My Second Build

[TimWay4]

Hello!! 

So i remembered I had done a thread based on the small layout I did last year for my loco train club. This year after a little bit falling out of love with the first layout, and picking up a cheap very basic layout at a show, I'm doing a different layout for the open day this year. The layout is currently nameless, it's a small compact layout using N gauge flexitrack, it sits in a relatively small flight case. Initially when I bought it, I was going to leave the original board in tact, this plan has now changed and I've decided to spruce it up. At the moment it's not really a Japanese layout (hopefully no one minds) though I do have a Tomix railbus that I'm hoping will run around it. 

 

So a quick run through of the attached pictures 🙂 

 

WIP 1: This is the layout as it came, absolutely nothing done to it. The person I bought it off was blasting an N gauge tram around it and wanted £100 for the layout, no tram, no controller, just the board and the flight case. Not sure if I feel that was too much, but at the time I was happy with what I paid, and really, to me, that's all that matters

 

WIP 2: This is after I've covered the board with more scatters. The initial grass on the board was overall a bit too bright to look right to me, so (with the help of a club member) I made a mix of scatters that looked more natural, but around the top of the mound, I left some of the original green just to be able to remember how green it used to be really. By this point I had also managed to track down a GaugeMaster controller that is more than capable of running this layout (it was the total sum of £20)

 

WIP 3: This picture was taken last week (the club meets on a Tuesday night) I put some more scatter down because as I expected some had come off and then I painted a mud path that leads from the castle (this came with the layout, I'm not sure if it's actually N gauge or if it is from a fish tank (I think it's from a fish tank) 

 

I have the layout with me now and I have a couple of jobs lined up tonight to do to it, so hopefully I can post a picture or two tomorrow.  🙂 

[cteno4]

Very fun! Going to be tourists trouping up the trail? Tomytec has a set of photographer figures.

 

jeff

[TimWay4]

Yes that is the plan ^_^ I didn't get much done last night, basically cut part of a coffee stirrer to make a small in promptu crossing at the end of the dirt trail. I even remembered to run a loco and make sure it didn't derail constantly. I'm probably going to pop to my local model shop at the weekend and see if there is anything I can pick up to add a little more scenery to it, but I'm not looking to add too much (i don't like overly cluttered layouts which UK micro ones often seem to be).

[TimWay4]

Time for a new update!! 

 

So the layout is basically complete, I just need some people and some tress and then I'm calling it done, so what did I do to it? 

 

I added a small piece of a coffee stirrer to make a crossing point, and then some Graham Farish scenery buildings to the board, I haven't glued them yet but probably will do so.

 

Finally, one of the other club members made me some back scenes, there's three so I can have a choice of different ones 🙂 so for your viewing pleasure here are some pics 🙂  

[TimWay4]

So tomorrow is my club's open day, and this year I'm taking this with me, I think I've decided on the name Casey Castle for it. It seems kind of fitting that I'm taking this layout this year as it's almost a year (just short a week or two) since I acquired it. 

 

Hopefully it all goes OK tomorrow, I'm not especially great with people so it's a bit of a tough day for me. 

[Claude_Dreyfus]

Ah, it didn't immediately twig you are a member of the Astolat club. My lot are immediately due south west of you.

[TimWay4]

I am, I joined about 2 nearly 3 years ago 🙂

 

I think you attended a couple of the groups exhibitions, but unfortunately it's the same weekend as my mam's birthday so I've never actually attended the exhibition which is a shame.

[Claude_Dreyfus]

That's bad planning on your mother's behalf! Yes, we took our club 00 layout to your show this year, and my old Japanese layout (Kanjiyama) about 2 or 3 years ago.

[TimWay4]

I was gutted I missed Kanjiyama it's not often you see Japanese layouts at exhibitions, but I couldn't justify not making it to my parents lol

 

@Claude_Dreyfus if you visit tomorrow say hi 🙂 

Edited August 17, 2018 by TimWay4

[gavino200]

On 7/23/2018 at 7:58 AM, TimWay4 said:

Time for a new update!! 

 

So the layout is basically complete, I just need some people and some tress and then I'm calling it done, so what did I do to it? 

 

I added a small piece of a coffee stirrer to make a crossing point, and then some Graham Farish scenery buildings to the board, I haven't glued them yet but probably will do so.

 

Finally, one of the other club members made me some back scenes, there's three so I can have a choice of different ones 🙂 so for your viewing pleasure here are some pics 🙂  

 

 

 

 

 

This is a beautiful layout! Did you paint the backdrop yourself? The helicopter is a nice touch. The scene reminds me to the final showdown in the James Bond movie "Skyfall".

 

I also love that this fits in a briefcase!!!

[TimWay4]

@gavino200 thanks for the nice comments, a club member painted the backscene for me, he figured that the helicopter would be a good way to see the castle so as I didn't want to build a helipad, he said he'd get one in some how. He offered to paint the back scene to hide the plain grey in the lid and when he showed up he brought 3 painted scenes, one with the helicopter on. I love all three of them and it let's me change the scene up every so often.

 

In general the day went well, the layout only really runs 0-6-0 locos so I had a J94 and an 08 as well as Thomas and Percy, I was glad I took so many as the J94 didn't like to pull anything, the 08 would run for about an hour and by that time it was too hot to run, so Thomas and Percy filled in the rest of the time. So for next year I need a few more to spread over the time. I got lots of comments and a couple of people took pictures. It was amazing how many people will blank a layout when Thomas is running, but will come and have a look when he isn't  (had a few people show no interest when Thomas was running, but came back later and with a different loco running, they came over for a chat).

[gavino200]

7 hours ago, TimWay4 said:

It was amazing how many people will blank a layout when Thomas is running, but will come and have a look when he isn't  (had a few people show no interest when Thomas was running, but came back later and with a different loco running, they came over for a chat).

 

That's interesting. I notice a lot of model train people have a big hangup about whether or not these trains are "toys". Maybe the Thomas trains are just on the wrong side of the "Toy Taboo" line. 

[TimWay4]

Yeah that's true. I mostly run Thomas as It's a good way to get kids interested in trains and I'm big on getting younger people into the hobby. I was mostly happy to get some positive comments on the layout, and have people interested. I have confidence issues so the positive reinforcement is good.

[cteno4]

There does seem to be some Thomas backlash, we get it here a little, but I expect more in the uk. I have folks comment on the Panasonic pompa train (sometimes negative we have a Thomas on the layout) when it’s out, but it’s not a Thomas, just looks like it might be and at least it opens up a conversation. We try to keep Thomas off the layout for this reason. Luckily with all the fun and cool japanese trains we don’t need to use Thomas to suck kids in.

 

its a whole spectrum of tastes out there and to each his own. We just decided to stick to japanese trains to make it easy on the layout at shows. But we could then do the Thomas excursion train and be prototypical I expect. I agree I would rather cater to kids though than grown ups who are stuck in their ways. Again though with the Japanese layout we get the kids without a problem! Also main reason we keep goji on the layout to keep it fun, even if they don’t now godzilla it makes them laugh and again angood tslking point to interact (interacting gets the best impression on them.)

 

We have a small group shun us at shows as we are not American trains. It’s gettring rarer and the obnoxious and sometimes bigoted comments have pretty much gone away. I am surprised what folks will say within earshot at public shows. I don’t know if it’s meant to be heard or they jsut think we won’t hear them.

 

jeff

[Claude_Dreyfus]

On 8/17/2018 at 5:30 PM, TimWay4 said:

I was gutted I missed Kanjiyama it's not often you see Japanese layouts at exhibitions, but I couldn't justify not making it to my parents lol

 

@Claude_Dreyfus if you visit tomorrow say hi 🙂 

 

Sadly I could not make it. Dealing with a stinking cold over the weekend, so couldn't go out to play.

 

It is a nice little model you have there.

[TimWay4]

Yeah Jeff I'm the same, I intend on Building a Japanese exhibition layout when I move into a house, and have some actual space.  Also I agree on the stuff people say, if they don't like what I'm exhibiting then they could kindly keep it to themselves, there are lots of people who will appreciate what I've brought. Plus at our club shows I think I'm the only one with an N gauge Thomas so it's not like the place was swamped with him.

 

@Claude_Dreyfus That's a shame, better to stay home and get better than come out and get worse though 🙂 thanks for the kind comments 🙂 

[cteno4]

Folks don’t always think about what they are saying or I guess don’t think you will hear! Once and a while I will turn to folks dropping something snide to someone else and is loud enough for my earshot and I politely retort to their comment just to let them know they are saying it loud enough to be heard. Most are embarrassed they said it that loud and I’m very polite and sometimes it leads to a nice conversation and some enlightenment. A few though are, shall we say, just jerks.

 

also many folks just don’t appreciate the effort you put out to do a presentation at a show. I’m always surprised by this, but it’s way more than made up for by the folks that always thank you so nicely for doing the layout and bringing it to the show. Some are so amazed that you would do this for them and nice to know you made an impression like this. Usually at least one interaction every show that makes it all worth it otherwise I wouldn’t do them frankly.

 

glad you are doing this. Showing off the mini box layout is great as it shows folks what they can do with limited space and funds and be creative! Just fun idea to boot.

 

jeff

[TimWay4]

It's good that you are able to turn some of them in to nice conversations 🙂 

 

I must admit that since I used Kato track on my first one, bought this one with the track laid and only now I'm trying to do one from scratch with lying flexitrack that I realise just how much effort goes into a layout and how awkward they can be, I think I appreciate more now the effort people have put into the building of them. 

 

It's been fun so far, i really enjoy the aspect of what can I put into a tiny space and most people seem to like them to. While they do I guess I'll keep taking them out, might be nice one day to get invited to an exhibition, but there's plenty of time for that 🙂