I was on Google Photos the other day and it highlighted photos from the same dates in previous years and made me realise that I’d been working on the railway now for just over 4 years – the earliest photos I have being from the 2015 Christmas holiday period. This made me realised just how far it’s come in that time, so I thought it would be a good time to look back, but also high-light some of the more recent work which was not made it to the blog.
2015
2015 saw trains being unpacked and the start of the frame to support the layout. With very few changes, the frame has been in place ever since.
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- The raised station starts to take shape with the main line running in front on the lower level
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- Looking down the loft at the fiddle year end
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- The opposite end to the fiddle year showing where the viaduct will be
2016
The work from over Christmas 2015 continued into the new year to add the surfaces to the layout. This then allowed the track laying to start, and also the start of some of the scenic work with the engine shed under construction.
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- Surfaces in place on the layout frame
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- Shelves up and full with the layout below and the start of track laying
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- Start of the track laying
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- Where the laying started with the track disappearing off in the distance….
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- How to start building an engine shed
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- The main structure of the shed now complete
2017
Another year and more progress was made on the railway. This included new additions to enable a future station, the first trains actually being run on the layout which eventually resulted in both loops being usable. The year also included starting to investigate DCC control and starting to build a viaduct.
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- View from the main line showing sidings going off into the distance
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- Mock up of a train arriving at the station
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- Percy on the initial testing of the newly laid track
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- DCC booster with everything still in the box
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- Testing computer based DCC control with a Raspberry PI
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- Small cardboard triangles added for additional strength
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- Finished track across the viaduct
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- The start of the wiring underneath the viaduct
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- GNER Intercity 125 HST first time on the layout
2018
This was a very quite year for the layout due to the majority of the year being focused on building a 1:1 scale extension to the house, so very little happened in the loft besides a small amount of cabling work. This didn’t stop a few new additions to layout
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- Christmas Presents 2017
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- Additional rolling stock
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- New analog controller for the layout
2019
The start of the year continued the quiet spell for the railway as the number of follow up jobs for the extension occupied most of the first half of the year, however the second half of the year has been much more productive with significant progress being made.
This year has seen a number of new additions join the layout including the Dapol Class 68, a Bachmann Class 66, a Hornby Flying Scotsman and the Hattons Railhead Treatment Train. Interesting to see how the purchases have been split across the different manufacturers rather than just being from a single one.
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- Front view pulling a couple of random wagons
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- Front view pulling the same random wagons
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- All the items in their box
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- Unpacking the box showing the different pieces
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- Being pull be the Class 68 loco
2019 has also seen significant progress on the wiring front. Previously only the two main loops were functional, however now there is a control panel and the goods yard is functional allowing trains to traverse the different sidings and on and off the main line. There’s a blog post here about how the power side of the layout works, and hopefully at some point in the future (no promises on when) there will be one on the point control.
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- Building the basic structure
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- Another view of the basic structure complete
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- Underside showing all the cabling
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- Control panel now in place
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- Relay board for the points
Also moving forward has been the scenic work, mostly in sitting in front of the TV in an evening, however it does allow progress without being in the loft. This year has seen a large section of retaining wall well on it’s way, the viaduct has gone from a wooden frame to starting to look like a proper railway structure and work as started on something which should become the large station.
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- Viaduct arches taking shape
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- Starting to think about landscaping around the viaduct
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- Testing the new portacabins in location
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- Flying Scotsman in front of the retaining wall
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- Mocking up how the station might look
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- Wooden bases for the platforms cut
2020
Writing the post has made me appreciate how far things have come over the last 4 years, from a concept to a layout which is starting to really take shape one.
Looking ahead to 2020 briefly, I’ll start by making no promises about what and when things will get done as the railway is always one of the lower priority activities, however there are a clear set of next things to do…..
- Fit the remaining point motors to the points that are currently laid
- Install the power supplies and relay boards to control the points at the far end of the layout
- Commission the second half of the control panel
- Finish the viaduct
- Landscape around the viaduct area
- Build the large station platforms
- Start landscaping the large station and surrounding areas
My aim (as always) is to try and create more blog posts as I go along to show the progress, however please bear with me as time is limited and often blogging time can eat into actually working on the railway. However this gives me something to look back on next year and see how I did!