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Rebuilding the "ultimate" fiddle yard
Last year I adapted the fiddle yard for Hexworthy to suit its new location, but that has limited capacity and is only intended for home use. You may remember the sliding and rotating fiddle yard built...
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The "Ultimate" fiddle yard - Latching mechanism
The next job in the fiddle yard rebuild was to create a latching mechanism that aligns the traverser tracks to the entry track, and provides power to the aligned track. This uses the same sprung notch...
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The "Ultimate" fiddle yard - refinements and finishing
So, here's where I think the problem is. With the sector plate of the home fiddle yard (left-hand diagram) the latch arm is pivoted in line with the movement of the pin, so it's movement is...
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Ashover carriages
Hexworthy will need some passenger stock, so I have collected a few of the Meridian kits for the Ashover Light Railway carriages. Bachmann are soon to release a ready-to-run model so I need to get on...
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Linda
Waaay back in 1993 I remember attending the Festiniog "Hunslet Hundred" celebrations as a teenager. The elegant lines of the Penrhyn "Ladies" made an impression on me, especially Linda. When Bachmann...
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Uckfield 2023
Yesterday I was at the Uckfield model railway exhibition helping Robin Edwards with his O14 layout Tony's Forest. I've seen this superb layout a couple of times and it was a pleasure to operate. As the...
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Ashover coaches part 2: adding a brake
Work has continued on the build of the Ashover coach kits. There are now five...A couple of the kits came from a friend at the Sussex Downs group who was having a clear out, but with them was a...
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Ashover coaches part 3: Details and roofs
The instructions don't mention handrails but pictures of the coaches show them prominently, and with the steps for low platforms they are an obvious requirement. I realised that staples were slightly...
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Shades of green
The Ashover coaches got primed today. Not much to share from that, but the next question is what livery to paint them? My usual livery is a light green, sometimes with white upper panels, sometimes...
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Brighton show 2023
Yesterday I visited the Brighton show, a small club show in a community centre. Small as I think there were only six layouts excluding the "vintage" Triang (which I do), strangely layouts seemed to be...
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Ashover coaches Part 5 - Painting
Having decided on the colour - the Tamyia deep green with white window surround - it was time to start painting the coaches. I'd primed them in white, but the areas to be white were painted an...
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Life for Hexworthy
The work seen in this post has happened over several months. I was actually painting figures back in the summer, it's a task that takes time and was spread out over a few weeks of occasional evenings,...
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New coaches and people
Christmas has brought a couple of new coaches...A Festiniog Railway "bug box" and a freelance Glyn Valley style brake van. There were a few other model railway related presents with some scenic items...
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Ashover coaches Part 6 - completion
In the last update the Ashover coaches had been painted. I applied a brown enamel wash sparingly to the bogies, underframes and steps, and in places allowed this to wick up into the match-boarding...
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Making Tracks III - Milton Keynes
Over the Christmas break I visited family, and just down the road at Blakemere Village (a collection of craft shops and other attractions) Pete Waterman's "Making Tracks 3" model of Milton Keynes was...
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Readying ready to run
I've a lot of small tasks ongoing in parallel at the moment, mostly preparing stock for Hexworthy in preparation for its first exhibition next month. The first to be finished was a small but important...
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Hexworthy dry-run
Ahead of its first exhibition next month I thought I should do a dry-run of setting up the layout in its exhibition format. You may remember the exhibition fiddle-yard, which was fitted to the layout...
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Car unwash
I've acquired a couple of road vehicles for Hexworthy, a ubiquitous Transit van and a Land Rover Defender. Both are nicely detailed models by Oxford Diecast, with interiors, UK number plates, and...
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Hexworthy prepares for its first show
Hexworthy will be on show at the Wealden Railway Group exhibition in Steyning in 10 days time. Do say hello if you are able to get there. I've been working hard to get the layout ready for this it's...
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Readying ready to run - Part 2
I've collected several ready-to-run locos since they have started to become available in 009 and Hexworthy is an ideal place to run them. However, as with the Peco coaches, there is something about a...
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Readying ready to run - part 3
It was time to bite the bullet, take a brave pill, and weather a whole batch of not exactly cheap Bachmann ready to run locos. The techniques are the same as described in the last post - water soluble...
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Wealden Railway Group Show 2024
Of course this was the first time I'd loaded Hexworthy into the car, and indeed I'd changed cars since I started building it back in 2017, so I was glad it fitted - it was a bit tight! The exhibition...
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Hexworthy last-minute show prep
I had promised an update on the last-minute jobs ahead of Sunday's show, these weren't critical but make life easier when exhibiting. I had discovered during testing that the arc of the "gates" at the...
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More life for Hexworthy
I mentioned that I'd been adding more details to Hexworthy as one of the multiple tasks I was working on ahead of its first show last weekend, but I'd not managed to keep on top of blogging. As well as...
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Alexandra Palace - London Festival of Railway Modelling, 2024
Last weekend I helped my friend Martin Collins exhibit his layout Llandecwyn at Alexandra Palace. The layout depicts a Welsh narrow gauge slate railway terminus and port, Martin displays a history...
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