New beginnings

[Paul M]

Thanks! I searched for him last night, and ordered a figure on eBay. It took some fumbling around between the british and dutch eBay sites, but he was very helpful, and now I have a painted 7/8" driver coming.

Yes he's a nice chap

 

[Jasper]

The 7/8" scale driver figure from Clavey Models has arrived. Very nicely made and painted.
She's named Zoe, and I think I will keep that name.
Now I'm thinking of making a dummy brake handle to fill her right hand.

 

[Paul M]

Next time I see him, I'll mention your endorsement.

 

[Jasper]

And I tackled yet another lingering problem: not being able to run the Brammert loco because it can't deal with my tight curves.

Twice now have I laid an oval of track on the garden tiles, just to be able to run Brammert. This has worked well in rekindling my delight in this quirky locomotive, but it isn't a long term solution. So I have faced the facts: I want to run Brammert on my layout, so I'll have to change the layout.

So I've begun to make changes. There will now be a new circuit with a minimum radius of R2 (775mm). I will also pay better attention to loading gauge: Brammert is 130mm wide if you include the handrails. That's wider than LGB's standard width. So I'm making sure to provide clearance for that.

There will also be a few other changes: to make things easier for myself I will remove the overhead on the hard-to-reach route behind the Hazel tree. I'm also removing the 64mm track. This may return in a later incarnation of the layout, but it's not a priority now.

Something that will remain is the small circuit under the pergola with its peculiar intimate atmosphere. I don't want to lose that!



Changing the track geometry.


It's beginning to take shape.

 

[Jasper]

Even the Flamingo has had to move a bit. Compare to the last photo.