October 2024 Forth and Clyde Area Group meeting

Our October meeting had fewer attendees than usual, for the second month running. The usual excuses were made... two members moonlighting to maintain an ageing P4 layout... 'flu bug going around ... dog ate my homework... However, Alistair, Alisdair, Alastair, Jim and Graham made their way to ESME's Almondell premises and unpacked their toolboxes. There was some discussion of the recent weekend workshop at Beckingham, enthusiastically attended by four FCAG members, who commented favourably on the spacious venue and superior catering. This was the scene on the second day.

Back at Almondell, our "Mearns Shed" project was, once again, not available, so we resorted to working on our own models. Alistair worked on backscenes. Alisdair worked on ... something ... he had his tools spread out anyway. Jim had brought along a trial motor bogie for an Underground train. The motor, temporarily located by a blob of blu-tak in this view, is displaced to one side to keep the height of the bogie within the motor coach envelope.

 

Jim is not happy with this iteration - lessons have been learned, components will be recovered for re-use, and the scrap man will take the rest.

Graham had 3D-printed some power car side louvres for Jim's project.

He spent the time trying to add Simpson springs to a Fence Houses J72 chassis which had been the focus of his weekend workshop endeavours.

Alastair was also busy with a 3D printer project - in his case, for a Class 04 shunter, which grew out of last year's FCAG chassis-building session. Several of us worked on Farish replacement chassis using the original Association kit design, and found its fold-up gearbox to be a source of frustration. (The design has since been changed). Alastair started to investigate a 3D printed block to take Association bearings, and ended up printing the motor mount, side rods and body as well. The project (a skill-development exercise as much as anything else) continues.

The sun came out in the afternoon. Through the meeting room window we were diverted by the sight and sound of a rake of 7" gauge Gresley coaches behind a blue diesel. It was hard not to take a closer look.

The owner generously birled all five of us us round ESME's extensive woodland circuit behind his battery-electric model of a Glasgow Eastfield diesel-electric (37408 "Loch Rannoch"), then we were all offered a shot behind the controls. The Chairman, just a wee laddie at heart, got first go. As a qualified passenger guard he was impressed by the vacuum train brakes and spent some time applying and releasing them. Finally, off he went.

Jim makes no secret of his lifelong scorn of the Diesel engine and the East Coast companies, so he was torn, but as a fair-minded man he overcame his doubts and stepped forward. Onlookers detected the ghost of a smile on his features as he completed his circuit.

 

He'll be forever known as "Diesel Jim".

September Forth and Clyde Area Group Meeting

Our September Meeting was a relatively small affair, with just three regular members, Martin, James and Stuart attending, although our numbers were bolstered with the attendence of Tony, a stalwart of the Grampian Area Group who had decided to travel down to the Central Belt to join us.

It was reported that the Highland Railway Association held their AGM conflicting with this meeting, and with some of our members dual (or more) hatted, they had attended this AGM over our meeting. "Tsk, Tsk" I hear you intone, what could be more important than 2mm Modelling?

There was no overarching theme for the meeting, and for the first time in a long while, Mearns Shed was not in attendance, and as such, we were all labouring on our own projects.

Stuart was continuing work on his very impressive Mill building.  He was continuing adding roofing strips, manufactured to custom order by York Model Making to Stuart's specifications.

Stuart intends to take the complete building to the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Society's AGM, which is planning to visit the prototype!

Our guest Tony, was working on finescaling a Farish 4F.  This will form part of the fleet for running on the Grampian Area Group's layout, Dunallander - see the Grampian Area Group Blog for more details on Dunallander.

James was working on some PCB soldered pointwork.  He had eschewed chairs, and was instead, soldering rail straight to the sleepers.  He intends to build a short dockside shunting plank/test track to fit in a Really Useful Box nominally designed to take wrapping paper.  James has previously built chaired turnouts for Mearns Shed, and decided that these turnouts and plain track will be buried in the concrete and/or cobbles of the dockside, and thus, that level of detail is probably not required.

Martin was also working on PCB soldered pointwork.  He intends to use Easitrac for plain track, and soldered construction for turnouts, even considering classic Scottish interlaced turnouts in the Goods Yard for a bit of additional visual interest.  Martin spent most of the meeting making up a pair of common crossings which will form the main element of the crossover.  He uses the crossing nose web etches available from the association, necessitating the use of chairs, which, whilst he has with him, have not yet been deployed in anger.

(Martin swears he took a photograph of his work, but it isn't on the camera reel for his phone.  He may take a photo at home and add this to the blog later...)

After a few hours of modelling, and the ingestion of lunch, the tools were gradually put down and conversation began on topics such as life, the universe and everything, interspaced with more modelling and more conversation.

Our next meeting will be once again at Almondell on Saturday 19th October (note the later than usual meeting month).  Further details in the Association Newsletter.

(Updated for spelling and grammar - Martin's first language is allegedly English...)

August Forth and Clyde Area Group meeting

Alisdair, Alastair, Alistair, Jim, James, Stuart, Nigel, Steve, Andy and Graham convened at the Edinburgh Society of Model Engineers' spacious Almondell clubrooms for our August meeting.

Members worked away quietly (for the most part) at their personal projects. Stuart is installing lighting in his mill building using Woodland Scenics' "Just Plug" system. This includes a diffusion film which is applied to windows to disguise non-detailed interiors - apparently Stuart does not propose to spend the next few years modelling textile looms.

Alasdair was making up Electra couplings using Tamiya long-nosed photo etch pliers. He prefers to work without a jig, instead using a detailed drawing he rustled up in SolidWorks, which shows the relationship of the coupling to the mounting he includes in his 3D wagon prints. 

Alisdair was working on detailing an EFE Austerity tank, adding finer handrails and the smokebox "star" added by many Scottish drivers to their locomotives in pre-grouping days. The tradition has been followed at the Bo'ness and Kinneil railway, where Alisdair blows his whistle and wields a fishbolt spanner, on their No 19. Here he is explaining the matter to James.

The main business of the day, apart from the usual conversation and discussion, was a short presentation from Nigel and James on "doing DCC properly and cheaply", prompted by recent interest from group members. This focused on the options for inexpensive control systems, rather than on DCC technology itself or its installation in models. The notes below are via the imperfect filters of my brain and notepad, so any errors or misunderstandings are mine, and not due to to Nigel or James.

We learned about four potential routes to a low-budget but effective DCC control for a typical 2mm modeller: these are MERG CBUS, DCC-EX, SPROG, and JMRI.

MERG's system at its most basic has four elements: a command station, one or more handsets, a plug-in point for the handset, and a DC power supply. The first three come as kits from MERG which the modeller assembles. A minimal setup  costs about £90 currently (plus £29 to join MERG for a year) with additional handsets at about £40 each. A module can be added for connection to a computer's USB port, or to boost power above one amp (for larger scales). Its main attraction is the excellent, highly ergonomic handset; its high success and satisfaction rate; the good documentation and community support from MERG; and assembly using normal 2mm soldering skill levels with through-hole technology components rather than surface mount devices. Points against are the lack of a "recall stack" to select quickly between a small pool of models; and (depending on your point of view) the effort required to cut through MERG's enthusiastic explanation of all the other things they do to focus on basic DCC. The modeller is left to make their own choice of enclosure for the elements, which can be as compact or spacious as desired. Here is Nigel's, which uses a diecast metal enclosure principally because he had one available. Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo of James' version, which uses a plastic enclosure.

DCC-EX is based on the Arduino microcontroller. Elements for a basic system are an Arduino Mega; Arduino Motor and WiFi shields; and (depending on various factors) a voltage regulator and/or power supply. A mobile phone or tablet is used as a low-cost user interface. It is possible to make a basic system for £40; a kit of parts (without case) costs around £90. Its advantages are minimal soldering and simple access to automation functions. Disadvantages are the lack of a low-priced physical controller; support requiring use of the Discord social media platform; and the need to invest time in understanding the software architecture. Here is Nigel's DCC-EX implementation:

A third possibility is the SPROG, a commercially-manufactured family of DCC controllers. At its simplest, this offers a single-board solution with a USB connector at one end and connections for power supply and track feed at the other end for £80 including a power supply. Unlike the MERG and DCC-EX solutions, a computer must be constantly connected for the system to work, and physical throttles are restricted to relatively expensive devices such as the Train Control Systems UWT-50.  It excels as a simple and portable test-track controller using a laptop.

Also mentioned was JMRI, an open-source, very capable, very elaborate software suite for model railways, compatible with almost all DCC systems. Decoder Pro provides a visual interface for programming DCC CV values: it is compatible with most decoders and keeps an audit trail of changes as they are made. The user interface for layout control is from a computer screen or from a mobile phone.

In conclusion, choice between these four is driven by personal preference for the various user interface options, and (for the choices requiring it) whether a computer is available. As for most things in life, there is a simplicity-flexibility payoff to understand and factor in to a decision as well.

The talk was very illuminating - thanks Nigel and James for generously sharing your knowledge and experience.

The rest of the afternoon passed in gentle contemplation of these and other matters, and by 5 p.m. everyone had gone home peacefully.

July Forth and Clyde Area Group

Fresh from our trip North to the Perth Model Railway show last month, the members of the Forth and Clyde Area Group convened at the Almondell Model Engineering Centre for our monthly get-together.  Some 9 members were present: a full compliment of Als, Alisdair, Alistair and Alastair, Graham, Andy, Simon, James, Martin, and for the first time in the flesh Jack.

Mearns Shed, fresh from exhibition, had thrown up some operational issues that were to be remedied.  Below we can see the Glorious Leader, wearing the Optivisor of Office, doing the ceremonial "checking the floor for the bit I dropped!"

There had been some ad-hoc repairs at the show, as at least two of the turnout blades had separated from their operating mechanisms, and Alisdair was hard at work repairing these.  There was some additional building and grounds work ongoing - the beautiful plastikard coaling stage, based on an example on the Highland Railway at Aviemore, had proved to be a little too fragile for show use, and so Alisdair, the architect and master builder of the initial, had beefed up some of the support in brass strip and solder.

Simon had brought along a recently purchased Class 27, yet to be rewheeled, and a rake of coaches that was sent running around ESME's test track.  The loco, and the rake it's pulling is prototypical for Simon's West Highland Line Extension layout, Glenfinnan.  Once it all has proper wheels, of course.

Simon was also continuing work on the Ministry of Supply tank wagons he'd brought along the previous month - these too are destined for Glenfinnan and represent the heavy fuel oil that was shipped to Mallaig for use in the fishing fleet.  Simons ex-LNER Fish vans that brought the produce from the boats back down to the Fish Markets and industry of Glasgow have previously featured in these esteemed pages.

James had arrived with a laptop and some paper he'd printed from Templot and and asked for some help in arranging his file so it printed the way he wanted.  Nigel stepped up to help, and we can see in the photograph below the pair staring intently at the track plan and using the many options Templot allows to make the subtle changes required.

Alistair had brought his supplies and was working on some remedial work on the backscene - this being taken away for further remedial work.  Alistair has also been volunteered to create a backscene for the ESME layout and was taking various measurements and sketches to prepare for this.

James was also working on the lighting - the arrangement back at Perth had involved a strip of colour lights, but the feeling was this wasn't required, so James was remedying this.

Below we see Alisdair hard at work, with Andy and James offering helpful (or indeed, "helpful") comments and advice.

Martin was continuing his experiments with PCB trackwork - this time a B7 Crossover which includes 4 25ft timbers, whether entirely prototypical or not, he had decided to compromise to help improve the strength of the build.  Starting from a templot printout, all of the sleeper strip was down and gapped by the end of the meeting, with the straight stockrails added to each side and the first common crossing ready for soldering.  He did. in true blog-author fashion, forget to photograph his own work.

Jack had brought along some of his first adventures in 2FS, as well as his laptop and DCC programming rig.  He envisages an idealised 1970s scene with DMUs taking up the main haulage duties - he had brought along a modified RTR Class 122 that had been stripped and primed, with the route indicator panel plated over with a cut to size piece of floppy disc!  Martin didn't get any photos of this because he was intent in soldering a common crossing... the Chairman has said he'll have words...

Graham had brought along 2FSed J94 he had picked up at the Association mega-meet at Derby back in May.  He was disassembling it to understand how it all went together.  Hopefully he remembered how he took it apart, and doesn't have any bits left at the end of the process.  That would be unfortunate and this author has never done anything like that before...

And here endeth our tale for another month.  The next meeting of FCAG will be Saturday 10th August.  Details of the meeting, and contact information for the Area Group are in the Association Newsletter that accompanies the magazine six times a year.  We do encourage waifs, strays and the North British Railways modeller, so don't hesitate to get in touch and/or pop by to say hello.  We are a friendly bunch - and welcome modellers of all skills and experiences.

Forth and Clyde Area Group at the Perth Model Railway Show 2024

This weekend, the Forth and Clyde Area Group unveiled Mearns Shed to the general public at the Perth Model Railway Exhibition.

A lot of work has gone into the layout in the last few months - much of which has been covered in this blog, but the weekend show, held in the Fair City, was the first time many of the components had come together.

This, atmospheric, shot, shamelessly stolen from Graham, shows a mix of locos on the shed.

An ex-North British C15 sits over an Ash pit, an ex-Caledonian Jumbo waits for the instructions to proceed to the coaling road for a top up, whilst an ex-LMS Black 5 takes on water. 

Hinted in the foreground, a Sulzer Type 2, sits, engine off, wondering what all the fuss is about. Whilst in the very foreground a short engineering train of a Shark Brake Van, four Grampus wagons, a Warwell and an ex-LMS 16t unfitted Brake van rest from overnight duties. 

Most of the locomotives and stock are from the collection of Alisdair - if you search back far enough in the blog, you'll find posts of the construction of all three Steam Locos!

The Coaling stage, built by Alisdair, is based on a Highland Railway example found in Aviemore. The coal bins seen on the stage were used to move coal from the wagons in the siding to the locomotive that sat under the shelter if the roof.

The Shed is based on Abroath, with a similar design seen in Forfar, is a 3D print with etched detailing, designed in Fusion 3D and printed by Graham. The etched detailing is from artwork by Jim. The shed was assembled and painted by Martin, who was still working on it at midnight on Friday before the show. A further design iteration of the shed has been produced and will be assembled and painted in due course.

The grounded van is an Association Midland outside framed van, converted, assembled and painted by Richard.

The water tower is a plastikard construct by Jim, it is detailed with brick paper, the tank being an etch of Jim's design.

The water cranes are designed, 3D printed and painted by Alastair.

The bothy is a plastikard construction by Richard. This does have an open door and an LED to provide the illusion of a warm fire where the shed workers can take a well earned break, but sadly this wasn't wired in or functional this weekend.

The backscene was imagined and painted by Alistair - it gives a fine impression of a Scottish Town, with a mix of residential and industrial buildings backing onto this Shed.

There is lots still to do to finish the layout, but overall, a fantastic first outing.

Of course, whilst the main interest was naturally the Shed, and the moving locos, the Further North Road Show was on hand to extol the virtues of 2mm Modelling to the General public. Modelling demonstrations were ongoing throughout the weekend, and lots of people were given the Sermon according to Alisdair.

FCAG were not the only exhibitors of 2mm Finescale Modelling present at Perth this weekend. In fact, directly next to us were the Grampian Area Group, who had brought along the viaduct module from Dunallander.

This lovely shot, stollen from Graham because someone forgot to get their camera out, captures a mid-1960s scene in Central Scotland. An ex-LNER A4 on its final passenger duties on Glasgow-Aberdeen 3-hour expresses, a Black 5 on a loose coupled freight from Perth to Stirling and Oban - Glasgow trains on the branch towards Callander.

This is hopefully a taster of the whole layout, which may be at Perth in 2025. For more information, please see the Grampian Area Groups Blog.

Now with the excitement of the show out of the way, and a countdown to next year's event, the next meeting of FCAG will be on Saturday 13th July, at Almondell. Further information in the Association Newsletter.

 

June 2024 Forth and Clyde Area Group Meeting

The Edinburgh Society of Model Engineers premises, the Almondel Model Engineering Centre, were a hive of frantic activity this Saturday last, not just because of the (in)famous Taylor Swift Era's tour happening just ten miles down the road at Murrayfield, and an ESME open day on the Sunday.

With just 14 short days until it's debut at the Perth Model Railway Exhibition, the Forth and Clyde Area Group met to continue work on the layout and other projects in 2mm Scale(s).  Present were Alisdair, Alistair, Graham, Andy, James, Simon, Stuart, Nigel, Steve and Martin.

Martin, who was definately not late to the meeting because he'd left the layout on the dining room table and started driving to the meeting, (no definately not...), had been working on the scenics, and now, the slightly greener layout was re-united with the backscene.

There's still a lot of work to do - James took over, starting to add the LED strips that will form the integral lighting.  Alisdair and Andy worked meanwhile on the main board where the agressive scenic-ing of the layout had foulded one turnout, and another required some gentle persuasion, backed up with threats of violence and other unspeakable acts, to operate reliably...

Graham had brought along the latest print of the eponymous Mearns Shed.  This was dry-fitted and posed to check clearances with Alisdair's Black Five, which had some slight issues with fitting its cylinders through the exactly to scale doors Graham had made.  This time it fitted perfectly, with a whole quarter milimeter to spare on either side, requiring, we think, a "limited clearance" board or two to be fitted as part of the paint job.

Custody of the shed has passed to Martin for assembly and painting ready for the Perth Show.  Something he plans to tackle this weekend with as much airbrushing as possible given the available time...

Elsewhere in the room, and hiding from being handed jobs relating to Mearns Shed, other modelling was occuring.  Stuart had brought along his very impressive Mill Building.  He was working on roofing the extention he had previously been working on.

I'm not sure that the photos give the true scale of this building - the main building is easily a cubic foot, if not greater, and this extention - painstakingly recreated from period photographs, site visits to other mills in Lancashire and various books on the subject - adds at least another foot.  This will be the centrepiece of the layout, being both rail served and having trains running on a long viaduct behind it.  

Simon had brought along some goodies.  Firstly, he was using ESME's American Outline N Gauge layout to run an extrodinarily long train.  Simon has an interest in American outline modelling and occasionally brings along parts of his collection to run.  In the photo below Alistair watches the trains pass - he has volunteered and/or been voluntold to produce a backscene for parts of the ESME layout, and seing the train skim by in the environment seems to be inspirational...

Simon was also working away on some 2FS goodies in the form of six Fuel tankers, formerly of Shop 2 and now sadly out of print.  Simon is modelling Glenfinnan on the West Highland Line Extention which saw some fuel traffic for the various fishing boats and ferries that offer from the port of Mallaig (to this day, though fuel is now transported by road rather than rail).

Simon was finishing up the chassis' at the meeting and had started the next stage of drilling the whitemetal wagon ends to take the stanchions which support the tanks on the chassis.

Heeding the Glorious Leaders call for DCC locos to do some track testing on Mearns Shed, Martin had dutifully (finally) gotten round to fitting DCC chips to his diesel fleet the evening before the meeting.  Then when placed on his test track, all of them had failed to do, well, anything.  Martin had brought along his DCC Controller, a Gaugemaster Prodigy Express, and asked forlornly "help?"

Nigel very kindly answered this plea for help and spent most of the meeting working to fault find with the controller and locos.  Here Nigel is seen fixing the pickups on a set of Class 20 Bogies which were making poor contact thanks to the additional back-to-back space on 2FS wheels rather than N Gauge wheels.  Other issues included, but were not limited to - connecting the DCC handset to the controller by the wrong socket, an upside down DCC chip, and the worm gear not connecting to the top of the tower in a Class 26.

By the end of the meeting, Martin had a working DCC system, and two locos working well under DCC.  Another requiring some further dissassembly to try and understand why there is intermittent issues with the worm and gear train...

The next gathering of the Forth and Clyde Area Group will be the aforementioned Perth Model Railway Show, the weekend of 29th and 30th June at the Dewars Centre, Perth (Scotland).  FCAG will be flying the 2FS flag with both the Further North Roadshow and the public debut of Mearns Shed.  With plenty of other layouts, traders, societies and a dedicated Finescale Zone, it's certainly worth the Trip to visit us, and the Grampian Area Group on Stands 28 and 29, Hall 1.

Our next scheduled meeting is Satruday 13th July at Almondell.  Further details in the Association Newsletter.

May Forth and Clyde Area Group Meeting

Delayed by a week due to the festivities of the Expo2mm down in Derby on our usual meeting date, the Forth and Clyde Area Group met this Saturday last at our usual haunt in the Central Belt.  Despite a near perfect day weather wise, or perhaps because of it, we had a high turnout with 10 members present, namely, Alisdair, Alastair, Alistair, Jim, James, Simon, Graham, Stephen, Martin, and new member Steve who signed up back at Model Rail Scotland.

With time fast ticking down towards its first public showing up in Perth, the weekend of 29th and 30th June, most of this months work focused on Mearns Shed.  James had custody of the "dead penguin" as the boxed up layout is sometimes referred to, and had been finishing work on the electrics - specifically the lighting, which is to be mounted inside the lid of the box.

At the meeting James finished fitting the LED strips, and fitted the supply wires, opening a hole in the baseboard for these to protrude through.  James is photographed here, deep in contemplation over routing of these wires back to the power source.

Alistair had also been working on Mearns shed at home.  He had been tasked to work on the backscene, and is photographed here putting some finishing touches on the canvas.

The backscene itself is  thing of beauty, it almost seems a shame to be covering bits of it with the railway...

The backscene was trial fitted once James had finished.  The layout will sit on top of the blue crate (hidden by curtains) t bring it up to viewers eye level.  Alisdair, wearing the Optivisor of Office, squints from afar at the framing.

The backscene was trimmed to size, and the structures and buildings that were ready for planting were put into place to give the feel of the layout.  An improbable pairing of locomotives was found and placed on the layout to help get the general feel.

And it looks alarmingly like a layout!  With the latest revision of the Engine Shed itself taking pride of place.

Alisdair had brought along his fleet of Locos and was using his Black Five with its outside cylinder blocks to gauge structure clearance.  Graham had brought along his latest revision of the Shed itself, and it was found that the shed doors were just marginally too narrow for the Black Five.  Graham was chastised for staying too close to the prototype and not taking into consideration these sorts of things.  A new shed frontage with approximately 0.5mm wider doors will be produced.

Martin will take custody of the Layout to put down the ground covers and some other scenic work.  Watch this space for further updates!

The light blue engine seen in the previous shots is Jim's complete CR900 Class 4-4-0, known also as a Dunalistair III.  Regular readers of this page, or indeed RMWeb will have seen this come to life from CAD drawing to bare etches to the finished article.

Whilst the main thrust was on Mearns Shed, others were involved in their own projects.  Simon was working on signals

Alastair was working on his 3D printed NBR Mineral Wagons, applying transfers.  Someone forgot to take a photograph and can only apologise for his misdeed.

Martin was working on Turnouts.  Having built a number of Fintrax Turnouts over the last two years, Martin had been having issues laying them, finding the crossing V or knuckle (or both!) were popping out of the 3D printed chairs.  Whether this is because Martin had damaged the chairs in the construction, or his methods of laying track require some more finess is unclear, but he had decided to try his hand at PCB soldered construction.

Starting from a Templot printout at the start of the meeting, by the end, a mostly functioning turnout had been constructed - this was just a practice to get the feel for building these by hand - this representing the second attempt, so fitting of a tiebar was skipped on this occasion.  Martin intends to use the "Standard" Chairplates available from the Association for "the real thing".

Our next meeting shall be the usual second Saturday of the Month, in this case Satruday 8th June, usual time and place - details in the Association Newsletter.  We are a mostly welcoming crowd - we have recorded at four meetings since last reported biting, and the last one was a provocation... - and accept waifs and strays from other Area Groups, or of no fixed modelling abode who may be visiting the area, and/or people interested in 2FS modelling and wish to see the one true way...