As mentioned in previous "What are you working on?" thread I'm currently working on completing a model railway which will cater for a few options namely passenger, freight and a mildly busy engine shed to cater for classes up to 2-6-0.
The current plan is the following:
Due to space restrictions I'm unfortunately limited to a rather bog standard 6' by 4' setup but surprisingly alot of features can get into the layout. In the top left section there will be two sidings laid with flexi-track which will allow for a somewhat irregular shaped storage double siding setup. Here will either be stored freight wagons or passenger stock, but most likely freight to be shunted into a appropriate train on the second lower track on the right side of the upper part of the trackplan. As of yet I'm undecided if the upper right section will be a runaround double track station or a shunting zone, the other option is to have the station on the lower left of the plan on the long straight after the pointwork leading into a partial curved platform.
The 3 track siding which has a lead off to a turntable I intend to make a double engine shed (which you have seen pics of) on the lower two sidings and the top most siding will consist of a ashpit built into the rails with a coal stage for fueling and GWR styled water tower.
The beauty of the current layout is that I will primary be aiming at just Metcalfe card kits to flesh out the building scenery, but doing so and also not fixing them permanent to the board I can adopt to make the double track runaround in the top right corner a colliery aswell as station depending on mood. With this way of thinking the card kits can be lifted out and placed at will and create the ability to swap to anything I please depending on mood.
Board wise will be a standard frame setup of 1x4 outer edge frame with cross braces with 10-15mm holes drilled in central positions to allow for a DCC Bus to be carried around the layout thus creating no interruption zones. a 9-10mm Plywood top is planned and this allows for both track pins to be inserted and easy drilling, using chipboard creates to much mess and is rough to handle and MDF is extremely hard and most likely the track pins would bend so that will not be used.
Besides this the entire track layout will be raised off the board by about 2inches. Normally you could do a open frame setup which means you just hae the track shapes cut out on Plywood and then build up scenery around it but in my case this would make it weaker and alot more differcult for me to work with. My option of raising the track 2inches up via polystrene insulation sheets means that I can create mild embarkments and reasonably bridgework. Ofcourse this will depend upon the Metcalfe viaduct kit I plan to purchase and kitbash into a stone bridge.
Era is going to be steam ofcourse but transistion period of early to late crest, carriage stock will primary be maroon MK1s with a wrack of pullman for a fancy special. Wagons will be abit more diverse consisting of 10 and 20ton wagons carrying minerals, there is also plans to purchase some more goods vans and a few plank 5s with inserted wood pit props to create a mixed goods setup. Artistic liscencing usage means I'm not locking it to a real life location but a kinda mixed area which will still look like a real railway.
Locomotive fleet currently consists of:
Ivatt 4 'Flying Pig' in single chimney variant - it us currently in factory finish but will be heavy weathered, my plans is to having the Ivatt as my primary mineral mover.
BR early crest 56XX - a GWR loco enlisted to move the 20ton wagons. This one is also sound fitted so will probably see quite a fair bit of usage, its also weathered from purchase.
Standard 4 2-6-0 EC - This loco will be providing the passenger service capacity but also will fit into mixed goods duties. I plan to lightly weather this but emphasis rust on the cyclinder heads as photos of these machines showed sigificant rust in those locations in the later 50s.
BR EC Jinty - This will fill in a shunting role and will share some pilot duties with the Pannier tank. This is weathered from purchase but I intend to give it some extra weathering.
Pannier closed cab type EC - This loco will be serving my pilot duty role at the station if I keep it the station in the top right section of the board, if not it will duo shunting duties with the Jinty.
BR LC Bulleid Q1 - This was a impulse buy and to add another region to the mix, it will be the secondary bigger wagon loco and will be heavy weather to the point where not even numbering on the sides will be viewable.
All locos are DCC fitted which means wiring wise I do not need to include isolation tracks or any much more complicated wiring beyond creating the proper DCC Bus, it also allows for multiple locos to be on a single road at the engine shed without them all moving at once.
Additions to the loco fleet in the future will consist of a 4MT tank, a ivatt tank if I can find a DCC compatible one and maybe a Fairburn 4mt when Bachmann releases it next year.
Bar the Q1 most of my fleet is made up of Bachmann products which have started to be better than Hornby in recent years, they also cost less and generally have more selection for the locos I want to. Passenger stock also might get the inclusion of some Stainer coaches in red and cream colours but they currently retail at a whopping £35 per coach so 3 coaches will cost the equivilent of a loco purchase currently.
Hopefully I can get the board up in a week or 2 and start posting some WIP shots as I go, but in the mean time some more Metcalfe pics will be coming and probably my attempts at weather the Ivatt 4.
So what are the rest of you working on, do you have pics and what are your plans? I'm quite interested in hearing what you are doing
With the S&Djr 7F i was very lucky to get the model, Currently it is just in it's box in storage at the moment. Although one of the best Steam locomotives i have ever owned though.
