Hard running

Fingers crossed but Maria's problems seem to be over. I gave the loco some extended running to see if that could solve the problems its developed lately (cutting out and grinding to a halt), 2 hours yesterday and another tonight. It all seems to be OK now, not quite as good as Percy but not bad. Even handled a 2 coach train. Maybe it was just a bit of debris that got in the motor somewhere? Hopefully the problem will not return.

Two projects on the go

Two model kit projects are currently on the go. Project #076 is an ancient Airfix kit of a British Railways Park Royal Railbus (OO scale). Building is pretty much complete and painting has begun though is currently on hold as i need specific railway colours for it. Another project is #077 which is a Focke-Wulf Fw 190 and painting can soon begin of that.

Ballasting and OO

I was going to do it next year but i have decided to do some ballasting, mostly under the new bridge. It will be difficult to ballast when the bridge is completed so i decided to ballast it now. I've extended the ballast to cover the approach roads to the station and MPD. It all looks reasonably good... so far.

The bridge will be a railway bridge by the way. I will get some HO scale stock for it one day but for the moment a couple of carriages from my stored OO scale fleet are being used!

The bridge

A major new feature of the layout is a bridge that cuts across from one corner to the back scene wall. In doing so it crosses 3 tracks and will add a lot of interest (hopefully!) I've built in in wood and am applying card and plastic bricks to the outside. Well not too much so far, one thing i realised was that once the bridge was in place ballasting and scenery underneath the bridge would be very difficult so i've done the ballasting now in that part of the layout (wasn't planning on doing the ballasting until next year).

In other news the latest locomotive Maria has a fault, after a couple of minutes running it becomes very jerky before eventually stopping. I've stripped the loco down to see if anything is obviously broken but all seems fine on that score though it is a very tight fit inside so i've left a piece of the cab interior moulding out to see if that solves the problem.

Back to the past

A Liliput equipment van has been bought which is an older version of the second wagon bought for Eskalon way back in 2014.

Railbus

A few years ago i did a series of Airfix railway kits, building up a little OO scale train. I've bought another Airfix railway kit, this one a railbus. Building has commenced and it is Project #076.

Bf109G-6

The latest model project, Project #075 is a Messerschmitt Bf109G-6. Its not the first i've done so i completed this one in Swiss Air Force colours. Its come out pretty well. Usually i glue the propeller in place but on this one i let it rotate freely. Never again though, made painting the prop a right pain!