Friday 24 August 2012

Write it down

I haven't done any modelling today and I'm off on hols tomorrow so I don't suppose I'll get much done in the next week but I have spent some time today writing an article for the 009 news. Its all about the railcar sets on the Isle of Stoner which currently number six. Now I need to take some decent pictures and send it off. Will have to wait a while I go to Yorkshire and drink gin and read books. Laters.


Saturday 18 August 2012

Woodwork and so on...

I haven't had a lot of modelling time recently what with one thing and another but I have done a few bits and pieces. Most importantly I've made the baseboard for the second part of Underhill. With my stunning carpentry skills I've ended up with a very complicated way of connecting the boards but after much swearing and starting again I made it work.


This shows the L shape created by the joined boards. The funny gap at the front will end up with a small scenic attachment of some sort. The line runs behind the cheese factory on the right to the junction and then disappears to the fiddle yard via a road over bridge. In front of the fiddle yard is the nursery mini layout which has its own 6mm rail network (non working). It will have a control panel built in at the back in much the same way as the other board and will also have a connection to the PSU as I forgot to make provision for a jumper cable from the first board... Doh!

I've also been making rolling stock first of all I've added to the railcar count with a cheap and cheerful Oxford Diecast/Bachmann 0-6-0 Plymouth bash. This was inspired by the similar unit done by Neil Rushby in the 009 news (more of him in a tick), thanks to him. His version was single ended but I've added a second van back to back for ease of branchline use. It needs some bits and bobs doing but works well and looks nice.


Having a motor and gearbox in both vans solves the reversing problem.


The other item I've made is a new resin kit from Rushby's Resins which is a splendidly silly four wheel coach or Fowler Trolley. Went together very nicely and is the first resin kit I've made. It still needs the painting finishing but here it is.


It sits on a Parkside Dundas skip chassis which I happened to have ready made. The new coach will sit very nicely with the train of skip chassis coaches I already have although it is twice the size of most of them!