The Railway has a home!

The shed is finished at last!

The rest of the cladding was added over the course of several weekends as the enthusiasm and wallet dictated.

After 3 coats of cheap emulsion and a days wiring by my neighbour who is qualified in these things, a roll end of vinyl flooring has completed the process this morning.

I am now running out of excuses not to start the layout itself!

Every railway needs a home!!

It has been a very long time I haven't been totally idle but the summer intervened as usual.

The Riber Valley nearly has a home. My birthday present this year was a heavy duty 12' by 8' workshop shed which is now esconced at the bottom of the garden.

I have insulated with thermowrap which is the foil / bubblewrap stuff. Not necessarily the cheapest but dead easy to do.

The two biggest lining boards are nailed onto the ceiling with the rest of the panelling underway in 6mm ply. A couple of piccies below and more to follow shortly.

Simon

The Dairy - A second source of revenue

The primary source of revenue for the Riber Valley Railway is the coal mine, however I had always fancied using a transporter wagon a la Leek & Manifold so I decided to build a dairy with a railway siding to load standard gauge bulk milk tankers for London, these would be carried on said transporter wagon.

So I bought a Lilliput "Rollwagen" and the Hornby 6 wheel tanker seen below as they came out of the box paired with Riber

Some time ago I had bought a Pola kit which I thought might come in handy for a bit of bashing so it formed the basis for the dairy

The first stage was to paint the kit and then assemble the basic structure

I added an extra sliding door to the side. then needed a loading dock to the side the cover of which started life as part of the Wills Platform canopy. On the other side I have adapted the Dapol / Airfix platform canopy to provide a covered tanker loading area. So seen below is the finished article which I think works pretty well

Thats the last building before I start layout construction......I think!

Back in Action!

OK it's been a long time. That does not mean that I have not been active, although summer and the family have tended to get in the way.


After the station I went back to Rolling stock and built three carriages based on the well known Ratio GWR coach sides. These were a brake first and two semi open thirds, using Tomix container flats for the chassis'.

The roofs were made from the stanley carpet protector, which is ready curved but being PVC isn't the easiest stuff to deal with.

The outcome is below:

After the coaches it was time for the first steamer which was a Chivers "Russell" which i have named "Dove" This engine will ultimately have a twin sister called "Derwent"

Finally Santa Brought me a Paul Windle Masterpiece in the form of his new Yorkshire Engine Comapny 0-6-0 seen here carrying the name Riber with "Dove"

General Update

OK. I will admit defeat with Seafoam for this year. Not really sure why but they all got to about 2cm then that was it turned red and zippo!

Never mind will try again next year.

On a brighter note I have completed a kit bash on a 30 year old Pola Kwik Western station into something more English as a terminus and headquarters for the Riber Valley Railway.
The first pictures are as it was held together by Blutak as a demo and then pictures of the completed article with roofs & gutters from Wills Kits

Growing Own Update

Not sure what is going on now, but thought it worthy of an update. The planted out seedlings either turned red or died away. Not very promising!. I then put the remainder outside in the sunshine still in their seed tray and these too turned red. Some are showing new growth from the bottom in green.
I did read somwhere that not a lot happens until they are nearly ready to flower then they grow rapidly. So I am not yet sure whether I have a disaster on my hands or not!!

Growing Your Own - Potting up

Just a quick "sea foam" update. Six weeks after planting I potted up some of the seedlings this weekend. They are still too many in each pot but it allows for a few fatalities and they will be thinned later. Currently in the shade for a few days whilst they recover before they go out into the sunshine. Couple of pictures below: