WorldRailFans

Dear Friends,

This morning I received some 50 passenger figures, including a few children, from Trafofuchs and have put up a couple of photos on my website (http://trains.manvell.org.uk/ and click on the trackplan to see them). I also bought a Railex Z scale Bavarian PtL 2/2 (Glaskasten) which can be found on my Epoch 1 Z scale locos page under the class ID. At just over 3cm long it's a sweet little thing (and a lot more robust than the N scale equivalent)! Do have a look.

Next step is to turn the layout round so that I can start testing all the wiring and the trains. I had hoped to have a footbridge on the station but, after having built built the pillars, I picked them up yesterday and they disintegrated. So plastic cement doesn't work with Märklin plastic kits. I will have another go after the exhibition using Superglue. If that doesn't work I don't know what I will do. (MEK didn't work either.)

With best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

Last weekend's exhibition went pretty well. I had to retire a couple of G8.1s fairly early on but the remaining one worked fine with 12 2-axle wagons with few problems in spite of my poor track-laying. In spite of the baseboard being on a slope one of my pacifics (S 3/6) happily managed 7 coaches. (The most I have ever managed was 9 Bavarian 4-axle coaches.) I wonder if I could do better with a few drops of oil around the rolling stock; nine would be most impressive. There were many positive comments and the kids were fascinated by the branch line even though I only had one train on it this time. Got to find a way to stop them coming round the back to look though.

One thing that went down well was the "Spot the ..." activity that I initiated after one child spotted all the birds unprompted. So we had spot the birds/sheep/climbers. Some kids were really good at it while others had to be prompted almost to the item itself! Maybe I should do this more often.

Anyway, I am delighted to tell you that eight photos are up on my site at http://trains.manvell.org.uk/exhibition ... 326-Moray/ . Do have a look. The rest of the layouts will start coming next week.

With best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

My Moray MRG exhibition page is now complete, so you can see what the other exhibitors were showing. Enjoy.

http://trains.manvell.org.uk/exhibition ... 326-Moray/

With best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Having changed the sort options for how topics are listed, I see that I appear to be running two identical topics, for which I apologise. So, I am trying to change the topic subject here. Whether I succeed pressing the Submit button will tell. I would like this topic to follow progress (currently lack of it) on my Z scale layout.

Best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

At last some progress.

I have sorted out the burnt out pointwork and done a small update on the control panel. In addition, I have finished building a footbridge across the station. I'm just hoping that all the steam locos have enough clearance (3mm = 660cm) under it. Anyway, it's all there on my website. It's another small step towards finishing the layout.

One obvious problem, very obvious in the photos, was the excessive use of plastic cement. It looks a right mess. I've been told I should have used a toothpick to apply the glue and not used it straight from the tube on the bottle. Too late for the bridge but I will try it in the future, or just use MEK it it is appropriate. Mind you, not having binocular vision doesn't help either.

With best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

It's been a bit of a struggle over the last few days, what with electrical faults and sundry minor annoyances, but I've managed to post daily updates with a few images now added. Not the world's most interesting except, possibly, for the bird's eye view (less bridge 'cos it would fall off) which is even now a bit out of date. Still, I am progressing at a steady pace and all will be ready for Friday.
All the best,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,
Just a short note. The layout is all ready for it trip to the Dundee expo tomorrow. I took a few photos shortly before and after closing it up. Sadly they didn't come out too well; I don't think the auto focus was working properly. Still they do give an idea of where I am at.
All the best,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

The Dundee expo went really well with very few spontaneous derailments and coupling failures. I did do a few rear-enders though! Several people opined, on the basis of plenty of detail and the tiny size of the trains, that Breitenfurt was the best layout there. (Smug feeling.) No awards tho'. I'm just about back down to earth.

I've put up three photos of the layout on my diary/blog. Some more will be available later but they won't be very good as the autofocus AND exposure controls were both misbehaving. I think it's something that I am doing, but don't know what. Anyway, do have a look.

All the best,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

Latest exhibition (Elgin Modelfair, last weekend) passed without too many problems!

However, a while ago I was asked if I had any videos of Bahnhof Breitenfurt – Ost to which I replied 'No' as I didn't have a video camera. However, a friend of mine, Gerry Coogan, came to see the layout at the Elgin MRC exhibition and took a few ad hoc videos which are now on Youtube. Rather than clutter up the forum with a load of links, I have set up a draft webpage with the necessary links on my site. You can see it at http://trains.manvell.org.uk/exhibition ... videos.htm . It's a bit of a mess but I will tidy it up later. Note: currently there are no internal links to this page, only the one above. That will be remedied later.

All the best,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

Just a very short (copy and paste, sorry) message as I have a lot to do before I leave for next weekend's exhibition. I have posted five more photos of my layout, five by moonlight and one after the clouds have covered the moon. I do promise that there will be some daytime photos soon (and, maybe, a couple of videos). Anyway, do have a look at http://tiny.cc/breitenfurt/ .

With best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear friends.

Well, the Moray MRG exhibition in Elgin (Scotland, not IL) has been and gone. It all went pretty well though the usual problems of tired locos on the second day afternoon manifested itself. Anyway, I am happy, which is the important thing. The visitors had a lot of positive comments though quite a few just walked past noses in the air. No prizes though.

Anyway, I have been very busy on the web. I have completed reports for the Dundee MRC and Moray MRG expos. Sadly the former is very patchy as I did something to my camera and most of my photos were unusable. I have only competed the Breitenfurt part of November's Elgin exhibition and the rest will follow over the next week.

Do have a look and I hope you like what you see. Here are the links.
Dundee MRC exhibition, October 2011
Elgin MRC Modelfair, November, 2011
Moray MRG GNOS* Exhibition, March 2012

Finally, I have also added 13 extra detail images to my Breitenfurt diary (link in sig).

With best wishes,
Chris.

*GNOS: Great North of Scotland.(exhibition)

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

My Elgin 2011 report is now complete.
Best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

I apologise for the long gap in communication. I lost all my bookmarks and overlooked quite a few while rebuilding the file. All is well now.

Last weekend I took Breitenfurt to the Inverness MRC's expo; an experience I hope I don't have to repeat, as you will see.

The Inverness expo was a bit of a disaster. First of all the layout was playing up even before I left (because of the ballasting mostly). Then the expo was spread across two floors of an hotel and, needless to say, I was (two floors) upstairs. To get it up we had to tip it onto its end to get it in the lift. As a result, the signal box, which I had forgotten about, fell and all but demolished two signals so now all four signals at the up end of the station have broken posts. Fortunately the motors were not affected. In addition the newly fitted starter signal for Gleis 4 decided not to work so power had to be supplied to the track manually.. Actually, this didn't matter as I could not use Gleis 3 so only one train could be run anticlockwise at a time anyway. On Gleis 3 locos and coaches were derailing by the up signals. This turned out to be the result of a fishplate being under a rail. It's worked OK for 4 years, so why now? And, finally, my backscene disappeared during packing up. Inverness club don't have it and the hotel doesn't have it so the club had emailed all the exhibitors to try to track it down.

Turning to the trains, several of the locos (all, I think, with 5-pole motors) kept going short circuit after a few minutes so had to be replaced with older, more reliable, ones. Other than that the trains worked well. In fact, at one stage I was running a train consisting of an S3/5 (1972 version) with 3 Päckwagen and 7 Reisewagen - 40 axles and no wheel spin. (Of course, they were the old Bavarian coaches which are shorter but the whole train just fitted in the platform.)

Going back to the signals not working, can anyone recommend an adhesive for the plastic that Viessmann use for their signal masts/posts? Nothing I have seems to work.

Best wishes,
Chris.

PS. There are plenty of images of the missing background from previous exhibitions and my blog on my website in case anyone spots it.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

I've been really busy this last couple of months (not just on railways) so, just to give you a summary of my recent activity, here are my latest web pages. I only just finished the Inverness one. Please, if you spot any mistakes, do let me know.

Bahnhof Breitenfurt – Ost — updated 2012/10/26:
http://tiny.cc/breitenfurt/

Zedex 2012 (Oxford & District MRC) — The annual convention for Z gauge modellers in the UK, including Z scale (1:220), Nm and 2mm narrow gauge:
http://trains.manvell.org.uk/exhibition ... /index.htm

Inverness and District MRC Exhibition (8/9 September) — at 100miles (160km) my nearest model rail exhibition:
http://trains.manvell.org.uk/exhibition ... /index.htm

Do have a look, and enjoy, especially the Zedex page where there are two 1:220 British outline layouts, and one in the making, amongst all the superb models.

With best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

I just checked my access files and was horrified to see hundreds of errors reported. My apologies for the two links that didn't work. I hadn't realised that the forum software had abbreviated the addresses. Here are the correct links; do have a another look.

Click here for Zedex 2012.

Click here for the Inverness 2012 expo.

If all else fails, just go to http://trains.manvell.org.uk/ .

Once again, my apologies.

Best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost

Dear Friends,

After several days of hard work, I have completed my Elgin Modelfair page and updated my layout page Do have a look. The links are:

Click here for the Elgin Modelfair.

Click here for the Breitenfurt Diary.

No more exhibitions planned at the moment but still have some work to do on the layout..

With best wishes,
Chris.

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Chris M.
Home page, Breitenfurt – Ost