Loco for sale - Take 2

Well, Jane didn't quite make here reserve first time out on eBay, so she's just been relisted with a lower reserve - let's hope she goes this time...! http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130176620417

The weather was sufficently un-foul today that we managed to get the Baguley-Drewery doing a few laps with the Hudson tippers, once the rain water was emptied out of them!

Kew

Well, I managed to escape for a couple of hours to the Kew Bridge Steam Museum Live Steam Model Railway Show on Sunday. Seemed a bit better than last year in terms of layouts & stands, although mostly pretty similar. Nice to See Brian Caton's 4mm / OO9 live steam layout again; fantastic to see live steam-hauled prototypical length main line trains and very impressive to see live steam working at this scale - especially the meths-fired OO9 saddle tanks.

Also nice to see Wrightscale's prototypes on display - the open cab Kerr-Stuart Tattoo looked great, as did the Bagnall wing tanks. Other than those I didn't see much that had me reaching for the credit card, though it's been a good year (having acquired a Baguley-Drewery & a Mortimer), so I should be quite content! Perhaps I should be saving for the rumoured Accucraft Countess, which according to Brandbright will be announced next month, though if memory serves, at over a grand...

The only other thing I realised is that it's impossible to get decent shots of indoor railway layouts, or moving quarry Hunslets in foul weather with my somewhat ancient digital camera! The traditional ride behind Cloister was a delight though, even in truly grim weather. The rest of the museum as ever forms a great backdrop to the event - well worth a visit by itself.

Weekend Steam Up

Decided to steam Cackler this weekend, as she's not been steamed again since her re-build over the summer. She ran OK, but of all the locos on the line, seems to be the most challenging to get running at a pleasingly slow speed! She spent a good deal of the time in steam with the safety valve lifting or on the verge of doing so and would frequently stall on the gradient at the back of the loop. Although often self starting she would then continue at high speed; cornering almost on two wheels! Although slow speed running on a circuit with tight curves is challenging, it would be great to get this loco (and her driver) running better. By comparison, the recently acquired Mortimer seems a good deal more controllable. Top priority will be relaying the rear of the loop to take out the gradient, which should allow more measured running. I also wonder whether adding a smaller bore chuff pipe may help tame Cackler?!?

Railway Progress and Plans

The garden railway at present consists of a basic circuit, with a long siding. Track is Peco SM32, some flexible, some 'set-track' curves giving a minimum radius of 2'6" - no Garrett's here I'm afraid. Track is laid onto paving blocks which are laid on ballast into the soil. At the moment the track isn't fixed firmly onto the blocks, although I may end up doing this to encourage the flexitrack to stay in the desired shape.
The circuit is fairly level, though there is a slight rise at the back, which I need to sort out, as the steam locos tend to slow and then speed up as they go over it. The circuit isn't huge, but large shrubs in the bed conceal some of the track at the rear, which helps to disguise this. Most trains run are fairly short, which also helps maintain some sense of illusion.
The current plan (subject to a policy of continuous 'improvement'!) is to develop the siding onto a triangular junction, leading round to the back of the garden to a simple terminus with a run-around loop, allowing extended out and back running. I hope to get the remainder of the track laid this winter, but we'll see how it goes - life with little ones means it's hard to find much un-interrupted time. Stay tuned for further developments...

Loco for sale!!!

Well, my recent acquisition (an Accucraft Mortimer), means that I have to move a loco on, so I have put my IP Engineering Jane up for sale on e-Bay. Although she was my first loco (sniff!), I have two oscillators, so one has to go & it's Jane. It'll be interesting to see what she fetches at auction (& whether she makes her reserve!)...
Follow the action here: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130170678265

Garden Railways on TV

I've added a section for Garden Railway related programmes on TV - although these programmes are on fairly infrequently, if they are on, then the widgets in this section should tell you when & where (disclaimer: I am one of the team behind the site that provides the widgets; www.locatetv.com).
So far I have the Garden Railway series that originally aired on Discovery, plus an episode of Model Magic where the presenter builds a Roundhouse Lady Anne kit. Let me know if there are others I should add!

The Garden Railway Blog is born!

Well, here we are; my first venture into the Web 2.0 world of blogging! I'm not really sure how it will work out, how often I'll blog, and I have a hunch it may well end up being 'write only' (no Google Ads fortune here!). But I am interested to see what kind of content I can stitch together using UGC sites (this blog, youtube et al.) without having to directly host it.

And topic of this adventure in self-expression?! My garden railway! We moved into our current house nearly 6 months ago, and in that time I've laid a simple circuit of track, so at least I've been able to steam up my locos, and have have a few running sessions. My main interest is in live steam, but I have a couple of battery locos for instant running when necessary.

Anyway, that's all for now...