"Great Northern's Return"

Well, it had to happen eventually.

I was finding it rather depressing looking over at the model on my desk, only half built.

So I did a bit more work on it. It still needs lots of work, 60113, but at least it has a reasonable representation of its running plate and front bufferbeam now (and a decent set of deflectors, at last! That I need to re-file to fit).



I have started to change my mind about the colour I should be picking. I think, rather than the blue, I might go for the brunswick green instead. I wanted it to be a "bit different" to other depictions of the lone A1/1, but perhaps I could save the express passenger blue example for when I get a proper kit of it.

Then again, I could paint both of them blue and show how bad my modelling was in the early days!

Until next time!



PS. There's two photographs of the real A1/1 I stuck to my old Apple Mac, to help with the build. But what's that strange looking pacific locomotive behind Great Northern...?

That's another story!!!

"Best of British"

Some of you may be aware that I make a little series for Youtube called The British Railway Series. Well, I've been making a few videos of late, and thought I'd post some of my favourite episodes here.

Here's the very first episode - and compared to the later ones, is terrible. Worth putting here as it set the scene for what was to come:





This one below is Episode Seven - a snow episode! The first snow episode, I made an entirely new set from scratch and carefully reconstructed the original using the same buildings and track. Snow was made using Scale Scenic snow, washing powder and copiuous amounts of PVA glue...! This was the first episode to feature the entire cast of steam locomotives - Allen the A1 Pacific, Stephen the Holden B12, Sir Ralph the haughty A4, Herbert the nervous V2, Nigel the Gresley V3 and last but not least, the episode's protagonist, Tavish the mixed traffic engine!



Now this episode was for our first anniversary. It was intended to be a fun episode after Episode Ten: The Legacy of Gadwall. As it turns out, its been one of the more popular episodes, due to the inclusion of a certain Hawksworth Pannier tank...this episode is Episode Eleven: Hawk Eyed!




Now the most recent episode - Episode Fourteen: Silent Night. This was the last of the Christmas 2008 specials, and, like Episode Seven earlier, had the benefit of being a specially built set, albeit with new, better detailed buildings, lighting and soundtrack. Enjoy!

"Tornado at Copley Hill, 2011..."

Imagine the scene: it's the year 2011, and we are at DB Schenker's latest depot. Built on the old Wortley Triangle, the modern diesel depot is known as "New Copley". To the right of the red-brick diesel shed, permission was granted in 2009 for a specialist and volunteer run locomotive works to be built, for maintaining main line registered locomotives.

On shed, is the three year old Peppercorn A1 Pacific Tornado, recently repainted D1500, and, restored to main line use by the N.R.M - 60800 Green Arrow. It's a cold winter's eve, and the snow covers the track outside the "New Copley Hill" preservation centre.

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Okay, so none of that is technically possible - Tornado will be blue, but D1500 will still be in Coporate blue, and Green Arrow, mothballed recently, won't be back anytime soon.

But I can dream - and I thought I'd take a few photographs of my dream while I'm on shed, taking down a few numbers...D1500, 60800, 60163...