Patrick Davey

Sounds nice! Which station? Or are you keeping that on the QT? Looking forward to seeing it!

The reverend ladies on the platform are actually authentic - my mother's cousin was a nun in Ballycastle and she had plenty of memories of the railway, and that's not the only family connection I have to the Ballycastle line: my great grandfather was a driver on the BR in its independent days AND a great uncle of mine lived in Capecastle before emigrating to the USA. I can imagine him starting that sad journey on the very platform I am recreating here.

These comments are out of order (boom boom).......

A few more ‘artsy’ ones.....

Some further updates.

Too ‘narrow’ Leslie - very good! I suppose it’s hard to ‘gauge’ the demand..... My era is just before closure (the dreaded ‘Withdrawal of Services’ notice will be displayed). But as it’s a static diorama am not that bothered to have a train, just a few hoppers in the limestone siding perhaps!!

Yip, just as soon as some brave supplier releases a range of RTR LMS NCC narrow gauge stuff!!

Success!! Nicely bedded in - just need to add foliage and some planks at the front to hide the gap (the original setup had some planks as far as I can see) then just need to dull the roof a bit.

Fascinating stuff thanks JB, as always!

Yes indeed

Yip, plenty of photos of those ancient vehicles, and indeed my mother remembers them from childhood visits to BC. Did I read that they were brought to Ballycastle - very slowly - along the NG line, with NG bogies attached? Can imagine the anxious moments getting them through the tunnel..... Part of the challenge in these scenarios is is to make a ‘best guess’ decision based on sometimes very limited evidence - my next guess will be to do with the colour of the station nameboard and the lettering thereon.....have only seen colour photos of NCC-region UTA nameboards from broad gauge stations and they had either black lettering on a yellow background or red lettering on a cream background (nicer!). Will assume that one of these will be correct for the NG lines, until more concrete evidence emerges. JB, what would one give to have a copy of the Ballycastle line survey that JB Senior authored.......

I’ve also noticed from looking at the photo that I have placed the platform too far away from the track.....fixable by adding a new platform face in front of the current one, although it won’t really be noticeable without a train present, which won’t be likely. Still, if it starts to annoy me I can fix it ok. ⛏⚒

The only photo of it which I have seen JB is from an angle (in Colourpoint’s excellent reprint of Dr. Patterson’s book) so hard to be sure - the van seems to have had a non-original roof added which makes me think it might have been one of the ‘open head’ vans, therefore needing to be fully covered over for use as a building. I eagerly await further photographic evidence...... I wouldn’t normally do this but here’s part of the photo I’m referring to, Admin can remove if breaching copyright......

I can add a sign saying ‘No Peco vans were harmed during the making of this diorama.’

Yes fair point and I’m on the same train (ha) of thought..... the van has easily removable couplings, vacuum pipes and brake gear but the rest of the chassis seems to be moulded to the body which was causing some head scratching as I needed the van to be lower down on the platform. So I slept on it and may have awoken to a solution.....rather than chop the chassis to make the body lower, I’m going to sink the immediate platform area lower so the van can go into this, and stay intact, minus the removable parts which can be stored inside as the roof is also removable. So in the event of the diorama being decommissioned, the van can be returned to running order with the removable parts to hand! Pretty smart!!!

Some further progress - the van is from the Peco range and will, regrettably, shortly be dissected and grounded for use as the station building, as on the original. Pity, it's a lovely van!!

Tony lots of makers bring almost-completed layouts to shows and the visitors totally understand and don’t mind at all! In fact it’s helpful sometimes to see work in progress, or, as in this case, a masterpiece in the making!

Fantastic - those buildings are superb!!!

Some more scenic progress on Capecatle. I am actually approaching the final stages with this diorama - just some trees to add then the very limited platform furniture and a wooden shed for the lever frame which controlled the siding. Then some tidying up of the sides of the baseboard to hide the edges of the polystyrene ceiling tiles which form the base of the landscaping.

Ha ha totally - shows how reliable the replacement bus services are going to be! Thanks for the nice comments Galteemore

Cheers Popeye!

Making further progress - am enjoying checking out new materials & techniques, including using hanging basket liner as a base for the grass & foliage, and I have just acquired some seafoam trees to help build up the wooded parts of the diorama. Hoping to have Capecastle ready for the RPSI show in November!

Very nice Tony, love those gate posts!

Very nice!!!!

Very kind Mayner, thank you! It’s 4mm, I wasn’t planning on tackling coaches or locos but now that you have told me about the WW coach sides that might change things a bit......!!!