This post was brought to you by the letter 'F'

That's 'F' for friends, fencing, flagstones, foundations, fenestration and the Furness Railway!

First up, some sad news, in that word reached me a couple of weeks ago of the death of Alan Pollock.

When I first went to one of the Pennine Group meetings approximately 18 months ago, Alan was one of the first people I met and he instantly made me welcome. By the end of that meeting he'd already passed on the responsibility for constructing the buildings for Lightcliffe on to me, albeit that he was a constant source of inspiration from that point on.

A shared enthusiasm for the railways of Cumbria was soon identified (LNWR in his case, Furness in mine) - and numerous e-mails passed between us concerning building construction techniques and the layouts that we were both planning. The last exchange we had was about fencing for Lightcliffe following on from a site visit that Alan had made to get some measurements and there will be a certain poignancy when it comes to adding that to the layout.

My condolences go to his family - I'm sure he'll be missed by all who knew him.

In a way, it was the news of Alan's death that prompted me to pick up the modelling tools again after something of a work enforced hiatus and I hope that I can go on to repay the trust he put in me at that first meeting.

In terms of Lightcliffe, I've more or less got the first of the platforms to a point where I'm happy with it, so it's on now with the other portions. Construction is a foamboard and plasticard sandwich with stone coated slips cut to size and stuck on with PVA, whilst the edging is Redutex 4mm scale stone block. The stone slips were grouted and the whole structure was then coloured and weathered using artists pastels, weathering powders and modelling dust.

A bit of greenery has been added too (bring us a shrubbery!), and the next step will be to finish off the detailing of the platform - adding some more grass, as well as fencing (white picket?) and railings and a coal hole - and then bedding in the buildings ... but first I've got to finish off the main staircase for the footbridge so that once we've got the etches for the metalwork from Bob Jones they can be soldered up and affixed to the staircase and the whole assembly can take it's place on the platform.

It can be a bit tricky working on structures away from the layout as I found to my cost at the last but one meeting when the platform clearances were a bit tight! Hopefully all will be well at the next meeting.

Another job that needs doing but can only really be done in situ is cobbling the roads. As a result of discussions at the last but one meeting I attended, I bought a 3D roller with the idea of impressing the cobbles into Das or something similar, but I'm struggling to apply this consistently and am going back to the idea of using plasticard or Redutex. Further discussions on that next time out methinks.

Bumpy cobbles!

In addition to the buildings for Lightcliffe, I've also dug out the buildings that I was starting to put together for my own embryonic Furness Railway layout. This has the working title of 'Yewdale' and will be based on Coniston circa 1915. I'll shortly be embarking on a 3D mockup of the layout but for now it's the signal box that's occupying my time. It's a fascinating structure which, in real life, was an amalgamation of a wooden, outside framed, upper section (which had originally been in use at Carnforth) with a stone base.

  Coniston in 1961 (most of the outside cross bracing had been removed by this time)

Cross bracing still in place on end panels

The base I built three years ago, but I was never happy with the upper panels or with the roof so decided to have another go and have now managed to produce some panels that I'm happy with and have just started to glaze them.

 

Fiddly but fun!

February Meeting (and a few other bits)

Here's a few more pictures of the David's station building and Alan's bridges in situ on the layout.

Firstly, the station -

Secondly, Alan's bridge at the Halifax end, now painted by David -

Finally on the test track my EWS 37 has been joined by a Class 66! Fear not - my BR Green Class 03 shunter is nearing the end of a bit of a rebuild and normal service will be resumed once it's footplate has been straightened.

On the more contemporary front my 37 and 66 are having some suitable wagons prepared for them in advance of their use on 'Marsh Lane', an early 2000s era layout set in North West England.
 
Finally, the group's February Meeting is this Saturday (the 14th) from 2pm at Keighley MRC. The usual tea, chocolate bars and other refreshments will be available!

Of chimney pots and station signs

Me again!

Now, I know I said that one of my modelling resolutions for 2015 was to post here more often but twice in a couple of days? Well you see, yesterday was a good day with three packets of goodies landing on the doormat and a new loco added to the stud.

Firstly, I managed to get my hands on some 2mm louvred chimney pots courtesy of Mike Topping of Topp Trains of Stafford (http://www.topptrains.co.uk/) and fellow 2mm modeller, Tony Simmons.

Thanks chaps!

Unfortunately, the pots are a bit smaller than expected but a couple of e-mails later, and Tony's produced a bulked up version which will hopefully be on the way to me in the not too distant future ...

Louvre chimney pots designed by Tony Simmons and sold by Topp Trains.

As yet, they're not available from Topp Trains but I understand that they will be appearing on their website shortly.

Secondly, my new back to back gauges turned up (God knows what I've done with my old ones but they'll probably turn up now I've bought some more) so hopefully I can now get the J94 chassis working as it should (thanks to the Steves of Shops 2 and 3 for processing my orders so quickly).

And thirdly ... and this was a very pleasant surprise ... (drum roll) ... some etches that I'd ordered from Guilplates towards the end of last year arrived as well. I'd originally ordered some buffer and cab side number plates from them for the Sharp Stewart and for some other Furness locos that I'm building (both in 2mm using 2mm Locomotives 3F masquerading as a Furness G5 and in other scales) but then I discovered that they did some L&Y signs in 2mm and that they were able to make the ones that I needed that they didn't already do ...

 Buffer and cab side number plates for Furness Railway locos nos. 20 & 123.

L&Y station signs.

 

And the new loco? Well, that was a belated Christmas present of one of Farish's new Class 25s. I'd been umming and ahhing about buying one for a little while and then saw one in the display cabinet in the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway's shop at Haworth and my resistance was broken. In fact I went and bought a set of finescale wheels for it before Christmas so now it's just a case of popping those in and away she goes. Incidentally, if anybody's in the area I'd recommended popping into Haworth shop - they've got a good range of Graham Farish stuff at reasonable prices plus there's a very good selection of books to tempt your fancy.

And yes, I do know a Class 25 isn't pre-grouping Furness, but what's the point of making New Year resolutions if you can't break them?? 

Happy New Year!

One of my New Year Resolutions is to be more focused with my modelling - I let myself get far too easily distracted by other projects.

So, 2015 is principally going to be about two things - progress on the group's layout of Lightcliffe and my own attempts at recreating a small part of the Furness Railway in 2mm.

As regards the latter, there's nothing really to show at the moment. I've got some etches for a Sharp Stewart 4-4-0 that I'm itching to build but I need to improve my loco building skills first so I've started putting together a replacement chassis for the Farish J94 and this is as far as I've got.

The chassis runs freely enough, but the back to backs need adjusting - had them ok before I quartered the wheels but must have moved one or mores of the wheels when I was doing the quartering.

As for Lightcliffe, the main station buildings are almost finished and I've also made a start on the up platform. Chimney pots need to be made (there's nothing quite suitable in any of the available ranges) and signs have to be affixed and then I think we're almost there. Unfortunately, the blanks for the signs that I built into the walls got broken off during the build so I've had to reopen the slots for the signs and will have to touch up the walls once I've fitted the signs (hence the white mark above the waiting room doors).

Other modelling resolutions include getting along to more Group meetings this year, and posting here more regularly!

Happy New Year and Happy Modelling to one and all.

Regards,

David V.

There go the drifters ... here come the carpenters

The last two weekends have seen visits to Corrieshalloch and Fencehouses ... inspirational stuff in both cases, though for different reasons.

Nearer to home, the roofers have done their bit and now the carpenters have moved in to install the window frames.

Will miss the next group session (going to Furness MRC's exhibition in Barrow) but should be there in November by which time I'm hoping that I might have finished the station master's house and the two halves of the building can be joined together and presented as one.

In the meantime, here are some progress shots of the waiting room ...

More scenic developments

Following on from David's post yesterday, here's a few photos taken at the meeting on Saturday showing some of the scenic work which is currently afoot.
 
Firstly, Alan Pollock has built the bridge at the Halifax end of the layout -

This will form part of a group of bridges at the Halifax end over both the main lines and the entrance to Brookes Ltd.

Another photo of David's station building in place, looking up the line towards Bradford -

Some work on checking the clearances of the footbridge also took place, in advance of etches of the footbridge itself being produced by Bob Jones - this is Chris Arthur's 3F Tank and a Stanier Coach being used to check the clearances -

At the end of this month we'll be making a field visit to Lightcliffe to check over what remains there, particularly the bridges. Much of the area has been built upon since the 1930s and Brookes is no more but the visit should be useful.

Also, the layout may be moving elsewhere in the KMRC clubroom, however this is all in the early stages and at our next meeting on Saturday October 11th we'll be discussing this together with fiddle yard plans as well as more scenery work and finising off the linkage for the single slip!

When this old world starts getting you down ...

Twas a good turn out at the weekend and good to see Neil Moxon for the first time in a while (don't leave it so long next time Neil!).

Plans made for the site visit after Halifax show (when hopefully we'll be able to grab Bob Jones for five minutes to talk footbridges) and a good discussion about scenics.

Bit of a bombshell at the end about the space allocated for the layout at KMRC's clubrooms, but we'll just have to see how that pans out.

Anyway, the painters have put in an appearance at last and have tarted up the waiting room, followed closely by the glaziers and now the roofers are in residence!

Thought about using plasticard roofing and experimented with self-adhesive slates, but wasn't happy with either so have chopped up some slate effect slips from Richard Stacey (www.richardstacey.com) and have now started to apply those to the roof. Stick a CD on and it's all very theraputic!