Back on the rails......

Well after the last post which could have seen SCR ripped apart, I have come back to my senses and after a session down the shed I decided to get back into finishing off some scenery along the back wall. These photos are taken where the header photo with the garrat was taken.

It was only a small section but after a few hours later it was nearly complete. In the above photo it was the small section on the right hand side near the to be enclosed bridge pylon support. A new code 75 point had been laid but not yet ballasted, this was also completed.

The things you notice in photos, I notice that the rear left hand porthole has gone missing, hopefully it is still inside the body.

I have included some more photos for my benefit to make me feel better about not abandoning SCR.

There was a box cab on E bay but they wanted $100 and $40 postage. Thanks but no thanks.

Forgive me I am off the Rails...

This post has got very little to do with South Coast Rail but more with the brain spasm I got from the layout room the other day when visitng the shed.
I went into the shed not knowing what project to tackle next (as I always seem to do when I go there). I hardly ever run the layout mainly just build it. Its only when someone wants to come for a run that a loco is sent around to clear the cobwebs from the tunnels and dust off the track. This particular day nothing seemed to be working out OK and this set off the thought juices to maybe something else.
This something else was really 'bad thoughts' something like abandoning all I have done on South Coast Rail, selling the lot off and restarting off with a 6' x 4' board with the ability to actually complete a layout. (Something I've yet to do from over fifty years of modelling). Maybe if I put all the energy into a small area it would be done and finished quicker.
As some of the older members would relate to I started off with Hornby clockwork, moving on to Tri-ang trains. With a slight gap after I had left school I moved on to the Shinohara track with different locos that took my fancy at the time.

Then for a period in time I got into trams and traction modelling for a period. I joined the Sydney Tram Museum, went to Bendigo and Ballarat taking pictures of their systems. This also included trips to Brisbane taking some movie of their last year of trams in 1969?. Traction modelling was started by obtaining a seconds door (the back had a hole in it) and I commenced to get into tramway modelling in a big way. After a few years with this, I felt I had conquered all there was to do modelling a tramway. I had hand laid all the track and installed working overhead as well. You soon get tired of watching the tram do 384 laps in a session and I started looking around for an alternative distraction.
Next on the list (any guesses?) was 009 Narrow gauge modelling utilising EggerBahn and Lilliput models. I think this had the shortest span of attention and in the early 70's N scale was starting to become popular.
So the narrow gauge was sold off and N scale started to replace it. This choice was made easier owing to the fact that I had acceess to a small shed which suited N scale well. The shed had all the extremities filled with track and you had to duck under to get into the middle for operation. This shed must have frustrated my then girlfriend (now wife) who when she found me missing from the house knew where I was.
The N scale managed to stay intact even till we got married and moved to a new house. She still reckons we chose the second house we saw because I happened to mention that if we dug out under the house I could make a layout room. I will concede this is partly true.
Into the early eighties and they started to make better HO NSW models so again I bit the bullet and changed scales.
To get rid of a lot of the N scale equipment I remember one year when I went to the Liverpool Model exhibition. I happended to mention to some of the guys on an N trak layout brought down from Brisbane that I had some equipment to sell. They said can we come up after the exhibition that night.
Later that night a kombi van full of guys piled out into the layout room. Wow that was a successful night. Eventually it all went.
Just after this we were comtemplating moving to a house with no stairs and this was the golden opportunity to start again.
The new house had a back 20' x 12' garage and this is where SCR started back in 1989.
So if you are still with me after that model rail history lesson back to the bit where I went off the rails.
I had a link sent to me http://www.markusworldwide.ch/Railways/Chile/Tocopilla/SQM_Tocopilla.htm of this electric railway down in Chile. I had never seen it before and thought it was unique and still operating.

Photo from web site used without permission but quite happy to publicise.

At the moment this would make a great line to model. The Woodland Scenic factory fire would have no effect on its construction as you will notice if you look at the photos not a friggin tree or touch of green to be seen. As can be seen a had an earlier fondness for overhead traction and considered the making of catenary overhead to be another challenge.
The next step was to find a suitable loco that looked like these locos. The only ones that I could think of were made a long time ago by Model Die Casting / Roundhouse as Box cab locos.

The only trouble is that they are scarcer than the stuff that comes out of rocking horses to find. I also researched on the internet and found that they were poor runners. I was going to try an modify them and add pantographs as well. Has anyone out there got any they no longer need?
I also thought I could make a layout based on the Chile electric locos and also add a few shays and climaxs to the mix. Again more research on the Bachmann shays found that they were prone to plastic gear cracking, rendering the units useless. Apparently the company was aware of this issue and offered replacement gears. This problem with the plastic gears is also an issue with many of the brass models. Locos with split gears just now sit around unable to move. Hundreds of dollars tied up from a lousy plastic few cent cost plastic gear. You would have thought Bachmann would have been aware of this problem before chosing plastic gearing.
So unable to get any Box cab locos and being wary of the shays I didn't have full confidence of making the switch and flogging off SCR.
To make myself feel better I decided to draw up a plan of what I might have built. It was to be a mixture of motive power both electric and non electric. On the plan the red is diesel and steam track and the blue represents electric operation. There are ore, coal and log traffic just to keep it busy. The plan below covers 10' x 12' (One foot squares)

I will now admit to having my plans complex like the proverbial spaghetti bowl as the following plan will attest. Once a layout is built I like to focus on operation, not just watch a train go back and forwards on a straight bit of track or a circle with two sets of points. Achieve layout construction, scenery making and then operation.
The layout was designed for two stages, the left hand terminus and the bottom board, then the top right hand board. Unlike the Chile photos this layout would be rivers, hills and plenty of greenery.
The track shown in red are the unwired ones meaning steam lococ would travel over the whole layout for shunting. I like the idea of interchange between the steam/diesel and electric. This provides more interesting operation. A few crossing loops as well helps the operation side of things. The layout would be built to standard gauge as some of the material was to be salvaged from SCR. I was looking on the internet for layouts of this style but the closest you get is by going to the narrow gauge style layouts. The curves are mainly 18" radius with a few 15" radius to fit it all in.

To to make operation not so straight forward I devised the following trackage between the two major boards.
A train come in from town A, six cars and a loco long. It then goes into Town B. Loco runs around and take three cars into the switchback, it then propels them to track 2. Loco returns back to Town B for the remaining three cars which it then propels into 3. It then reverses onto track 4, then back to track 2 to pick up the first three cars. All 6 cars and the loco head off towards Town C.
A similar process is done but track 1 and 4 are used when going from Town C to Town B. These switching problems are what makes layout operation more interesting to me.
Well no cause for panic as I went down the shed again today and ran a few trains and got the "short line" out of my system.
I shall put this track plan on the back burner, maybe one day I will get to build it. Sorry for the long winded blog today. SCR rules.

Santa delivers

Santas been
Well this is what the man in the red suit left. It wasn't exactly left under the tree but carefully positioned on the layout just prior to the big day.
The model is an Ian Lindsay kit that was assembled and painted by renown modeller Howard Smith. It was one of two locos assembled for David Anderson from Mansfield Hobbies. The other 70 class was weathered but I ended up with the clean one. I will have to see about getting it 'dirtied' up a little.
I would rather get this loco than a 73 class for a shunter as they were an earlier model. They spent most of their life around the Port Kembla area in real life shunting usually with two coupled together.
As South Coast Rail is situated a little further south on the same Illawarra line I was able to convince the local DLE to release one for shunting down Bega way.

7002 shunts the meat siding at Narooma

 The model is very light and would benefit with some weight stuffing. It made its way up to Candelo with plans to make it the coal mine shunter. This was soon cancelled when load trials found out that it could only take two empty BCH's there at a time. There is a short sharp grade as the line leaves Candelo and this is where it failed. A 44 class will take up 9 BCH's and a van in one go. Hopefully if the 48's ever get here, it might become a shunter for Candelo and the mine branch.
One minor problem with the 70 class is that it has a low slung open gearbox. Twice it has stalled due to it running over some small pieces of foam it ran over between the tracks and were sucked into the gearbox and it stopped. I will either have to try and cover it up or make sure there are no stray bits of foam in the four foot.
As most of the yards on SCR are level, shunting trains of reasonable length shouldn't be a problem.

7002 shunts the yard at Bega

This will be my last posting for 2011 and I look forward to 2012 as hopefully the models I have been waiting for such a long time might appear. My second sound loco, a 40 class and eventually some 48 class and the 422. Throw in some bogie tank cars, BSV's and it should be a good year.
I am on a short break at the moment and hope to be able to visit the 'shed' more often.
Roll on 2012

Rolling in dough

This Saturday I attended a sale day presented by the Epping Model Railway club. They were most considerate by having it start at 10.0am, as both Saturday and Sunday are currently my favourite sleep in days.

It was a lousy week for weather and I spent the fifteen minutes up to opening time sitting in the car waiting for the rain to stop.

At 10.0am right on the dot they threw open the doors and welcomed us to market day. There are two large rooms with private buyers having tables with their goods to sell. Most seemed to be private set ups, but Austrains were also there. I guess their motive was to save you postage. They didn't get a visit from me.

Past visits to these sales have been good for me. In the past I purchased a completed Hanovale weathered bogie ballast plough (BBP) for $25. I also acquired an Ian Lindsay bogie van (MCV?), last year I purchased some oil tanks.

This year I was lucky to pick up two Ian Lindsay Models that had been assembled but at this stage unpainted and decalled.

One of the kits was an EHO brakevan (commonly referred to as 'a loaf of bread' - hence the title of this thread) This is listed on the ILM website as $93 as a kit.

Also with the EHO was an assembled kit for another Ian Lindsay model being the KB mail van. (Listed for $77)

When I asked how much they were I quickly snapped them up at a bargain $30 each. Now I'm not sure how long they will stay unpainted like this, maybe when I get sick of doing scenery and have a break and finish off a few kits etc.

A quick trip round the rest of the tables didn't reveal much more. True there was plenty I could have got but having these two models in the bag so early made me more choosy regarding the rest.

The day is also enhanced by the club providing a sausage sizzle on all day. It was also interesting to see some well known modellers present with bags of 'leftovers' being flogged off. You know a few decals, plus a few other bits and pieces in a plastic bag for $20 or so. Kits they no longer wanted or could be bothered to put together.

After an hour or so I decided to leave, the rain had stopped by then and with my bag of goodies I headed home.

Fotopic has got the Flick (r)

I must have been one of thousands around the world that had photos lost when Fotopic suddenly shut up shop. I was posting photos there long before I had started this blog.

The story of how I also lost many photos when the hard drive crashed and was rescued by 'Albert' who had downloaded some of my photos was recorded on this blog recently.

In looking for another web hoster for some South Coast Rail I reckoned that Flickr was as good as any other, so I have recently uploaded some of my favourite shots onto this site. All seems well so far. A lot of the shots have already been on either fotopic or on this blog over time, but it groups them all together without the need to read all of my crap writings in between.

This weekend in the shed was a poor effort, only managing a few more shrubs outside the tunnel that supports Kameruka. So no need to show any of that effort.

The year has gone extremely fast again (Anyone else notice?) and I am looking forward to another break off in the new year.

The manufacturers should be a lot kinder to us NSW modellers with three locos I am waiting for will hopefully get delivered (48 + 40 + 422) and a few freight wagons as well.

Anyhow to get to the Flickr site just hit the link under "links in the right hand column "More South Coast Rail photos" and I hope you enjoy them the second time around.

Bonding Session

Well last night was another train night get together between our group. Most of the group  are known together because of the school link.

This link must be nearly rusted through as we go back to the mid to late 1960's. As I was not as smart as the other guys I left school earlier. I can see that the extra two years of schooling paid off for them as they have all done well in their careers and we are all approaching that magic thing called retirement. I was out already earning an income on the New South Wales Government Railways. Starting at Darling Harbour Goods Yard I only had the site and smell of 19 class shunting during lunch breaks while they were enjoying the smell of the hot asphalt in the school yard.
We met up again years later and begun having our irregular  train nights. We get in about three to four a year which pales compared to some groups who seem to see each other each week. One of our group was the late Ken Bowen, always the character and ready to show off his  large under house 'O' gauge model railway

Last night was Phils turn again and we were keen to see his progress from our last visit on Friday the 13th February, 2010. If you go back to my blog on that date you will see his initial work and now the progress he has made.

Phil makes and adjustment to the draw slider. On the left hand side is where the branch to Newcastle station will eventually be.

 Although rain was predicted, it didn't compare with the deluge we had at Phils previous visit.
The layout room scores a 10 out of 10 for design and comfort. Tons of fluro's, light blue coloured walls.
The layout design is a double track folded 8 with dogbone returns at each end. There is a branch into Newcastle and off that there will be a small shelf shunting section based on the Wickham Branch. Off the lower layout section there will be another branch station he will be calling Swansea. In the photo above is what he calls Broadfields (based on Broadmeadow). In the centre of one dogbone he is incorporating his 'Broadfield' turntable and loco depot. On the other dogbone will be a coal mine.

Early days on the Wickham Branch where the tracks and structures are laid out to see how they work. The gold top bottle is not expected to be a future structure.

Looking the opposite direction the curse of Newcastle another level crossing takes shape.

As there is a large amount of rolling stock on the layout Phil has incorporated a clever draw system as seen below for storing train consists in between runs. I have seen these used before on other layouts (Brad - Armchair Modeller). In this example the drawer cleverly slides under Broadfields above making the most of the room. On the far right of the layout Phil has used the conventional points into parallel sidings.

 

The multiple storage roads on the drawer slide. At least they are away from the dust when its slid in.

The future Broadfield Loco depot and mine on the right hand side

Close up of the future mine. Note the very solid baseboard construction

There is not a lot of area on the layout that can support scenery. I thought that his previous layout had more than this one will. I don't suppose that's a bad thing as he will get his layout finished sooner.
So we ran a few consists around and Ross gave his set of 4 new Trainorama BCW's a run. I noticed he was quick enough to get them off the train consist that was sitting on the draw slide before Phil could shut them away on him.
We later adjourned upstairs to partake in some tea, coffee, cake and scones and enjoyed an old black and white dvd on Steam on Hawkmount. It was a great way to finish off the night. Thanks Phil we will look forward to more progress in another year or so.

All in all its just another bit near the wall....

Close enough to that famous Pink Floyd song The Wall. Close enough indeed.Todays effort was to finish some scenery from the gully corner up to Kameruka. Having only a centimetre or so between the track and the wall it seemed the best finish would be to put a photo landscape scene there. As luck would have it, I had a photo scene taken from the platform at Tarago a few years ago when on a tour taking two 49's to Goulburn, then swapping a 49 for a 48 class. It was a perfect day there and I just took about three panorama shots.After some manipulating and cropping on the computer, mainly to delete the foreground tracks in the yard, I printed and glued them together. I was quite happy with the end result . This photo image has been sitting around in the shed for a few years now waiting a final resting place on the wall. It is not completely successful in that it is not very high in parts. I could have enlarged it on the computer but it will do for now. Maybe a replacement when the other two hundred and seventy five jobs are done.
The sheet had clouds present which didn't match the blue wall of the shed. So I got to work with the craft knife and cut away all the clouds and it now blends in quite well.There was only a gap of a centimetre or two to fill in between the track and the wall. I used some cleaning cloth 'grass' and a few other bits and pieces. The colouring matches fairly well and the blend line is not really obvious in the photo.

Oils Well at Kameruka
Well the Liverpool exhibition has come and gone for another year. I went on the Sunday and remember it was a similar day to the 2010 exhibition in that it poured down rain going from the car to the entrance. Arriving around 9.15am there was no queue, straight up to the ticket office and then inside. This is certainly the opposite for the Saturday attendees judging from the forum reports. (and then crowded when you got inside) I was only looking for the bogie oil tankers to take home. Reckoning on three manufacturers I thought one lot might jump the gun and have some. Looks like 2012 is going to be a big year. Two layouts stood out that impressed me. On was the new O scale layout and the other was a small layout based on Tasmanian practice, very nicely done and up for sale as well. My purchases were minimal but costly. I headed for the Orient model stand and bought some of the MiniNatur scenic products. At around $30 each lot, they are amongst the best scenic representations for grass you can get. I like to support this stand as I reckon if they can come over all the way from Adelaide they've earnt my money. I also got a pack of stone wall there for $4.90 for two strips. I had plans to use it for a wall at the rear of the oil siding. More on this later. I also bought two buffer stop kits from Joe Casula. There is a picture of one on the previous blog entry. Joe deserves support for his contribution to the hobby. I could have scratch built some buffer stops but if we don't support the manufacturers they might shut up shop. So after around three hours I headed for home wondering if they might do something special for the 50th exhibition next year??

Lights, Camera Action.

I purchased one of those twin 500 watt halogen lights on a tripod for photography. Recently one of the lights went out. So OK I will get another bulb. Opens it up to replace, put the new one in and nothing happened. Jiggled the light bulb and still nothing. Bugger must be stuffed somehow. Knowing very little about electricity (Other than the high bill I keep getting) I thought I would have to survive on one light and cut my photography down in half. By chance I mentioned this to a visitor to the railway and he said " You never touch the bulb with your fingers, its stuffs them" So after they went I grabbed the other spare bulb with some paper towelling and placed it in. Again nothing. But after a small jiggle it came on again. You beauty back to full power. I then took the CPH onto the gully bridge and took the following two shots.
I also managed to do some work on the oil siding at Kameruka. As you can see from the photo, the siding is minimal. Just long enough for around two bogie tankers or three four wheelers. There is also not much room to put all the hardware in between the window and the track.
The first photo shows the window sill, so I used the stone wall I purchased at the Liverpool exhibition, cut and painted it up with a capping and used this to cover the sill of the window.

Along the top of the window sill I placed some green florist foam. This is easily pushed into shape with the fingers and makes it easy to push the scenic bushes into and hold in place. Cheap and effective.

The last photo shows some of the greenery in place to help hide the sill and a few tanks and other bits being positioned for the removal and storage of the petrol from the tankers. I'm not decided at this stage whether to put up a wire mesh fencing. This I might do at a later stage.

More Kameruka Progress
It is that time of the year again where I take a two week break from the grindstone. The weather is usually not too hot or cold and today no rain like we had yesterday on Sunday.
I have a yearly booking for the Sydney Model Railway exhibition where ever it may be held. I have attended most of them since the lower Sydney Town Hall days. Sunday is my chosen day to attend mainly due to less crowds (bargain hunters). I hope a least one of the groups promising oil tankers has them there on the weekend.
And what a great day this Sunday will be, exhibition in the morning and getting home to see my team win the grand final in the afternoon.
This morning I washed down the house ends ready for painting, then after a cuppa dissapeared into the shed for some modelling.
Made it up to the house for lunch and then returned for more in the afternoon. Today I arranged to put the base down around where the goods shed will be. A lot more detailing to go on there and a yard crane to be assembled.

As mentioned before Kameruka is overshadowed by an in window air-conditioner. It would have fitted into the scenery better if I had made it into a tunnel but too late now to alter. It certainly provides some relief down there on the stinking hot days.


As may be noticed (the driver in the last picture certainly did) the headlight hasn't yet been fitted, so restricted to daytime running for the time being. It is in the workshop waiting for a fitting.

Smile - say Cheese
Well just a day after posting about the new dairy at Kameruka, I was reading todays local paper the Daily Telegraph.
Not a lot happens down Bega way and on turning a page I saw the name "Bega". What was it all about?
Well it happens that Coles supermarkets reckon they are going to source all their cheese from Australia instead of New Zealand. Very patriotic of them.
News of this soon got to the spokesman for the NZ Cheese Industry Mr Rick Cotta. He was decidely upset and blue a vien and then calmed down. At this moment they were undecided if they should challenge this in court or just whey the odds and see if its coon forgotten. He labelled the Aussies "Krafty" and wanted to know if their cheese wasn't gouda nuff.
So what does this mean for South Coast Rail? Obviously a rise in milk traffic mainly coming off the branch from the dairies at Candelo and Kameruka.
This gets railed down to Bega and after reading the news cutting I have decided to end up building a cheese factory down near the flour mill. This siding is currently an oil siding but I can move this to another site at Bega.
Then it occurred to me that I can now create another movement of traffic i.e. milk in and cheese out in refrigerator wagons up to Sydney.
So I had better hurry up and get the Kameruka dairy siding finished so the milk can start flowing.

Vents are here!The last post dealt with the ordering of some roof vents for the dairy roof. They turned up yesterday in a bigger cardboard box than I had expected. I thought they might have started dealing with shoes, it certainly could have fitted a pair in there. (Well maybe thongs)
When I searched the Walthers cattle dog using the key word 'vent' It came up with two items that looked promising.
One was from JL Innovative Design containing about 16 various vents and a few chimneys. These are described as 'unfinished cast details' I am a bit hesitant to open the package with the word "unfinished" stated thereon. I wonder which bit they left out.
The other bag of parts was from Rix and are termed 'multi scale' The bag is specific in saying "Ages 14 and up". It would be sad to be 12 only to be told you would have to wait another 2 years before opening the bag. And the other words at the other end of that statement " ...and up" goes up until you can't see or feel anymore to put the darn things together. And then make sure your grandson is over fourteen before he can help you.
The order was made on line on the 18th August and turned up here on the 6th of September.
The JL vents were $9.98, Rix vents $7.95, Mail order handling $6.25 and Air freight $3.58 for a total of $27.77.
As usual I will probably wait till the weekend to have a go at getting the vents on. Saturday looks like its a dead horse for the shed as I will be going to the model exhibition at Broadmeadow, along with hopefully viewing the double headed steam heading for Newcastle on the same day. Then Saturday night the footy finals are on. So maybe Sunday.

Dairy ProgressSlowly but surely the dairy situated at the back of Kameruka platform is taking place. The bulk of the building is built, the roof is on and there are now actually three posts to support it.
To the casual visitor who doesn't know what the building is for, the cream colour of the building, three milk churns and a guy dressed in white overalls should help. (He would certainly not work at the oil siding next door in white clothing) All that is missing from the building are some roof vents which are on their way from Walthers in the USA. At least Hurricane Irene is blowing the plane in the right direction so it might get here quicker. As soon as the vents are placed on the roof I will do another report on the building rather than this skimmed down version.

Kameruka Happenings
Just a quick update on the layout. I have been concentrating on Kameruka lately. The last post showed the platform extensions in place and the green 'undercoat' has now dissapeared under a layer of platform limestone.
Having the platform finished the ballast has now been laid past the platform and on the loop line beside it. With the rain a week or so ago its also magic how quick the weeds will grow.
With the platform extension I also extended the fencing. It seemed to take ages to find that extra bit of fencing in the shed as I am not very organised. Then when it was in position I must of run out of the original paint colour, so then I had to repaint the new and existing again to match it up.
The next item I am planning to finish off is the dairy building. One part will be some of an old kit and the rest is slowly being made up as I go along. The siding comes in at an angle which means that the roof has also been cut similarly. The roof will cover the track and be above the edge of the platform. One of the supports will be on the edge of the platform.Its almost impossible to get shots of how the milk was loaded into the wagons. I would imagine there would be a pipe coming out of the building and then into a hose which would be placed inside the wagon to fill it. I think as long as there are pipes, valves and a few other bits and pieces then it should come out OK.
I will keep working on the dairy and then move onto the oil siding. Hopefully some of the bogie oil tankers should be available by the end of the year.

A Diversion
Last Saturday my son, knowing how I had a faint interest in trains drew my attention to a movie I was unaware of.
I will go to the movies to see features not available at home such as a way bigger screen and 3D.
This movie must have snuck past but when he said it had trains from the beginning to end I said lets go.
The movie is called "Unstoppable" starring Denzel Washington and Chris Pine and a few diesels who didn't even rate a mention in the end credits. Its a non stop action typical runaway train movie with some great angle shots.Don't be to picky or critical when you watch it, just enjoy it for what it is. If you want to find out more check out the trailer for Unstoppable here.

Shed Duty
After many weeks of working on the Garbage Protection Unit (sounds like a new government department) and getting some landscaping done on Saturday morning I decided I would actually get into the shed and do some work on the layout. This was able to be done during the day when the weather wasn't so cold. The weather has been freezing lately and going down there at night comes second to a night at the computer.
I decided to concentrate on Kameruka for the time being. One of the projects is to lengthen the platform from a 2 FS to 4FS platform. Originally this platform use to grace the old layout and suited its location. The only reason it got as advanced as it did was the fact that I took it to a Branchline Modelers Convention at the Macquarie Uni when they were on many moons ago.
The original platform was formed from a piece of pineboard and has so far been ok, so I hunted around the shed for another two pieces, one for each end of the platform.
I already had cut out a styrene platform front which had a ramp down at the end. I eventually got the piece of pine filed down to match the profile. That was OK for the Candelo end. The other end was just a straight cut.
As can be seen from the photos the track through the platform is not yet ballasted, so that made getting the platforms completed the first priority.The concrete facing was made from a piece of 40 thou styrene with a few horizontal scribed lines to represent the layers. Then another piece is glued onto the front to provide the vertical support pieces.
You might note the horrible green paint I used to seal the timber with. I could tell you that this was the only can colour I could find, but a better answer would be it was my contribution to greening up Kameruka. Co-incidently it was the day young Julie - argh was going to tell us how the carbon tax is going to save us. Just a thought is she going to put a carbon tax on carbon brushes for locomotives? I might just get a few in.

Well I didn't get much more done today than what you can see as all of a sudden bang the lights and power went out. Stuff it, I'll go in and have a cup of tea - doh no power. It was getting around critical crunch time for the Sunday arvo footy as well. Half an hour later still no power and the game had already kicked off. So I did the next best thing, I went and had a soak in the bath and listened to the game on radio (battery). The game had finished, Manly had won and still no power and was I going to see the replay on telly? Eventually power returned around 5.15p so I went in an watched the second half of the footy.

Maybe next weekend I can get down and do some more work on the platforms so that ballasting can be undertaken.

Yeah for Liz
You must be someone important to give everyone in the state a day off for your birthday and thats just what Her Maj Liz has done. And what better reason would you want to hold a model railway exhibition. This was the second year the Epping Model Railway club had held their exhibition at the Thornleigh Brickpits. The venue is great, its just that its not set up for parking and the swarms of modellers that throng there first thing on a Saturday morning. I heard one guy was queued up at 7.0am obviously keen to get to the second hand stall first. I reckon he would have frozen his nuts off at that time. Me I was tucked up in a warm bed enjoying my first sleep in of the long weekend. I have decided not to attend the exhibitions on the first day due to the large crowds on Saturdays. Was told by the Bowen Creek boys (whose layout stood between the entrance and the second stall) that when the gates opened on Saturday it was like a stampede from Rawhide, yes cattle heading for that elusive bargain. While I was working in the garden on Saturday trying to finish the GPU ( garbo protection unit) in between showers I got a phone call from Mr Jim Kamilaroi saying that he was going to the exhibition on Sunday with a few friends from the Port Macquarie region and wondered if it was ok to drop in to check out the layout. OK by me so it was arranged. Sunday came around and the weather was as miserable as Saturday - raining and cold. Having left in the dark around 6.0am they reached my place around 9.40am and we headed straight to the show.
During the short journey to the show I felt the great social side of the hobby coming out. They were just a bunch of nice guys with plenty of joking and laughter going on. Arriving just after opening at 10 we headed into the show. Jim took me along to meet Andrew Campbell from Bowen Creek. Andrew comes from the Port Macquarie area as well. I was trying to match up his profile picture on his blog with what I saw in the flesh. I'm still not sure it was him as he had a beanie on. Due to the ambient temperature in the hall the beads of moisture on his forehead would not have been sweat but probably condensation from the cold.
I also met Ian Millard and if you have never met Ian and Andrew you will understand why their layout is set so high. In the hobby this setting of layout heights must reflect the standards to which they are built. Bowen Creek high set layout = high standard. The U - Drive layout set low = low standard. This is really design by accident as the little kiddies while standing in front of Bowen Creek will never be able to see the layout. They could never build to that standard so come back when you are taller. I couldn't see the back as well and are quite ready to admit I haven't reached their level either. A beautiful layout guys.
Bumped into Stephen Ottaway who must be congratulated in getting his eleventh child out into the world. The Australian Journal of Railway Modelling is a great wall to wall magazine of modelling. May there be many more.
I worked out that I had met (or spotted) throughout the day six bloggers - Ian Millard from - Liverpool Range, Andrew Campbell from Bowen Creek, Gary Laker from Lakers Locomotive, Carriage and Wagon Workshops, James McInerny from Lambing Flat, Jim Harris from The Kamilaroi Railway and Brad Hinton from Armchair Modeller DownUnder. Why Brad would want to model armchairs is beyond me. Get yourself a layout and some trains Brad. I did a tour of the layouts and noticed only two new ones I hadn't seen before. Having got a ride there with the guys from Port Mac I thought I had better get around the commercial stands before we had to leave.
My first port of call was the Austrains stand as I was interested in their 4 wheel tankers. I thought with only 4 wheels per wagon they had got to be cheaper than a bogie version. Yes one dollar change out of one hundred. Then the next problem which pack to pick? He had five choices and I wasn't sure what one to get. The blue one looked odd and the one with the typo on it (Pur Pull - John its spelt Purple). I ended up with the pack with the Golden Fleece (sunnies on for viewing), the C.O.R. and the Atlantic. (odd for South Coast Rail as it shares the coast line with the Pacific!)
I then saw the carriage packs. As much as they are very nice I am going to stick with my Powerline ones and hopefully get them detailed up. To make myself feel better I also bought a Sydney Hobbies FS interior to ease the pain of not getting the Austrain ones. Hey go tell your wife you have just spent $300 on three carriages. Did a quick trip into the second hand stall to see if my Atlas 40 class with Main West cab conversion kit had gone. I couldn't see it there so hopefully it was sold. Might put the money towards a 422 class which I believe will be my wifes Christmas present to me. I find the day is a great social day as well catching up with people you only get to see at exhibitions. And there are some you also have to dodge if you don't want to meet up with them. I remember David Anderson from Mansfield Hobbies saying the everytime he went to Liverpool he would spend 90% of the time talking and the other 10% to see the layouts.
Eventually caught up with the group and after a quick sausage sandwich we set sail for home, a cuppa and a quick look at South Coast Rail.
They left around two ish and headed for Port Mac. On a confirming email later that night they had pouring rain all the way and got home around 6.0pm. I think they all enjoyed the day out.

OIL TANKERS ARRIVE SOUTH COAST RAIL

I got the tankers out of the box today and was surprised with their weight. I think they are actually full of oil and petrol. I couldn't imagine ten of these behind a 32 class on a grade. Did a start on the weathering to tone them down a bit. Think they look better.

CANNISTA:
What is it you say? Well if a barista does things to coffee, then a Cannista does things to cannisters, or more importantly ex film cannisters.
There seems to be a recent interest in the use of old film cannisters for model railway purposes.
This to me has become a sieze the moment event. I like most others have gone digital photography and the humble film cannister has gone the way of the VHS tape.
I could see the potential of these items and their size really suited them for HO scale. Too big for N scale and too small for O scale they were just right.
My next dilemma was - Did I have any?. I thought I had left my run too late, my old 35mm camera was given away a few years ago, so why would I have any cannisters?
Taking a chance I went to my wardrobe where the last known said cannisters were know to have lurked. But alas none. I then went to the next cupboard and bingo I discovered two cannisters (complete with film and no camera to take it with).
Anyhow I took them down to the layout and put one each way up between the oil siding and the to be milk factory. So this is where they remain.
I'm not sure how I am going to use them but are open to suggestions. The could either be a milk vat or for oil storage? What do you reckon??