Widnes Road - New Arrivals

With a matter of weeks until the exhibition season begins again, time for a few photographs of some new arrivals on Widnes Road. Firstly a kit built Leyland Roadtrain Tanker, painted to represent the late 1980's and early 1990's ICI Chlor-Chemicals livery. The transfers are from Fox, the lettering being adapted from their 'Rail Alphabet' series. Its not perfect but a reasonable approximation of the real thing.

The next arrival is a new Bachmann Class 85, fitted with Kadee couplers, the first of two for Widnes Road. I hope to have at least one blue class 86 ready as well. The 85 is posed next to the other element of the layout I've been working on, namely lineside equipment and signalling. I have added new colour light signals, and numerous signal telecoms cabinets of various sizes and shapes as well as ducting and point heaters etc.

Bavarian and Austrian Travels

A selection of photos taken between 30/5/12 and 10/6/12 in and around Munich and Salzburg. Further pictures from this trip can be seen on my Flickr page: Widnes Road

Spring has arrived - Time for garden railways

We have been blessed with fantastic weather this week; and what better excuse to get out into the garden and try out the new 7mm stock that has arrived since last autumn.

First up is a test run for the RJH/PWP Class 37/4 (37 421) that recently returned from being finished by Aardstorm models. www.aardstorm-models.com/ On its first run out it performed very well, 10 airbraked wagons being dispatched with ease.

The second new arrival is 08 100 which was acquired from the Gauge O Guild stand at the recent Basingstoke show. A Bachmann Brassworks loco, finished by Tower models, it also put in a superb performance.

For comparison purposes, I lined up the brass 37/4 against  the Heljan 37/0, surprisingly there is a significant size difference, the Danish machine being around 1 1/2 cm longer.

With some more coaches arriving next week I'm hoping the weather holds out to enable another running session next weekend.

Where to see Widnes Road in 2012

Somewhat belatedly, as I have already taken Widnes Road to the Canterbury model railway show in January; here is the brief list of exhibitions that I am attending with Widnes Road this year:

10/11th March         Basingstoke & North Hants MRC - Aldworth Science College, Basingstoke

13/14th October      Croydon Model Railway Exhibition - John Rusking College, Selsdon

24/25th November  Shoeburyness Model Railway Exhibition - Southend Leisure Centre 

Also to look forward to sometime later this year; Widnes Road will be appearing in Model Rail Magazine. The photo above was taken when Chris Nevard popped round in January to do the photoshoot. I've seen the finished results and they are fantastic. 

O Gauge Class 37 - Finishing by Aardstorm Models

Many years ago (probably well over twenty years in fact) I purchased a Post-War Prototype (PWP) O gauge class 37 kit. This represented was a pretty steep learning curve for a 17 year old who at the time had been used to detailing Lima class 47's, but I wanted an O Gauge 37 to run on the layout at the model railway club I was then a member of, and there were no other options available at the time. I had actually built 90% of the loco by around 1992 (three years later) but by then I lost interest in 7mm as I was no longer a member of a club with a 7mm layout, and had no layout to run it on. It was then out back in the box until I could get round to finishing it. 

Twenty years later, I now have a O-gauge garden railway, so I thought I would see what needed doing to finish this part built kit off. The problem I have is that my modelling standards have (slightly) improved in the intervening two decades; I couldn't face undoing work I had already done, and have many other newer kits to distract me. So... I decided to send the lot off to Aardstorm Models www.aardstorm-models.com/ and see what Trevor could do with it. The answer is, he can work miracles, as these photos will attest to, 37 421 is now ready for action in the garden as soon as it stops raining, now I just need to finish the rake of 1980's airbraked speedlink wagons to run behind it.

Widnes Road goes to Warley 2011

Widnes Road (and Malcolm and I) have returned from a fab weekend away at Warley 2011, with some great memories, a much lighter wallet and some top purchases. A new performer on the layout over the weekend was 40002, which was purchased as the show opened on the Saturday morning, and promptly fitted with a Howes sound decoder and DCC supplies rectangular speaker.  It then proceeded to perform faultlessly all weekend.

One of the best aspects, from an operators perspective about this show, is as the photo below testifies to, the ability to drive the hire van right into the hall, which saves about an hour of lugging layout panels about. Very civilised.


The other great aspect was being able to see up close before the show opened some of the best layouts in the UK. My personal favourites, that the photos do not do justice to were 'Diesels in the Duchy' and Mike Anson's 'Western Road'. Two of the finest D&E era layouts on the circuit. The curry and beers with Mike and Andy from Western Road was the icing on the cake of a top weekend away.

Widnes Road on YouTube

Widnes Road - YouTube

I have to express my gratitude to Hawkingetippyd who has posted a superbly shot video of Widnes Road on YouTube filmed at the Folkestone show last month. I particularly like the long shot of the 45 approaching the camera at 6:35 which captures the feel of the layout in action better than any photo I have managed to take.

Alsager Railway Exhibition

Last weekend Widnes Road had its last outing before the Warley MRC National Railway Exhibition at the NEC in two weeks. A nice medium sized show that was very well attended. My favourite layout was the outstanding Rowlands Castle set just before D-day.

One advantage of the relatively poor light within the Alsager Civic Hall was the opportunity to use the model lighting on Widnes Road to take some dusk shots of the depot area.

A Bavarian Break

A half term break to Bavaria and good fortune with getting some late October sunshine produced some good photographic opportunities in and around Nuremberg and Munich this week. My third visit to the area this year and I'll definitely be back next year, with such a variety of traction, and great locations it's rapidly becoming my favourite railway destination.