David's 0 Gauge stuff

[David Holman]

Going through my 0 gauge stock to get it ready for the Club layout's appearance at the the Chatham Show next month, thought it might be of interest to share what I got up to in the years prior to 2012, when I started modelling the Irish scene.

 After initially dabbling in EM gauge and then 7mm NG I eventually moved to 0 gauge with a Light Railway layout called Loose End - a Colonel Stephens essay of which there are no digital photos available, but which appeared several times in the Modeller from the late 90's.

 The next project was somewhat grandiose - a 10m x 4m oval, with a high level secondary line, modelled on the Marks Tey - Cambridge line which also included a low level goods yard. It was all way too big for a solo project, so eventually it got scrapped, but not before I salvaged the buildings to create a more sensible terminus-fiddle yard layout. It was called Eatonswell - an adaption of Eastanswill, which was the name Charles Dickens allegedly gave to Sudbury in Suffolk in the Pickwick Papers. 

 Very much BR 1950s Eastern Region, I built a far bit of stock, which has been confined to either boxes or my display cabinet for far too long, so it will be nice to run some of it again. Below are some pictures covering a selection of views of the layout.

 

 

 The station was a fairly accurate copy of Chappel & Wakes Colne - chosen because of its two level design. I used Howard Scenics embossed brick papers, painted with water colours

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 The goods shed was a standard Great Eastern design, while a row of matings were inspired by those at Hadleigh and Snape. The loco shed was Saffron Walden.

 Pride of the line was my B17/6 "Nottingham Forest". My home town club, the loco itself did work in East Anglia. The Gresley Brake 3rd is a Kirk kit.

 Proof that I'm not entirely averse to ready to run models are the two shunters. Both are Bachmann Brassworks, which came unpainted in those days. The 08 needed a fair bit of detailing, but is a nice runner, while the 03, which also runs well, simply got a paint and weathering job.

 At the other end of the scale is this Waggon & Maschinbau railbus - because it was scratch built. A real challenge with all those complex curves to say nowt about the curved front windows.

 

 Finally, for now, one of my favourite models, the George England Wantage Well Tank. I'd started building it for Loose End when, very fortuitously Model Railway Journal ran a series of articles by Laurie Griffin as a scratchbuilding project. Even better was the fact they produced a range of castings to go with it. Building this little loco taught me a lot and gave me the confidence to later tackle a D16 4-4-0, leading eventually to all my Irish stuff.

 One day, I really must build a small shunting layout so this pretty little engine can run regularly again.

 Hopefully more stuff will appear later.

 

[Galteemore]

Wow what a treat! Love Shannon - live about half an hour from her old stamping ground.

[leslie10646]

Lovely work, David, especially the buildings.

While I agree with @Galteemore that the Wantage Tank is delightful, it's the "Footballer" pic which caught my eye, almost a 12 inches to the foot photograph. Congratulations!

[Tullygrainey]

A real pleasure to see these pictures David and a lovely selection of locos, all up to your usual high standard. That pic of Nottingham Forest is particularly effective and hats off to you for that scratch built railbus - some very skilful panel beating there! I can understand your affection for the little well tank. A real charmer. More please.

[Mol_PMB]

Wonderful stuff! Having been brought up in Essex and familiar with Chappel and the Sudbury branch as well as other local branch lines like Braintree and (former) Maldon, I think you have captured the atmosphere very well. 
And Shannon looks superb!

[David Holman]

Thanks folks. Have occasionally thought about moving the wheels out on Shannon, but the loco is so tiny, there just isn't room.

[derek]

Fantastic stuff David. Great to see. Agree with Leslie, the buildings are phenomenal. Thanks for sharing 

[David Holman]

Eatonswell

 This layout was built in the early 2000s, in a pre-digital age - for me anyway. Hence most of the pictures here are photos taken of my article in the April 2009 edition of RM. Eatonswell was my first attempt at 'mainline' modelling, trying to depict a secondary line in East Anglia in the 1950s, as shown in the map below.

 The scenic part of the layout was about 16ft x 2'6, divided into four split level boards as shown below.

 As in many of my schemes, even in this relatively large area, it relied on off scene sidings to develop the scene, though as I wrote at the time a 16ft scenic section out of a total run of about 70ft wasn't exactly good value for exhibition managers. The eventual intention was to grow the scenic areas over time, but it soon all became too much to organise. Might have worked as a club project, but not a solo one!

 Indeed, the only thing that made it work in the first place was the innovative idea of making each 180 degree curve in two sections of different radii, so they could 'nest' with each other for storage and transport.

 RM staff did a nice job on all these drawings and likewise the actual track plan.

 As can be seen, the goods yard was at a lower level and fed by two separate fiddle yards, which used cassettes. Overall then, this supposed solo enterprise actually needed at least five operators, though with that level of help, we could get it set up in about ninety minutes and back in the van  in about 30.

 Apologies for the poor quality of some of the photos. I'll do some up to date ones as stuff is being got ready for the Chatham Show this year.

 The photo was taken after the layout became end to end, in which form it managed several shows because it took up much less space.

 All things being equal, nearly 20 years on, it is nice to reflect on what, while ultimately a bit of a blind alley, still looks pretty good and actually ran well too [it was DCC by the way]; shame it was all a bit too big for me to manage...

 

 

[Galteemore]

Fabulous work David - really high standard of work and lots of scope for operation. Don’t take this the wrong way - I’m glad it didn’t prove an enduring project or we’d never have had Arigna/Belmullet/Northport/Fintonagh/Swillybegs. The Eastern Region’s loss is our gain!!