The line to Eckythumpington...
The line to Eckythumpington...
G'day all. After years of having a permanent structure in the loft, I decided I'd rather have a portable layout, so set about creating this. Now I have some progress to report, I thought a PL thread was in order.
As the title suggests, the name of the station on my layout is Eckythumpington, for various beer related reasons! The line is going to be modelled around somewhere ficticious in the North of England, between Manchester and Sheffield. There will be a fairly busy main line, with a single track branch line. Most traffic will be of late 80s to late 90s vintage, consisting mostly of DMUs with the odd freight train or loco hauled passenger train. Of course, I'm not going to stick religiously to this period, so anything I like may make an occasional appearance!
I have constructed my new baseboard out of 6mm ply atop a 2"x1" frame - 2 4'x2' boards currently giving me a total size of 8'x2', with enough wood to do two more!
So, the next thing to do, after buying some other baseboard items such as cork floor tiles (would you believe B&Q don't sell these any more!?), I began playing with some track layouts. Here's what I've come up with...
There will be a cassette based fiddle yard at each end of the layout (with two lines at one end, and three at the other). I may also decide to utilise some of the space under the town to use as storage sidings.
As I have previously said, there is plenty of scope here for me expand the layout onto further baseboards, perhaps having a countryside scene on the other side of the bridge to the left of the plan.
What do you think? Any comments/criticism/questions will be greatly appreciated!
Please excuse the mess in the loft! Eventually I will have this layout somewhere more civilised, most likely on pasting tables or trestles...
As the title suggests, the name of the station on my layout is Eckythumpington, for various beer related reasons! The line is going to be modelled around somewhere ficticious in the North of England, between Manchester and Sheffield. There will be a fairly busy main line, with a single track branch line. Most traffic will be of late 80s to late 90s vintage, consisting mostly of DMUs with the odd freight train or loco hauled passenger train. Of course, I'm not going to stick religiously to this period, so anything I like may make an occasional appearance!
I have constructed my new baseboard out of 6mm ply atop a 2"x1" frame - 2 4'x2' boards currently giving me a total size of 8'x2', with enough wood to do two more!
So, the next thing to do, after buying some other baseboard items such as cork floor tiles (would you believe B&Q don't sell these any more!?), I began playing with some track layouts. Here's what I've come up with...
There will be a cassette based fiddle yard at each end of the layout (with two lines at one end, and three at the other). I may also decide to utilise some of the space under the town to use as storage sidings.
As I have previously said, there is plenty of scope here for me expand the layout onto further baseboards, perhaps having a countryside scene on the other side of the bridge to the left of the plan.
What do you think? Any comments/criticism/questions will be greatly appreciated!
Please excuse the mess in the loft! Eventually I will have this layout somewhere more civilised, most likely on pasting tables or trestles...
Chris M.
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Re: The line to Eckythumpington...
Eee bah gum .......Ah'll bi wetchin' this 'ere thred wi' intrest tha knaws ....it's set reight in mi own backyard .....wots rout tha teckin'? ...is it o'er t' Woodheard else throu' t' 'Ope Valley?f1_mw wrote:G'day all. After years of having a permanent structure in the loft, I decided I'd rather have a portable layout, so set about creating this. Now I have some progress to report, I thought a PL thread was in order.
As the title suggests, the name of the station on my layout is Eckythumpington, for various beer related reasons! The line is going to be modelled around somewhere ficticious in the North of England, between Manchester and Sheffield.........
What do you think? Any comments/criticism/questions will be greatly appreciated!
Kind Regards
Terry [South Yorks, aka "The heart of Eckythumpland"]
Edit ......a translation can be provided for the benefit of anyone who does'nt understand the "broad Yorkshire" accent
I know it's the fastest .....but why did they have to name it after a duck?
Chris, this looks great - and I'm very impressed with your carpentry. That baseboard looks solid! Just my opinion but I'd stay away from trestles. With something that size the weight of the board ought to be distributed as evenly as possible, either on its own legs or on another table.
It's inspired me to make a slow start on my new baseboard this spring. At the moment I'm finishing off a couple of diorama-style layouts but want something better planned. No whippets or ferrets though!
Tim.
It's inspired me to make a slow start on my new baseboard this spring. At the moment I'm finishing off a couple of diorama-style layouts but want something better planned. No whippets or ferrets though!
Tim.
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Re: The line to Eckythumpington...
Understood - even though it's a "Furrin langwidge" !!TerryB wrote: Eee bah gum .......Ah'll bi wetchin' this 'ere thred wi' intrest tha knaws ....it's set reight in mi own backyard .....wots rout tha teckin'? ...is it o'er t' Woodheard else throu' t' 'Ope Valley?
Kind Regards
Terry [South Yorks, aka "The heart of Eckythumpland"]
Edit ......a translation can be provided for the benefit of anyone who does'nt understand the "broad Yorkshire" accent
Dennis
I know nothing, but much I believe
Thank you, so am I! Didn't know I had it in me...Rector wrote:Chris, this looks great - and I'm very impressed with your carpentry. That baseboard looks solid! Just my opinion but I'd stay away from trestles. With something that size the weight of the board ought to be distributed as evenly as possible, either on its own legs or on another table.
I take your point about trestles, so may end up making a table! Will keep it where it is on the bench in the loft for the forseeable future though.
Thanks for the comments guys.
As a little bit of a non-update, I have started cutting the cork tiles to use as underlay. I have also decided to use a standard Hornby diamond crossing instead of a single slip, and have an extra points crossover before the junction to enable the necessary operations. I am also toying with the idea of ditching the raised town and doing a countryside layout, but I can keep that in my imagination until the track is laid!
Chris M.
I've spent 2.5 hours this evening building the free shelter from ScaleScenes.com ... I've not modelled in years, so took me a while to get back into it, but SS models are great
I couldn't get any 2mm card - all I managed was 170gsm, so I layered up 6 sheets to get the correct thickness! A bit of a bodge, but it looks great Mine are just printed out on normal 80gsm paper on a colour laser printer at work - I think it looks fine.
I couldn't get any 2mm card - all I managed was 170gsm, so I layered up 6 sheets to get the correct thickness! A bit of a bodge, but it looks great Mine are just printed out on normal 80gsm paper on a colour laser printer at work - I think it looks fine.
Chris M.
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Now then F1 i think the idea is good but looking at the size & space of your baseboards i think you can do so much more with it if your having a cassette fiddler you could have a nice station say 4 platforms & a decent depot servicing area if your using dmus you could easily build a station like buxton with a depot sidings & station. its only my perspective that & probably no use to you what so ever but i think you can use the space so much better.
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