Again these models are for my friend in Australia, he has become quite a collector of DRS traction over the years.
37038 is a limited edition from several years ago and apart from detailing one buffer beam and giving it a medium weather it is virtually ‘out of the box’.
The second loco, 37703 is far from standard and is a complete re-spray from R3 Re-sprays, and my job was to detail one buffer beam, re-instate emergency cut offs and give a light weathering.
This 37 is for a friend in Australia who remembers the Class 37’s on the Great Eastern Region of BR in the late 70’s – Early 80’s, just before many moved to Scotland.
The Loco is one of Heljan’s latest centre head code models, although several modifications were necessary to bring it into the timescale required for this loco.
All transfers were purchased, which included new marker dots for the head code and numbers and overhead warning flashes.
A banger plate for above the screw couplings was fashioned out of plastic card and fitted, the original pair of holders above the centre head code were removed. A new centre lamp bracket was made from brass and fitted. The whole area around the removed holders and the new lamp bracket was masked and re-sprayed.
A quite heavy weathering was required so I researched Class 37’s around the chosen period. They did become very grimy, very quickly, although the sides and yellow ends did seem to get a token cleaning, I have tried to portray a loco in this condition.
After fitting the extra 6″ to the layout and sorting the fiddle yard join, I tested the whole layout electrically with an old controller and jumper leads. Thankfully all points and tracks worked according to plan and the first loco and stock was run. Full wiring will follow soon.
Next task was to place the buildings on the layout in their revised positions, due to the extra 6″. Although I am not committed to these positions, they are likely to be near. I have made an extra item since my last post on buildings, it is a water tank built again from a laser cut kit. It is a superb kit but I have to say it is a bit larger than I expected so this may move over to my Steam Shed layout and another smaller one purchased. It is well worth having a good ‘play’ and see what looks best, end or side on etc.
As I have no indoor facilities for working on layouts, most work is completed on our picnic bench in the garden. This is why I have buildings in all states of manufacture, these are indoor fill in jobs when the weather is inclement outside.
I also added the ‘buffer stops’ at the end of the sidings and bay platform. These stops are made up of Scratch built, Peco and combinations of the two.
The Goods shed looks a bit blotchy, but all will be revealed later. My basic paint work laid down, I can now put the mortar in with fine Polyfilla and when dry and cleaned a coat of Coloron Wood Dye is wiped over to lessen the white effect of the Polyfilla. I will post pictures later.
Well, a lot has happened on the embryo layout. After much thought I have added another 6″ on to the run around end of the layout. The main reason was that I wanted to run all available loco’s on the layout and not be frustrated because some were too large to run around. It now takes everything that I have, likely to get and my friends loco’s. I simply made a 6″ x 24″ box and glued it on the end. The board now measures 6′ 6″ x 2 . This move will make it non transportable in my car so unlikely to be exhibited!
The next thing I tackled was to marry the fiddle yard to the board with the station ‘neck’. This was achieved by means of a template to position the baseboard locator’s. I had left the ends of the track on both the Fiddle and the board unglued to allow me some flexibility when getting both tracks lined up, thankfully they were nearly spot on and little movement was needed before final fixing.
You will see a spirit level – this is a vital tool to ensure all is correct.
I must admit while doing this job I had some strange thoughts! I was making this layout as a terminal station, possibly a station that was a through station before the line was truncated because of poor loadings, track washed away or whatever reason I could think of. What about if I made another similar fiddle yard for the other end! Its worth considering even if it could be ‘down the line a bit’.
Another couple of O gauge Heljan Diesel Locomotives for a friend, Shaun Harvey. Shaun has recently appeared in a Model Magazine with his N gauge layout, but like a lot of us, he is moving to O gauge. I won’t go into his plans, but an exciting new layout is on the way over the next year or so.
These loco’s are numbered to the pre-tops system without the ‘D’ prefix. This puts them in the 1968-72 era. Both are light to Medium weathering and are DC at present. although I think Shaun has plans for DCC.
While making the baseboards, fiddle yard and track laying, mainly outside on our picnic table, I also wanted to ensure all buildings and structures fitted in, size wise. To this end I have purchased some Laser Cut MDF and Laser Cut HD Card Kits and made them up indoors when the weather was poor outside. As the track laying progressed I kept checking the buildings clearances as I made them, this ensured all would be OK. I also refurbished a very old scratch built Cattle Dock that was in a very poor state.
I now have several items in various states of completeness, but at least I know they will fit in the required positions.
Station Building and Canopy ——-LCut Creative
Goods Shed ———————————-Laser Cut Railway Models
Coal Depot————————————LCut Creative
Loco Coal Stage—————————-Poppys Woodtech
Station Fencing—————————-Poppys Woodtech
Signal Box————————————Laser Cut Railway Models
Signal Box Interior———————–LCut Creative
Station Platform—————————Laser Cut Railway Models
Only the Cattle Dock is actually finished – I will do update posts as things proceed.
I was looking around for a new project and my thoughts varied between an O gauge garden layout to yet another micro/mini layout. I certainly have stock for a goodish size Garden Layout, but did I need the stresses and strains of making and maintaining it. Another option was to clear the garage of my OO layout and start afresh in O gauge. After much thought, I decided to make a large, for me, layout that could be kept in the garden shed and brought out on fine days any time of the year with little maintenance. I also wanted to keep the door open to possible display at Exhibitions although I have no suitable transport at present.
I came up with many plans and a couple were later put on a shortlist. I purchased a pair of Laser cut baseboard kits, both were 6′ x 2′. After much head scratching I decided that these had to be the scenic section and that a separate provision was needed for a fiddle yard.
I chose the attached plan for the scenic section. And I innovated a small fiddle yard, possibly to be superseded later.
The overall size including fiddle yard is a respectable 17′ and will hold a small Tender Engine or for instance a Class 24 and three suburban coaches. The fiddle yard has the head shunt from the goods yard, this only extends half the length of the fiddle yard. This meant that by adding a point in the fiddle yard I could gain a lot of flexibility. I can hold three small trains, one large and a small train by the use of isolating sections. I consider the whole layout is for storage and the run round loop and the bay platform can hold stock awaiting movement.
I also wanted to run the layout in two sections, the parcels/passenger section and the goods yard, hence the placement of power feeds and crossovers. The runaround loop being dual use.
No name for the layout yet as I want to run multiple era’s and regions. It will be scenically set from about 1950 until 1970 and generic railway structures will be used.
I think that any era/region can be run with three small loco’s, six parcels/coaching and up to 30 goods wagons – plenty of shunting using ‘spratt and winkle’ couplings.
The extensions for the four sawhorses were made to increase the height by 5″. Note I took the opportunity to increase the width that the trestle can hold, and put a ‘stop’ on the top to hold the layout in place.
The Layout will be DC as I find that I can use a smaller magnet with ‘spratt and winkle’ couplings and it is easier to position a train over the magnet.
All the straight track is glued already, but the points are just tacked as they need the holes drilled in the baseboard to accept the motors. A manual test then needs to take place before the full electrics are done.
The Platform has been formed already to ensure good tolerances for the stock. The platforms are Laser cut MDF supplied by Laser Cut Model Railways – excellent product.
Another great Exhibition by SRC. As usual the standard of Layouts and Traders was excellent. This has to be of the best one day Exhibitions in East Anglia. It was nice to meet up with some old friends on the DEMU stand and lots of mates both with layouts and as visitors.
This was a bit of a special day for us as both my sons came with my three grandsons. After things had calmed down a bit we gave three year old Charlie his first taste of operating a layout after a bit of tuition by his Dad. Luckily we were exhibiting Lowe St. which only has one point. I have to say that he did remarkably well, a future operator I hope, if we can keep him away from games consoles etc . I have to say that his Dad buying him a Hornby Edward should help.
I would like to thank my son John for staying on and helping and Graham M for his support. Photos by my wife.
After a break of several years I was invited to attend this exhibition with my O Gauge layout Sefton Yard. This was my first visit to the new venue at Hellesdon High School, and what a great venue it is.
Not only was this a very friendly show, but all the layouts present were truly excellent. I have to single one out though, this is ‘Worlds End’, a classic. Its scenic modelling puts it in my best ever top 10 layouts. This also shows just how diverse railway modelling really is, from the urban setting of ‘Worlds End’ to the vast space of ‘That Dam Railway’ to merely the shunting puzzle of our ‘Sefton Yard’ and the depot movements on ‘Bedford Road’.
We were in Hall 2 along with two other O gauge layouts Bedford Road and Blackshaw Yard/Coopers End. It was nice that we were all in the same Hall, but also that the three O gauge layouts were all different era’s.
I would like to thank my helpers of the day, Shaun, Graham and Graham. I would also like to thank my wife for the following photographs. Lastly thanks to Terry and all members of the Norwich Club – great Show, see you next year with Morlock Heath.
Last week I got around to numbering the last of my Dapol Class 08’s – Weathering to follow!
The first one is D3131 and is in green. In fact this loco was still in green when it received Tops numbering. The bonnet access doors had their handles removed as they were not needed on this series of 08’s. I also added an extra vertical hand rail on the nose end. These seem random fitted to some loco’s. This engine was based at March (MR) in the period I model. Again I did a fair amount of research into appropriate loco’s, this really is essential as liveries were constantly changing, even on the same loco! I used Fox Transfers for the warning flashes and data panels. HMRS pressfix again being used for all numbers.
The next 08 was to be D3103, a Western Region engine, based at Newport (EJ) during my modelling era. It did move to the Midland Region in late 1969. Again the bonnet access doors had the handles removed as they were not required. This loco had a black buffer beam in the photograph(s) I found.
The third 08 is D3275, this is a Scottish Region engine based at Polmadie (PO) during my required era. This loco has all the correct handrails and grabs as modelled by Dapol. The only modification was to paint the cab roof Blue.
The last Loco in this batch of numbering was D5593, this was a Finsbury Park (FP). It was one of the last 31’s in this original livery with a small warning panel and lasted until 1969 in this condition.
