David Holman

Fascinating! Looks like an interesting, but hopefully stress free build and will form a great picture frame for current and future projects. In one of his 7mm layout building books, Gordon Gravett did a plan of a light railway junction, with the bay platform to the front and the mainline behind - just like Enniskillen. Hence either a full coach, if room, or a half relief, or even a painting or photo of a GN coach could set the scene nicely.

Investigations this morning revealed the cause of the ridge in the track. Turns out to be a case of not enough screws/glue/both to fix the baseboard to top the frame and the former had risen about 2mm in the centre. More than enough to derail a 7mm scale engine... A couple of screws was all that was needed to push the baseboard top down on to the frame beneath. This has enabled some of the copper clad sleepers to be replaced, but as can be seen from the photo above, clearance gets tighter near the baseboard join on the left hand side. The righthand side seems ok. So, I put in several small screws and then soldered the rails to these, before using sleepers made from thin card to fill in the gaps. As can be seen above, the track is now ready for ballasting, so am hoping it will be a case of third time lucky - though if I'd done a proper job in the first place, luck would not have anything to do with it. I've since sprayed primer over the new track, to prevent water getting into the surface [and card sleepers] when I do the ballasting. The final picture shows that everything is pretty much nice and level, while the longer spirit level also reassures me that there is no rocking over the baseboard joint. A bit of levelling up was also needed on the loop track, but nothing so drastic and hopefully I'll be able to run trains again soon.

A serious amount of work in that model!

Not sure about smoke effects, they rarely seen to scale down for me, though the late John Dorman did some very impressive stuff on his 7mm scale GWR loco shed diorama. I think he used disco equipment. DVD control on vaping puffers maybe? The clouds that the gaspers produce are pretty substantial as is the range of 'flavours'. Not sure if wood smoke or steam coal is available though!

The Portsmouth Show proved to have a lot of very high quality layouts. Indeed, I would not have been disappointed to get 'worst layout', were such an award given! Lots of interested and knowledgeable folk came to look and talk, so it was in many ways a nice day. However, NPQ is still not all it should be, not least because the 'ridge' in the main baseboard joint reappeared and was severe enough to derail Shannon in either direction. Wolf Dog and the 101 were decidedly unhappy, but managed to get through with care. Part of the problem almost certainly came from the the varied heat and humidity of the weekend. The layout spent the night in my car & then Saturday morning was really wet, though luckily there was a brief window which let me get the boards into the hall unscathed. Normally, school sports halls are ideal, with high ceilings and flat floors, but as the venue warmed up, the humidity started to play havoc, so much so that in the middle of the day, the fiddle yard stiffened up considerably. Thankfully, things eased later, but it only goes to show the things that can affect exhibitors. Back home and with time to think on the two hour drive home yesterday evening, did a thorough check on my overall set up which revealed several issues I hadn't been aware of: One of my trestles is actually half an inch higher than the other [!] The beam extensions sag at the far end, by another half inch [!!] Therefore one end of the layout is a full inch lower than the other, which equals a minimum gradient of 1 in 90... Clearly, this doesn't help, but that ridge at the baseboard joint has meant I've had to strip out about half a metre of track and start relaying it. Again. Discovered that the fixing screws which the rails are soldered to at the join were sitting too high, but also the baseboard surface on the left hand board seems to have lifted slightly. Laying some new rail across the joint, shows there is minimal clearance between the bottom of the rail and the baseboard surface, so am going to have to find a way of sorting that out. At the moment, it may be I'll have to solder the rail to a few countersunk screws and the use thin card to represent the sleepers on a short stretch. I'll also be seeing if a bit of extra bracing is needed underneath the board. All in all, a bit of a bummer, but at least I don't have another show until July at the moment.

Only angles you need to worry about are the horizontal and verticals. Suggest you extend the buildings down to the baseboard level, then add the actual ground levels in front. If it is a terrance, remember to make sure the front steps are level. If extending into a backscene, perspective demands that verticals are just that, with horizontal lines actually sloping up/down to the vanishing point.

Am depicting the 1940s, Andy so nothing fancy -apart from the locos, which always seemed to be well looked after. Shame none were saved...

Sounds interesting, especially if available in 7mm scale.

Ouch!

The Swilly coach is now pretty much finished. Final jobs included fitting roofs to the duckets, glazing, plus lettering, numbering and a bit more weathering. At least the Swilly didn't go much on complex liveries for its coaching stock - the diamond logo [hand drawn with various fine marker pens], plus 'guard' at the van end and a number [both transfers] and that's it. I also made some covers for where the lamp tops went after electric lighting was installed. Hopefully it looks suitably care worn. Eventually, it will form the mixed train with a couple of wagons and the Barclay 4-6-0T With another show coming up for NP Quay, decided I ought to improve my stock storage, so invested in some new plastic ones from The Range. Not sure about the Barbie Pink lids, but they mean my stock now stands on its wheels and I can [hopefully] protect the AJ coupling hooks better. I can also fit a complete train in each box, which makes for easier setting up and packing away. The three deeper cardboard boxes contain the station building, the crane and some spare stock if/when required.

Northport Quay gets its second outing at the South Hants show next Saturday. Venue is the Admiral Lord Nelson School, 10.30 - 4.30 and will be running the 1900s stock. Nothing after that until second half of next year at the moment, though should be a few coming up, post Uckfield.

7mm scale but 36.75mm gauge and 21mm for 3'ng. I sometimes wonder how many folk actually model 5'3 in each scale. Take 7mm scale: Slater's do a broad gauge loco axle and Donegal wheels, but the evidence of this forum suggests that, apart from myself and Galteemore, they don't have many customers! We seem to have Angus doing 2mm and Broadstone in S, while 4mm scale is probably still in single figures - I can think of four. Then there is Ballyconnell Road in 3mmfs. Not that it matters, there are great things being done in the more commercial scale/gauge combinations, but it would be nice to know who else is out there.

Mail order parcels have been arriving this week, albeit not quite in the order I expected, but welcome nevertheless. First in was a pack of Kadee 0 gauge couplings. Fintonagh stock uses No5s, but these are too small for the 2'7" Donegal and Swilly rolling stock wheels, so have had to go for the larger ones. Had been thinking about using Alex Jacksons, but these need standard side buffers, whereas narrow gauge favours centre 'chopper' couplings, so Kadees seemed the only option. They are quite chunky, but certainly work in terms of height, though being American, key dimensions are in fractions of an inch. The gap between the the bottom of the dropper wire and the rails is 1/16th of an inch, but the top of the drag box has to be 25/32", so making a simple gauge or three seems the best option, the simplest of which is a piece of 60 thou plastic sheet, which is as near as dammit to 1/16th" A bit of weathering and painting has been done - in the case of the roof, after receiving a couple of layers of tissue paper to simulate the canvas covering. Another parcel was from Worsley Works. I hadn't been expecting the Barclay 4-6-0T etchings for several weeks, so it was a nice surprise. Worsley etches are very much an aid to scratch building and certainly NOT kits, because there are no castings, or indeed instructions, so working out what some of the parts are often requires a bit of thought, while you also need to compile a list of all the additional items required, such as chimney, dome, safety valves, handrail wire and other details, plus of course the chassis too. Speaking of which, am still waiting for the wheels from Alan Gibson, ordered at the same time as the Worsley etches... Anyway, I think I've identified the parts - side tanks, cab, footplate [& valances], smokebox saddle and sand boxes being fairly obvious. Less sure about how the boiler works, or indeed the smokebox wrapper, while the inner sides of the tanks are just one of the things I'll need to make, but overall, the etches represent a very helpful start.

Remains my favourite scene - something to do with the lighting and the wet looking ground.

Exquisite. Shouldn't be allowed, really...

Simple, inside cylinders, straight (ish) footplate - ought to be easy! Until you look more closely that is... Not hard to see the challenges, but certainly looking good and well worth the effort.

Indeed! Just been reading it. Interesting that he used just the outside frames.

A varied and eclectic library too, by the look of it!

Narrow gauge continues on two fronts, albeit one more theory than practice at the moment. In the practical world, the Swilly brake third is making progress, though as is the way with coach building, it is as well not to get ahead of yourself too much. The coach had reached the stage where I could give it a coat of primer. I'd made a removable roof assembly & added basic interior seating detail [not sure the Swilly went much further!], so after a bit of a wash and brush up, out came the Halford's rattle can primer. This first witness coat showed a few areas needing attention, but as you can see from the second picture, a piece of beading on the guard's ducket is still slightly askew. After a few hours drying time, decided it was worth having a go at a bit more detailing. I'd already added representation of the door hinges [20thou plastic rod for the top two, 40x40 square of 20thou for the lower hinge], so next up were the varied door and grab handles. The former are ok, but the various grab handles are certainly not my favourite task - fiddly to say the least, with other, less polite, adjectives applicable too - especially the multiple bends for the door commode handles. Speaking of fiddly, I'd also added some [very] basic brake gear to the outer ends of each bogie. Not worth doing any more because the footboards hide much of what is below sole bar level. The upper footboards are just strips of 40thou plasticard, welded straight on to the sole bar, but the lower ones needed brackets made from 0.7mm brass wire, bent into an L shape. I flattened the top end using a hammer & small anvil, before glueing in place with cyano. It could be that the primer may end up being the top coat as well. In its latter days, Swilly coaches were grey, which it seems often weathered to an even lighter shade - along with a fair amount of dirt too, so once final detailing has been applied, it may be straight to the weathering bit. As far the Barclay 4-6-0T project is concerned, this remains in the planning stage at the moment. It certainly seems important to have a set of inside frames, with the outside ones being dummy. Swilly stock was about 7 feet wide, so I've been trying to work out all the clearances for the chassis. Therefore have been making some actual and large sized drawings to help visualise things. At the moment, using Slater's wagon axles seems about right. 3' gauge wheels work out as a scale 3' 6 wide overall. Therefore setting the frame spacers at 2'3 should give a scale one foot of space between the inner and outer frames. The latter, if set at 4'3 apart is also the distance between the ends of the Slater's 1/8th inch wagon axles. The actual wagon wheels are pushed on to smaller diameter extensions & these will hopefully take the crank axles. By the time coupling and connecting rods, plus the fixing nuts are added, the overall width stretches to about a scale 6'6, which seems about right under a 7' wide footplate., as shown below. Much as I'm keen to make a start, it probably makes sense to finish the coach first.

Some real gems there, John - especially the 4-4-0!

Many thanks - sounds like good advice. Heard about the Slater's wheels and am certainly thinking will use inside frames, with the outside ones dummy - probably fixed to the footplate, with the extended axles in slots and not connected to the outer frames. Am thinking the inside frames will need to have a keeper plate, so I can drop out the wheels and motor gearbox when needed.

Fine work and handy to know where I might get whitemetal castings for a Swilly 6 wheel coach, albeit it a way down the road for now. I use stainless steel sink cleaner on brass and nickel. A brand called Shiney Sinks was recommended back in the day, but Cif or similar works well enough with an old toothbrush.

I'm going to be adapting Fintonagh - mainly just a few new low relief buildings and new backscene. The track is hand built, using Peco Code 83 flat bottomed rail on copperclad sleepers. It uses 4mm finescale standards = one millimetre flangeways on the points. Both 0 and 00 wheels seem happy with this combination.

All about framing and the right materials. 6mm birchwood ply is the best I've found for flat surfaces and frames, but there are many options. Try getting hold of books like Iain Rice's Cameo Layouts for ideas.

Post Uckfield, have managed to get back to my new narrow gauge projects & in particular the Swilly brake coach. And what an interesting time it has been! Indeed, have had to vacate the workshop for the second afternoon running having tipped over a bottle of DI Lemonine solvent. Yesterday, I did the same thing with a bottle of MEK, which was even worse. Anyway, back to Monday, when I was hoping to get the panelling done on the other side of the coach, only to find that my stock of 20x40 micro strip had virtually run out. Never mind, I thought and initially went to the Amazon website to get some more Evergreen strip. Bad idea! They were asking £18 a packet [yes, really]. Fortunately, other outlets are available, not least Slaters Plasticard, who not only do a packet for under a fiver, but it contains 50 strips to the ten from Evergreen. Ordered Monday morning, arrived Tuesday lunchtime. Can't be bad. So far, so good. While waiting for it to arrive, I decided I could have a go at the Alphagraphix bogie/underframe kit. However, while the castings are nice enough, when made up, the are a scale 6' wide and will not fit between the sole bars. I tried various ideas to cut them down, using most of my tools, until finally realised that I needed to shorten both the centre spacer and the axles ends too. The picture below sums up the chaos nicely... Since then, things have progressed well and the panelling is now complete, with the coach sitting on its bogies and awaiting the addition of the double footboards. Another problem causing much head scratching has been what to use for couplings. Kadee No5s are too short for the 2'7" wheels on Swilly stock. Thought about using AJs, but these won't work with the centre buffing couplers, so am probably going to have to try Kaydee 0n3 type or even 0 gauge ones. My mind has also been turning to building a Londonderry & Lough Swilly locomotive. First choice is one of the Andrew Barclay 4-6-0Ts, not least because Worsley Works do a 7mm scale body kit. An order has been made though it will be a while as it is currently not in stock. However, I can make a start on the chassis, especially as Roger Cromblehome at Alphagraphix kindly sent me his CAD drawing. So, more stirring of the grey matter because, as you might expect, things are far from straightforward. The main problem is that these locos were outside framed and as far I can tell the right combination of wheels, extended axles and cranks are not available. Alan Gibson do a 6' diameter, 4mm scale driving wheel that is a close match to 3'6 in 7mm scale. These come in a £10 a pair. Slaters do a standard gauge 3'6 wheel, but these are now close to £30 an axle! Gibson wheels use a 1/8th inch axle, whereas Slaters are 3/16th. Gibson are unable to supply an extended axle for 21mm gauge and though Slaters do an extended axle for outside cranks, it is way too long for 3' gauge. So, what to do?After MUCH pondering, finally came up with the idea of sourcing my own 1/8th inch steel rod and cutting it to length myself. However, a different alternative might be to use Slater's coach/wagon axles, which are long enough to go through the outside frames, while the 1.8mm extensions on to which the wheels are fitted could actually be ideal to take the outside cranks. Still with me? I'm not sure I am, but this is where I have got to at the moment, so orders for Gibson wheels, bearings, motor-gearbox and so on are being prepared, while Geoff Holt's excellent books on loco construction are being pored over again. He's not done outside frames though, so John Ahern's Miniature Locomotive Construction, first published in 1949 [mine is from 1971] may also be useful. Watch this space, as they say. Below is a photo of the loco, Roger's frame drawings and my idea of Slater's wagon axles against 3' gauge wagon wheels. The Gibson wheels, being 4mm scale have 24 spokes [drivers] and 12 spokes [bogie], Swilly ones were 12 and six respectively, so may have to remove alternate spokes, though probably only on the bogie wheels as the drivers will pretty much be hidden behind the frames. Life is complicated, that's why it's fun. Allegedly...