fungus

You've done well then. My 53810 couldn't manage more than 4 coaches on the 1 in 50. There's plenty of power, but not enough traction from the wheels, and they start to slip. The bachmann 9Fs are ok with 10 or 11, and my oldest Ivatt 2-6-2T 8 or 9, but for most of the 6- and 8-coupled Bachmanns it's 5 or 6.

Agreed, it's a lovely model. It doesn't perform as well on a 1 in 50 gradient as the prototype did though. I think Bachmann have shinier (therefore less gripppy) treads on their wheels than they used to. My 10 year old 412xx tank pulls almost twice the load of my newer one, and almost twice the load of my 7F. An interesting subject for research, perhaps?

The ideal model railway! Lots of space, scenery, long trains, an enormous selection of stock beautifully weathered, and fresh air too! How I would love to spend a day playing there!

Still unannounced as yet I'm afraid Mick. When I have some worthwhile progress, I'll start reporting on the blog. All I'll say at the moment is that it's a fairly compact end-to-end layout, more scenery than track, and based on an area of north Somerset where in my younger days I spent many weekends underground or holding a pint mug, both of which activities will be celebrated in the layout.

Welcome, Paul. I look forward to seeing the pictures!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LNER_Class_A4_4464_Bittern

Only once a day on summer Wednesdays! The rest of the time, it's mainly South West Trains EMUs, one every few minutes.

It's a Bachmann model of a Great Western 0-6-0 goods engine designed by Collett in the 1940s. I described it as a toybox wreck because, although it is quite an accurate model, it had clearly been knocked about as it would if it was thrown in a toybox after use. The model probably dates from between 2008 and 2010, so it's not very old. I knew the real engines when I lived in Somerset as a teenager. The branch line between Highbridge and Evercreech Junction used them in the early 1960s. Many lines were closing and local freight traffic was reducing, so many of these engines were being scrapped. If they were in working condition, they would be sent to a line like ours, and be used until they needed maintenance, when they would be sent for scrapping and be replaced by another. Hence the lack of cleaning, reflected in my model!

Traingeekboy: The engine was a toybox wreck bought on ebay. I cleaned off the food residue and replaced some broken details, than spent an hour dry-brushing with a magic mixture of paints to get the effect I wanted. No snow here yet, still 15 degrees and I haven't assembled my snowplough kit yet! Mick: Thanks for the kind words. I look forward to seeing the result of your work - probably not until the spring now?

"Playing trains" again today, mainly for test and photographic purposes. The figure with a camera on the loco represents me as a teenager, having blagged a ride from Glastonbury to Highbridge. The only non-authentic aspect of the tableau is that in reality I was so terrified by the rolling and lurching of the engine that I held on firmly with both hands and didn't take a single photograph on the footplate!

I also have an interesting "bottom of the garden"!

Hello Iain. I have read your posts and watched your videos, and I am impressed by what you have achieved. I just wish I had found this forum before I started re-inventing the wheel myself!! I particularly like your miniature trees; are they specific small-growing species or will you need to replace them when they get too big?

Thanks guys. I found that section after I had written my introduction, and I'm pleased to see that after some experiments I had settled on a method proven by others. I will try acrylic varnish though (or Klear polish), as it sounds even better than waterproof PVA.

I've used your technique successfully. My preferred method now is to solder the link wires to one end of the track section before laying, and tin the other end. I find his gives a neater result. The job must still be finished after the track has been laid, but pre-tinning makes it easier. Make sure you use a powerful enough iron though; a thermostatically controlled iron is even better. A good resin-cored electrical solder is also important.

I have tried numerous methods of ballasting and the only one showing any sign of surviving the weather is real stone (Peco I believe, but I've had it for years) held with diluted waterproof PVA. Mine has only been down a few months, so I'm pleased to read that others have found this method effective.

For straight track and curves of radius greater than 5ft, I use 30mm gauge to gauge (i.e. the distance between the inner rails plus twice the thickness of a rail head). This is based on an old B.R. guidance document, corrected for 00's narrower-than-scale gauge, and rounded up a couple of mm. It seems to be ok in practice so far. I don't have any main line curves tighter than 5ft radius.

I hope things have improved for you Martin. I have just joined the forum, so to keep the "gradients" thread going I will add my own experience. My railway has a ruling gradient of 1 in 50. This is no problem for Hornby locos with rubber traction tyres, but metal-tyred locos are variable. One of the best is the Bachmann 9F, which will handle 10 average coaches (150g each) on 1 in 50. Less traction weight or fewer driving wheels means fewer coaches. I have devised a loco test rig using a level track on a shelf, a variable set of weights on a cord, and a spreadsheet to do the calculations. It is surprisingly accurate in predicting how many coaches the loco will actually haul up a given gradient.

I have completed phase 1 of the construction of Danes Wood, a 00 garden railway.This comprises about 20ft of double track, 20 ft of single track, a viaduct, a tunnel, and quarry sidings. More details and pictures can be found at http://www.fungusmodels.blogspot.com. The biggest construction problem to date has been to find a way of ballasting that is both weather-resistant and realistic. Any suggestions?