7mm Heybridge Basin

[Richard Gawler]

The portrait of the 3-plk wagon is rather tasty, nice work.

Thanks Graham. The "Stores" wagon was one of my first for 7 mm scale and for some reason I usually reach for it first if I want to try out a new loco or a new bit of track or whatever. It sort of fits the project - a doubtful provenance (="freelance design") and the right "look" for the place and time.

 

[spikey faz]

Hi Richard

I reckon once you've done the ballasting and added a few weeds here and there you'll have got the balance about right.

Mike

 

[Richard Gawler]

I reckon once you've done the ballasting and added a few weeds here and there you'll have got the balance about right.

"Heybridge Basin" hasn't shown up any ghastly problems likely to lead to untimely abandonment, and I want to take it through to a reasonable state of completion. Ballast and weeds will make a big difference, and then I can think about smaller things like the lever frame and an oil lamp.

But first! It is difficult to show an overall balance here, but the whole model does look a lot better if I add an extra 400 mm to the left.


I can use Module B from my first fiddle yard to do this.

This gives me space to include a level crossing with road access to the yard, and one or two more trees along the way to the fiddle yard.

Adding Module B gives me a few possible layouts with different overall lengths, all able to do much the same thing but with an extra wagon if I use the extension for the sea lock. If I am careful, Module B will still be able to fulfill most of its original role as a headshunt in the fiddle yard project too.

Of course, if I had made my sample track 20 mm longer this could be up and running in an hour, but I made the track for a display case and then decided the display looked much better without it . . .

 

[Richard Gawler]

I have managed to resolve a couple of long-term doubts and the model has left the stasis where it has been marooned for the last six weeks.

I have cancelled the Magnorail before starting it. The water can either be the most realistic thing I can manage, or something compromised for Magnorail; and really, if I hadn’t already got a box of Magnorail left over from an abandoned layout I wouldn’t be going out to buy one specially for this. So no moving swans.


Better still, I have started to repaint the rails. I tried so hard to give them a corroded-but-new appearance but they always seemed to jar.


I will be forever grateful to @Quintus for his suggestion to use Humbrol no.29 ‘Earth’. This sits just right for me, half-way between brand new rail and a main line encrusted with brake dust. I have mixed in some White and Leather to give a little variety, because I am trying to model a rural branch line not a steam shed. But the Earth really is a very useful colour.

I have a visitor to the railway later today. He has 70 years in 0 gauge against my three and a bit, so I’ll wait for the critique before continuing

 

[John57sharp]

I don't have any seniority to claim, but that track looks great to me Richard.

John

 

[Richard Gawler]

I actually painted the rails under artificial light, but I had done some test pieces in daylight so I knew what the colours were going to look like. I saw it all in daylight this morning, which prompted my last post. I am happy again with how things are going.

Anyway - the main comments today were, it is amazing how much can be fitted into a small space; and attention to detail is paramount on a small layout.

Some gulls and ducks would be good, swans would be doubtful (I didn’t mention the Magnorail!)

For the next modular layout, some semi-detached houses along the back. Individual semis to connect together, this would solve the problem of having to make a new backscene board for each permutation of modules

 

[Richard Gawler]

This sits just right for me, half-way between brand new rail and a main line encrusted with brake dust.

I don't want to mislead anyone with my track painting. I got the layout into the kitchen this morning, where there is much more daylight.


This is a long exposure in bright cloudy daylight, with much care for the white balance. This is closer to the colours I have painted.

The daylight seems to emphasise Peco's moulded wood grain more than I would really like, but the spikes look okay to me. The camera never lies, it just distorts the truth.