Fiddling About.

For the last week or so, I've been working on a cassette fiddle yard for the layout, which will hopefully make operation a lot smoother and avoid unnecessary handling of rolling stock.

The cassettes will be made of 10mm L-section brass, epoxied to 4mm ply.

Each cassette is 13" long, as this comfortably fits a train of 5 vehicles and a loco.

A lot of the work has consisted of figuring out lengths, heights and general design of the connection between the cassettes and the layout.

Progress so far has reached the stage where I've made the transition section from cassettes to rail, this was done by first cutting a piece 15mm x 0.75mm approx from two pieces of brass L-section and soldering on short lengths of rail to match the Peco track. 

A jig from scrap wood and card was made and hair grips used to hold the parts in place dduring soldering:

The two soldered assemblies are shown below:

To keep all the various bits where they should be, I made a sort of apron from play, to which the transition was epoxied:

Next job is to build the tray the cassettes will sit on...

A bit more done...

The greenhouse is now "populated" with some plant pots, a pair of shears, and a watering can, all from a set by Noch. Having done this, I put the roof on and fixed the model down to its base...at least it's all less likely to get lost.

In other news, the cast resin maintenance boat got a coat of primer...this is somewhat significant as until this week, it's been too cold to spray paint (or any other sort of paint, come to that) in the garage. I may do the rest of the painting indoors, though...

Out of Hibernation.

There's been a pause in progress on the layout since autumn, largely because I had committed to taking my 0-16.5 micro to the Wealden Railway Group show at Steyning in March 2026; at the time when I decided to do this, it seemed that getting some basic scenery done and building a loco so I could run something should be achievable by then.

I put Dead Frog Basin safely on a shelf in the garage, with a vague intention to come back to it when I'd got further along with the 0-16.5. 

Later last autumn, it had got too cold to spend time in the garage as well as things like glue not drying(!), so I moved operations to a spare room indoors, though this meant I couldn't do things like spray painting or messy scenic work. 

All went well enough for some time, but after the Christmas break, when the spare room was needed for visiting family, I couldn't pick up the pace again, for a variety of reasons. I thought I could just push through it, but while I got a bit more done, I almost got to the stage where I couldn't stand the sight of the thing.

So...what to do?

One option would be to quickly run up something else, using RTR stock etc., but there wasn't really time and I could see myself hitting the same situation again.

 

Instead, I pulled Dead Frog Basin back off the shelf in the garage. I'd discounted taking it to Steyning as it had already been to the show a few years ago, but I've done a lot to it since, not least putting it back in the APA Box it was originally designed for. Having made the decision, I'm now busy adding small details and finishing off bits I hadn't got around to doing. 

With 4 weeks to go until Steyning, I suppose I'd better formulate a programme of work, so here goes, not in any particular order:

Build a replacement fiddlestick for the left hand side of the layout, as the original had been built for the right hand side, and before I put the layout back in its box. 

Finish off the Portakabin with some basic interior detail and fix it in place. 

Add a few figures, loads for rolling stock, and other things to bring the scene to life. 

Test run with the rolling stock I intend to use at Steyning. 

Sort out a few road vehicles; there are a couple of three-wheelers (bubble car and Bond Bug) as well as a lovely 3D printed BSA Bantam, but something like a flatbed Transit or small Bedford would be nice. Nothing too big, though...there isn't a huge amount of road space and the access lanes are very narrow. 

Hmmm...time to get up and get on with it!

Some Locomotives.

I thought I'd add a bit more detail about some of my loco fleet.

Kato chassis; the original version of these had been about since the 1980s, these newer ones are superb runners thanks to high quality motors, flywheel drive and compensation, all for around £20! 

3D printed freelance Kerr-Stuart style diesel,  on Kato chassis. 

Baguley-Drewry inspired 6WDM. A1 Models etched "scratch-aid" kit, running on a Bachmann "Brick" Plymouth chassis. Cab cut down from the bottom as otherwise it would be too tall. Hatches on the engine cover are BR Mk.1 buffet car vents, comments have been made that they resemble missile hatches on a submarine, so I suppose the loco should be called Trident. Exhaust is turned brass, from an 03 detailing kit.

 

Left: battery-electric loco from a Rushby's Resins kit, on a Kato chassis. I still need to add cab doors to it, probably wooden stable doors with the tops open, and a suitably legless driver.

Middle: EuroNG 3D/etched body kit on a Minitrains Gmeinder chassis, built with small cab doorways (there are a couple of different options in the kit), tarps made of fine fabric. 

Right: my version of the Minitrains Gmeinder. Unpainted kit, cab altered to something near the prototype, quite a lot of detail added, all from photos of real locos.

Another battery-electric. A1 Models kit, etched brass parts on a laser-cut core. Buffer beams and couplings from Chivers Finelines bits box, valance from Evergreen styrene. Kato chassis (again).

There are several other part built locos lurking in boxes and drawers, I may even get around to finishing some of them, eventually!

Biggest lack at the moment is steam traction; there are two or three kettles, and I need to get at least one running to give the water tower something to do!

Never Mind the Bollards.

As I use Greenwich Couplings in 009, there are magnets for uncoupling on the layout, two on each siding and one on the line through the platform. 

Some time ago, I added the wooden (actually whitemetal) post to act as a position marker for a magnet on the wharf siding in the foreground of the photo below, as well as an oil drum for the siding by the wall:

For various reasons, I hadn't got around to fitting the other markers, but with an exhibition appearance about a month away (details to follow in another post), it was time to extract a digit.

So...this evening, while looking for something else(!) I found a little pack of model ship fittings I'd had for some time, among which were several bollards (probably capstans really, but that would spoil the post title). The useful thing about these is that they have quite a low profile, and are less liable to be hit by protruding bits of locos, etc., this being particularly relevant in the one shown above as it's in the vee of a point and can't really go anywhere else.

As they come, the bollards have a sort of cruciform mounting thing so they can be pushed into place on their intended ship (Titanic, if you must know), I removed the four sticking out bits from the latter, to leave a round mounting peg. A 2.5mm diameter hole was drilled to accept the peg, and I also used a 7mm diameter wood drill bit to add a recess so the bollard would sit lower, see photo below which explains this more clearly!

Bollard fitted, and painted cruddy brown, also you can see the coupling loops lifting, and the blue oil drum poking coyly and out of focus above the open wagon:

Here you can see all the markers I've fitted so far, I still need to decide what to use for the platform line marker:

Finally, I've painted the soil areas in the garden, which are no longer bright blue foam, but Woodland Scenics acrylic "earth", which is what I also painted the bollards with, due to laziness:

Nearly There...maybe!

The last item on the Portakabin to paint was the roof.

I've no idea what colour it should be, so I went for a rough mix of Humbrol Tank Grey and Dunkelbraun enamels, to try to replicate some sort of bitumen type paint. To make the job easier, I fixed the underside to a wooden take-away food knife with double sided adhesive tape. I may add a bit more fading etc., with different shades of blue, as well as highlighting door handles, etc. and (suggested by Bernard Taylor) a notice board inside to give the impression of an interior. The roof needs fixing down at some point, but I'll probably use TakBlak or similar to allow access to the interior in case I want to add figures or whatever. 

It looks quite good on the layout now, I think. 

More Portakabin.

Today, I've fixed in five of the six windows on the little Portakabin. I used Revell Contacta Clear for this; it dries clear and once set, any excess can be scraped carefully from glazing using a wooden cocktail stick or similar.

I also decided to fit a partition about ⅜ of the way along the building, from .040" Plastikard.

I'll try to glue the last bit of glazing in the morning, hopefully before it gets lost.