Amberley in the rain

Saturday was typical of this summer - grey skies and rain varying between steady, heavy, and torrential. So not ideal for the Railway Gala at the Amberley open-air museum! I was there helping the Sussex Downs group with the 009 society stand - and Mark Holland's Spirit of Welshpool layout. Fortunately the model layouts were indoors...

Welshpool is a great layout to operate, well, once we got it all working. Despite all points having their frog polarity switched by the motors several didn't seem to switch when required, resulting in intermittent dead sections. Also two different locos at different times stopped completely dead, with no amount of cleaning wheels and fiddling pick-ups making any difference. Then they suddenly started working again... in the end we just blamed the damp. Mind you I've come to the conclusion I am a pretty poor operator anyway, always forgetting a switch and making the wrong move. Mark has written an operating sequence - which works well provided I followed the steps!

Since I had transported the showcase their I also set it up, so you will see some of my stock on the middle and upper shelves. However the Ffestiniog coaches and locos on the top shelf were built by Rob Waller of Bron Hebog, and owned by John Reeves. (John is the chap in the blue mac on the loco at the top of this post).

The weather outside was pretty wet, but I did venture out to see the proper trains too. Amberley is like a full-size train set for kids who like industrial narrow gauge! With a kit for an O&K in the to-do pile I was on the look out for a real one ... and here I found two, with a third just out of shot.

There was a steady stream of visitors but it never got busy, I'm sure like so many events this year the weather will have affected visitor numbers. Hopefully the Sunday will have been much better as it was at least dry. Anyway, if you didn't make it there are a few more photos here.

Sussex Downs 009 Members' Day 2011

Today was the Sussex Downs 009 group's members' day. Although I wasn't showing one of my layouts this time (I did at the last two, in 2007 and 2009), four other group members had layouts there, so I knew I'd be helping out somewhere.

As it happened I spent most of the day helping with Mark Holland's layout "Spirit of Welshpool". I've operated this layout before, and Sparsholt last year, but since then Mark has progressed the scenary, particularly the town area. Also he had (just) written an operating timetable - well, sequence at least. The idea was to give some order and meaning to operation, and given that the track layout is based on the real thing (albeit with serious compression) that makes sense. There were some hitches as the sequence was de-bugged, clarified, and operators were educated!

The above photo shows the station and goods yard. Mark has now built one of the W&L Pickering coaches (with several more to build), and has models of the original locos Earl and Countess, although not yet fully working. However this has shown that the track layout was based around more compact stock, leading to some tight clearances and the loco and carriage sheds are too small!

The Dovey Valley railway by Dick Wyatt (above) is one of my all time favourite layouts, featuring in an old Model Railway Constructor album I had as a teenager, and an inspiration for 009 modelling. You may remember it as the one featured in the Two Ronnies sketch!

Charlie Inslay's Kinwardine Wharf is a great little layout, the first time I had seen it in the flesh, although it was in Railway Modeller a couple of years back. Charlie has some lovely locos and stock too.

The award for "Best Unfinished Layout" (on the basis that no layout is ever really finished) was awarded in memory of Alan Fall, a group member who passed away last year. The most votes went to Martin Collins' Llandecwyn, a deserving winner. This layout is Martin's home layout and I last saw it at the first Member's day 4 years ago, it has made some progress since then but is still far from finished. However the quality of Martin's modelling is superb and this photo gives some indication of how good it will look when the layout is complete.

Martin was also responsible for much of the organisation of the show, along with Tim Sanderson, with much work done by Mike and Theresa Fox, and Doreen Fall in the Kitchen. Thanks to all of those, the exhibitors and visitors. The number of visitors was a little disappointing, probably not helped by being a bank-holiday and half-term weekend, and a rather remote location. However everyone seemed to be having fun. I've uploaded pictures of the rest of the layouts, please click on the link below.

Sussex Downs 009 Group Members Day 2011

Spirit of Welshpool

A few months back I posted some pictures of Mark Holland's under-construction layout inspired by Welshpool. Mark has obviously been busy recently as the townscape had really progressed by the time he set up the layout at Sparsholt last Saturday! His glamorous assistant operator (daughter!) confirmed that he had also been taking over the house somewhat with bits of layout too!

The effort is really paying off though, those familiar with the old pictures of the Welshpool & Llanfair railway threading through the back alleys of the town will recognise features in the model. Mark has done a great job of distilling the scenes into an atmospheric model, compressing and moving landmarks around but it is still recognisable, despite the whole town scene from the end of the station yard to the halt at Seven Stars being about 3 feet long. There is some way to go, the church is yet to come for example, and Mark is adding interior detail to the shops, as well as more people, vehicles and street clutter being required. But the washing on the lines, the railway running over the stream - they are all there! Would you believe the black-and-white cottage started life as an Airfix kit?

I was lucky enough to have a go at operating the layout for a while during the show, with a whole 5 minutes training (!). Actually it was great fun, although I am not a fan of the Bemo couplings, and there was one bit of track between a board joint and a point which was determined to derail any loco in one direction to frustrate me! I'm sure Mark will get that sorted. The sequence is to run in a mixed train, uncouple wagons in the yard, run up to station. Then back up, run-round, and shunt wagons. Reverse new train to station, depart for Seven Stars halt and the fiddle yard. Alternate with a railcar or goods only for interest! Mark is building up a fleet of Welshpool stock, which will really look good on the layout.

I'm sure I'll be able to bring more updates in the future!

Work in progress (but not mine!)

OK, so I still haven't had much time for actually doing any modelling! Various other distractions, including small children and their usual tendency to pick up any bug going, and the usual pre-Christmas nonsense (why do we spend weeks preparing for one day?), have got in the way. However I do have a few projects lined up for the new year.

Meanwhile I thought I'd show some photos of some friends' work-in-progress, which have inspired me. Mark Holland is building a model of Welshpool, he showed this at the Haywards Heath club show back in March, at that point he had only just got the station and yards to a reasonably complete state. However at a recent club-night he brought along the next board which contains the line winding through the streets and back-yards of the town. Now Mark calls the layout "Spirit of Welshpool" as he does not claim it to be an accurate representation - indeed a lot of selective compression has taken place and a few landmarks have moved! - but nonetheless comparing the under-construction town scene with old photos in books it is instantly recognisable. Bear in mind that this is only Mark's second model railway layout, to embark upon such a model is quite a feat!

This is where the line crosses the canal, and then Church Street, and dives between the shops. These have lighting and will be fitted out. The canal wharf has been "moved" to add interest to the scene.

Behind the houses and shops, the line ran over a stream - and along it! - on a strange bridge-over-culvert arrangement. When complete there will be railings, washing hanging out ...

In the background is the garage, where cars always seemed to be parked inches from the loading gauge of the passing trains! The church would be to the right. Mark has based the buildings on old and modern photos of the area, although they are not accurate representations and many are missing, it really captures the atmosphere already. There's a lot of work left to do though!

Finally, here is another work-in-progress, my friend Rob is building this model of a Darjeeling railcar using a Worsley Works kit on a Kato chassis. It has now been primed, and I can't wait to see his painting skills again. This model interests me as I have something similar waiting on my workbench ...

Incidentally, these photos were all taken with my latest mobile phone. Normal room lighting and no tripod. It's amazing what they will do these days, I don't think I could have got better photos with my "proper" camera!