West Allen Street & Thawne

[danielb]

It's metal chain, but it's never caused a short yet. I think it's coated in something - I picked it up from a jewellery makers supply store.

[danielb]

So....

After getting endlessly frustrated with rolling stock derailing on the 3 way switch, the centre board of WAS has been scrapped. A bit drastic, considering there's 4 days left before I need to load it into the car and take it down to Nottingham show, but eh, I like a challenge. Besides, if Chris Gilbert can get away with it, so can I!

Just to show I'm not completely mental, here's the progress on the replacement...









The front of the layout will now be a team track, TOFC ramp and a truck stop complete with diner. This should give you an idea of how it'll look finished:








I actually made the interior for Kim's - I might even add lighting at a later date.

[Tyson Rayles]

[danielb]

This morning's progress has seen a big chunk of the backdrop spring up from plain wood to urban skyline. Lots more work still to do though! Tonight should see the large glass fronted building in the shots below turn into something a little more fitting with the rest of the layout. Hopefully it'll also see the cream coloured wedge shaped building by the grade crossing get a roof and rear walls.

More photos to come as and when I can.

[Tyson Rayles]

Whats that thing sticking out of the building between the W and the E in the power brick sign?

[danielb]

Hi Mike,

It's a clamp holding that part of the backscene in place whilst the glue dries.

[Tyson Rayles]

10-4

[danielb]

This afternoon's progress was centred around getting the backdrop as close to finished as possible, however my train of thought got derailed by gluing down a LOAD of detail parts scavenged from the scrapped original board.

My plan for today is to get the right hand half of the Handy Co building from white foam core, to fully realised building. In the mean time, here are some photographs of the progress made today, with MBRR #529 posed with a short train of boxcars to see how a train looks in this urban canyon.

[Tyson Rayles]

Looking good Daniel!

[danielb]

Very quick update for tonight, as there isn't a lot to show.

Today I've mainly been working on turning the Handy Company background flat into a full on building after widening the centre board. It started out as white foam board, as can be seen in earlier photo updates, and has ended today looking like this:



After I'd finished putting the texture papers on it, I noticed that I hadn't added the cinderblock foundation strip like I had on the existing building, and adding it on to the building now would still leave the papers on the two halves of the structure out of alignment. As such, I'm going to make a small "foundation" for it out of a further few strips of foamboard and simply wrap that in the cinder block texture papers. This will however, make the newer half of the building a good inch taller than the other half, so I've added more corrugated steel papers along the back edge of the new building so it will simply look like the roof on that part of the building has been raised up at some point in the past.

I've also been working on a crossing keepers tower, based on a a set of plans for a Milwaukee Road prototype found in a 1964 issue of Model Railroader. It still needs additional handrails on the top of the steps, but otherwise it's done.





I've also built a couple of freight car kits from Accurail and Roundhouse, a Soo Line combo-door boxcar and a KCS rib sided boxcar.

Finally, this arrived in the post today...



Hopefully I'll have time to fit a decoder at some point tomorrow. Either way, weathering this one up is going to be FUN!

[danielb]

Whilst I prep a new update, here are a couple of short videos I made at Nottingham.

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[danielb]

At Nottingham show, I had a good couple of days to play with the new version of the layout and learn a few things regarding the new trackplan and the way it effects the operations.

A few points to note:

1. The Davis Produce spur was a great addition to the ops, but I found I didn't actually use the extra hidden staging track for what I actually intended it to be used for. As such, I planned to move the backdrop to the rear of the board and add in a further scenic space to allow for the spotting of large covered hoppers, as I have a fair few but no industries dedicated to them. It makes sense that Davis Produce might have a grain elevator along with their factory/warehouse.

2. The switching lead for Davis that runs behind the oil dealer is too short to fit a switcher and a couple of 50' cars in by a gnat's knacker, so that will need extending.

3. The trackplan as it stands requires the hidden staging behind the Stonemasons to be used as a switching lead, and this leads to more time of trains being "off stage" when they don't really need to be.

As such, I've decided to expand and rework Thawne to provide a better use of the space there, though this does mean for a drastic change to the existing layout.

So, after receiving an invitation to the Calder Northern NMRA exhibition in Crewe on April 1st, I had a week and a half to get these issues addressed. And tomorrow will be see the last of the work done to complete the changes.

To address the issues, I've done the following:
1. Removed the stock shelf from behind Thawne, added a new scenic board running the length of the Thawne expansion, essentially doubling the size of the board.This has required the removal of the hidden staging track, the Stonemasons building, and both backscenes from the board.
2. Coupled with the removal of the staging track from Thawne, the switching lead behind the oil dealer has become the new main, and has been routed through the backdrop of the Handy Co board to a new staging track behind.
3.On Thawne, the old staging track will become a switching lead to better allow for operations on the layout.

With these changes in mind, there's been some shuffling around and additions/replacements of the industries served by the Midland Belt.

1. The Vilas Brothers building has been removed from the Davis Produce spur and re-located (again), to the end of the switching lead on Thawne.
2. The Davis spur has been extended and a grain elevator (or part of one) has been added to allow for unloading of large covered hoppers.
3. Wells Stonemason is no more - the structures have been salvaged for use on a future layout, and the site it once occupied has been taken over by a construction materials distributor, with a cement transfer silo, lumber sheds, etc.

Most of the structures are finished, or if not will be after my night shift ends in the morning.

Tasks I've got left to do is to lay the track on the hidden staging, fix down the grain elevator and silos and fix the ground cover around them, and finish off painting the Cement silo in the construction yard, all of which won't take too long.

Anyways, enough waffling from me, here are the progress photos:











I've also been working on L&N #99, using some prototype photos provided by an L&N Modelling group on Facebook (aint the internet great?). Unfortunately I don't have an idea of who took these photos as they have no ID information on them, so I cannot provide credit where it's due. Shame, as they really are wonderful images.

So here they are, along with my progress on replicating it in model form:

[Tyson Rayles]

Are you aware you installed the Pringles silo upside down? Kidding aside that looks great!

[kamerad47]

Can you get that 70 to run ?? I have one they are one of the most horrible running loco's out there !!!!

[danielb]

Mike - if I install the tubes upside down like I have, I can glue the lids to the benchwork so the silos themselves can be removed for transport.

Kamerad47 - sounds like you have a dodgy one, mine runs as smooth as any other loco I have, if a little noisier. It was a bit jerky after I sprayed it with sealer to fix the weathering powders in place, but once the wheels were cleaned it was back to purring away same as before. Great little locos.

It's been a while since I last updated this thread, but that's due to how busy I've been working on the layout getting it ready for the Calder Northern NMRA exhibition last weekend. It was a great show, with some truly exceptional layouts, both US and British themed. Canal Lane was a standout, as was the modern CSX layout behind mine, the name of which escapes me at the moment.

Here are some photos of West Allen Street I took at the show, I know Ford took a whole bunch of the whole exhibition, but I don't think he's uploaded them yet.