Part of the harbour of my English-style layout. Everything, other than the figures, is scratch-built!
This website's about just one of my hobbies:
Narrow Gauge Model Railways.
Why narrow gauge? Well, narrow gauge railways were the poor cousins of broad gauge railways. While broad gauge railways linked towns and cities, narrow gauge railways generally were "feeder" railways or were industry-specific - like logging, mining sugar cane. They were a cheap alternative, using lighter rail, tighter curves, steeper grades, smaller locos and rolling stock. But, most of all, to me at least, narrow gauge trains were quaint and quirky. In modelling terms,
almost anything goes when it comes to imitating reality.
From a practical point of view, narrow gauge models takes up less space. The other side of the coin is that most narrow gauge modelling has to be scratch built. There's very little available off the shelf - compared with broad gauge modelling.
I model in HO scale and O scale:
HO scale is 3.5mm = 1'0" (1/87th scale). Therefore, 2 foot 6 inch gauge railways - that's HOn30 or HOn2 1/2 or HOe - run on N scale (9 mm) track. Similarly, HOn20 is 1'8" gauge running on Z scale (6mm) track and HOn18 is 1'6" gauge running on Z scale track - it all depends on how accurate you want to be.
O scale is 7mm = 1'0". (1/43rd scale). The most popular is On30 which uses HO track (16mm) to duplicate 2'6" gauge. On15 is 15" gauge - or O9 - uses N scale (9mm) track too.
I've got 4 layouts on the go - 3 HOn30 and one On15 - and always others in mind.
One, the largest, but by no means big at 700mm x 2000mm) (one of the advantages of modelling in this format) is an
English-style
on a mythical island off the SW coast of England, sometime between the two wars. The railway serves a mine which brings ore down to the docks to a plant which discharges the ore into hoppers. In the summer time, there's a lot of tourist traffic with open excursion cars augmenting the local rail-motor and closed coaches. The harbour's always busy with fishing boats coming and going including the ferry-cum-coastal cargo boat. The village is clustered around the harbour and the railway shares the quayside with all of the other activities. It's a busy place.
Two other layouts are micro-layouts measuring 500mm x 500mm. One is a French vineyard:
Chateau le Plonque
where the Count's narrow gauge railway serves a vast network of vineyards, bringing in wagon-loads of grapes in the season and carting barrels, timber for barrels, vineyard posts and prunings in the off-season.
The other is the
Tooleybuc Sugar Mill
in Australia, mid-last century. Clapped out steam locos haul sugar-cane trucks to and from the mill on ramshackle lines - little more than two grooves in the dirt!
You'll also find a departure from HO scale in the form of a third micro-layout, Slim Pickins' Mine. It's a very basic decrepit old mine in O scale this time, using 15" gauge (N scale) track - that's On15 - or O9....take your pick!This was only started in June 2010 and there's progress photos of the layout under construction and a some of its locos.
Click on "My Photo Album" - above, left - for further details of all models.
Enjoy!
email: henshaw1941@bigpond.com