middle street

Sitting at my computer, wondering where next to place a micro, I realised that one of the shelves on the desk was full of rubbish which could easily find another home and as it sat at eye-level, a safe height from little grasping hands, the destination was decided!

The size of the new layout is 14 x 76 cm. (5.5" x 30") The length of the layout was decided by the length of a sheet of foamcard and was only just 4cm short of the shelf, quite a nice fit.

At first I was tempted to use some 009 stock I’ve been slowly gathering, but really I want something with a bit of a run for these and as a shunting layout seemed fairly inevitable, it seemed like an opportunity to find a home for my newly acquired Bachmann 04, which in BR blue, does not get on too well with my LMS 00 stuff.

The plan is a mini-inglenook, using five wagons on three sidings, holding 2,3 and 2 wagons and a sector plate which holds the shunter and two (small 4 wheel) wagons. operation consists of shuffling cards representing each wagon and shunting to place them all in the determined spots.

Construction is very light and cheap, using mostly foamcard and balsa. I’ve continued in the thrifty vein by using existing spare bits of 00 track and one PECO electrofrog point to build a simple little yard.. I’ve also had a first attempt at building a sector plate and this seems to work quite well. I used some 6mm MDF for this as I felt it needed the rigidity and I didn’t know whether balsa or foamcard would stand up to regular movement in the same way. It pivots on a simple bolt on a sheet of plastic card to aid smooth movement.

Scenically I’ve tried to stick to simple light-weight methods. The cobbled yard uses Metcalfe self adhesive sheets cut to size, the wall is foamcard covered in brickpaper and the road surface is a fine grey sandpaper which actually is a good shade and texture for the job. The little building is a spare HO plastic one.

The sector plate and one point are controlled by rods of stiff wire and the power provided by a battery pack with 4xAA batteries wired up to a DPDT switch for directional control. (Another first for me).

Overall the layout only took a few evenings to get to the stage it’s at. I don't intend to add much more now, but might look at getting a few wagons that are a little more in keeping with the BR blue era, and perhaps add a simple backscene.