Outwell Village (W&U Tramway)

Rippers

Western Thunderer
a 'like' post is not enough for such a stunning model, well done all involved:thumbs:

cheers

Mike

Cheers for the positive comments.

We found the whole project a lot of fun (but thats what it is supposed to be all about isnt it?).

Plus it shows that if the base model is good enough you can upgrade a model rather than having to replace it.........something often overlooked in the hobby at present.

In the case of this layout Alan reports that interest has gone from a trickle of shows to many more enquiries than he can possibly handle!!................. not bad for a layout that is now well into its teens. :)
 

Jordan

Mid-Western Thunderer
It really is rather nice isn't it ;)
It's superb. In fact it's layouts like this that make me wonder about people who ignore stuff because it's "not my area of interest/I can't relate to the subject" (you especially hear this a lot if you model 'Foreign' ).
This layout is well outside my 'areas of interest' but boy is it a masterclass in realistic modelling? There's hardly been any pics here with rolling stock on view, but it is full of atmosphere. Don't those who ignore stuff because it "isn't Railway XYZ" miss out on a great many things??!! ;)
 

Overseer

Western Thunderer
It's superb. In fact it's layouts like this that make me wonder about people who ignore stuff because it's "not my area of interest/I can't relate to the subject" (you especially hear this a lot if you model 'Foreign' ).
This layout is well outside my 'areas of interest' but boy is it a masterclass in realistic modelling? There's hardly been any pics here with rolling stock on view, but it is full of atmosphere. Don't those who ignore stuff because it "isn't Railway XYZ" miss out on a great many things??!! ;)
Soo true.
 

Rippers

Western Thunderer
It's superb. In fact it's layouts like this that make me wonder about people who ignore stuff because it's "not my area of interest/I can't relate to the subject" (you especially hear this a lot if you model 'Foreign' ).
This layout is well outside my 'areas of interest' but boy is it a masterclass in realistic modelling? There's hardly been any pics here with rolling stock on view, but it is full of atmosphere. Don't those who ignore stuff because it "isn't Railway XYZ" miss out on a great many things??!! ;)

Indeed - thats an attitude I struggle to understand in this hobby. :(
Personally I like to see, experience and enjoy others work in any form from impressive top link finescale models to enthusuastic potterings in lofts and sheds. Be it local, national or international prototypes.

My own interests tend to be industrial and the 1960's/70's period (not withstanding the odd bit of post 2000 Irish modelling!..and getting dragged into others projects), however I guess that with my particular interest in layout design and presentation I tend to look at anything and everything for inspiration and therefore lack the overall gaugeist/scaleist attitude exhibited some.

For example Outwell was the second layout we refurbished, the first was an even older model based on the L&Y electrified Holcolme Brook and Tottington Branch (now with the LYDCC group). That layouts reworking and reformatting in a presentation sense owed everything to a form of individular modular presention seen on a layout at the Sedan show in France. Had I chosen not to look at such a model 'cos it wasnt my thing, scale, gauge, standard etc' then I would have missed out on something really different and really inspiring.

Oops I best put that soap box away!:oops:
 

Osgood

Western Thunderer
.......That layouts reworking and reformatting in a presentation sense owed everything to a form of individular modular presentation seen on a layout at the Sedan show in France. Had I chosen not to look at such a model 'cos it wasnt my thing, scale, gauge, standard etc' then I would have missed out on something really different and really inspiring......:

Individual Modular Presentation (IMP). Sounds intriguing, can you enlighten us (or maybe just me) further please?

I was fascinated by your novel Walker Marine presentation.

Tony
 

Rippers

Western Thunderer
Individual Modular Presentation (IMP). Sounds intriguing, can you enlighten us (or maybe just me) further please?

I was fascinated by your novel Walker Marine presentation.

Tony

You will probably be familiar with modular layouts where different modellers or groups build sections within a perscribed set of dimentions with connecting tracks at set points so they can all be joined up in different formats for running. Fun on some sence and pretty spectacular when you see some of the massive gatherings the societies involved can put on (especially in the US).
However what doesnt always work with that idea is the clash of differing scenic styles and ideas (says he who once saw a flat desert section on a 2mm scheme right next to a snow covered mountain one)..........but hey ho its all part of the show!

What had me thinking in France was a four sided presentation of reasonable sized modules (each consisting 2 or 3 boards by the looks of it) but which were aranged so that the scenic area were completely devorced form one another. (ie the nice Parisian suburbs in the evening area (with lights going on and off in various appartments as a backdrop) wasnt right next to the bright springtime country station).
What differed on this set up was that each of the scenic sections was seperated from the others by hidden areas (blank boards if you will - hiding straight or curved tracks).

Now the Holcolme layout as we aquired it consitsed of a 12ft section of Holcome Brook station, 8ft for Tottington, 4ft for the viaduct and several more 4ft boards to link the 3 main areas with little but plain single track passing through fields.
Hence I took the French idea for linked but divorced scenes (in this case the 3 main feature area of the exisiting layout of a single prototype branch) and reformatted them in correct geographical order into a far shorter and more exhibition friendly L shaped format by way of a pair of hidden 45 degree curved sections (making the nice viaduct the feature of the middle of the corner).
hb.jpg

On the French scheme the blank frontage was full height to the lighting and backsenes of their modules however we kept it low as it was limited by the height of the exisiting backdrops. It worked well and caused much comment and discussion at the shows we took it to. A format we might investigate again should a project that might work with it arise at some point.

As for Walker Marine - most photos of the real thing were taken for the road looking down over the site - hence the model was aranged to give a similar viewpoint.

Outwell here is done similarly. Alan and Neil's design offers the same angles to the viewer as most of the classic views of the site. Though if you know the real area and think about it logically the canal at the front of the model has a road and row of nice building arange parallel to the same over the other side which would make a superb backdrop to a model of the site and put the yard nearest the public - (though if built that way round it wouldnt be half as reognisable!:confused:.............. thats the dilemas of layout design and presentations for you.
 

Osgood

Western Thunderer
Thanks - that has certainly stirred the grey matter!

It doesn't look as if the blank sections need to be very long at all in order to achieve visual isolation of each scenic section given the uniform black colour of the frontage blank, and the angled sections work well to this end.
 

Rippers

Western Thunderer
Thanks - that has certainly stirred the grey matter!

It doesn't look as if the blank sections need to be very long at all in order to achieve visual isolation of each scenic section given the uniform black colour of the frontage blank, and the angled sections work well to this end.

Thats the joy of good forum discussion, sharing points and ideas that make you think and hopefully inpire.

The choice of a good overall colour for the frontage of a layout is important - I prefer black or grey but there are other colours that work. The key is for it to be tidy and uniform.

As for the length of the 'blank' sections so as to achieve visial isolation you could have a point there.
At the same show there was another layout (a NG one if memory serves...) which consisted of a single line with a could of stations with passing places winding through a series of linked scenes in a similar way to how I described the other (though on this case it was single sided with loops and a hidden return down the back). The individual scenes on that one were a mere foot or so appart (as opposed to the Metre plus of the big one) yet the idea still worked (though again the scenes were boxed in with frontages as high as the facia and higher backscenes to the rear.

Still food for thought..............and dont think we havent considered making Outwell here part of such a scheme linked with a model of the nearby Outwell Basin.;)
 

Rippers

Western Thunderer
There's hardly been any pics here with rolling stock on view, but it is full of atmosphere.

My thoughts on that are that the locos and stock of a layout are only a part of the overall picture that is being presented.
outw1.jpg
In essence they should only be as important as the vista in which they appear - and vise versa the landscape in which they appear should compliment the standard of the stock in use.
outw3.jpg
The stock on Outwell is seen as moving scenery to help tell the story. Alan had a pretty fair selection of examples of stock used on the line built based on photos in the book available (including a set of the coaches built from a D&S kit). These have now been toned down and weathered to blend better with the overall look of the newly refurbished layout and additional stock of the period has been built or kits thereof sourced (including more coach kits resqued from the depths of my unbuilt kit collection).
outw2.jpg
Plus truth be known Tappa and I had considered Outwell as a layout around the same time as Alan and Neil kicked theirs off. Thus we took ours no further than initial infomation and kits aquisition. Fortunately those diesel tram kits were still lurking when fortune brought the layout our way hence the decision to dust them off and create a 1950's set of stock too.



The early to mid 50's period offering a miriad of interesting livery posibilities. Yet you hardly ever see it modelled with any conviction.
outw.jpg
The stock on some layouts would have you think that BR repainted absolutely everything overnight in 1948 and yet photos from the 50's (and even odd ones in the early 60's show) examples of big 4 liveries (or remains of liveries on otherwise renumbered stock) still extant...........

outww.jpg

...beyond the patched and P numbered coal wagons is the usual limit for most (that even Bachmann offer a form of rtr!).........though this ramshackle collection started life as fully lettered and mint Bachmann PO wagons..........before I got my hands on them!.

Mind the odd railtours run in the latter days on the W&U tramway did offer us the chance to buid something a bit off the wall and yet still be prototypical..
outts.jpg
Seen here only partially completed.....................
 

Rippers

Western Thunderer
Only last night I found what this could have looked like had you used 16T minerals instead'!!!!!!!!!!

Actually those in the shot appear to be the similar construction Iron Ore tipplers.....which unlike standard 16t minerals and the 5 planks we used have no doors............... which must have made the loading and unloading of the passengers an interesting task!;)
 

Rippers

Western Thunderer
Well folks that about wraps things up on the story of Outwell Village to date unless anyone has any queries or wants more pictures.
out13.jpg

Come and say hi if you see us at a show!:D

Mind I could start a thread on one of the other layouts we have refurbished or built if you like as we now have quite a few under our belts that have seen our attention over the last few years................ including believe it or not the one seen in the latest TV advert for the NRM!.
 

Osgood

Western Thunderer
Did Walker Marine ever get a decent write-up other than one 'layout of the month' type article in a magazine?
 

Rippers

Western Thunderer
Did Walker Marine ever get a decent write-up other than one 'layout of the month' type article in a magazine?

Walker.......blimey thats a blast from my past..... we built that 18 plus years ago.

walker.jpg

No it appeared in BRM in its early days (initially as a few pictures when incomplete in a feature on EM modelling and alter as a layout article - March 99 if memory serves). Plus much later in its career it had a similar layout feature article in Modelrail.

Probably the best artcle ever done on it was the one done for the Dutch Magazine Spoor & Modelspoor.....not that I could read it!.

Mind in those days articles were 4-6000 words and quite in depth. These day the UK mags at least want only the very basics and 1500 words as an absolute max. Which leave no room for explaining anything in depth and is probably why I am finding that all layout articles now seem the same.
 

Osgood

Western Thunderer
Walker.......blimey thats a blast from my past..... we built that 18 plus years ago……...

I only stumbled across Walker Marine late last year - I traced an article to BRM March 1999 and obtained a copy. As a display concept it still seems very fresh.

The search also led me to Hospital Gates so a copy of RM for Nov 2009 found its way to me! I must say I've found both layouts very inspirational.

Hospital Gates - the Peckets are attributed in the article to ABS and Skaters. I know the ABS Zero Zephyrs W6 but can't find any reference to a Slaters Peckett?

Not that I'm short on Peckett projects - having long had an unbuilt Eric Underhill Peckett kit (is this the basis of the ABS ZZ?) and having just ordered an Agenoria W4 :eek:
 
S

SteveO

Guest
Another big fan of Drewrys I see! The W&U layout is lovely and atmospheric. I'm interested to read more about the one illustrated above – looks incredibly well detailed.
 
Top