Inspirational Lines, fieldwork, and an early Christmas message

A thread on Narrow Gauge Railway Modelling Online has got me thinking. I regularly Read Colin Lea's Rhydd Ddu blog about his 009 layout (link on the right), and he has been through a series of posts commenting on lines he's visited. One area which many people seem surprised about are the number of narrow gauge lines that ran in Scotland, and there were many more proposed!

I intend (after new year) to start going through these lines one by one and listing any info i can find on them. For many there is very little info, but the major ones have a little bit here and there that could be amalgamated into a blog post some time.

On the layout front i'm likely to be heading up to Plockton in February/March for a weekend away around my birthday. While i'm there i intend to take plenty of pictures of the town (buildings, vegetation, coastline etc) for more fieldwork research for the layout. I'm getting more tempted to leave the inspiration for the trackplan that has come from Portree and focus on Plockton to get a more believable scene as an end result. Because of this fieldwork will be very useful, fortunately i can fit well over 1,000 photos on the memory card of my digital camera!!

Finally, as this is likely to be my last post on here before Christmas... Happy Christmas to all those who have been reading!

Sounds like a plan!!

I went to ExpoNG last weekend and had a great time there. I spent most of my time drooling over County Gate and Pempoul, though i did end up helping out on the KB Scale stand for a while too.

I made two major purchases there, the first was a copy of Steam Locomotives in India - the Narrow Gauge, i've been looking for one of these for a while. It's got some fantastic locos in, and i'll definitely be employing some of the larger tank engines within it's pages on PnC.

The other purchase was a Soundtraxx Micro Tsunami medium steam sound decoder... WOW! DCC sound has me hooked now, i'm going to try and incorporate it into a tank loco design which i've got on my drawing board at the mo. I'll design the loco so that the speaker forms the face of the bunker which points into the cab - this then makes the entire bunker a 'bass box' in effect, and will hopefully improve the quality of noises such as chuff where bass is key.

I'll post some pictures on the various modelling forums that i'm a member of, and document the construction of the loco there.

Delusions of grandeur?

Something i'm very concious of is the fact that i have a rather ambitious and imaginative brain... This isn't a combination that goes together well when coming up with a layout design. Now i'm not going to announce a complete change of the track plan, just one thing which has made me think.

S scale has been 'on the brain' again of late, i scaled up a drawing of a 009 loco and realised it had the potential to fit a portescap sized motor/gearbox combo, and a sound decoder inside it. Now i'd like to try S scale, but when looking at the track plan for PnC i'm not sure if i would be happy with it in S scale. I'd have to shrink everything slightly and lose some areas of the scenery to allow for the slight increase in scale. Sound decoders and improved running are the main things which have been driving me down the S scale path.

There are two ways round this, one is to reduce the track plan to accomodate S scale on the board sizes i've got available. This is something i would consider doing to see how it looks, but i think i'll have to greatly simplify the goods yard, and shorten the station meaning i can't run trains of a length that i'd like.

The other option is to stick with 009 and make sure i can get it to run as well as possible. This will be greatly aided by DCC, and investigations into building my own chassis a bit like Jeff Bissonette has done. The only thing left to overcome is the size of loco bodies for accomodating speakers for DCC sound then. One thing i've thought of is to make PNC into a through station, this would allow trains passing through the scene to have a speaker located in the first coach or wagon and for the sound to come from that. This wouldn't allow any shunting of that loco/wagon combination, but perhaps i could build a loco suitable to have a speaker located inside to act as a shunter...

For this plan i think it best to stick to 009 as i said before. Whether i go for a through station i don't know, i would however like to portray the junction that PnC is supposed to be located near to if possible so i may see if it's possible to squeeze this in somewhere.

For sound i think the decoders are simply slightly too big to fit in your average 009 tank loco, however i might be able to design a freelance one where they would fit. This is something i'd like to have a go at with one loco to see if it's worth it, if not then it'll make my life a whole lot easier!

I think it's going to be important for me to realise what my initial objectives for this layout were:

1 - portray scotland with typical scenes merged into one believable town
2 - operate as realistically as possible
3 - give an impression of space, not being a layout with scenery stuck in around the track

Then i think i'll have to remind myself of these when i get delusions of grandeur again! At some point i'll have to cure the S scale bug and make a layout in it, it'll have to be small as PnC will take up a LOT of room in our loft so i doubt i'll get permission for anything sizeable!

Thinking inside the box...

One layout i've always had a soft spot for is Dulas which was a layout based on the Corris Railway in Wales. It was totally different to any layout i'd seen before as it was presented as a series of modules, each of which portrayed a distinctly different section of the line and were linked together by small black box sections with backscenes dividing the module scenes from one another.

This is an approach to layout design that i've always considered trying, and as my initial thoughts of a layout are as a series of small scenes, is something that i think would suit my style of modelling. Recently i've mentioned building an 009 modular layout with some friends, one of the ideas is to set it on a scottish island. If this goes ahead then PnC may become divided into several small modules, but form part of a much larger layout.

The scenes i'd particularly like to model are the tidal inlet with the bridge and the curved frontage like that of Plockton. If this modular idea doesn't go ahead then i expect i'll just carry on with the PnC idea as i, i think it will lend itself to both modules or one whole layout...

If the modules go ahead the they're likely to be in a box format containing each scene, perhaps i could make my boxes removable to allow PnC to be 'built' from the contents of each box...

Everything has to be weathered!

Well, the title of this blog post is a bit of a give away as to the content...

I recently posted on the Narrow Gauge Modelling Online Forum about the use of MIG

weathering powders and washes. I tried them out on a selection of Welshpool & Llanfair wagons i've got. This photo shows the results compared against an unweathered wagon.

This was my first attempt at weathering anything properly. I'm very pleased with the results, and was happy with how easy it was to achieve the results you can see in the pictures.

It's not just wagons that will need weathering though, i plan on weathering absolutely everything on PnC to make it look life like. I doubt that weathering powders will be applicable for some things, but i expect that someone somewhere on the internet has written about weathering anything i come across a problem related to. Model Trains Weathered has been very useful and contains some superb examples of weathering and some detailed descriptions on how to achieve similar results.

Just a short one this time, i'll expand on other weathering subjects as i come across them on Dunbracken... i can see the puffer being fun making that look really 'well used' and grimey!!

Researching for a layout

When thinking of a new layout i often sit and look through various sources of information for a long while before even beginning to produce a trackplan. This is one aspect of the hobby which really appeals to me, and one that can take up a lot of time.

In a way this has been going on for Port na Cailliche for around 7 years. That may seem like a long time, but i've been modelling the same line with layouts based on the stations at Invercloy and Dunbracken as well as this one when it's built. Consequently i had to do some research for the two previous layouts and there were plenty of ideas which couldn't be incoroporated into these for various reasons. These ideas which couldn't be used have been floating in my head, and remain in the scrapbook i draw all my ideas in - incidentally this is a VERY good idea, whenever i have a thought for a layout i jot it down no matter how small it is. You'll never remember everything and this is an easy way to look back through your ideas.

The main source of information for research is books, for this layout i've been using various sorts of books from landscape photography of the Highlands and Islands to a historic photo book of the Isle of Arran.

Books on Scottish railways have obviously been very useful, particularly those on the Campbletown & Macrihanish Railway, and the Lochaber Railway being the main narrow gauge systems in Scotland. However books on the West Highland line (and indeed riding on it) have been useful, as well as Highland Railway books, and even books on class 37s- often used in the Highlands!

Because this line is more similar to the Irish 3' gauge lines than the Welsh narrow gauge i've got several books on Irish lines, one particularly useful one is 'Irish Narrow Gauge in Colour' by Norman Johnson. Also books on specific subjects like the Clyde Puffer are particularly useful.

Mention of the Clyde Puffer brings me onto another source of information; Videos of the BBC tv series 'Para Handy', this is a comedy series based on the wiriting of Neil Munro about a rather mischevious puffer crew. These videos contain some brilliant detail shots of puffers, quays, bits of coastline and scenery. All very useful for a layout where 95% of the front of the layout is water!!

Photos and memories from family holidays are of course also incoroporated into the layout plan, both places or buildings that mean something to me, and places that simply struck me as a particularly nice scene to replicate. Of course seeing things first hand is the best way to look into an area for a layout, and part of the reason i've chosen Scotland is because of many fond memories of family holidays when i was younger.

Finally there are a few websites i'll mention which have been useful. I linked to some specific photos on various websites which will be incorportated into the layout in one of my first posts, but there are some websites which cover large areas that are a very useful resource.

Firstly geograph - this is a site which allows you to select a specific geographical area on a map of the UK and then view pictures which have been uploaded to the site of that area.

Another site in the same manner as this is flickr, though photos on here tend to be more artistic it is worth having a look at the map section and doing as you would with geograph, or searching for more specific subjects.

Ports and harbours of the UK has been a good source of information on all sorts of small jetties and fishing ports in the Highlands of Scotland. Again based around a map of the UK it makes it very easy to find pictures of the area you're looking for.

Finally, if there's still areas of the trackplan that i've not managed to fill after all that then i just try and make up plausible scenery and scenes from what i've seen in all the other material - after all it is a freelance layout!

Further scale thoughts

I've pretty much made up my mind as to which scale to use. It's been decided by one fact - N gauge chassis when scaled up to 1:64 are nearly all too short to be of use. I don't feel i'm in a position at the moment to scratchbuild chassis so i'm going to stick to 009.

In addition to this i've already got 3 Backwoods Miniatures kits in 009 which will be a loss if i swithed to S. Another issue is that i've also already got several buildings from the old layout so these would be useless on a S scale layout (unless having some forced perspective), as would the etches for the trestle bridge that i've bought.

I do have an idea for another layout i'd like to do long in the future, i have a feeling i know what scale that one could be...

One aspect that appealed of S scale was the increased level of detail, but i'm going to work as hard as i can to try and fit as much fine detail onto PnC. I'm not intending this to be a 2/3 year project - it's a long term one, the layout i've always wanted to build so why rush? So i'll have plenty of time to fit the detail in.

So there you have it... 009 it is for now.

Contemplating a different scale...

As PnC is a way off being constructed at the moment this blog is mainly documenting my thoughts before building the layout during the planning stage, therefore all sorts of things are going round my head at the moment.

One thought which has recently appeared is that of scale. I've always been a 009 man because of space restrictions and the fact that my 009 was part of an already existing 00 layout to begin with. However i've always liked larger scales, and in particular 0-16.5 and the other 7mm scales. Now, PnC would be absolutely huge in 7mm scale, but there is a compromise.

I first saw S scale when watching the Paul Scoles scenery DVDs i mentioned in an earlier blog. S Scale is 1:64 which equates to 4.8 mm to the foot as opposed to the 4mm to the foot 0f 009. Whilst this is not a substantial difference it does seem to improve things visually. 009 stock can often seem small to me (admittedly my stock is generally larger tank engines so this might not apply), and Sn3 stock seems rather nice and chunky looking.

A good compromise would be to use S scale for the layout, and to have 9mm gauge track which would represent a shade under 1' 11" gauge track - almost spot on for most UK based narrow gauge systems. This would still allow me to use 9mm gauge chassis for the locos (albeit adapted with new cylinders etc) to make my life easier. I was planning on scratchbuilding a lot of the layout to make sure that it was easilt recogniseable as a Parkside Dundas suchandsuch so the lack of any kits doesn't particularly bother me.

It's certainly something to consider, the major downside i can see is that the overall size difference between 4mm and S is around 19%, this will have quite an impact on the size of the trackplan i've developed for PnC. If i want to keep this then it will have to grow somewhat - potentially a problem if we move in the future.

S scale does look attractive, and will certainly be considered for future layouts, but i can see it's limitations for this layout. Having said that it would be different, and would certainly prove a challenge!! There seem to be absolutely no S scale narrow gauge layouts set in the UK, so this could be an interesting niche to explore at some point.

I'm planning on knocking up an S scale diorama to test out the theory some time to see how it compares to 009. I expect 009 will remain the scale of choice for PnC because of the size of the layout, and the proportion of the baseboards i can leave purely to scenery without any track, not to mention the availability of lineside details. These would reduce with S scale (something i want to avoid). A nice thought, but perhaps something for the future.

The Origin of the Layout

The idea for Port na Cailliche came from my original layout Invercloy which was supposed to be a terminus at one end of a ficticious West Highland narrow gauge line. I enjoy reading about people's layout's when they've made a ficticious history to accompany them and use this to justify and describe certain aspects of the layout. The one that particularly springs to mind is the Craig & Mertonford Railway by P.D. Hancock where he created a ficticious history of the line for pertty much every aspect of it. Another that has also interested me to read about is Ted Polet's Craigcorrie & Dunalastair Railway, this has been a huge inspiration to me and has been very interesting to see develop over the time that i have been a member of the 009 Society.

These two layouts got me thinking about the origin for the railway that would operate through Invercloy. I can up with some ficticious names for Scottish towns and villages to have stations based in, and these were then used to form the company name (the Ardaig Bay Joint Railway Company). Two stations on this line have been modelled so far, Invercloy which was never finished, and still remains in that state, and Dunbracken which is currently under construction. Dunbracken is based on an ironing board and is a very basic layout.

Dunbracken was built as a learning exercise for Port na Cailliche, i always wanted to build a bigger layout, but at the time didn't think my modelling skill would be good enough to undertake such a task. Hence the building of a small layout as a learning exercise, and being the first layout that i've built entirely on my own i'm very pleased with it. There are several aspects which i had not tried or used before that i wanted to have experienced before i decided to use them on PnC, these included Rock castings, making water, DCC, building a ship and generally improving my ability with creating decent scenery. Not a small list, so i thought that a new layout was worthwhile, especially if it was small.

Back to the basis of the layout... The ABJR was formed from two separate companies, the Glencloy Light Railway Company, and the Ardaig Bay Railway Company. The GLR ran from Invercloy to Ramasaig, with a small branch to Dunbracken, while the ABR ran from Port na Cailliche to Ardaig where it connected with the Highland Railway. The ABR claimed the majority of the title of the new Joint Companie's monicker due to their higher level of fiscal solvency than the GLR. The locals often commented that if the two hadn't merged then they thought the GLR would have closed long before it did.

Both lines were separated by a small range of mountains in the centre of the headland which they both ran along either side of.

At some point in their history the two companies decided to merge and constructed a line through the glen of the mountain range to connect to each other. At one end of these glens sat Port na Cailliche, so this is actually a junction station, but the line up the glen joins some distance out of the station (so this may feature on a future extension).

Due to the two initial lines running along the coast they were blessed with fairly easy gradients, and therefore could afford the use of smaller sized locomotives, however with the construction of the line linking the two along the glens so more potent motive power was required. This was provided in the form of large tank engines and a small group of tender locos, and even a garratt for heavy mineral trains.

This operation effectively created two eras for these lines, one of independence, and one of operation as the joint line. During the time of the jont company stock still mainly operated over the lines it was originally used on, but occassionally it would be required to venture further afield on the rest of the system. The larger stock bought by the joint company could be operated over the whole system, though it seldom saw use on the Dunbracken branch due to the size of the terminus at Dunbracken.

Of course this is all fiction, but it gives reason for the ficticious town of Port na Cailliche to have a station like the one i'm proposing to build for this layout. I find knowing the sort of line you are portraying helps to decide things like the stock, how well maintained it should be (also dependent on the era you've modelled), how to operate it and many other things. I've found it quite enjoyable coming up with this little history for the line and will expand on it bit by bit, if you're interested in writing a history for your line then Ted Polet wrote an interesting article on doing so which appears in the Modeller Book of Narrow Gauge, and is well worth a read.

Port na Cailliche was chosen as the site for the larger layout as i thought it would be an ideal place to indulge my love of scenery, sited on the coast with a glen approaching the sea, rocky outcrops, a town and plenty of water. Plus being at one end of the joint line it would have seen all sorts of the stock operating so would allow me to build up a varied collection of locos and rolling stock.

Hopefully one day i'll have enough room to add the extension with the junction on it, but i've got enough work now finishing Dunbracken and with the plans for the 4 boards of this!

A rainy holiday miles away from Scotland proves fruitful!

Might sound like a strange title for a blog post, but... i've just returned from visiting my mum (who lives on the edge of Dartmoor) for a week and a bit's holiday. Unfortunately it rained a lot so we couldn't go and do as much as we'd planned for the time we were there, but it had it's bonusses, my girlfriend read a book she's been wanting to for ages, and i finalised the trackplan for the layout, and looked through lots of my old railway books!!

Whilst I had intended originally to have the layout on a much sharper curve, from talking to other narrow gauge modellers about my ideas i've decided to smooth it out and have a much gentler curve for the trackwork. To accomodate this i've had to ease the shape of the layout away from an L shape to what might be likened to a banana shape. The idea is that the fiddle yard end of the layout sits some distance away from the barrier at an exhibition (while being close enough to see all the details!), and it then curves and comes to a stop at the station end much closer to the barrier.

I also went to Plymouth model railway exhibition, whilst there wasn't anything particularly inspiring there from a narrow gauge point of view, i bought a few bits and pieces which will be useful. As i said before i'm planning on building a new body on the Roco loco that i bought recently, this will be freelance, but a 2-6-2T which is very much inspired by the Ballymena & Larne compund locos built by Beyer Peacock (albeit with smaller wheels and outside frames). More details will follow on this in subsequent blog posts.

Finally, i visited a friend who has leant me two superb DVDs, those on Scenery techniques produced by Paul Scoles. They are superb and cover all sorts of scenic techniques in an easy to follow and well explained manner.

Source: www.paulscoles.com

Paul uses dirt for covering his scenic hard shell, and applies this dry to the slopes of the hard shell, lets it settle whilst gravity does it's work and then wets it and glues it in place. This provides as natural an 'earth' as possible in my mind, where the material has settled to the angle which it would in real life (ok, so grain sizes are slightly different which will have an impact, but it's sieved beforehand so it's nice and fine). Examples of Paul's scenery techniques are visible on the galleries of his Pelcian Bay Railway & Navigation Company.

This is something i might consider for PnC, but i'm not entirely sure as yet, it could potentially add a LOT of weight to the boards, but it does look very good...

Another layout that's got me thinking!

Whilst on a visit to a local model shop at the weekend I picked up a copy of the April 2008 Continental Modeller which i obviously missed first time around. In it there's an article on a French layout named Pempoul (metre gauge in 1:50 scale) built by Gordon and Maggie Gravett. The scenery on Pempoul is fantastic, i had seen pictures before, and when i saw the article that explained some of the Gravett's methods i had to buy it!

Some pics of Pempoul on these sites:
Crawley MRS
World Rail Fans
RMweb

I've just noticed it's going to be at ExpoNG (Swanley) later this year so will be able to take it all in then!

Two things in particular stand out for me, firstly the grass. This is done using a Noch Grasmaster which electrostatically charges the flock powder so that it stands on end when dropped into some adhesive on the layout, the difference between this and the old puffer bottle for flock is quite noticable. This looks particularly good for representing fine grass, but i think for the more moorland areas i'll stick to longer carpet underlay to achieve the more rough look.

The only thing putting me off getting a Grasmaster for PnC is the £100+ price tag... some experimenting with a balloon and something to rub it on before i go down the Noch path i think!

The other thing that struck me about Pempoul was the colouring and the fact that it's so subdued. Layouts with bright colours on stick out like a sore thumb, both vegetation, buildings and other scenic items need to appear more subtly coloured. After all they are being viewed at well over several hundred scale feet away most of the time so they should appear in model form as they do in real life over this sort of distance, not how they do when viewed up close.

Upon realising this i looked back through my modelling books and found a useful introduction to colour in Dave Frary's How to Build Realistic Model Railroad Scenery. However i feel that this is an area that military modellers generally achieve much better results than railway modellers, so i will be looking at this source for more information.

Pempoul has also made me think about baseboard construction, it's boards are 4 and 9mm ply around an extruded polystyrene core. Extruded polystyrene is not the white polysytrene used typically for packaging in the UK, but the coloure foam you can get for housing insulation (amongst other thigs). An example of it in use on a layout is this shot of the latest section of County Gate under construction by John de Fraysinnet.

Whether this approach will be lighter than the initial thought of ply and foamboard formers i'm not sure, but i believe it will be infinitely stronger due to it's more solid construction. The only area i can see being an issue is mounting the point motors, this could be done by having cross braces etc. where these are needed and mounting them on these. American modellers use this material much more than us in the UK, i'll try and find some info on mounting point motors from some US sites.

Hopefully i can find out more about the construction of Pempoul's boards at Swanley.

And a brief update on the Roco... it's been run in for about 5 hours now, and it will run soooo smoothly and will crawl round my circular test track even when controlled by my old H&M clipper, so it will be 10 times better when hooked up to DCC!

Improved running

One 009 myth that i'm keen to dispell in the operating of this layout is that the running is poor. With the quality of mechanisms nowadays it is possible to obtain very small gauge locos which will run smoothly. Unfortunately at present 009 isn't that well served for ready to run prototypical chassis, with the 009 modeller having to rely on converted N gauge chassis (often inside framed), etched brass kits or using HOe mechanisms.

Roco 0-6-0 tender loco source: http://www.roco.com/

I have just bought one of the latter, a Roco 0-6-0 tender loco (shown above) which has outside frames, brass flywheel and complex valve gear, therefore something prototypical and suitably large for a railway in the Scottish Higlands can hopefully be built on it.

I'm not 100% sure what will be built on this, but it is likely to be either an entirely freelance loco, or a standard design from either Hunslet, Hudswell Clarke or Manning Wardle reproduced from the reproduction Catalgues i've got from Plateway Press. At present the thinking is to produce a large tank loco (2-6-2T or similar) and use the tender for another project at a later date.

John de Frayssinet has sucessfully used these chassis under his Manning Wardle and "Russell" Backwoods Miniatures kit based locomotives on County Gate, so if all goes well with this one then i might buy some more and make a small loco stud of 3 or 4 locos out of them.

The running is extremely smooth, and will give a much more prototypical feel than the stock which earned 009 it's undeserved reputation amongst other modellers all those years ago. Hopefully the running can even be improved upon slightly by the addition of a Zimo DCC decoder which will allow me to limit the top speed and give more fine control of the speed of the loco. More on this once the loco has arrived.

For other wheel arrangements i shall be looking into using several sources of loco chassis, the first being converted Japanese N gauge locos (Tomix, Kato, Micro Ace etc) with dummy outside frames, all these run superbly, much smoother than European N gauge stock.

Converting a Hollywood Foundry Bullant to outside framed is another option, as done by Steve Fulljames in his Fairlight Works blog. Due to the size of the motor unit it will have to be housed in a saddle tank of some description, but i've found quite an attractive one that used to run in Borneo which was produced by Manning Wardle.

And finally by producing my own etched chassis and having a go at using these as a base for more complex locos if nothing else is suitable, of course with this method running properties are down to the construction which is an area that i feel i need to develop a little at present.

Update - i've just received the loco, i' m VERY impressed with it. Straight out of the box it runs smoothly and steadily. It will get down to some impressively low speeds out of the box too! Now just to finish running it in and to fit my decoder to it.

Minor revisions to the track plan

Following discussions on Narrow Gauge Railway Modelling Online i've decided to alter the trackplan for PnC slightly to reduce the bend in it and move away from the "L" shape towards something more gentle, perhaps a 45-60 degree bend rather than a 90 degree one.

It was pointed out to me that it would open up the area where the layout could be viewed from, and i think that this might help create a more realistic layout too, with better viewing potential for exhibition visitors.

Also discussed was the construction of the baseboards, i think due to the size of the layout (and my car's boot!) i'm going to limit the boards to 4'6" x 2'6" and have 4 boards, two for the goods yard and tidal inlet and two for the station and plockton scene. Due to the size the weight might be an issue, so i started to think of ways to save weight, one way would be to make "hybrid" baseboards and use ply or similar for the fascia boards and then use foamboard or blue foam for the contours and runnning surface. Hopefully that should keep the weight down whilst not compromising strength.

Will revise the trackplan soon.

Trackplan!

I've finally had time to sit down and sketch out a rough track plan. At present it's not been drawn to exact scale, but just to give an idea of what i'm thinking of.


Here are the explanations corresponding to the numbered items on the plan:

1 - Hotel/Lodge - this building i already have, it was built for me by a friend, and will make an attractive addition to the moorland area of the layout.


2 - Tidal Inlet with steel trestle bridge spanning end. This is supposed to be reminiscent of this inlet at Plockton. The structure i will be using is based on a lower version of this Austrian bridge and is produced by a company called N Brass Locos.

3 - The Vital Spark sitting at the "old quay". I love the Para Handy stories and had to include a Clyde Puffer (The Vital Spark) on the layout. I plan to have an operating mineral chute on the layout which will allow trains to discharge their load into the hold of the Vital Spark. The Puffer is based on the Dean's Marine kit, and is currently being built for use on Dunbracken but will be removed when PnC is started.


4 - Goods shed. This will be based on a combination of Irish prototypes with a curved corrugated roof similar to the Ratio carriage shed.

5 - Signal box and cattle dock - these will sit at the end of the platform for the goods shed.

6 - Castle. This will be a ruin of a small castle based on Castle Moil from the Isle of Skye.


7 - Beach with culverted stream from hills at rear of layout. This area is based on Plockton.

8 - Boat yard workshops, this is another building built for me by a friend, it was used on a previous layout and will be reused on PnC.

9 - Water tower - for this i have a very quirky prototype from an Irish line to use which was a cylinder lying on it's side with two domed ends and then sitting on a stone base.

10 - Steamer - this represents a small ferry vessel which would probably be sailing to the Hebrides, Ireland or to another Highlands port. At present i'm not 100% settled on a prototype, but it will be propeller driven.

11 - Station building - to sit opposite the ends of the lines running into the platform, from this building a short glass canopy will protrude out to the ferry steps and part way down the platform. This building will also contain an office for the ferry terminal.

12 - Church - probably based on the White Washed church seen in many photos of the West Highland line.

I realise that this trackplan is quite complex, but i think it will allow for some interesting operation. I wanted to give the feeling of the line once having operated to the yard and the "old" quay, and then having been extended to the "new quay", however with limited space here the run round facilities at the yard were still used. It's taken me a long time to get this plan to the state where i'm 100% happy with it, and i think there will only be small revisions to it now.

Making Tracks

I don't want this blog to start by solely being about what i'm going to do on PnC and moaning about how i think some commonly used products don't help realism of modelling, reading back through this is how it comes across to me. I don't want it to be of this opinion, what i'm trying to get across is that i'm by no means a fantastically talented modeller, but i want to try and create as realistic a layout as i am capable of, to do this i'm planning on using some different materials that suit my method of working better, and hope to share these with you as i go through both the planning and then construction stages of the layout. The thing i really want to create is the atmosphere of the line, and this may mean lots more scratchbuilding than i've done before to avoid using things like a GWR/LMS/Wills Freelance signal box for example, but this is something that i'm looking forward to.

One of the first products i found when investigating for PnC was Fast Tracks - this is an American company who produce... err... track making bits and pieces.

Their products i'm interested in using are:

Micro Engineering Spikes - actual spikes to spike the rail to the track rather than use chairs. This seems to have been common on many Irish lines, and therefore has been adopted for my PnC due to their similar nature (rolling stock, operation etc).

Micro Engineering Spikes source: www.handlaidtrack.com

The Tillig track i've used on Dunbracken gives a good effect of trackwork as can be seen below, but i would still like to try using more finescale appearing trackwork on PnC.

Parkside Dundas Vale of Rheidol guard's van sitting on Tillig HOe track on Dunbracken.

Wood Ties - actual wooden sleepers which will give a more realistic colour than pcb or rtr plastic sleepers. Some pcb sleepers will have to be used in the production of points, but this article is very useful for combining the wood and pcb and getting an even result from both mediums.

Wooden Ties (sleepers) source: www.handlaidtrack.com

PnC is very much inspired by Irish narrow gauge as well as Welsh and Scottish, and there is a photo of the Tralee and Dingle Railway which shows some very nicely wooden coloured sleepers with some light rust and grime staining. I think that to achieve this it will be much easier to start with wooden sleepers in the first place. At present Fast Tracks are the only i company i have managed to find that produce sleepers precut to close to 009 standards. They also produce some very useful looking point building tools which may come in handy when trackwork construction starts.

Not quintessentially welsh

One thing i'm going to try and avoid is the use of easily recognisable stock on this layout. Don't get me wrong, i've had great enjoyment out of building people's kits whilst modelling in 009, but for this layout i want it to be more prototypical than anything i've built before. I've looked into trackwork, buildings, signalling etc. But the one thing i'd not though about until recently was the stock.

Many 009 layouts have ficticious histories or companies behind them, yet they operate stock that is easily recognised as being from the Ffestiniog for example. Now, i do have some favourite locos (Russell being one) so they will make an appearance on PnC but on the whole i want to try and come up with my own designs for stock which won't be easily recognised as having operated on such and such a line in real life.

I've bought the Manning Wardle, Hudswell Clarke and Hunslet reproduction catalogues and intend to have a go at building some of their standard designs to operate on the layout, along with some freelance ones using various aspects of specific manufacturers designs to make them look believable as being produced by Hunslet or Fowler for example.

The same applies for carriage and goods stock, i've got loads of plastic kits which i've built up in the past that i could use for the time being, but eventually i'd like to replace these with scratchbuilt items, or kits of freelance stock. I think this might help give the layout (or rather the ficiticious company that operates on it) it's own identity, such as the Lynton & Barnstaple Manning Wardle's being easy to spot as originating from that line, that's what i'm aiming for - albeit in model form.

Oh - and i've finalised the track plan, but i've yet to draw it up good enough to post here, and i'm off on a weeks holiday soon so will post it once i'm back!

Inspirational Book

One thing that's made me think about how to improve the standard of my narrow gauge modelling is reading Peter Kazer's book Narrow Gauge Railway Modelling which is published by Wild Swan. This book contains some great tips on how to improve realism of a narrow gauge layout, ans has some examples of Peter's layouts. It's well worth buying and reading for anyone trying to create a more realistic narrow gauge layout.

Two things in particular have struck me from reading this... handmade trackwork, and using cast plater to make buildings - the textures and finish achieved on Peter's model of Corris station is fantastic! This is something i really want to try out for PnC and i shall be having a go at this for a building on Dunbracken to act as the test bed. As for track, i've found loads of stuff on that, so that's enough for an entirely separate blog post!

New blog!

This new blog is a place where i can share my thoughts on 009 modelling and to show the initial thoughts that are going into my new 009 layout Port na Cailliche (pronounced Port na-Kaleesh - although i'm open to correction on that!).

The layout is to be set in Scotland on the coast of the West Highlands, rather loosely located somewhere between Oban and Ullapool, and is inspired by many holidays to this area. Other inspriation has been drawn from various locations, including the Lochaber Railway which was one of the largest narrow gauge systems that actually operated in Scotland.

I have been working on my current layout Dunbracken for some time, and this was just a test to see what methods work well, what pleases me and what areas i'd like to improve. Dunbracken was always intended to be a short term project, and hopefully Port na Cailliche will be started some time next year.

I feel that my modelling has reached the level where i can try enough new things to warrant building a new layout. On Dunbracken i've experimented with DCC, and this will hopefully be up and running soon. The scenery is more advanced than that of previous layouts i've worked on, and finally it was the first time i'd attempted water. One new area i'd like to try for PnC (Port na Cailliche is far too long to keep typing!) is to make my own track.

At present i'm finalising the trackplan and will hopefully work on a scale model of the layout to check that everything fits and looks good over this winter. The plan is an L shape with curved edged boards inspired by David Bickerton's layout Pudley Lane, this gives a nice flowing feel to the presentation of the layout and gets rid of any harsh edges that right angled boards give.

This layout will contain elements of various places which i've visited in Scotland or have found appealing in photographs. As such it's been in my mind in some form for a number of years. Now i've moved out of home i have enough space to build it in my loft, but would like to finish Dunbracken first to continue learning lessons from that.

Real life locations and buildings i intend to include a representation of are:

• Plockton - this will form the backing to the curve in the L shape.
• Portree - the station will sit on a wooden quay built out into where the harbour is in this photo.
• Castle Moil - a remnant of the areas past which the railway has had to be built around.

The aspect of modelling that i most enjoy is the scenery, and i always like to try and get this as real as possible, but as this layout is basically the one i've always wanted to build it's a long term project so i will be going to town on most things. I've found some very useful and interesting products which i hope to use, as well as thinking up new items that i may well look into producing for myself. I hope to share these in future blog posts. This approach has partly come from frustration that certain items are not available from current manufacturers, or are not suitable for what i would like to achieve, and partly from seeing what John de Frayssinet has achieved on his 009 masterpiece County Gate.

I think that's enough rambling for now, especially as i don't have any pictures or a trackplan to share at present. Future blog posts will include areas which i feel will help improve my level of modelling and various methods i'll be trying out to improve the overall quality of the layout and it's stock before starting on the main layout.