AJN - some modelling historyStreatham Hill
1964: MY oldest model photo, taken while still at school.
All bar two of the wagons still exist so probably lasted longer than the prototypes!
Streatham Hill
1966: who remembers these wagons?
The loco wore oval holes in its 1/16th brass frames while working on the layout of the Wimbledon MRC (second oldest model railway club). It was badly damaged in a house move decades ago but has recently been repaired and given a new chassis.
Streatham Hill
1967: A poor photo of a ruler! (Checking distance to ensure good focussing.)
The Blaenavon wagon had working brake gear: it was damaged beyond repair in our move to Brazil.
Streatham Hill
1968: last photo before finishing uni, marrying and moving to Manchester where I joined the third oldest model railway club (MMRS).
The Dean single was surprisingly good hauling at least a couple of dozen wagons.
Trackwork was ABC moulded chairs in fibre bases, points were all hand built, which was a good grounding for moving to P4.
Nootdorp
Marriage, moving to the Netherlands and starting a family got in the way of modelling, so it was the end of the seventies before a new layout was started. By 1980 progress was visible.
Nootdorp
1980: the loco had its OO chassis bushed out to take P4 wheels - it did not run well! It took till 1998 to get a new chassis fitted and tweaked, but it still has its original Romford motor.
Nootdorp
1980: this was as far as the layout got.
São Paulo
Brasil saw no layout construction, but some wagons were built.
The humidity damaged or destroyed a large number of our slides, as may have been visible on some of the photos.
Wassenaar
1984: on return from Brasil a start was made on an N gauge layout to be based on Lisse in Holland.
This stopped following moves to Belgium, Japan and back to Belgium, with a couple of house moves there. Modelling was basically restricted to occasional wagon building.
Bwlch
Early retirement resulted in a move back to the UK where a layout was started, but it progressed very slowly because of lack of spare time. However did I have time to go to work?
Bwlch
I thought the signals would be a challenge so I did not leave them till last.
There was not enough width for the full goods yard, but the main line and adjacent sidings were to scale. The platform, station building, inn and two loco sheds were still to be built.
Bwlch
There were some problems: inadequate clearances for ground signals, poorly made switch blades, distortion of foam under the tracks causing poor alignment and lack of a couple of metres space for sensible fiddle yards.
However, the real defect was designing the boards on the jigsaw principle so bits of track could be exchanged to show development of the station with time. When it came for a house move the jigsaw would not come apart and damage to the baseboards was so extensive that the layout was scrapped; but the signals were saved.
Llangynidr
A move to where we are now resulted in a space for a "Geheugen Pad/メモリーレーン" (Memory Lane) layout in N gauge to be allocated in the garage: this layout will be restricted to RTR and kits to leave time for proper modelling.
A lot of buildings are needed to fill the empty spaces and a decision has to be made about OHLE. Covid wrecked plans for shopping trips in Tokyo!
Llangynidr
So what now? Tram Road (but this would be just a glorified photo plank), another attempt at Glyntaff (not enough space to set up with fiddle yards), or something on which to run very unusual stock that would have been seen in Newport?
