I am now in the rather slow process of clearing the loft to make way for the layout, it will be a fairly slow process as there is so much c**p up there! However, once clear I hope to have a nice modelling room which will allow for the layout to be up all the time and create some storage underneath.
Over the holidays I came up with a sketch of a loco design based on a combination of North British Railway tank locos, this is likely to be based on a Graham Farish 08 chassis using Backwoods Miniatures valve gear.
I'm hoping to make a start on this to coincide with the testing of the track on the new layout so that it can be the first loco to properly turn a wheel on it.
Finally, I've decided on the form of the baseboards, I will be using the same principal as Pempoul (so it can't be bad!), that is a ply outer frame to provide some rigidity and an extruded (pink) foam insulation centre for the running surface and scenic foundation. This should prove strong and lightweight, the latter being important as it will take two people to man handle (or should that now be person handle) the boards down from my loft!
