Woodwork and wiring

I haven't had much time for modelling in the last few weeks but I have grabbed a couple of hours here and there and so Underhill now has on set of legs for the terminus board and I know what to do to make the second set for the cheese factory end. I had a few false starts and spent quite a while swearing at myself and my dire woodworking skills but in the end I've made something which is quite stable.

 

 

This has ended up with baseboard height being slightly higher than I have used previously at about 1m. Hopefully this means that I won't end up with chronic back ache as I have with layouts lower down. Hopefully its not too high.

 

The cheese factory end has not been ignored and the wiring is done at the track end so now I need to make a control panel and wire that in. The tricky part is working out how to make the electrical connection between the boards, I know what to connect only I forgot to leave space for another connector on the first board. Doh!

 

 

Because of the way of I've made the baseboards, all the wiring has to run on the surface, this looks a mess until covered with plaster etc. It worked fine on the first board so I'm sure all will be well.

The name plates arrived from narrow Planet and they are fab as ever.

 

 

Fairlie with the new bogie coach made on holiday

 

 

Track laying fun

I got some time to do some modelling this week and so I grabbed the chance to lay the track on the second board of Underhill. Nothing complicated but I wanted it to be neat so that it runs well.

The bottom right hand line is the 'main line' with the sidings being at the front. The town end of things is coming along... at least in my head but I'm still quite vague about this end.

The underbridge, under the footbridge was originally designed to only need a face on one side so I have added the other side and started to paint it to match. It isn't as good as the face facing the 2 sidings but as it is in a cutting I think it won't notice. The footbridge now has a couple of the lovely IoSR etches which Bernard sent me so it has added railwayness to it.

Next project is wiring. I need to keep it simple and I want it to be self contained so that I can use it on its own or in conjunction with the other board. I've been scratching my head about this a bit but I think I've cracked it, we'll see.

Lining trauma

Blimey, that is a fiddly process! I've just added the Modelmaster waterslide transfer lining to Staithes. It looks loads better than the hand drawn previous effort but I have simplified the scheme quite a bit as it is so tricky to do. Just waiting for my name and works plates from Narrow Planet to finish her off. Some varnish will hold onto all the paint and transfers.

Before

After

And here she is with the new tea van and open coach.

Green engines

I recently got out a loco which had been languishing in the 'kits I buggered up' dept and spent some time unbuggering it and it has come out pretty well. It was a Chivers Sittingbourne and Kemsley 0-6-2 Bagnall, I gave up on it when I first built it some years ago because I mashed the cab and it was so much bigger than my other locos at the time, however now I have a big hill and longer trains so it would be ideal. It sits on an 0-8-0 chassis which I think is a Fleischmann so it isn't a direct model of the prototype but it looks well on it.

I had to de mangle the cab and square it all up and finish the body off to my recent better standards, with some filler and some filing it all came together pretty well. I added pipes from the sand pots and a whistle and some bits and bobs and it looked fine. In sorting out the cab I removed the doors so that the empty cab could be seen but then it looked too vacant so I added a backhead with a few details. The chassis has LEDs which are directional one of which is in the cab so I covered it in a thick layer of orange paint, when running backwards the cab is lit by a satisfying flickering light as if the firehole was open.

I wondered about loco colour and ended up going for 'Snot Green' which is quite similar to the S&KLR locos. I'm pretty happy with this beast but it means that I have too many locos again so I'm going to have a sell off of some surplus rolling stock including my green double Fairlie. I prefer my Hull red open cab version so the green one must go. I also have a rake of MK3 FR quarrymans coaches which I will never run so they can go too. Will put them on evil bay later, I'll see if there is anything else that can go too.

I've also finished painting my new tea van from Neil Rushby. Nice.

December looms

I had a peek at the 009 society forum this week and saw a post about the Porthmadog Exhibition in December and I read that I had a new layout... blimey. I better get on and finish it then. So with that in mind I've been putting in some hours making some progress on the second board of Underhill. I had a vague idea what I was going do when I made the baseboard but I hadn't really got any further with a track plan or scenery. With some head scratching and looking to see what I already had I decided that the fiddle yard will be hidden by an area of town with a footbridge down to the main board area. In front of the fiddle yard will be the already constructed Nursery. It has a 6mm gauge line of its own with a transfer shed for a 009 siding.

Anyway, I've sorted out buildings and started construction, I built the footbridge from Ratio parts mainly and it looks great. I am going to use the road over bridge which I built for the main layout with some expanded polystyrene rudimentary scenery also fitted.

The other side of the board is where it connects to the other board and this is giving me some headaches so I'm ignoring it at the moment. Scenically I'm going for a plainer area with a couple of sidings being used by the preservation society, it will work as an excuse for parking a silly number of locos in view!

An area of town known as Three Bridges

I feel a bit happier that I'm on the way now so watch this space for progress reports. I need to sort out the track and electrics next... just like the main layout. So, I'll build some more locos probably. I also have some lining to do and some painting and a couple of locos to finish off and a tea van to paint...