WEST ORTON

[Steve M]

I think the ballast has turned out very well Steve.

I haven’t shown you the dodgy bit.

[Walkingthedog]

Even your dodgy bits are above average.

[bulleidboy]

Great job on the ballast Steve. The engine shed - is it the one with the "foreman's" office on the front corner? If it is, I had my eye on this a while back - I thought I could "southern" it with a bit of green paint - it's a bit bigger than the Skaledale one I have. Cheapest I have seen it is £101.99 - I'm still tempted.

[Steve M]

That’s the one Barry. I think it would fit well on Wykeham but we don’t want a bidding war on eBay, do we?

[bulleidboy]

That’s the one Barry. I think it would fit well on Wykeham but we don’t want a bidding war on eBay, do we?

Certainly not My wife and son did this some years ago, both new the item was wanted but, forgot to tell one another they were bidding - they were the only two bidding - cost £20 more than it might have done

[Steve M]

Unexpected benefit of using chinchilla sand - it comes off quite easily with a small scraper.

[Steve M]

Well, this wasn’t part of the plan.

Having ‘borrowed’ a couple of structures from a Low Ghyll, it quickly became clear that a small shed would not fit, nor would it look right, opposite the signal box. That area will probably develop into a goods yard/ edge of town scene.

The section of the layout in the picture was always going to be for storage, although having played with a few templates and track offcuts this morning, it seems to be developing into a shed area with the possibility of a turntable. My sliding workbench restricts the depth below the board so the TT will either be raised by about 1cm or just a non functioning one like the Dapol kit.

This plan does in fact give me the option of a much larger shed structure, possibly laser cut but clad in plasticard stone sheets (like the bridge) rather than the brick pattern or plain wood that laser kits tend to be made from.

2021-07-03_10-28-58 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

[Steve M]

Completed the basic static grass covering, with detail work to be done as and when buildings and the like start to appear.
An all over covering using 1mm and 2mm spring and summer fibers followed by layering spray to hold on the second coat of 4mm summer fibers. Finally more layering with 4mm dead and patchy grass.
The WWS glues have instant grab and it’s possible to vacuum away loose fibers after about 5 mins but I will leave it a bit longer before tidying up.

2021-07-05_02-50-06 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

Changing subject, I have been watching a couple of items on eBay and have sent questions to the sellers to clarify a couple of things - nothing too difficult, just details of the contents of the box and/or the catalogue numbers. But as usual, no replies. It’s not as if they are casual sellers with just one or two items either. Almost as if they’ve never heard of customer service.

[Stese]

Stunning work there, steve!

[bulleidboy]

That looks good Steve - the grass colours are just right - I'll make a note of the colours you used.