Brockbank mainly Southern

[Ken Shabby]

After 5 years and much indecision the layout now has a name, Brockbank. The name is taken from the motoring cartoonist Russell Brockbank,
I was a huge fan of his cartoons when I was a lad.
Since the last update I have been working on the scenery at the other end of the layout. as always these's still a lot of tidying to do and I've just noticed the front wheel of the Terrier are derailed.

This low relief house overlooks the good yard, It's made from the back half of a Superquick shop with various bits out of the scrap box added. The cars are all old diecast models from the 60's. I also use modern Oxford diecast models and try not to park them next to each other.

Finally another view of the layout showing the road bridge , the other side of which is the fiddle yard. It can't be seen in this shot, but I've modelled a small section of the embankment on the other side of the bridge. This can be seem when you look under the bridge , so that you don't just seen the bare board of the fiddle yard. A lot more scenic work is still required to try and hide the corners of the hardboard back scene

Cheers, Ken

[Ken Shabby]

There's little to report since the last update in November Some of the spot lights in the loft have stopped working and until I can get an electrician to look at them not much can be done up there after about 4pm. The spot lights were put in when the previous owners had the loft converted in the mid 90's and I'm hoping it won't be too expensive to repair replace them.
Trains are still running at least a couple of times a week and the scenery in one corner of the layout in nearly complete except for some tidying up of the ballast. The MLV in the photo had it's first run for about 3 years this afternoon. It seemed a bit hesitant at first but soon settled down.

Ken

[Ken Shabby]

The layout had a big tidy up this afternoon.. The town area over the tunnel was almost completed a few months back, but has been hidden under a plastic dust sheet for ages.
I'm running BR(S) steam this week and so it's 1959 in the town. Most of the buildings are Superquicks which have had a few modifications plus a couple of Bilteezi and Airfix. I resisted the temptation of adding too many cars, the roads where much quieter then.
There's still people, road markings and some street furniture to add.
Ken

[Bigmet]

... I like the "non-uniform" appearance of the street buildings ...

Which is surprisingly difficult to achieve convincingly, but here it is done so well. A totally unplanned road layout from the original ancient village, now overlaid with buildings of varying ages and styles built by the expanding town's inhabitants as best served their purpose at the time, and then adapted as new owners moved in. And the name suits so well, there's multiple possible derivations and the most obvious offer good fits for such as topography, water supply, local wildlife or the original settler; it would require a place name specialist with as many early references as possible to sort that out...

[Ken Shabby]

A couple photos taken this afternoon, next week's job is to tidy up the ballast in the station.
Ken

[Ken Shabby]

I recently made some alterations to one end of the layout, where the line disappears under a road bridge into the fiddle yard. One thing I was unhappy with was the bare board and general bits and pieces in the fiddle yard could be seen If you looked under the bridge.
This couldn't normally be seen but it was annoying If you attempted taking photos at track level..
To get round this I built a 12cm section of embankment
and painted some very simple and basic scenery.

. Not the best photo as my phone is past it's best, but I'm reasonably pleased with the result..
I must get round to straightening those buffers.
Ken

[Chops]

Brockbank is splendid. The manner in which the terrain, both geological and manmade, rise to the edge of the track work as the trains disappear into tunnels is most dramatic. In my feeble way, I hope to steal some of your ideas. The street scenes and the use of roadways are evocative.

[Ken Shabby]

After 7 years of slow but steady progress I recently came close to dismantling Brockbank .
In April I replaced my two H&M Clipper controllers
(one of which I'd owned for 42 years) with a Morley Vector Crawler.
I've been very pleased with the Morley and the last few months have been taken up with running trains most days.
As a result , I've decided to keep the layout in it's present form the foreseeable future.
The most recent work on the layout has been finishing off the half Superquick, half Aifix water tower.
This sat unfinished for over 10 years.
It's 1964 in this picture, check out the tired looking Ford Zephyr.
Ken

[Dad-1]

Hi Ken,

Keep using it !!
I do like the atmosphere of Brockbank.
The white paint man has not been there yet, the 'clean' street tells it all !!

Geoff T.

[Ken Shabby]

I had a long running session this afternoon. For the past couple of weeks I've mainly been running BR blue diesels. A proper layout update will appear early next month.

Ken

[Phred]

Ken Shabby wrote:
A proper layout update will appear early next month.

Looking forward to it!

[Mountain]

Things are looking really nice on your layout.

[Ken Shabby]

Brockbank will shortly be turning the clock back to the fifties, this means the diesels will be going back in their boxes for a while.
Before this happens, and to give the layout a test with an intensive service , I had a diesel gala this afternoon.

Unfortunately I only own about 10 figures, so it was very poorly attended.. Here;s 47853 running round it's train/

Airfix Class 31 31401, which is a very reliable runner and surprisingly quiet.

Recently repainted and built from spares Lima Class 33 33043, has failed. .The brass clip which holds the trailing bogie on came off.
In the foreground is the remaining stub of the private siding which ran under the bridge and up to the asylum.

Lima Class 33105 and 31401 wait in platforms 1&2 , while Triang pretend Class 101 ( a mixed blue and green 3 car set) arrives into Pltform 3, which is the platform for the harbour branch.

47 853 passes newly purchased Lima Class 40 D336, which is waiting for a platform.

A few more photos will follow tomorrow.

Ken

[Peterm]

Some good pic's there, Ken

[Ken Shabby]

More from yesterday's gala.
I wanted to capture the look of a typical diesel gala and this meant not using too many locos, and only using types of locos that have been preserved..
The coaches used were mainly Mk1s, some of them in rather tatty condition just like the real thing.

Taken from the buffer stops.

The Triang 08 shunts the inspection saloon which was probably the most expensive item of stock used in the gala. The 08 was running perfectly, but a while ago I did a chassis swap a Jinty. It will need a service and the flanges turned down to get it running properly again.

Eagle back on to the stock in platform 2. Note the tail load on the DMU.

And finally, 33105 leaving the scenic section and about to enter the fiddle yard.

Ken