Hi everyone, Digging through my old photos, and I came across these of the very first layout I ever built. I built it in a weekend in an old boxfile I had layout around, out of whatever materials I had around at the time, essentially from scraps. Not the best work I've ever done, but it's a nice glimpse into the past - I think I've come a long way since this.
Hi Dan, Looks very well constructed for a small layout especially the brick work very impressed. Regards, Gloria.
Thanks This was passed on to a friend several years ago when I moved out of British N gauge as he had a collection of stock but no layout to run them on. Not sure if he still has it. Mainly I built it to develop skills and learn the basics on how to build a layout. Boxfiles are great for this - an excellent way to learn techniques in a way that doesn't cost a fortune if you make mistakes. I've learned the hard way that making mistakes on a project that causes issues in a key location will sap your will and drive to continue with it. As a perfect example, I decided to expand a layout by replacing a sector plate with a three way point - but because of how I'd spaced the track, no commercially available point would work in the space, so I had to build my own - only I'd never built my own track before, and I right royally buggered it up. Unfortunately it was right in the middle of the layout and all trains routed through it, so it made the layout unworkable. As such, that layout ended up getting scrapped. But you live and learn, right?
Andy, the grass is just hanging basket liner trimmed down to a useful length, a lot of the non-grass looking stuff picked out of it, and then cut to shape and stuck down. I don't tend to use it anymore as there's a lot better out there (though much more expensive), however as a cheap and effective solution, it's great.