For the purposes of checking the alignment of the board joints Himself has been testing them with what prove to be our most derailable stock: the B Wagons.
Or to be more precise, my resign cast B Wagons.
This, I'm sure, is just because when running empty they are absolutely featherweight, unlike the Worsley Works kits for the earlier, flat-ended design, which are made of brass.
I suppose one idea might be to fill them with some removable loads of loco ash, as these wagons have made quite regular trips up the WHR carrying all the clinker generated at Boston Lodge to be used as infill.
At any rate, I saw them sitting parked on the layout on the usually inaccessible S-bend and thought they made a good subject for some arty shots which also show off the ruined barn well.
Let's face it, there's not a lot of modelling gets done in the run up to Christmas, so I've got into the habit on the blog of taking stock of what we have achieved over the course of a year.
Quite often I end up surprising myself with how much has been done, because progress on a model can be such a haphazard affair that you sometimes don't realise how many things you have been working on over the period.
January
At the start of the year Himself was putting the finishing touches to our scratch built model of the new FR service car 125.
A few miles down the coast I was starting work on one of the more obvious missing pieces on Bron Hebog - the ruined barn which sits in the middle of the S bend.
And after many years sitting in primer Himself got around to painting the exquisite model of Britomartwhich was built up from a Brian Madge Quarry Hunslet kit (which are sadly filed under H for Hen's Teeth currently, more's the pity.)
February
There were other locomotive loose ends which Himself set about tidying up earlier this year, including the long-standing issue we had with the wheels on our Welsh Pony.
This model was built - with extreme difficulty! - from another now unavailable kit (do you spot a trend here?) and the problem was that one of the wheels on it was slightly less than round.
Our little pony ran with a nasty limp.
Fortunately, one of my contacts who knows the manufacturer was able to obtain a replacement set of wheels, for which we are most grateful.
Himself pulled the chassis part and replaced them, with the result that it now runs much more satisfactorily as you can see below.
Which is more than can be said about the real Welsh Pony! (Patience is a virtue...)
As milder weather arrived he ventured into the garage and began scenic work on the layout again, making a start on the scale miles of post and wire fencing alongside the line.
I was very taken with an overhead shot he took of the farmyard area, which I think showed off the subtlety of the scenic work he's been doing.
March
While that was going on Himself had been painting the old barn which was ready to be tried out in position on the layout, and looked very effective.
We'd also taken a radical step into a new technology: 3D printing.
For his birthday I bought him a copy of the Robex design for the unique Quarry Hunslet Lilla which I had been admiring for some time after seeing pictures of models which other people had made.
Until now all our locomotives have had brass or white metal bodies.
Himself found that bits fell off this one from virtually the first time he held it, which didn't do much to endear him to the medium.
On my workbench I had begun another stretch of house building with the intention of finally finishing the Oberon Woods estate scene.
Because we use acrylic paint on the buildings (as preferred by the Artistic Director) rather than the enamels that we use on the trains, the process is a lot swifter due to the difference in the drying times.
We still have to complete the landscaping around the barn which is just resting on its plot in the photos here.
Once it has a few trees camouflaging its position I think it will blend into the scene nicely.
So that's one of the big outstanding jobs ticked off, now I really need to get on with those remaining houses..
Having finished the slates on the old barn roof I dropped it off at Himself's place, ready for him to paint it.
We dropped it in position for a couple of quick photos.
Above is the view the punters get, and below is the side we see from the operating area.
It doesn't look very subtle in the landscape in plain white styrene like this but it shouldn't take too long for Himself to make it blend in rather more.
My first project of 2017 is complete - or as least as much as I'm going to be doing on it.
The old barn, which sits in the middle of the upper part of the S bend is now ready for Himself to paint.
He's been nagging me for years about this.
(Okay, maybe nagging is a bit of an exaggeration - try regular reminders)
It was, however, one of the very obviously unfinished parts of the layout along with the rock face of Cutting Mawr and the filling the Oberon Wood estate up with houses.
The houses are what I plan to turn my attention to next.
I looks as if I shall have to design them myself this time as pleas for plans have gone unanswered.
I probably should have done it before I'd got 90% of the way through the build, but at the weekend I took the old barn over to Himself's place to see what it looked like in place on Bron Hebog.
The reason for testing it out is because I reduced the dimensions of the building by around 15% compared to the mock up which had been made by the Artistic Director.
It's always hard to judge when a model is still in naked styrene because it will inevitably stick out like a sore thumb, but I reckon that should be OK.
In fact it will have to be because I'm not about to do all that scribing again!
This last week I've been working on the roof of the old barn - the end that still has one, that is.
The challenge with this has been to make it look suitably distressed.
On all the houses I've been building for the layout I've been able to use embossed plastic sheets but here the only realistic solution is bespoke slating.
I use strips of very thin card - or perhaps, more accurately described as very thick paper - onto which I have run through a photocopier with repeated design of rows of slates.
I cut out a row and then slice with the blade on the markings between each slate, leaving them connected by a sliver along the top edge, and then I glue them, row upon row, onto a styrene sheet using PVA.
Doing it this way I can break the row at any point to create the look of a missing slate, or one that has slipped.
In case you were wondering why there is the triangular marking at the top it's because I first created the pattern when I was asked to make a model of Minffordd weigh house as a retirement gift for FR permanent way legend Fred Howes.
There's been a two week break in the barn build on account of me having to run off another batch of wagon kit castings for sale on the Narrow Planet webshop.
With those done I was able to put in an hour's work the other night and I had a go at fitting some rafters and battens on the front section of the building.
The rear is to have a dilapidated covering of slates which I think I shall represent by using strips very thin card, sliced to mark the individual slates - a number of which will be slipped or missing entirely.
At last I can put my dental tool away because the final wall of the barn has been scribed and the seven walls are now joined together.
The effort now turns to the roofs.
The higher section, at the rear, is to be represented in a mostly complete state although there will be a number of slates slipped or missing, with some areas of daylight opening up.
The front section will have just the rafters remaining in a suitably distressed state.
Scribing the barn walls has advanced steadily, although I might have hoped to have got the job finished by now.
I am, however, onto the final section of wall, the gable at the rear which includes the window which I suppose gave access to the hay loft once upon a time.
Once that is fixed in place I can give it a try out in position on the layout before moving onto the roof.
Modelling that in an advanced stage of dilapidation is going to be interesting, but I hope, fun too.
After my last post about starting work on the model of the old barn a few people got in touch to ask about how I scribe stonework into the styrene?
(And a few others wanted to question my sanity...)
One of the questions was about what kind of tool I used.
I don't know exactly what it's called but this picture may help.
I've read some suggestions that it's some kind of dental tool - which rather puts me off ever going back to the dentist, if you ask me - but all I know is that I picked it up on a tool stand at an exhibition more years ago than I can remember.
I use the tool a the left hand end - the sort of pointy-spoon-shaped piece.
I hold the shaft very close to the bottom in the same way as you would a pen. The point is very sharp and it doesn't that that much pressure and a couple of passes to gouge out a convincing amount of styrene.
There are different types of plasticard, I know, but the stuff I use is probably a lot softer than you might think it is if you've never seen this done before.
The effect, I think, is rather good, especially at a distance.
The only problem is that the surface is much too smooth very rough or lumpy stones, but it's quite acceptable (to me anyway) for walls built out of Welsh slate blocks which can be quite flat.
Besides which, once it's six feet away from the viewer, as this will be, who is ever really going to notice?
I've picked up my scalpel for the first time in 2017.
My first project this year will be to fill in one of the very glaring gaps on Bron Hebog, the old barn which sits in the middle of the S bend as the line climbs out of Beddgelert.
Usually with the buildings on the layouts it is cutting out the windows from the blank pieces which is the most bothersome task.
This model doesn't have so many of those to worry about, and even though I will have to scribe all the dry stone effect into the styrene what's really going to be tricky is depicting the roof.
You can't really see it from the angle in this photo but the smaller half of the building at the front was in a very dilapidated state at the nominal date we set the layout, even though some renovation work has taken place since.
There were many slipped slates and large areas where the rafters are exposed - it's going to be quite a challenge to get right.
As the weeks go by Himself is making more space in the railway room - sorry, garage - and he's been able to put up a second board so that he can fix the final position of the farmhouse.
The model appeared in a more basic form at the show at Dinas last year but this is the first time we've been able to place it in its spot on the layout since it was finished - or at least all the construction done.
Further down the track is the site of the barn which I have yet to make.
Once upon a time this was a derelict shell but in more recent years it has been completely renovated.
That's one of the challenges with modelling a real place which continually evolves.
There are other new farm buildings which have been put up in the intervening period as well, but we're not going to model any of them and so the barn will be done as a ruin.
I understand that the Artistic Director has some plans in hand so that can soon be added onto my To Do list which is lengthening once more as Boston Lodge churns out the carriages.
Broadcaster, writer and railway modeller.
Best known for the 009 Festiniog Railway layout 'Dduallt' which I built with my father David in the early 1990's and which is still making appearances on the exhibition circuit.
