Garden railway in 16mm: Wilmington Light Railway

[Greengiant]

To give me something to do over the winter months, I made a start on the buildings, the first up being the engine shed, so I made a rough mock up to judge size and positioning.



Then on the computer drew up some full scale (16mm) drawings.



Using these computer drawings, I dug out my old drawing tools from my art college and early paste-up days and set to work drawing the building out on PVC Foamex, this being a new material to me and inspired by the work of Nikki Wilkes, thought I would give it a go. I used a print out of brick courses taped at the top of the drawing board as a measurement guide when marking out the Foamex.





This I embossed and cut with a selection of tools.







Until eventually I had effectively a building kit of parts.



Assembly went quite smoothly and soon took up a lot of space on the workbench.



In my research I came across this superglue used in the double glazing trade, comes in a decent sized bottle and is very powerful, I tried a test piece first and the Foamex broke and not the glue joint.



Martin

 

[Greengiant]

I made a roof with trusses which is a very snug fit into the building and hoping this will hold in place when it gets windy in the garden, if not, I will find some way of fixing in it place.



The roof was covered in nearly 800 slates, hand cut and chipped or broken where required.



A set of steps for the pedestrian side door was also made, sanding the flag stones to simulate years of wear.



Now in position by the doorway. The first step does look high at the moment, but when on the railway the building is effectively 'planted' in gravel, so the building has 15mm extra added to the wall bottoms to cater for this.



As the build progressed, I felt the end of the shed lacked interest, so a driver and fireman rest was added.



Ridge tiles and end boards have been put on the roof.



Next I need to start getting some paint applied.

Martin