Today I sawed my layout in half!
Okay, that was mostly said for shock comic effect, but it's partly true. The scenic 2.1m of the layout consists of two board modules joined together. I bought the modules from Elite baseboards and they are rather solid. After I'd joined them together and fitted the backscene, we managed to carry them upstairs to the railway room. However, now there's a bit of scenery, and the track, they seem really heavy. And that's before I add 3 kilos of ballast.
The original reason for fixing the boards together was because they are straddled by a turnout. Fortunately all the moving parts are safely on one side of the join. So, I separated the boards. This meant sawing the turnout in half, which does appear to have been successful. Sawing the backscene in two was not quite so successful. The kerf (thank you Philip Healey Pearce, I said I'd use it) is about 2mm so I'm going to have to re-read Gordon Gravett's article about concealing baseboard joins in MRJ.
All this hard work is the fault of MRJ. An article in the latest issue about laying grass, says you should do it under the lighting the layout will normally receive, or it will look wrong. so I thought I'd install the lighting ( a 1.5m fluorescent) . Which meant fitting the legs, which meant lifting the board...
Elsewhere, the setts in the gutters, and the kerbstones have been laid. If the weather is like this on Monday, I'll be laying paving slabs. Mike Williams reminded me that the wagon turntable will need capstans. I'm sure MRJ will have devoted a whole issue to these mundane, but vital features, I just haven't found it yet.
In the meantime, if anyone out there knows of any good photos or drawings of capstans, please drop me a line. (Great Eastern preferably, but failing that LNWR, for Mike)