Bron Effans

  I have struggled to find time and motivation to sit at my workbench for any length of time. A consequence of this is that the layout has really been neglected. I gave myself a day to myself and set about doing some small jobs on the layout. I have received some new rolling stock and items that can be used on the layout. Coaches I managed to secure a new Indian Red Lynton and Barnstaple styled compartment coach to match the brake coach. I have been looking for suitable carriages to replace the European style coaches that I repainted over the summer. This will form the second main rake on the line and they fit the aesthetic of the railway with a more uk based design and size. Ultimately, my rationalisation of the stock was intended to give my layout a more unified theme. This rake will help form backbone of services on the line. I can also use it for "Covid secure" services as it is a compartment coach. I feel that the Indian Red coaches look more appealing than the Southern ...

  I have had a fairly productive summer break from work. My time has been divided by various jobs on the layout and catchup repairs from the lockdown period. Ultimately, I had set myself some targets for the summer period to improve the running of the layout and to sort out the ongoing issues with the rolling stock. I have managed to finish the vast majority of these jobs and have finished a few other extra things that were not in the original plan. The biggest of which is the new retaining wall at the west end of the line.  I have been trying to give the layout a more unified look and feel that reflects the location that I am trying to model. I found some inspiration from the creation of a group on Facebook concerned with modelling the Corris Railway. I took ideas from this group and set about building a retaining wall along the northern slope to disguise the poor effort on the slope. The first layer of styrene is laid. I used styrene to make thin slabs and built them up with...

  I have been adding to the scenery on the days where the temperatures were more reasonable. I took this opportunity to build on the scenery around the station. I had obtained some lichen and other scenic bits from my parents house. These materials were used on my childhood 00 gauge layout and I thought it would be a good idea to put them to use around the layout. I used a 50:50 mix of water and pva glue to spruce up the older materials. I dipped the lichen into the glue mix and then into a tray of scatter material. The next few images show how it has made the lichen look more like realistic bushes.  This is an aspect of the hobby that I am not overtly keen on doing, but I am happy with how these small additions have elevated the level of the scenery around the station.  I will be adding more to this blog over the next couple of weeks. There has been a lot of progress and I haven't really kept up with the updates. Suffice to say that pretty much everything I had planned f...

I have opted to signal my layout in a similar style to that of the WHR with the ladybird style signal boards. I am not going to add movement or lighting as the signal is intended more as a sort of warning board, than an actual signal. I have used components from an ARB ModelCraft Ffestiniog Railway Disc signal kit. These are intended to move once a train has passed. I decided that I would have it as a static signal. This is mostly because my layout will be operated on a one engine in steam principle so I don't need an excessive amount of signalling. I have made provision for two train working by using this board as a warning measure to not proceed unless the road to the platform is clear. I do need to get a point indicator signal in the future, like there are on the WHR, but that is something I need to educate myself on.  I used the cast base and the pole to assemble the signal and glued the disc onto a piece of wire at the top with an endcap to make it look more presentable. ...

After languishing under the lockdown and my fettling of carriages and other distractions I decided to turn my attention to the scenery once again. I was happy with the layout of the station and how I could run two trains at once into it with no issues being caused to the rolling stock. However, I had painted it in a cheap acrylic grey and it really was not looking the part. Scuffs were showing from when I had caught it and it was not looking as polished as I had hoped. That is to say, it did not evoke the scene that I was intending. Typical Welsh Narrow Gauge stations have large stones on the edge of the platform and a crushed stone surface. To that end I took the chisel to the plaster platform again and began the process of cutting out a trench to place the 'stones' into. I know from practice with my wall building that I needed to be careful with the sizes of the slabs and make sure that I did not make them too large. I did a test fit of each piece of mounting board ...

Due to the Lockdown enforced as a consequence of the Covid-19 virus, I have found myself with an abundance of free time on my hands. This situation has allowed me to pay more attention to the scenery of the layout and as such I have added more detail to the station area of the layout. Effans Uchaf is situated in the heart of the Welsh countryside and I felt that nothing would suggest that more than some slate walls. The Southern platform (Platform 1) was always intended to be the main platform for trains to arrive and depart and, in my head, would be the original running platform. Platform 2, the shorter, was always intended to be used as extra capacity and would only ever be able to manage smaller train sizes. I began the process simply with only a small section of wall, so that I could get used to the construction of a wall. I used mounting board as my main material with some thinner card and plasticard to mimic thicker slabs of slate. I stacked them on top of each other and secu...

I have had another go at the backscene, after making a mess of it with the mod-rock on the scenic background. It was a terrible mess after I had sploshed plaster water everywhere. I was planning on adding to the backscene anyway but a new coat of paint was essential. Especially after the scenic work. I started with a white base and then made use of some blue poster paint to complete the blue look of the background. I dont intend to add much more detail to this, as my artistic skills are severely lacking.

I have finally begun the construction of the western end of the layout in order to create a backscene to hide the fiddle yard. I had been putting this part of the layout off for some time, owing to me not being able to make my mind up on how I should disguise the portal to the yard. Originally, I envisaged a simple portal in a board which could be hidden with a simple footbridge over the cutting. I couldn't figure out a way to make this look convincing especially due to all efforts to build a footbridge resulting in wobbly and misshapen disasters. Inspiration struck me when I found a suitable portal on a well known auction site. This resin fascia looked very similar to the ones on the Moelwyn tunnel on the Ffestiniog railway and, given the reasonable price, would be perfect for the entrance/ exit on the line.  I mounted the board to the layout and attached the fascia to see how it would look with the cutting. I added some cardboard over the gaps between ...

In my continuing effort with the scenery I have made a simple crossing for the railway. The boards are made from mounting board for picture frames. I cut it into strips and glued it directly into the sleepers. My mistake was to leave the board unpainted before mounting which wasn’t a good idea. I have since painted over it in brown to simulate wooden planks. I think it looks rather good for a first attempt. Now I need to replicate this on the opposite side of the track to form my basic crossing.