Easter Reflections

Six Easter's ago I started creation what should have been my next layout, an O9 version of the Julian Andrews brickworks plan, later known as 'Avalon Brickworks' in the stewardship of Howard Martin. We were in lockdown and the weekend saw rapid progress on the layout during the day and depletion of a small keg of Hobgoblin (Ruby) in the evenings, and maybe afternoons... All the details

This project became bogged down in difficulties about what it should represent and what should run on it, I could have persevered but it was later all lifted due to the following reasons:

• The curve at the top-right hand corner was never smooth enough and really needed completely relaying.
• The angle and curve in the middle siding could never be decided on (in many ways due to me persisting trying to use MicroTrains couplers) - now actually I think it looks right as first laid!
• The fiddle yard siding was later extended and curved and always seemed to get in the way.
• I should have raised the track bed up from the board surface as I did on 'Shifting Sands', it always looked too 'sunken' around the edges.

As it was, the track was recovered, the curved rail mostly got used up on 'Odsock Corner' and the points and board await re-use, hence why most recent planning uses a 'Y' and Right-hand point. That current layout planning presents some dilemmas, there are several competing ideas that come up against practicality and reality. 

You may have seen the ideas on these pages in the last few weeks, centred around the Scale Model Scenery board for a Really Useful 'wrapping paper' Box . The most recent, posted on April 1st, was not really trying to fool anyone other than myself! That scheme needed a substantial run-off board to work effectively and there are space considerations as to where it could actually be operated - it would inevitably end up only being able to be set up in the workshop and having to have rolling stock transported out to meet up for a running session. I think at the moment I really want something that can live and be operated in the house...

The inglenook variations on that board hold a little more possibility for this by using them as a desk-sitter, but the board length will only just fit across the desk and with a solid wall either side I foresee issues getting it into place reliably. The original 'Upcycle' scheme that was abandoned well before Easter 2020 was a little shorter in length and perhaps better for it, although it could have benefitted from a little more depth. Height-wise it was designed to fit into a space and was going to present a challenge with fairly low-key scenery up to hedge/fence height.

However, at the moment, the idea of a single board that is shorter than the 30" of the Scale Model Scenery board, desk-sits easily and has low height scenery to store away with ease, is quite appealing. If it could offer a continuous run and some shunting possibilities, have a fairly generic setting and use the stock built recently with Greenwich couplers, it might tick a lot of boxes. If it looks like what was laid six years ago, that will be entirely a coincidence...

Food for thought...

Colin 

Boxing Clever

After some thought, maybe all that messing around with Inglenook variations is OK, but sometimes all I want to do is model more of a miniature railway scenario...?

Now it would probably benefit from a slight curve into the scene on the right, taking the platform out of parallel with the board edges and pushing the headshunt into the corner 'Shifting Sands' style...

Hmm...

Colin

Thinking in the Box

Taking the planning for the wrapping paper box project a step further, last weekend I mocked up the v3 Inglenook using the actual board parts and real points and stock to see if it actually worked in practice rather than theory. A few scraps of ply also got involved along the way...

The passenger coach here is substituting for a longer wagon, to test for some variation in the stock used. However the option is there for short passenger workings into the headshunt. I am conscious that the Lister is a fairly small loco and others, such as my Simplex, are a little longer - there isn't much extra clearance in the headshunt once the end of the board is taken into account plus any scenic treatment.

One option would be to have the board open-ended at the headshunt end to give a little more breathing space. This would provide a nice contrast with the necessarily closed-in sidings end. Here I've mocked up the positions of the wall and shelter leaning off it, but more importantly there is clearance in the sidings to allow three wagons to sit behind a magnet but still be recoverable beyond it.

Thinking back to the headshunt issue, a week on I opted to mock up the other possibility to breathe a little extra length into the space. This uses a second 'Y' point in place of the right-hand point and this affects the angle of the headshunt and the angles and curvature in the sidings. What it does not do is help me re-use the right-hand point that I intended to use from a previous project!

In many ways I think I prefer the way the sidings sit in the version with the right-hand point and having had another look today I think it should be possible to remove about 1/4" or rail between the two to squeeze a little more out, and angle the headshunt into the corner. We shall see...

Colin

Living in a Box

At Christmas, after a well-placed hint, I received a Scale Model Scenery baseboard kit designed to fit into a 'Really Useful' wrapping paper box. The intention is to produce something that can (hopefully) live in and be operated in the house. possibly as a 'desk sitter', although clearances may be on the tight side for that ambition. I haven't built the board yet but marked out the space (730 x 207mm) on some Amazon packing paper and played about with point templates, various rulers and a bit of post-production to run through a few options. 

The obvious one is an inglenook, a "standard" 5-3-3 seems possible but the second version is more a 4-4-2 with a shorter headshunt, the idea being that the rearward longer siding could have a rough platform to receive a simplex and a couple of 4w coaches from a fiddle stick run-off connected top-right.

The next option is to go for two points facing each other, along the lines of my earlier desktop-sitter 'Upcycle', again a passenger operation ought to be possible to the rear right hand line using a fiddle stick connected top-left. 

It's not too far from there to what to me is a very familiar plan adding another point... I have described this as 'Tragbar' as it is a mirror of an arrangement popularised in Scale Model Trains by the late Chris Ellis building the build of a layout of that name. It is more familiar to me as my Dad and I built a layout to this plan many years earlier called 'Chetley'. We hid the line top-right as a fiddle yard on the board but again this idea uses an optional fiddle stick. 

Next is a version of the plan I was previously looking at on the small cork board, a loop and siding. Whilst all of these plans benefit from a fiddle stick, this one requires it for full operation. However it would be possible to shunt it as a tuning fork without it for a quick operating session.

The final plan is actually a return to the Inglenook theme and has been created more recently than the other images. This switches the fiddle-stick line to the longer siding and the headshunt is a dead end. In some ways I prefer that as it creates a real restriction to the length rather than the possibility of cheating off down a fiddle stick! 

To fit in the box the board doesn't actually have much height to the backscene boards, 95mm - so buildings are something that have to be considered carefully. We are in the territory of huts, grounded van bodies and high walls. I envisage the line at the back running behind a wall, that get's higher and then has a lean-to over the middle line. Some shrubbery behind the back line would make it's disappearance complete as it wraps over the hole in the sky...

More soon...

Colin

Sitting Comfortably?

The driver of the Lister was not alone in his journey through the paintshop. For company he had the passenger and baggage for the 4w coach for 'odsock Corner. He's a 3D printed figure from 3D Printing for Charity (Facebook) raising money for the Lincs and Notts Air Ambulance.

He looks very relaxed in his shorts and cap! I could see a hint of a beard in the print so painted this in accordingly. The bag is from a set of Prieser unpainted figures bought in Shifting Sands days, both were finished in a similar way to other items in the recent batch, dry-brushing colours over a black-grey wash.

Colin

Odsock's Lister in Green

I had originally intended to reveal the painted FK3D Lister a few days ago but the original set of photos revealed a chip in the paint on the driver figure's hat and I just couldn't un-see it... hence repairs and a re-shoot. As a bonus that time gap allowed me to fit the couplings to the model and properly finish it off.

Normally when painting a locomotive model I use a process of primer> main colour (spray or by hand)> and then ancillary colours, but for this model I wanted to try something different, more akin to the way I might paint an item of machinery or a figure. Once the grey primer was on I ran a fairly heavy black-grey wash over the model, making sure it sat in the many crevices, angles and recesses of the print. I then masked off and painted the coupler blocks and brake wheel, firstly red-brown as an undercoat and the dry-brushing red over the top. Similarly the bonnet front was masked off and dry-brushed with several coats of a light grey. The intention was to allow the darker colour to remain in the recesses and add depth.

With the paint on the coupler blocks, brake wheel and bonnet front fully dry, I then masked them off to protect then and started to apply the green. Vallejo 'Flat Green' is the order of the day (again!) with a spot of a darker green added in to make a future stage easier. The colour was applied with a large flat brush and was again almost dry-brushed. I was particularly keen not to flood the solebar areas with colour as my intention was to use the dark grey base to provide some extra shadow and create an impression of more depth. The darker wash also shows around the grilles on the bonnet and in may other little spots.

The green had covered in one coat, but I then ran over it again very lightly with the undarkened colour, subtly highlighting the edges of raised detail. Other details such as the gear lever were picked out in appropriate colours and some extra dirt effects added in places. The 'Lister' logos on the bonnet side were dry-brushed in the light grey and I attempted to do the same in green to the 'AUTO TRUCK' lettering on the front. Meanwhile the driver had been painted, again dry-brushing over a dark grey wash, using subtle colours so he doesn't stand out too much. Everything was treated to a spray of Humbrol acrylic matt varnish to seal it all in and give a flat finish.

Finally my attention turned to the couplings. The print does have NEM style receptacles designed to take a Peco coupler, but not at "standard" height. I did try a Greenwich NEM style coupler but it didn't locate properly and even if bent down to the lower height would have stuck out a fair way. In the end I have used a pair of standard Greenwich couplers (the ones I had actually used to experiment with on O9 models a few months ago) located at the base of the block and bent upwards to the correct height. A rather unusual modification is that the loopholes that usually hold the coupler loop have been bent upwards and actually now help locate the coupler into the coupler box. A new hole was drilled in the shortened shank and a Peco trackpin through the coupler block, secured with superglue, holds the coupler in place. 

Colin

Junkbox Jury - Painted Decay

Paint shop capacity finally became available last week to give the "dismantled diesel" some paint. You may recall I built this in the backend of last year, mostly from the remains of incomplete projects. If I'm being honest I'd ben putting off painting as I wasn't sure how I could get the look I wanted. Thankfully the work on the Lister pointed most of the way and the job was actually completed over a small number of sessions.

There are two areas of the paintwork I am particularly proud of, both as a result of careful masking throughout the painting process. The first is the two bonnet doors that have seen a recent coat of primer, which were masked off pretty much throughout the painting process! With these areas masked everything else was given a coat of dilute black-grey as a basis for what would follow, and once dry the light blue of the bonnet was effectively dry-brushed on, leaving the black-grey showing through in the ledges around the rainstrip and grilles. Some really pleasing accidental effects were the runs under the grilles, the brush just missed those lines!

The second masking effect is the red oxide primer bordered with grime where the coupler blocks were once fitted. The bufferbeam had been primed in red oxide and the rectangular areas around the bolt holes were masked off prior to the grey wash. Masking was left in place when the red bufferbean colour was dry-brushed on which left the grime marks above and below the area. The masking was then removed prior to other weathering effects being added, including light brown washes, gunmetal over bolt heads and Citadel 'Typhus Corrosion' in selected areas around bolt holes and the exhaust pipe hole.

In the cab area the panel with the controls was given a weathered wood effect, we have to assume this was left in place, propped up on the bonnet, when the cab was removed. The chequer plate on the floor was dry-brushed with gunmetal to give it a metallic look, which spread to a patch where the doorway would have been. After some overall dry-brushing, including green-grey applied upwards from the bottom of the model to give it the effect of having been outside in grass for a while, I was satisfied with the result. A coat of Humbrol matt varnish was applied in the one day of sunshine we appear to have been allocated this year and whilst I may add some weathering powder effects in due course, I don't want to go over the top...

More soon...

Colin