A casualty...

The planned weekend didn't go ahead due to illness, so instead we took the opportunity to finish all the outstanding work on the portable layout and then decided to construct two new 4ft x 2ft hinged boards to accommodate more sidings and replace the narrow section of track leading to the turntable & sidings.

I was never happy with the arrangement crossing into these sidings as it always left a piece of straight track without a board to fix it to and a girder bridge won't fit in the available space. Also after the previous streamlining it provided very little running space within the sidings which made it difficult to move the locos around without coming onto the main running loops. The new boards then required all the electronics and wiring to be transferred from the old ones, wires extended, new holes drilling etc. In short, after two days of work we managed about 30 minutes of running before it was time to dismantle everything and put back in the car.

Had major issues with the timber supports of the boards warping. Although it's always been a problem, this time it proved to be a right pain, particularly now that the boards are hinged together as there are some pronounced high spots on the edges which make track alignment very difficult. Once we finished we screwed the unhinged ends together in an attempt to straighten them out. I'll find out on the next run if this has been successful!

Sadly during the course of testing the finished wiring on the main station boards, I managed to drive the diesel shunter straight off the end of the board after hitting the wrong switch. It fell and hit the ground on its rear end, snapping the rear buffer, destroying the steps on one side and put a large crack in the rear. Not happy :(

Although it still runs, it doesn't sound good and then started to stutter & hesitate so I'll strip it and see what's going on. So I'm now on the lookout for a new shunter body.

Also had a very close shave with the SR EMU, it wasn't negotiating the corners, which was later found to be due to a trapped wire, but it too managed to come off on a bend and hit the floor, thankfully and miraculously the motor coach wasn't damaged and was fixed in minutes.

On the plus side, I've now got plenty of siding space for all the running stock, hopefully when we do the public display later in the year I can get everything out and running. I'll just have to park the shunter somewhere where the damage can't be seen!

The postman came...

I've now taken delivery of a replacement body and tender for my Silver King, along with a very nice City chassis that was sold as spares or repairs, and finally a very interesting repainted Duchess of Rutland. I also managed to replace the front coupling on the Southern repainted 2-6-4.

City of Birmingham has been in the collection for a few years but its total running time can be counted in minutes - it made one appearance on the portable layout one evening before it expired. It started life as a very poor City of London, which I bought as part of a biscuit tin full of scrap locos, Silver King was in the same tin!

I sourced the new body and tender as the old one was beyond saving, sadly though the wheels, axles and rod pins also turned out to be badly worn, it threw the rod pins after only a few laps of the layout, one of the wheels also fell off shortly afterwards so the loco was abandoned and left in bits - I've been scouring the Internet on and off ever since trying to find a reasonably priced chassis. The one I eventually found was totally seized, all 3 axles jammed and valve gear stuck but thankfully the armature checked out fine. A throrough clean, grease, oil, commutator clean and neo magnet (I "borrowed Sir Nigel's magnet) and within 30 minutes of arrival it was up and running with the nice shiny body and tender.

The Green 2-6-4 is an interesting repaint, it arrived last week and needed no work apart from a quick oiling. It'll look great pulling a rake of southern green coaches and who cares if they never actually painted them that colour in real life?!

My Silver King, as previously mentioned, was also in the biscuit tin of scrap locos. The tender was missing and the body paintwork too badly worn. I sourced a replacement body and tender but as they were sourced separately I ended up with a gloss body and matt tender. The paint quality wasn't that great either so when another body and tender came up for grabs I took the opportunity. The only minor problem was a missing handrail, which was quickly pinched from the old body.

Looking forward to giving these a good run next weekend.