The ballasting has now been completed on both boards – I will remind you that ballasting is made up of sand, grit, earth (wargaming war dirt and medium stones) and a little O gauge real ballast to top up. These railways were only used for two or three years maximum and anything to hand was used as ballast. I think the look is of a ‘temporary’ railway only.

The small drainage ditch along the front of the layout has been fashioned in cork and in real life even the soil from this was also used to ballast. Although the drainage ditch is only a scale 3′ wide, it will have water (varnish) added so it looks deeper than in really is.

The next thing I tackled was the bank at the back of the layout. This was made from three layers of 1/4″ cork glued together and then shaped as required, it was then covered with a thin coat of Polyfilla. It will then be glued against the backscene, painted and flocked. The final part will be adding hedging, bushes and small trees, some photo’s show the hedging balanced on the bank to see the effect.

The final part of this update, was a decision that had to be made, and we have decided that the tracks that emerge from the fiddle yard will be through a dilapidated barn. When these temporary railways were laid, nothing got in the way and buildings just had holes knocked through to gain access and any original doors were simply taken off.

Having not modelled this gauge before, I keep the one wagon in my possession and a couple of scale solders on the baseboards  to remind me of what scale I am working in. The swing on the bogie wagon through the entrance from the fiddle yard has been checked, however we do not have the tallest wagon available and this does cause some height concerns!!!  The basic sides of the barn have been formed as a template and test fitted.