Read the instructions...

Or, in this case, read Norman Solomon's series of track-building articles in Model Railway Journal.  That would have been very helpful with my recent track-laying experience.  

Before going away racing at the weekend, I decided to lay some of the track that I've been building for my demo board.  Having seen Norman's demonstration at the Missenden modelling weekend earlier this year, I thought that I would try his technique of fixing the track using PVA and ballasting it at the same time.  This would be laid on a bed of Carrs foam, which is just the right thickness and firmness to give a resilient but yielding foundation.

I also used the technique of laying granite ballast immediately on top of the wet glue, in the areas where I wanted to show finished track.  So I did this, after spreading the glue reasonably well, up to and over the edges of the masking tape that I'd use to define the formation, and placing the track carefully on the wet PVA.  Then I applied a few weights just to hold the track in position and left it for the weekend.  When I came back to it, this is what it looked like:

Good points:

- the track had stuck well, and hadn't tried to lift or twist

- the glue was flexible, and the foam trackbed still worked as a firm foundation

- the ballast had generally taken well, sticking to the glue without going rock solid.  It had also stayed reasonable clear of the sleepers, so I don't have a huge amount of clearing up to do. 

Less good points:

- the steel rail has rusted!  Having been very careful to keep it unblemished prior to laying it, there are now patches of fresh rust all over the sides and head of both plain track and pointwork.  This is going to have to be cleaned off.  I suspect that it is something nasty given off as the PVA dried, and as it is much more pronounced on the sections where the weights were placed, I believe that it was trapped from evaporating away.

- there is glue and ballast that has crept behind a couple of the switch blades.  This is going to need some careful digging out and cleaning.

- the PVA stuck the masking tape too well to the edge of the track to separate easily.  I'm having to carefully cut it off the underlay.  In future, I think that I need to lift the masking tape when the PVA is still wet, and chance the glue and ballast creeping further.

So all in all, a mixed result.  I'm confident that it doesn't need scrapping and rebuilding, but it does need a bit of TLC to get it back to a usable state.  Live and learn!

Today's Top Tip

...if you have spray painted a length of flexible track off the baseboard, don't try and subsequently adjust the curve of it.

For although it is relatively easy to break the bond on a single painted chair, or even Pandrol clip in this case, a track panel worth's of them isn't going to move easily :-(

Oh well, it's nice to be doing some modelling again.  I am just wondering how long it will take the PVA that I laid last night to dry.  It seems to have hardly dried at all by this morning.  It's also very successfully turned the sides and head of the steel rail rusty.  That was unforeseen.  I think that my track laying technique is going to need some refinement in the future...

Scaleforum inspiration

All has been quiet from me recently, as a house move at the end of August meant that modelling equipment had to be boxed up, and time found for more important things (like rebuilding drains, and fixing lights).  There was also the run-up to Scaleforum, which meant  Society matters took my attention as well.

However, with a very successful weekend at Leatherhead behind us (I'm sure that there are many that will tell the story better than I can) I have both more time and much inspiration as well.  Inspired by Horsley Bank, I feel a minimum space "box" layout coming on :-)

Finally, it was great to spend time talking to folk over the weekend that I only normally "know" over the web.  Too many to name individually, thank you all for taking the time to say hello, and I'm sorry that I may have been interrupted to answer questions about catering and suchlike.  If you have a namebadge on, at times you're a target ;-)

See you all next time!

J15 build - Mystery Parts

In the background, behind my exploits with the High Level Pug, I've been building an Alan Gibson kit of a J15, or more accurately a Great Eastern Y14, as it will be in condition suitable for circa 1908.

I'm now at the detailing stage of the body, and I've found on the fret these mystery parts - four times part #42 :

They look like washout covers for the boiler.  However there is no mention of a part #42 anywhere in the instructions, nor do they show on the exploded diagram, which is intended to cover the parts not mentioned in the text.

Fortunately, it seems like they were a not an original GER feature, so I can safely ignore them.  I can't see them evident on any of the period photos that I have from the GERS Journal.  But does anyone know if my assumptions are correct?

Flymo

Weighty matters

It's been a few weeks since I last made a post.  I'm afraid that's because I've been busy with other things - both Scalefour Society matters, advertising the Scaleforum exhibition in September, and more importantly preparing for our house move that will take place in two weeks time.  That means that I get a dedicated study cum railway room  :-)

The Pug has made some progress since I replaced the axle after the unfortunate Loctite Incident.  It has been put on a rolling road, and shows a slight limp that I need to eliminate.  To help the running and road-holding, I also needed to add some additional weight to the kit chassis.  The normal model has a large cast weight in the tank, and this is replaced in the High Level model with the motor and gears, to give the benefit of clearing the cab and allowing full backhead detail to be seen.

I used lead sheet to pack up the free corners, cut to size with a scalpel and snips, and held in place with either superglue or epoxy resin.  This photo shows how it was done.

The locations are:

1 - under the cab, next to the reversing rod

2 - under the cab, behind the rear valance

3 - in the front chassis "box" between the cylinders.  This has a section cut out to allow a screwdriver to the chassis mounting screw

4 - inside the coal bunkers on either side of the cab.  There was a need to be careful here not to intrude into the area of the floor fixings

5 - two curved strips placed under the roof, and glued out of sight.

Together, they've brought the weight up to 76 grams.  Probably not as heavy as the original model was, but a definite improvement.  Let's see how it runs when it's back together.

Frustration!

I was hoping to get a good few hours of modelling in today...

Anne is away racing sidecars in South Wales, and apart from a couple of hours over lunch to visit some bee-keeping friends, I was expecting a day of peace and quiet to finally knock a couple of things off.  However I didn't anticipate the modelling bug striking my ten year old stepson so hard today.  A friend of ours gave him an old Tamiya kit for a Ducati 916 (the same bike that I have).  

So I've spent most of the morning and afternoon holding parts, cutting out components, and generally being a gopher!  Pretty much all of it he can do himself, but he does like the company :-)

Anyway, I'm not really complaining.  He's shown a skill and patience level far beyond what I was expecting.  This is the result so far:

It's about five inches long, and has exactly the same components as the real thing, so he's had me going "that's a crankcase breather, that's a steering damper" and so on...

For me, I was frustrated because:

(1) I forgot that I'd switched my mini-drill into reverse to do some burnishing, so the small drills I was using to make holes for handrail knobs on my J15 were going nowhere, and particularly after I snapped the drills...

(2) Whilst spraying track for my demo board, the paint well fell off the side of my airbrush, so that was a clearing up job...

(3) I took the Pug back out of its box where I put it for the loctite on the gearwheel to set, and found that I hadn't re-done as much to it as I thought.

Oh well, in reality, it's been a lovely day!  Hope that yours was as well...

East Suffolk Light

Over the weekend we visited Snape Maltings, in search of antiques shops.  Whilst driving around the area, and seeing the maltings itself, it reminded me so much of Iain Rice's East Suffolk Light Railway.

Many people talk about the influence of Pendon or Heckmondwike on their modelling, but for me the key influence was the ESLR.  That combination of artistic observation, eclectic rolling stock, and a history that bound it all together was superb in setting a time and a place.  It wasn't just a model railway, but a model *of* a railway, even if that was an entire fiction :-)

It would be great to know "where is it now?" and whether it was ever going to appear on the exhibition circuit again, but it simply seems to have sunk without trace.  Ah well, I think that I'll be digging out my old magazines for a dose of nostalgia tonight...