Introduction to my railway

Era is mainly BR steam and green diesels, with some time travelling trains I could not resist, be it a Stephensons Rocket, Swallow livery HSTs or a Virgin SuperVoyager, of course named "Dr Who", the Dr finally got the (can't remember the name of it device) fixed. (Chameleon circuit says Andy_Sollis, thanks)

The focus of my OO railway is a marshalling yard with supporting facilities connected to the national network, nominally on the east coast roughly around Peterborough because that sort of fits in with the freight traffic I run. Ironically my preferred line is the Midland region with Stanier locomotives, however the geographical location has been fictionally moved to the east with most of the local locos working the branches being J94s and J39s.

The marshalling yard connects to two branches which have various industrial and dockside rail interfaces and the layout is built for both watching the trains go by and end-to-end operation. Because there is never enough space it is on 3 levels with inclines to tax the locos.

My railway is a mix of vintage from late 40's Trix, through Dublo, Liliput-Trix, Triang, Triang-Hornby and current, modified wheelsets and hard wired DCC decoders where appropriate to run on Peco Code 100.

Scenic items, railway and civil appear from Wardie, Crescent, Dublo, Triang Arkitex, Merit mixing with current finescale offerings.

Weathering is generally light weight and will be applied across more of the scenery when I have got all the buildings put up.

Design has made extensive use of AnyRail which I thoroughly recommend with the caveat I have not tried any others which may be better.

Not a railway for rivet counters, just one I mix whatever age of stock together detail wise, from an open wagon with TTR written on the end to the occasional wallet pummelling weathered goodie from TMC.

However I try and keep the rolling stock and loco combinations as prototypical as I can, passenger trains are dynamic background scenery passing by, or rather getting in the way of freight movements.

I only show images from places an enthusiastic rail employee could stand with his camera, be it on ground level, roof top, up a tree or embankment, I'm not into aerial shots. So images will be posted in the appropriate forums.

For a first view which sums up my tastes, a northbound grubby Q6 Raven pulling some equally filthy ICI hoppers around the southern end of the marshalling yard contrasting with colours of my preferred season of spring.

 

Hi Mark, I have too many diesels from early black, a few prototypes, and green of differing shades, the only blue diesels are a Triang Pullman, and a Deltic DP1, even my HSTs are swallow livery, to me the best ever on the early HSTs and is free of blue and "arrows of indecision".

So apart from blue they will appear working or just snoozing in the yards along with the kettles.

 

Hi Keith, I don't ever expect to finish mine, just develop it in iterations, track done and operational, scenic landscaping virtually done, populating with man-made structures underway, then there is another pass detailing and weathering, then ....

Trouble is there are interruptions to play and drink coffee, Jim

 

Thanks