OBB HOe layout "Connafeld"

[Georgeconna]

10 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

A lot of bits and pieces are cheaper on Temu nowadays…. Scenery especially.

Yeah got some flock and tbf is grand, some course I won't use though. 

[Georgeconna]

Finally got the Guest house wired and roofed and looks nice and finishes the setting. This was laser cut card and wood from Igra models. Excellent kit and quality. 

[Mol_PMB]

That's looking superb. The guest house is an attractive building and a nice kit by the look of it.

The night scenes are very atmospheric - I'm not currently planning night-time and lighting on my layout but perhaps I should make provision for it..

[Georgeconna]

On 16/12/2025 at 9:03 PM, Mol_PMB said:

That's looking superb. The guest house is an attractive building and a nice kit by the look of it.

The night scenes are very atmospheric - I'm not currently planning night-time and lighting on my layout but perhaps I should make provision for it..

I'll be sitting in the dark a lot, there is coach lightning needed now

[Georgeconna]

Minute long Vid of the steamer in action

Finally installed the Plux16 in and it works so the dud Sound decoder is going back to the vendor who will kindly sort it out for me. 

 

 

Edited December 18, 2025 by Georgeconna

[Georgeconna]

[Georgeconna]

Happy New Year Folks. Hope 2026 is a good one. 

[Mol_PMB]

What a super picture! Does your train have a bar car, or have they paused to take refreshment in the hotel? 

All the best for 2026!

[Georgeconna]

15 minutes ago, Mol_PMB said:

What a super picture! Does your train have a bar car, or have they paused to take refreshment in the hotel? 

All the best for 2026!

I think looking at the consist the train has defo a bar car!! That's AI for ya

[amdaley]

Happy New Year George.

Tony.

[Mayner]

Visited the Mariazellerbahn on a day trip from Krems in 2004, while visiting Austria while en-route (very indirect) from Ireland to New Zealand, via Austria, the UK and the USA. We only had time to ride the lower section of the line to Grenrendorf to check out the steam loco in its shed, the shed staff were friendly but we struggled to understand each others English/German but had a good time. I guess its unlikely at this stage whether we will get to travel the length of the line to Marizaell. Bottom section of the Mariazellerbahn reminded me of the Welshpool and LLanfair a wlesh 2'6" gauge line built with minimal earthworks, following the contours with sharp curves. I think we rode to  Grenrendorf behind one of the original C-C electrics and returned to St Polten in a diesel railcar

We travelled by Ryanair to Graz and rode over the Semmeringbahn to Vienna. At the time the majority of Obb services were loco hauled with recently introduced electric locos hauling older coaches sometimes working push-pull with a 4w covered van attached at the rear for bicycles!

Graz was interesting a kind of Austrian Clones a junction between secondary lines complete with a roundhouse, though the station building was a modern structure with raised car park above a goods/marshalling (fiddle yard?) Shunting was scary with loose/gravity shunting of freights arriving from a harbour branch (Danube)/local industries. 

Shunters (human) used to place a "sprag/s" on the rail infront of in-coming wagons and casually enter the 4' to stand between the buffers of a stationary wagon to couple up, wheels of arriving wagon would skid when it hit the sprag and nosiily buffer up to the stationary wwagon/rest of the train, shunter would then couple up (screw link) attach brake hoses and then get ready for the next arrival, no room for errors.

Commuter train to & from Vienna were made up of loco hauled modern double decked push-pull sets, with diesel railcars and occasional loco hauled sets complete with 4w van.