[Blackcloud Railways]

_________________
Bob Hughes
Playing Trains

Once there were mountains on mountains and once there were sunbirds to soar with and once I could never be down.

[giles b]

Time for another picture. As we approach the end of the year I was looking back at some pictures of my G scale loft layout in our last home. Like full sized railways, Christmas always interrupted services on the Catwater & Southern, though in our case it was because a cupboard in the eaves needed opening up to get at the seasonal decorations. A section of the yard at Catwater had had to be made as a pivoting table that caused a deal of head-scratching before the track could be arranged to accommodate the necessary baseboard cuts. The pictures show "train services suspended" and the normal view.

I took a calculated gamble on a light baseboard construction, and found it to be quite adequate, as the LGB track was very sturdy and the locomotives and rolling stock forgiving of any small bumps at the edges of the moving section, despite all the odd angles the rails crossed the baseboard edges.

[giles b]

Photos of my former O gauge layout, Stratford (Waterside) have been in short supply since I sent most of the good ones off to a publisher who promptly lost them. However thanks to a photo-tweaking website I've managed to enhance one of the rejected shots which originally was over-exposed.


The 0-6-0ST is waiting to leave for Moreton-in-Marsh, hauling the Brake/compo and a coach converted from Peco narrow gauge kits. Also visible is the experimental diesel, and an assortment of kit-built wagons.

There has been some discussion in RM on where coal bins were sited. These are based on my recollections of a small coal yard in Twickenham (not the main goods yard where coal was shovelled directly from wagon to sack). There were some very broken down devisions between the bays, made from scrap timber and corrugated iron. I think there was a low sleeper-built wall backing the track, just enough to stop coal spilling onto the rails, but below the level of the wagons' drop-down doors - as seen here.

The back-scene was hand painted, and based on photos of the town taken in the 1920s that I found in the town's Shakespeare Centre. They also had period trade directories so I was able to model wagons based on real coal merchant's names, although in most cases I invented their wagon liveries.

[giles b]

These may already be in the system, though I can't remember where. They show what I was doing 50 years ago - I can't quite believe it's so, but have checked and it is true. Two scenes from my OOn3 Midd Valley Railway layout. These are the earliest model pictures I have, as my first two layouts never really got in front of a camera.


A passenger train heading out of Lamberstock crosses a rather flimsy looking trestle. Loco is a TT Castle mechanism with a home-built body, seemingly owing something to the Lynton & Barnstaple engines, hauling a couple of Irish coaches that had been built from drawings in the Modeller and Model Railway News (those were the days!)


A bit further down the line we see a goods train passing Kingswood Halt. TT Jinty based IOM-style loco and home built wagons including a Welshpool brake van

[giles b]

Some memories of a trip over the Welsh Highland Railway some years ago. It had been a stormy night and the rain only stopped shortly after we left Caernarfon. However I did manage to get a few shots.







An unusual shot of our loco on the return trip, taken from an open-sided tourist coach halfway along the train. About as sharp a bend as you might find on an 009 layout!

[Broadoak]

Some really good photos, thanks for sharing.
I like the last one especially, very atmospheric.

Regards Peter

[giles b]

Just rediscovered the on30centre website. Looking through the Conventions and Meets section I came across this; the basic idea appeared on Carl Arendt's site some years ago.



The model is by Jim MacIntire, and is HOn30 scale. It looks like a good idea to model small scenes connected by plain track (or trestle bridges, as here) but it does seem an awful lot to pack up and move. I suppose a green table-cloth instead of the boxes would be a saving at the expense of a worse sight-line. One advantage would be the ability to construct the modules in a small apartment or bedsit and then hook them up at a show to make an operating layout. There is something about it that appeals, though.

[giles b]

Time for another dip into the archives. These just re-discovered............

One of my favourite locos, seen here at the Baie de Somme steam week-end in 2006


They also had this tiny draisine on display. Note the dual gauge track, and the passing SNCF train in the background.


On another French ramble I found this Brookville diesel converted into a mobile hedge trimmer. Should be fun in 009!

[giles b]

A search through my photos stored in the loft turned up a few I'd forgotten about, chiefly a few of my O gauge Stratford (Waterside) and also Alcudia (7mm narrow gauge).

Here's a shot of 0-6-0ST "Pyramus" drifting across the River Avon. I had to omit half the bridge's length, but it still captures feel of the original. The nearby road crossing, Clopton Bridge, had to be in very low relief on the backscene. Tramway Cottage is also a real building, although I had to simplify its surroundings a little to fit it onto the layout.

[giles b]

Here is the first of the Alcudia pictures. I think they may have been taken by a fellow club member at the Twickenham MRC show in the early 1980s. I've had to do some cropping and cover over the background in some of them, so apologies for any rough edges. I enjoyed building the models of Spanish prototypes in 7mm scale, but gave up in the end because of the scale/gauge discrepancy. Memory of the layout certainly helped to get into the style when Puerto Paseo was built.

This is a view of the loco shed with a Reus-Salou 0-4-0T outside, and the Nasmyth-built 0-0T hiding under cover. The layout was based on the paste-table idea by Chris Ellis in the magazine in the late 1970s. The baseboard join between the two tables is just behind the shed and the main line heads off to the right in the background, the line to the harbour being on the left.

[CRACKED]

Giles,

The late 1970's, surely you mean the early 1980's

The article "Layout in a Paste Table" was in the December 1982 Scale Trains. There may have been some follow up articles in 1983, but as I do not have issues for that year, I can no longer certain.

The first issue of Model Trains was January 1980, with Scale Trains starting from April 1982.

Model Trains appeared somewhat intermittently after Chris's Departure, although at least one of your articles appeared in it during this period.

Cheers
_________________
Clive

[giles b]

Yes, apologies if I got the date wrong. I did not bother to get out all my back-numbers for a trawl, and merely looked at my list of past layouts. The dates for some of them have slipped from the record and are approximate; Alcudia is one of them! I must have kept my connection with the Twickenham club longer than I thought - by the early 1980s I was living in North London, but obviously still exhibiting with the club in SW London.

[ruedetropal]

It is also got its own chapter in book about modelling narrow gauge.
It does puzzle me how many people model metre gauge using O16.5 , but can't grumble as a couple of people have bought my 1/43 scale 3D printed Corpet body, and like you Giles, it is one of my favourite locos.I am pretty sure the Corpet on one O16.5 layout in latest Voie Libre is my design. All it says is that it is 3D printed, but you tend to recognise your own children!
It wasn't one design though, the loco design changed a little over the years, including the wheel base. Other more subtle differences were probably due to different lines wanting different features. Some had what Irefer to as blinders/shes above spectacle windows, some did not. And was the Pingely(?) a licensed variation on same design as it was so similar.
_________________
Simon Dawson
Will try anything once, looking for the ultimate easy to set up portable exhibition layout, preferably French narrow gauge and with lots going on, not necessary on the rails.

http://www.rue-d-etropal.com

[giles b]

[Blackcloud Railways]