This stunning seasonal image of our model of Prestleigh Viaduct on Evercreech New arrived in our inboxes from Allan wishing us all a Merry Christmas. Quite how this magic was done is a mystery to your author, but we trust that the virtual caster sugar made it safely back in its packet before it got damp.

Allan has an excellent 4mm GWR layout called KingsFerry, and this layout has by far the most visited page on the website. But, like many of our senior members he has been infected by the 7mm virus – those of us who have not been so contaminated, did warn them to mask up and wash their hands! Anyway after building some wagons and an ex LMS 4F, Allan is now building a rake of LMS coaches to grace Evercreech New and The Summit. Above is a photo of Allan’s second 7mm coach project, a Sidelines 7mm LMS two-window panelled open brake third of 1927. It is one of 55 built to diag. D1693. Allan has yet to build the bogies, the interior and corridor connections.

Jim A has splashed out on two 7mm scale diesel railcars for his Forest of Dean themed shunting plank which is housed in his garage. The green “bubble car” represents the last period on his layout before closure, whereas the former GWR railcar represents the 1950s. The former is Dapol, the latter Heljan.

Not to be out-done, Simon K has gone for the streamlined version for his new project oulined below.

In contrast to his large S&D-themed garden railway, Simon is building a 7mm scale shunting plank with a small station called “Cerne” (as in Abbas). He tells me “it comprises three 1200mm by 600mm boards, two scenic and the third a turntable fiddle yard. Pictured are station building and signs, and aview of the track work from over the entrance to the fiddleyard. Platform on left, goods shed back right on the long siding and signal box will probably be in the right foreground.

Without giving too much away (like how he did it), Dom has spent a couple of weeks on crutches, thus gaining quite a bit of modelling time, and so has made progress on 4mm scale Combe Town. The point rodding is down on the first scenic board, he’s made a good start on the ground cover in the yard, and the road embankment up to the bridge has grown hedges. His 14xx has gained sound, and the obligatory Modelu crew has been painted and have clambered aboard. Happily he was quickly back on his feet, and expected progress to slow again.

In February our Chairman Ed, was coming to the end of an intensive training course to be a guard with South Western Railway. After which he will know the difference between the opposite ends of Class 159 EMUs (there isn’t any!) plus all the aspects of the infrastructure controlled by Network Rail at Basingstoke. He’ll also always find room for my bike – OK, I made that bit up!

Our former Chairman Dave S now in exile in a lovely part of North Wales, has found time to work on the control systems for the Fiddle Yard of our N Gauge layout The Bank. With the move it’s taken a while longer than anticipated, but there’s no way that Dave will issue them properly until he’s drawn and checked them. It all takes time, and so to a few pictures:

Just some of the diagrams needed for the whole layout.
Three main relay boards (RBs) for the Down Control Panel. RB2 controls the cross over. RB4 sets which Fiddle Yard (FY) siding is required. RB6 sets which track in the FY is selected for the through route. It’s like the radio buttons on The Summit/Evercreech New control panels only takes up more space. The odd numbered relay boards are used in the Up Control Panel. The group of four relays are for Up/Down Loop selection and the one labelled BWR is used when the Banker is waiting, in the Up Loop, to go back to the Up FY.
The Down Panel with all its push buttons (PBs) and LEDs installed. The four red PBs and one black one use RB6 mentioned above.
The back of the panel having a bad wire day, with all the PBs and LEDs identities etched into the panel for ease of wiring it up. The red/black wires are from all the “white” LEDs, as bought, with dropper resistor included.

All looks too complicated? Not really, it’s just a push button setting lots of other switches, with lots of wires connecting it all together! Yes, Dave…

Dave H has built a ScaleFour Society etched nickel silver kit as a ground frame for the East Somerset yard on Wellsey. Recommended by Steve (whoever that is), it’s a neat little kit which incorporates clever mountings for some microswitches inside, has working sprung lever catches and nice turned steel handles for the levers. At about £6 per lever it’s good value. It has etched number plates included too. All Dave has done is to make some mods to make it dis-assemblable if one of the switches pops. It stands about 4 inches tall, so about 1/16 scale. As a non-member you can buy these at exhibitions attended by the S4 Society stand, so in our cases this was Railwells in August.

Steve has spent rather too much time on his crane kits. By popular demand (well, not that popular) he has produced a ‘Swanage’ crane where the frame is reversed and the gear wheels have eight spokes.

There are no decent pictures of the crane at Swanage, but this representation captures the ‘look’ to the satisfaction of the first purchaser, a chap in Hampshire who’s building Swanage in 7mm scale. There is also now a ‘Wimborne’ version (the up side one) that is a ‘Verwood’ crane (so with safety guards) printed in reverse. Steve has takers for two of those in 4mm. Perversely it’s the ‘Verwood’ crane (safety guards) that doesn’t sell so well, and the ‘Semley’ one (no safety guards) that has sold best of all.

Lastly (for Steve) on Ebay he ‘won’ a box van and an open wagon, both very LSWR in design, though essentially obsolete for BR era Verwood. He’ll lose the transfers, add black patches for BR numbers and pretend that it’s all OK. The box van is a Maple Models resin kit from the 1970s. Both in EM and very well built, they were less expensive than the component parts would be – if you could find them.

Another member of the EMGS South Somerset Area Group, EM gauge wagon rescue sub-group is Adam. His recent Ebay rescues were largely supported by Delay Repay disbursements from South Eastern Railway – the joy of periodical commuting. The finished ones all came from a batch of rather erratically completed EM vehicles which had suffered through the years and were consequently very cheap indeed (what he paid would have been a fair price for the wheels.

All have been refurbished with some new parts: the LMS van and Cory mineral will become part of a ’30s-era freight which will guest on the still nowhere complete layout.

The rather tatty grey van (in pieces – it’s now in many more bits, because superglue isn’t a viable adhesive for whitemetal wagons), turns out to be a NER diagram G2, by David Geen. At some point it will be stripped and soldered back together; it will still cost less than the kit would have done, even were it still available, and will be an interesting exercise.

The BR-era vehicles consist of two vans and a now very heavily weathered mineral wagon, modelled after one of Stephenson Clarke’s enormous fleet as it might have looked towards the end of its life. The Airfix Meat van (red plastic and all) had a new roof and chassis, but that is the original paint and Airfix transfers. More anonymous is the Ratio MOGO which just required new buffers and a repaint.”

In other news The Summit has been pencilled in for the Bristol (Thornbury) show in 2025 or 2026. Work has started on titivating Bob Alderman’s St Martin’s Wharf layout for a visit to Taunton Rail-Ex in October. Planned work will include converting the layout to DCC control in a manner similar to Gas Works. Most importantly, despite the cold, the ice cream van has appeared outside CS2 to much aclaim.

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