Tuesday 1 April 2008

Panic and a slight diversion

Well, after getting hold of baseboard materials and mocking up the planned 4ft x 1 ft I got cold feet.

I have done virtually nothing but armchair modelling for a considerable time, and it all looked a bit daunting full size, so I decided to do a 'sketch' before embarking on the full thing.

I still have not decided on what kind of track to use; the original plan was to use plastic based track for the electrified low-level and plain soldered track for the high level parcels depot. Despite having enough materials in the gloat box I have not built soldered track for a while, and have never used any of the plastic bases. Then there are the other possibilities of chairplate track, Versaline, Bill Blackburn, Fencehouses....

Maybe if I made a little 'shoe-box' type diorama with 3 pieces of track (one for each method of construction) I could get a little experience and make informed decisions. Add an overbridge to disguise the track exit, a short platform with partial canopy and a small parcels office; that almost makes it a layout. A couple of short cassettes and it would be operational.


While this was going on I saw that Tescos had cheap plastic toolboxes on special offer. The inside dimensions of the big box were 17 ins by 6 ins. Decision made, a small easily portable layout on which to try some ideas before getting stuck into the main course.

A visit to Alexandra Palace exhibition and lengthy chat with the guys on the stand gave me inspiration and a huge amount of practical help and advice Many thanks to you all. Progress should be reasonably quick as I have enough re-wheeled Farish and Dapol stock to populate such a layout, and the boards are under way.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Both of your plans look grand. It would be good to see a photo of the starter materials, before you assemble them into a layout!