Railways of Telford

At Christmas I received the quite excellent book 'Railways of Telford' from my future in-laws. It was a book I'd looked at several times and, having moved Telford way, is an area of the railways I've become very interested in, meaning it was a very much well-received present. Included within it's pages is a chapter on the Lilleshall Company. This is of huge interest to me, as it is very much the area that I'm looking at basing my layout on.

The back cover of the book states that the author, David Clarke, is building a model of Trench Sidings and then, by chance, I discovered a thread on the Lilleshall Company and Mr Clarke's own blog to do with his layout build on RMweb.

After some initial conversations we swapped email addresses and since then Mr Clarke has - very kindly - sent me lots of pictures of the Lilleshall system and it's locos alongside more information about it.

One picture - included below - has solved a problem I was facing. Having weather the Cory Brothers wagon, I was wondering how on earth I could include a South Wales wagon on a Shropshire-based layout. Well, look at the wagon poking out from behind Lilleshall No. 4 (on the left).

Inspiration truly is everywhere!

'Oh no! I've ruined it!'

That's what I thought several times whilst carrying out the work below. In an effort to do some actual modelling last night, I turned off the laptop, put Doctor Who (series 9) on the box and set to work with the MSC DH16 Hornby Sentinel. The goal was to remove the lettering and basically make her one dirty girl, ready to receive new nameplates.

Rather than post a blow by blow transcript of what I did (acrylics, cotton wool buds and the odd drop of water) here is a photographic account transformation. I'm very happy with it, but can't help but wonder if I've possibly over done it? I'm yet to varnish it as I might remove a little bit more first. All thoughts and comments welcome.

End of the Line.

Two days ago I posted about my idea for the MRL 2017 box challenge.

I've changed my mind. Several reasons.

1) I get married this year. Any modelling funds - which aren't high, unlike the wedding funds - are very small.

2) Therefore, I want any funds possible to go towards my main layout idea - the 'for keeps' layout - rather than losing them on something with little potential.

3) If I do anything it will be very much the diorama approach and I want to have tried something new out, like building my own track.

Therefore, staying in Shropshire, Jackfield Sidings, a curious place, seems a good potential idea.

What do you think?

Thinking Inside the Box

Firstly, Happy New Year to you all. I hope the Christmas period was good to you and that 2017 is a happy and productive one.

Now 2017 is here I can now reveal that the 2017 MRL Forum Challenge is 'In a Box.' As always with me, I'm thinking micro. Therefore, after a shopping trip to Ikea I am now the proud owner of a Knagglig box. 

Made of pine, the Knagglig has dimensions of 23 cm deep, 31 cm wide and 15 cm high. I'm yet to build it up - it's from Ikea, of course it's a flat pack - but when I do so I need to leave one side open, as well as cutting an exit hole on one side.  I might hinge the side, meaning I can then close it to aid dust avoidance, but I'm unsure as yet.

But that's the box. What about inside it? Well, since I've moved to Shropshire I've taken quite an interest in the railways of the area. Although you don't perhaps think of Shropshire as a major railway player, the county has lots of railway history. Therefore, I've decided to use a bit of it as the basis for my challenge entry. Coalbrookdale and it's surrounding area, to be precise.

My entry is going to be a pointless fork based around the tile industry found in the Jackfield area. The plan is a low relief factory (I've got a Dapol shed that will be just the ticket) down the back of the layout, with a door leading to a loading area (un-modelled) on one line, with the other just being a siding. As much as I hate working with Wills sheet, I'm thinking that the back siding (along the factory) will be inset in the cobbles. 

That's the plan, anyway. I best go and put this box together! 

Train Planner

(C) Mark Branson

Back in the day, before working in education, I worked on the railway. I was a train planner for a large freight company, in their bulk freight division. Now, I almost feel like I'm back there, train planning. Except, in fairness, it's not trains I'm planning, it's layouts.

Since Chetwynd Aston bit the dust I've been debating what I want to do and have held off doing any layout building until I decided just what. However, the forum I'm an admin on is running a layout building competition in 2017. Yet, as the brief hasn't been announced (as admin though, I was in on the discussions), I can't really go too far into details.

Suffice to say, I'm beginning to lean towards something along the lines of Juniper Hill (photo above) again. It's a fantastic layout with a genuine sparse-feel to it, detailed yet not over-crowded, and with a really excellent atmosphere to it. The cogs are whirring, that's for sure.

And I need somewhere to run my new Sentinel (and weathered Cory wagon) too...!

Dirty Trucks

Amy's on her work's Christmas do and isn't back until tomorrow, therefore I've got an evening to myself. So, with a beer and a Bond film on the go, I got stuck into a bit of modelling.

Bachmann recently released the quite stunning Cory Brothers 7 plank wagon, weathered and, all in all, looking quite grotty. I was very tempted to buy one, but then decided that, already owning a Hornby version in pristine condition, I should just do a bit of 'proper' modelling and weather that myself.

Having dug the model out I realised I'd forgotten that, on receipt of it, I'd had a little go at weathering it with a bit of dry brushing. It was pretty rubbish so after a quick splash of water I'd rubbed it off and it was back as new.

After that, I lightly scrubbed the surface with a craft knife to distress some of the lettering on the sides. In some cases I totally removed the lettering on planks, with the aim of priming and repainting these to indicate replacement panels.

Then I primed (acrylic) the replacement panels and then dry brushed the chassis of the truck to lose the sheen of the black plastic.

  

After that the next stage was to paint the replacement panels brown. As soon as the paint was applied I dabbed at it with a small cloth to remove the paint, leaving a slightly grainy effect (it looks ok from a distance) on those panels.

The next stage involved dry brushing all over the wagon with the primer. Again, the aim was just to tone down the black plastic effect that the wagon suffered from. On the wagon ends I feel I may have overdone it, so there will be a little reworking of that in the future.

The final job was to dry brush (a technique I love) the wagons with the brown paint again, this time on the underframe and around rivets and metalwork to try to indicate a light rusting effect. This can just about be seen on the pictures but I'll probably add a bit more work to this, potentially using a lighter shade - I have a 'burnt sienna' somewhere that will do the trick I'm sure.

Overall, I'm really very happy with the wagon. Perhaps it is a little too lived in, but I'm applying 'rule 1' of railway modelling. It was a very pleasant way to spend half an hour too.

Next steps: weather the Sentinel and decide on a layout plan to run both the loco and this wagon on!

A day out at Ironbridge

Last Saturday Amy and myself went to Ironbridge for a stroll, a look in the Museum on the Quay (we've got the Ironbridge Museum annual pass) and a bit of a mooch around the shops that are there. Earlier this year I bought a fantastic book called 'Shropshire Railways' by Geoff Cryer and in it were a few pictures of the old Ironbridge station. Therefore, I decided that this visit would be the perfect chance to have a peak at the site and we decided that we'd take a walk down the pathway that was the line, back in the day.

What was surely once a station in the most stunning of locations is now a (quite cheap, now you mention it!) car park. The pub in the first picture is called 'The Station' - I bet a lot of late nights went in to naming that one!

If you look closely at the picture above you can see the lines crossing the road. This was a crossing when the station existed and it was a picture from this angle - with the bridge and the toll building in the background - that piqued my interest in looking at what was there now.

As mentioned above, the lines go across the road still, although it's Mazdas, rather than Manors, which cross the rails now.

The path above, once the line, heads off towards the cooling towers now. We set off and walked a pleasant - and leafy - mile or so, before heading back.

Just before we got back to the car park and the former station site we passed under an old rail bridge before emerging into the platform area.

Then it was off to the nearest coffee shop to warm up!

A bit of maths for you...

I've been pondering over this maths sum this morning.

Take this...

Add these to it...

And what do you get...?

A tiny servicing (water and coal) point for a small preserved/industrial railway.

Thoughts?

Beware of Trains

Beware of trains!

Especially model ones, as deciding what to do with them is bad for your health.

On Friday night I had a running session with my micro layout, in it's current unfinished form. It performed terribly. I used several locos and they all ran poorly. So I cleaned the track and tried again, several times. It ran no better.

I left it and tried again on Saturday and once again it performed poorly. After this I had a good look around and came to the conclusion that my track laying was not good enough. So I've decided to stop work on it for now and practise on some dioramas to improve some of my skills.

I've got a static grass puffer bottle that I want to get better results from as well so thought that a tiny diorama - and tiny is the word - is a perfect way of doing this.

So I'm planning something just 6x4 inches. It'll act as a good photo board for any stock I model (particularly as I have found a lot of enjoyment from making kits over the past year) and will also enable me to have something to look at to inspire me. Plus, as I'm planning a wedding it will be cheap and will help me practise scratch building.

So, although it's sad to see the end of Chetwynd in it's current guise, I still feel full of modelling mojo and am looking ahead with gusto!

What's In A Name?

Names are important. We all have one. We all have an identity that begins with our name. We give our pet names. We give our cars names (mine is Clara... my car is Tardis blue). Some people name their golf clubs, their cricket bats. In fact, you name it, people name it.

So why is it so hard to come up with one?

Chetwynd Aston is, the more I hear it, not resonating with me. It's too, what's the word, clunky. It ties down the layout to a location. I'm not sure I want that. There is a trend developing in the model railway world to not use 'locations' as names; 'Terminus, All Change!' and 'The Sidings' being two examples. Do I want to go down that route? Do I use a location name, but make one up. Possibly, but I always feel that my 'names' sound exactly like what they are... made up.

I'll have a think about it I think.

Incidentally, speaking of names, the Wabtec shunter has lost it's identity ahead of receiving some new plates. It's going to be called 'Alexandra' courtesy of the good people at Narrow Planet. I've posed the loco on the layout (currently 'un-named' of course!) which has recently seen the track and ballast get a good weathering. It's amazing how that starts to pull things together. The fencing is posed and, again, starts to pull things together. In fact, I'm pretty pleased with how things look.

Now, about that name...

Chetwynd Aston MkII

I mentioned in my last post that Chetwynd Aston was now Chetwynd Aston MkII. I hadn't liked the cluttered feel to the yard so took one Y point out and just had two sidings. I have also ripped the scenery up too and now - having added ballast - I have the following:

I'm far happier with it. Although operation is a little more limited, I'm happy with what I've got. I've decided to properly plan the layout too, so I got the paper and pencil out and sketched away. 

The idea is that - as in MkI - I'll block the entrance to the fiddle yard by a building, although rather than a pub I'm looking at an old cottage. I want a small barrow crossing on the front siding, allowing access to the small yard office in the middle. I also want another small hut at the back of the layout too. Add in some fencing and greenery and there you go.

Finally I've done some weathering on the grey 16t mineral wagon. I love doing things like this that add a bit of individual character to a model. In this case, the 'CAFC' graffiti that has been drawn into the gunk (bottom left) is the little touch I love the most!

Last Orders Please...!

Today I started work on a pub for my new micro-shunting layout, Chetwynd Aston. Using some spare mount board and a Scalescenes 'Stucco' download I shut myself away in the office and got on with making a tiny watering hole named 'The Moody Mallard.' Here's a little step-by-step guide as to the process so far...

1) Cut the bases for the sides out of the mount board. I made a chimney breast out of foam core as this gave me the required thickness for that part of the building.

2) Cover the sides with the Scalescenes stucco sheet, leaving it to dry whilst weighted down. Once dry trim to fit, leaving enough overhang to wrap the paper around the sides and around door and window frames.

3) Glue the sides together, using corner triangles to make the edges meet. Whilst this was drying I made the pub sign and glued it on. 

4) I made the window frames from sticky label, cutting it out before fixing it to see through packaging and sticking to the inside of the shell.

5) test fit on the layout. The Moody Mallard is designed to act as a 'view-block' so that the viewer can not see that the line has no buffer stops yet does not go anywhere. The test fit seems to show this works. At this point I made a small 'lean to' entrance. 

6) I tackled the roof next. Using a Chris Nevard idea I made loads and loads of 5mm squares by chopping up some junk mail (in this case, a Hattons catalogue appropriately enough!). Then gluing the roof base I, one by one, placed the tiles using the point of a craft knife to pick up and position. Twenty minutes saw me do the lean-to before I'd had enough for one day! I left it to dry before painting the tiles with grey acrylic primer. I'll do further colour work with various washes and darker shades.

That's where I'm up to right now. There is still lots to do including printing an interior to give some detail to the inside. However, I'm pretty pleased with it so far.

Hopefully when it's finished you'll be able to almost smell the tankard of 'Fursty Ferret' that the octogenarian sat at the corner of the bar is supping...

Back on Track!

Aside from hammering Football Manager recently, I've also kept the modelling mojo going with a kit build, modifying a couple of Hornby 'Caledonian Pugs' and planning my new layout.

Firstly, a recent post said I'd taken inspiration from a trip to the Telford Steam Railway. Well, with that in mind I set about recreating their shop, which is located in an old 'van' wagon. I purchased a Dapol 'meat van' kit and set about building it. Once I'd got to that stage I focused on the interior. Using scaled down pictures off the net (a bookshelf, display case and some Hornby train set boxes) I made a representation of the shop interior.

Although you can barely see it with the roof on, I know it's all in there and that's the main thing. It's not finished yet though; the doors need filling smooth and a sign whilst I also need to weather the thing.

Some of you may recall the loco I repainted and called 'Amy.' Well, I've never been that happy with the either the colour or the standard of paint job I gave it. So I sanded it down and repainted it blue. Whilst doing so, I found the other Caley 'Pug' and decided I'd make a small fleet. The result can be seen below. The other loco is yet to be named and numbered, I'm heading towards 'Sophie' and '10' at the moment.

I've ordered a new loco too. Nothing too flash though as it is Hornby's rather inaccurate RailRoad range Bagnall Shunter. I'm not too fussed about it's inaccuracies though, but for £18 figured I could repaint it (and name it 'Alexandra' with the number 1877 courtesy of Narrow Planet) to make a rather fabulous private industrial diesel shunter. In my mind I have visions of it shuffling in with a couple of battered mineral wagons on my new layout... which is still very much in the planning stages - although the two locos above are posed on it's early stages!

Beating "Modeller's Block"

Although I've been working on - and thoroughly enjoying - the Lima 47 to keep the modelling going, it's been several years since I last had a layout that I could run something on. In the intervening period I've started to build a few but they've all been abandoned and forgotten.

Recently, you'll remember that I recently blogged about a visit to the Telford Steam Railway. Well, when looking through a few pictures of it again recently, a combination of a few pictures led me to come up with a little idea. The two pictures in particular are below.

Why so inspirational? Well, with only a little space available for a model, a single line terminus (which was my last completed model too) seems to be the right idea. Horsehay and Dawley (above right) is an example of this, as to is Lawley Village at the other end of the line... although I didn't take any pictures of that for some reason. Indeed, Lawley Village - or rather it's Pagoda shelter - is the basis for the station. The picture above left is of the Telford Steam Railway's shop. I loved this, so thought that I'd add that to the model as something a little different. Yes, it will take up some space, but the other idea is that the line is preserved but is only very small and operates brake van rides, nothing more.

So, with all that in mind, I ended up with the following...

I've ordered a few Dapol (formerly Airfix) kits for a brake van and a meat van to act as the passenger service and the shop. I've enjoyed working on the Lima 47 so much I decided I'd rather kit build my stock, rather than just buy ready to roll off the shelf. I knocked a quick foam core base board up the other day. It's tiny (even by my standards) but will suffice. The trusty Wills Pagoda shelter is perfect for the station whilst, finally, my revamped 08, Clara, will do just the job for the motive power.

So far today I've primed the parts to the meat van, and painted the components of the under frame black too. They are just drying now.

Beating modeller's block? Maybe not, but it's a start!

A trip on the Telford Steam Railway

Amy (SWMBO) lives in Shropshire and I've long fancied a trip on the TSR. So, with me moving in over the summer we decided - finally - to go and pay it a visit last Sunday (19th). It's not a huge heritage line by any stretch (but they do have big plans of expansion down to Coalbrookdale in the Ironbridge Gorge) but it was a most friendly and enjoyable trip. We were pulled by 'Rocket,' the mainstay of the fleet, and housed in one half of a DMU. 

I thought I'd include a few snaps of the visit.

Not a big railway by any stretch, but well worth a visit! I shall certainly be back over the summer!