Arrivals and purchases over Xmas

• Hornby Jinty in LMS black (not arrived yet)
• Two Hornby LMS 20T brake vans (ditto)
• Replacement body for 57xx (Great Western lettering)

This evening's job, once I've acquired the necessary small tweezers to get the NEM couplings out so I can get at the body screw (being married to a vet may help here!), is to re-body the 57xx.

Hornby 2010 new additions and pre-war GWR

As I've said on RMWeb, I can't say that I'm leaping around for joy.

I'll be saving for the NRM 28xx (in lovely pre-'34 Great Western green). Kind of disappointed that the 61xx appears to have that ghastly shirtbutton logo, and really very unchuffed about the coaches....

Hawkesworth? What would have been wrong with re-tooling the Collett 57' stock - it too lasted into BR times, but at least it's usable by the GWR modellers. Apparently pre-war GWR doesn't sell, but it does seem that Hornby are turning that into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Getting my hand back in...

So, I 'found' a bunch of my old wagons to give to James today. He won instant brownie points by agreeing that some of them looked horribly 'plasticky' compared to some of the newer Bachmann ones he has, so we took a trip to Trains4U to pick up some Humbrol acrylic paints to see what we could do about it.

For starters, I grabbed one of a pair of Hornby Silver Seal 'Lancashire' 7 plank coal wagons, and started out by painting the inside an old wood brown, and picking out the outside metal framing in dark grey.

Considering its the first time I've picked up a paintbrush in anger since about 1990, it went well. It already looks miles better, but tomorrow I'm going to paint the underframe and make a start on weathering it.

Track Plan 2

Just idly considering two other options:

• taking the right hand end right round the corner and along the workbench, which gives me an extra 10' of main line run and room for Wistanstow Halt. If I can do that, though, I can cut it down a bit, and try for....
• a roundy-roundy with fiddle yard in 12' x 8' or so. My first run at a station plan with runaround loops for 6 coaches looks to be about 20' long, but it could be bent in the middle....

Track Plan

So, after a skim through Cooke section 63, I've reached a few conclusions...

I do actually have about 35' of length in the music room, and I can turn the corner at both ends for a fiddle yard (one end has a piano, the other is used for stacking flightcases, which in both cases will fit underneath) - basically a very stretched, inverted U

Essentially the layout of Craven Arms from south to north goes:

• south-facing junction, South Wales line off to west
• main station
• level crossing
• relief roads/goods loop
• north-facing junction, Bishop's Castle branch off to west
• Wistanstow Halt
• north-facing junction (Marsh Farm), Wenlock branch off to east and an up loop.

My mental map has had the southern end at the right hand end of the U, but I'm starting to think that's less practical if I want to slip the Bishop's Castle branch in, since it can come off a bit short of the right hand end and vanish behind the backscene to a two road fiddle yard, whereas the Wenlock Branch can curve round to the main fiddle yard.

Assuming I have 30' of clear run (allowing for turns into the fiddle yards on both ends), if I can fit the South Wales junction, main station and relief roads in 16', that leaves about 14' of open country to fit the two north junctions in. I might even have room for Wistanstow Halt. The Wenlock branch can actually round the corner in front of the main fiddleyard and have its own small (4', 3 road) yard.

More arrivals

Keeping the postman busy this week :D

• The Mogul, and the rest of the Hornby clerestory and Mainline LMS coaches arrived
• A bulk lot of a Mainline Patriot in red, some wagons and a couple more coaches (as well as a rebuilt Royal Scot in ugly lined black, which is going back on eBay)
• Several wagons
• Bachman Coaler set (57xx, couple of wagons, oval of track) - nice cheap way of getting a pannier tank, though it does need re-liverying to pre-'35 from "GWR"
• Copper cap to replace the missing one on my 2721
• RA Cooke GWR track plans section 63 (covering Craven Arms)
• one set HMRS GWR Pressfix transfers.

Still to come are a few more wagons, and I have my eyes on an LMS Jinty (probably the Hornby Railroad one rather than the Bachmann) and a small Prairie.

Loco wishlist

Just, mostly, to get it down somewhere:

• Jinty (Onnybrook station pilot)
• G2 0-8-0 (South Wales line coal trains)
• 45xx small Prairie (Wenlock branch)
• 28xx 2-8-0 (Heavy goods traffic)
• Dean Goods and/or a 2251
• Fowler 4F (goods)
• Deeley 3F (this'll probably have to be a kit, since the Triang one is just... ick.)
• Compound 4-4-0 (suburban passenger)
• Hall (express passenger/goods)
• County 4-4-0 (the Hawksworth 4-6-0 is well out of period!)
• One or more of Jubilee, Patriot, Black 5, 8F 2-8-0, parallel boiler Royal Scot -erm, I seem to have bought a Patriot in a bulk lot of stuff on eBay...