Bahnland Bayern - December Update

Some more progress to update on the Bavarian HO layout; the overhead catenary (by Viessmann) has been installed over the rive bridge and towards the eastern end on the first large scenic board. The campsite at the 'country' end of the layout is largely complete, just some hedging to fit between the caravan pitches. I've now begun the main Bavarian riverside tavern, on the eastern bank of the river. I'm also planning a small loco fuelling point to the rear of where the two electric locos are stabled to the rear of the second photo.

European Specialist Material - Part 1

Hi there, long time no blog. What with rebuilding the superstructure of the BR layout Widnes Road with the gratefully received assistance of Andy (peg-leg) and Wayne, and the a third and final re-think of the baseboards of the 'great European project' I've not found much time to get out into the real world and do much photography, nor has the progress on my three layouts been interesting enough to photograph being mainly confined to extensive gnawing of large piles of wood into lots of sawdust and smaller pieces of wood.

Having now finished the new legs and baseboard connections and tried the new arrangement out at the recent Watford show, I have been able to do other things. The first of these was a long weekend, Friday to Monday night in the Bremen and Hamburg area with some reprobates from the UK, including Peter, Tom and Colin, and joining up out there with Andy (Ginge).

Monsoon at Bremen Hbf 17th May 2013

Despite the best efforts of a monsoon on arrival to dampen the enthusiasm, a great three and a half days was had, and many updates are to follow as I work my way through the 1,350 photos that were fired off.

There was also time for a quick visit to Roland-modellbahnstudio (which was rather longer than anticipated due to the shop having moved about two miles nearer town). Note to self, check address before heading off into rain to find railway shop, don't rely on Tom having been there five years ago...sorry Tom ;) So there are some new Hobbytrain Doppelstockwagens and a digital Roco 101 to give test run to when I get home.

DBAG BR 218 339-0 on a top-and-tailed DB Regio service at Hamburg Hbf

A few sneak previews of some of what was seen and bashed follows, much more to follow on here and on my Flickr page.

SBB Cargo 421 389-8 @ Bremen Hbf 18/5/13

RBH 102 (143 069-3) & RBH 102 143 150-4 @ Bremen Hbf 18/5/13

Wiener Lokalbahnen Cargo Siemens Taurus 1216 953 @ Bremen Hbf 18/5/13

Metronom ME 146-08 @ Bremen Hbf on a Hamburg Hbf turn 18th May 2013

Dispolok Siemens ER 20-001 at Niebull Bf 19/5/13 on a NOB service to Hamburg Altona from Westerland

A quartet of new Voith Gravita 10 BB Diesels at Itzehoe Stabling point inc. 261 099-6, 261 037-6 and 261 077-2

DB Rabbits with 218 366-3 leading passing NOB Siemens Mak DE 2700-10 at Niebull Bhf

Back from a rail trip round Germany and Belgium

I've posted another few highlights from a week long trip round Germany and Belgium, taking in Munich, Nuremberg, Berlin, Cologne, Brussels and Charleroi, and there is a link to my flickr site with far more for those who are interested here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/widnes_road/

Widnes Road - A short picture update and Exhibition Dates

Photos courtesy of Tim Reynolds (Cambridge MRC)

Widnes Road - Exhibition Dates - Autumn 2011

10 & 11 September - Worthing MRC Durrington High School, The Boulevard, Worthing, West Sussex

1st & 2nd October - Folkestone MRC Leas Cliff Hall, Folkestone

5th & 6th November - Alsager Railway Association, Crewe Alsager - Civic Centre, Stoke

19th & 20th November - Warley National Model Railway Exhibition - NEC, Birmingham

After attending three exhibitions in the early Spring, both Widnes Road and its operators are taking a break from the circuit for a five month period. The next dates are given above, a fairly intense set of two day shows, also getting to parts of the country where we can meet new faces, and also get to see layouts that never make it to the depths of Essex and Kent, our usual 'patch'.

The next five months will be a phase of fairly intense work on the layout, as the final stage on converting Widnes Road from a simple fiddle yard to depot layout as originally built six years ago into a full end-to-end railway capable of running through trains takes place.

This has partly come about from the explosion of excellent 'depot' layouts over the last few years, and partly because after more than 20 exhibitions in its current form, I need to keep things interesting both for me and the layouts operators and audience.

The first stage of the works has already taken place, the existing 5-road traverser has been completely rebuilt, now measuring 5'5" in length, the maximum that will fit across the inside of a Transit van. Once the second fiddle yard is finished, this will allow reasonably long rakes of stock to pass through the scenic section of Widnes Road, adding visual interest between the usual loco moves and shunting of the yard.

As well as being dictated by the width of a Transit, I'm keen to run the occasional through parcels rake, or perhaps a diverted inter-regional passenger as well as the ubiquitous DMU, so the fiddle yard is capable of accommodating a Class 45 Peak and 5 of Bachmann's MkII's or a similar number of GUVs.

The next focus is getting the pointwork built for the third and final scenic board in time for testing in the summer, and being complete with scenery by Warley at the end of November.

New Film Scanner = Nostalgia Time...

I've just treated myself to a new high-definition film scanner, as I really needed to get round to digitising my pre-2000 railway images. It just makes it easier to search for a particular shot or subject if they are all in one electronic filling system. Its a daunting task though; some 15 years of photography before I purchased my first digital camera in 2000. Considering in the last 10 years I've taken something like 15,000 photos, there are a fair few to scan from the previous years.

Here is a sample of the first two rolls of films I've scanned; from July 1989. the first two are taken at Carlisle on 3rd July, the second pair at Glasgow Queen Street later that week.

The final shot is from a random selection taken early in 1990, just outside Old Oak Common. I have no idea what each film contains until I  see the scanner preview. I'm wallowing in nostalgia...

The start of spring = large scale models outdoors

Spring is in the air, and that means the chance to get outdoors to have fun with the larger scales. The plan for this Spring is to complete an outer loop of G-scale track outside the existing O-Gauge inner loop. I've placed an order for 24 metres of Accucraft flexitrack from the excellent Kent Garden Railways, to suppliment the 8 metres I've been using as a test track.

Hopefully that should arrive in the next week or so and the Class 66 Malcolm and I picked up for a bargain £140 in the Autumn can finally stretch its legs.

Newly arrived today is one of the Bachmann / Aristocraft twin intermodal wagon sets, which makes for an impressive model. Another three or so will make up a very nice rake. The Epping Larger Scale Modellers have also acquired a few second hand wagons to convert into beer wagons. These will be insprired by the ones I saw at a Brno pub last summer. Called Vytopna this friendly pub and restaurant was a rail enthusiasts paradise, but also seemed to attract a surprisingly broad mix of people.

'Trainspo' - Peer Reviewed Railway Photos

In an effort to fill the void in my life (well bored tea-break shaped void anyway) that has been left by the demise of Fotopic, I've been dabbling in other photo hosting websites, including various groups on Flickr. It was through this that I came across Trainspo.com which seemed to have a far higher standard of photography that simply hundreds of similar shots dumped to an enormous folder online. Their mission statement of sorts is:
"we would like for you to only upload high quality photos. It is better to upload just a few, yet high-quality, photos than a lot of mediocre ones."

Which I think is a laudable aim. to help enforce this, upload slots are restricted to a maximum of 5, and are only renewed if photos are considered by peer review to be of a sufficient interest and quality.

I hope I've managed to upload some interesting shots, and they are located here: http://trainspo.com/Widnes.Road/gallery/ The best part was having to carefully sift through the last ten years or so of photos to pick ones I felt were interesting or of use to modellers rather than dumping 100+ images at a go online.

As for a replacement for fotopic's incredible usefulness when looking for a particular detail shot for railway modelling, it's not perfect. I'm still looking for something as infinitely searchable for such delights as different headcode / disc combos on early 80's Class 40's and other delights...

My favourite shot I've uploaded to trainspo so far is the one below, not because it is particularly well shot, the lighting on the loco front is unfortunately out, but because of the setting and memory of watching kilometre long coal trains snaking through the Australian countryside. Fantastic.

The demise of fotopic... a chance to reflect

As has been sporadically picked up on various railway blogs over the last week or two, the photo-sharing website fotopic has ceased to be. Having gone through various death throws over the last year or so it would appear to have finally expired at the start of March.

This is a pain for a number of reasons; not least of which is the sheer efffort required to move everything to another image hosting website, not to mention the loss of the ability to search millions of railway images for a particular detail shot for model railway projects.

However it does mean now that I have started a flickr site, Widnes Road Flickr Site I will be far more selective on what I upload, due to a 300Mb / month limit. This does have the advantage of making me thing rather more carefully about which images I want to put online, and not simply batch load 300 at a time, half of which are just a slightly different angle or zoom. Less is, as they say, more. Todays selection is Hungarian Railways (MAV) V43 class electric V43 1108 taken at Budapest station on 3rd August 2010.

A short trip to Cornwall

A quick picture update

OMWB - New Bachmann / Rail Exclusive Class 03's

Happily running in on the excellent DCC Concepts Rolling Road are the latest arrivals for Widnes Road; a pair of the new Bachmann Class 03 Shunters - No. 03371 & 03160. Both models are a limited edition run of 500 commissioned by the erstwhile Rail Express Modeller magazine but now being delivered by the separate company 'Rail Exclusive'.

First impressions are that this is a much needed model to fill a big gap in the BR Blue Era modellers stable. Detail differences are faithfully captured and they will make good weathering projects when I have a little more time and after my modelling room has been rebuilt after the flood from earlier in the year as at present I'm limited to a test track on the dinner table. They need a good run-in before a straightforward conversion to DCC using a 6-pin direct Lenz Silver decoder in each loco.

DB ICE at London St Pancras International

In what I truly hope is a first taste of great things to come, Deutsche Bahn in a superb piece of publicity tested a pair of their ICE-3 sets through the Channel Tunnel this week, including evacuation tests to demonstrate the potential for additional services from London to Europe culminating in the display of one of the ICE-3 sets, suitably vinyled with Union Jack ICE logos and displaying ICE service No. 9970 to Frankfurt (M) Hbf via Koln and Rotterdam at London's St. Pancras International station today, the 19th October.