ feet), the product makes sense, although economically it just isn't feasible for the whole layout (Including the fiddleyards, I'm looking at somewhere on the sunny side of 800' of track). They recommend a 'run-on' at the top of the rise equal in length to the longest train making the ascent, which makes sense. The practical upshot of this is that I've had to take the track off the oft-rumoured but still unseen T-section viaduct, as I will need to lay the Powerbase on the trackbed there. And I still haven't finished the new piers for it... (although I have put together a Parkside LNER plate wagon, just to get back into the rhythm of building rolling stock). So the Powerbase goes on the shopping list for next month. (Incidentally, it's worth pointing out that I got my answer on the same day that I emailed the question. In combination with a couple of other considerations, that level of customer service has convinced me to go for Cobalt IP Analogue point motors for the scenic sections of the layout). Expensive hobby, this, isn't it?

Morning all from Aberdeen. A bit blustery here, although the roads are no more than damp. Today I shall be wrangling with the company's lawyer. She's very good, and together we make an effective team - I stop people breaking the rules, and she stops them breaking the law - but occasionally we need to get together to thrash out the nuance of some of the company procedures, and this is one of those times. I'm looking forward to it. We're both Stephen King fans, so if progress slows on the actual work we're meant to be doing we can stop and discuss Sai King's oeuvre. I've just finished The Outsider; I liked it a lot. Good thoughts for all in distress (may all black dogs be scruffed and brought to heel); a cheery wave to the ever-ravishing Alison; and hello to Jason Isaacs.

I have extracted from Marketing a promise that before they start flinging stuff on the web they'll run it past me first. I've explained that I don't have an issue with any statement they make that could justifiably be preceded by 'It could reasonably be argued that...'; where I drew the line was with stuff that ought to have been prefaced with 'It is clearly blatant nonsense to suggest...'! Still, at least I'm now gently easing into the downward slope of the afternoon (and hence the week).

I don't suppose you (or anyone else) happens to know what colour the brake vans were? Edit: on the assumption that, if nothing else, it will match the livery of the wagons, I've found a red Bachmann Toad-E (split, I think, from the 'Jack the Saddle Tank' trainset) that will do very nicely - especially once I add the letters 'P L A' to the sides!

Those of you with preorders on Hattons may wish to check them. They'd accidentally cancelled mine (actually, they accidentally cancelled half of mine, and had boxed up the wagons without the loco!), and if I hadn't been a bit on-the-ball I could have lost out.

There's something distressingly phallic, in an equine sort of way, about how that tornado descends from the clouds...

Morning all. I'm at my desk and gearing up for a fight. I'm the senior quality engineer for the company I work in, which means that almost all of our output, of whatever sort, flows through me before it reaches the wider world (I am, in that sense, a sort of one-man bottleneck). Recently I've been locking horns with Marketing, who have demonstrated in spectacular fashion that they ought not to be allowed anywhere near a statistic, and my relentlessly calling them on their buffalo excrement has ruffled a few feathers. I expect that to kick off later this morning. Is it bad to say I'm looking forward to it just a little bit? I'm sure of my facts, sure of the high ground, and know how to construct an argument - three crucial advantages I'm not convinced my opponent enjoys. In any case, I have decided to adopt a new motto for my department: "In God we trust: everyone else gets fact-checked."

One of the most rewarding lunchtimes I have enjoyed recently occurred earlier today when I simply entered 'Sarthe' into the search function at the top of the page. For an even more focussed reading experience, search for 'Alison'!

I am having fun in the office this morning, surrounded by people for whom the words 'document control' mean nothing more than two decent consecutive rounds in Scrabble...

This is a really lovely model. May I ask 2 questions? Who makes the Charioteers, and, in a similar vein, who makes the LMR open wagons? Regards, Gavin

I have just read through this thread in its entirety and I'm hugely impressed at the model's scope and precision. And, remarkably, I think I may have found something on which I can shed a little helpful light: The easy way to solve this problem is to replace the propeller blades with circles of clear acetate of the same diameter. Drill a hole through the centre of each circle, affix to a Dremel, hold a paintbrush loaded with thin yellow paint to the edge as you spin the disc, and lo you will have very effective representations of turning props with perfectly-applied yellow prop-tips! I did it with a Lancaster; take a look below: 00-gauge indeed, and I would guess it will appear sometime in 2019 because MR's second project, a Southern E1 0-6-0, is suggested as likely to appear in early 2020. Regards, Gavin edited to incorporate images

The first of what will, I suspect, be many rethinks. Nothing major, and certainly no disaster, but in the image above, the crossovers between the fast and slow lines are going in the wrong direction. How can I tell? Because Girtby Sea will feature a through station, and one of the things I intend is that the fast lines will not be platform-facing. Therefore, if a stopping service that had been on the fast lines wishes to stop in the station, it needs to get on to the slow lines to do so. The crossovers will be far back from the station to give adequate deceleration and acceleration distances for trains. 'Tis an easy fix, especially because I haven't actually laid any of the track yet, although I'm sad to be losing the points-based curve that swept the up slow line away at a tangent from the fast lines. (The up slow line is the one that has the longest single bridge highlighted in yellow on the diagram above). I do have 48" & 60" tracksettas, though; I shall experiment to see what can be achieved. Work on the T-section viaduct has stalled due to a lack of UHU (the only glue made from owls?) but, counteracting that disappointment, some progress has been made with the Oykish Viaduct: everything at track level or above has been completed. Apologies for the dodgy phone-camera pics, and the fact that the bridge isn't sitting on a flat surface: Gavin

Given that new technology is new-fangled, and previous ways of working are, presumably, old-fangled, does that mean that current technology is simply fangled? "Gavin's layout uses best fangled practice to achieve reliable operation..."

Thanks for posting this. I'd been wondering about point motors - never having owned a layout that used any - and, after looking at the Cobalts, they appear to be perfect for my needs. A website to stick in the 'Girtby Sea Shopping List' folder, I think. Cheers! Gavin

After faffing around with AnyRail, I can show you a rough approximation of what I'm up to. Yellow bridges are ones I have (from top to bottom: T-section viaduct; Oykish Viaduct; trestle; and to the left the Skaledale river crossing); blue represents water; waterfalls are at the top and to the left; the black line represents a cliff-face; and the green line is a backscene. Regards, Gavin

Drawing some conclusions solely from your username, you may find the picture below of interest: it's one of the trains I intend to run on Girtby Sea. Now, if only we could persuade Hornby to release a composite coach to match the others... I also realise that after announcing Girtby as an LNER layout I have so far failed to provide a single image of any LNER locomotive or piece of rolling stock! Hopefully this goes some way to redressing the balance: C1 Atlantic with Queen of Scots: K3 with refrigerated vans: J15 with cattle train

Glacial progress continues. The first of (at least) 15 Peco bullhead points has been ordered, along with a non-scenic code-75 electrofrog example. (It will be hidden behind a backscene, although it will still comprise part of the loop, which is why it's of the same track profile. All the fiddleyard trackwork will be code 100, because it's so much cheaper!) Also in the post are some more laser-cut MDF handrails to finish off the above-track-level aspects of the Oykel-like (Oykish?) Viaduct, and a ready-to-plant Skaledale rail-over-river bridge. Depending on how the track plan develops, I may need another, but one will be sufficient for this month. I am trying to be organised about how I prepare. As stuff arrives, it gets segregated into preparatory boxes labelled with things like 'UPPER BRANCHLINE' or 'LOWER QUAYSIDE'. It is remarkably satisfying to see the boxes slowly fill. It is also a way to ensure (I hope) future satisfaction: buying everything I need slowly and well in advance means (I hope) that build progress won't be halted too often by having to wait for missing bits and pieces to arrive - a particular issue with resin items, because once the tooling required to make them wears out, it's done, and then the S/H market is your only option. In the meantime (pics to follow), I have decided that I am unsatisfied with the fairly weedy piers provided with the MDF T-section viaduct I've been building, so I am wrapping some 9mm ply offcuts in Wills Coarse Stone to make some slightly more substantial supports. The bridge is part of the climb up to the upper branchline, so please don't panic if it appears to be sloped - that's on purpose! I do sometimes wonder if I have fashioned a rod for my own back by starting with what will almost inevitably become the most scenically-complex area of the baseboard: a three-level, 7-track-containing ravine that features three tunnel mouths, five bridges and at least two major waterfalls. The end result will, I think, look spectacular, and I'm looking forward to posing trains on it, but getting to that point is likely to be slow, complicated and expensive - that's a lot of scenic features to incorporate in quite a small area! Here's hoping it all works out...

Good morning Tony. I have an awful lot of the Wills Coarse Stone sheets to paint. The example on Little Bytham, the retaining wall that features in the lower right corner of the three pictures above, is about as realistic a stone effect as I've seen achieved with it. Can I ask what materials and techniques you used to get that effect? I would like, if I may, to steal it shamelessly... Regards, Gavin

I bought one not long after they first came out, plonked it on the rolling road and burned out the motor in less than two minutes at half power. It was returned, a new motor fitted and I've had no problems since. There do seem to have been a bad batch among the first releases, and some of the mechanical errors were not minor faults! That said, I am now debating with myself whether my next heavy LNER freight loco should be a pre-war O2 or a pre-war Q6...

The photos do indeed look good enough that I've been persuaded to place an order for an LNER example. Not wild about the front coupling, obviously, but such things are eminently fixable.

I used to be averse, but I have subsequently been extended to the full ode.

Great news about the PLA Janus. I assume the wagons are on the same boat? Looking forward to having it and the recently-announced Hornby PLA Peckett scuttling about on the quayside. I have a question, though: what brake van would be suitable? (Incidentally, I told someone recently that I had a few PLA models on order. Brow furrowed, they asked in all seriousness if I was modelling Palestinian railways now?)