Notes

• The two outer lines in storage yard are designed for trains longer than the storage loops, but can the loco's pull them?
• The two inner storage lines are designed so that they can hold two short trains or one longer train each.
• The main board will be complete in itself so can be run with or without the extension board.

Located on a fairly busy mainline, 'Breitefurt' station is situated on the edge of what is now a medium sized satellite town. The station serves both long distance traffic and as the terminus for commuter services. A small branch line also terminates here though a few through trains carry commuters direct to and from the 'metropolis' during the morning and evening rush. It is the use as a terminus and junction that has led to the fairly complex pointwork at the west end of the station and is the justification for the small locomotive refueling and refurbishing yard. Primarily a passenger facility, occasional goods are handled using one of the sidings at the west end. The two remaining sidings are used variously to store excess rolling stock and to act as temporary home to a travelling railway museum with replicas of some early German trains.
        There is a proposal for a (mainly freight) branch to feed off to the west and this will, if it comes to fruition, increase the diversity of trains passing through the station.
        The model does not represent any particular area or era and anachronisms will abound, though the trains themselves will nearly all be steam hauled. It will be operations based with the scenic aspect being secondary (due to my lack of modelling skills).

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Nov 25th – Just an interim report. I will be putting up photos in the near future. Apart from suffering from sickness, I had a great weekend. So, negative first.

• One locomotive went short circuit shortly before the end of the exhibition.

Now the good news.

• Apart from the dead loco everything ran to perfection except for some wagons that kept coming off the track – candidates for lead treatment – and were removed before the exhibition opened. Mind you, I did have finger trouble occasionally, usually when engaged in conversation, which lead to a few collisions.
• The really good news was that I am the proud holder of the "Best Operating Model Railway Layout" cup. However, I think that was more by default that to my credit. Mind you (again!), I did keep trains running throughout the entire exhibition whenever there was someone present.
• I should add that my idea of having the control panel swing up over the layout using parliament hinges was so successful that I think I will go down that route permanently unless the scenery prevents it.
• I learned from one visitor that the BR61 (in 1935) had ABS to cope with the change in weight as its water was used up.

I'm far from being up to the Modelrail Scotland standard but hope to be able to attend other exhibitions in Scotland next year. So, the next stage is to make a longer control panel so that I can add the extra switches and buttons required to put in route selection and uncoupling as well as sorting out a few minor glitches and getting the branch line modelled. Also there is the dream of adding a second board.

Lessons learned:

• Take your own lighting and your own extension lead.
• Avoid second hand curved points.
• Test out trains more thoroughly before use – in both directions.
• Take something to allow the layout to be raised above normal table height and a step for kids to see.
• Take less stock.
• Put images on the front of storage boxes with picture of a) item that goes in that box or b) how contents were packed in crate.
• Put security panels at both ends as well as the front.

Probably other lessons as well, but I forget them.

Finally, there was considerable interest in my 1:450 and 1:900 scale trains, though the former was a bit unreliable at times due to a warped board.

Nov 20th – Big day tomorrow. I will be setting off at 1030 and will spend some time in Inverness before moving on to Elgin to set up the layout and check it all out. I have wired up some diodes (four per controller wired as two parallel pairs in series). Hopefully they will allow me to near zero volts and achieve smoother stops and starts. It will probably take some getting used to. The turntable has four pairs wired in series as the locos on that are virtually uncontrollable as supplied. I will write up a report, with photos, when I get back. (BTW, the two clamps are there to prevent the control panel hitting any part of the layout when it is folded back for transport.)

Nov 12th – I thought it was time for an update, especially with the exhibition being just 10 days away. I have, at last, started installing the wiring between the board and the switch panel. So far I have found some three errors, all of the causing short circuits, but I did manage to get a loco to move between tracks 0 (top right of board) and 2 (relief road through station. One major blunder; there are no connections to the four tracks connecting the station to the sidings! These will have to be soldered direct to the rails. More later.

Oct 26th – Apart from a few above board tweaks, practicing Backs Brandenburg No. 1 and being as sociable with visiting family and friends, the last seven days have been spent putting in wires and linking them back to terminal strips. It is taking far longer than anticipated and I am only half way there. The first big mistake I made was in having all the terminal strips by, and at right angles to, the sides of the board. The section still to be done will have them in two rows down the centre of the baseboard. I also had to repair a dud turnout and replace a spring in of the uncouplers (much easier than repacking it with a working one). But, as I keep telling myself, each wire added is one wire less. Finally, I tested the turntable.

Oct 19th – A red letter day! This morning I laid the last length of baseboard level track and pinned down the last loose lengths of track (I think/hope), though I will probably have to add a few extra pins where there are several turnouts adjacent to each other. I am going to leave the branch line for now and fashion a plywood base for it as the Märklin inclines are somewhat restricting as to what track one can use.
        My next job is to get all the electrical connections (bar signals, which will be added later) brought out to connector strips under the baseboard and then produce some kind of loom or set of looms to connect them to the temporary control panel. Current thinking is to use small hinges to attach the panel to the back of the baseboard so that it can be folded back over the sidings for transport.

Oct 17th – I've been busy adding and terminating wires to all the places that need them, By the time I finish I guess there will be some 350 connections. It wouldn't be such a problem if it wasn't for the fact that Märklin use the same colour for both the curved and straight control wires on their pointwork. Grrr.
        The other thing that has been occupying my mind is the temporary control panel to allow me to apply power to all the track sections. I spent a merry couple of days laying it out, drilling pilot holes and final holes and fitting the 55 switches and 20 push buttons. Now starts the task of wiring them all up. :o( , I know that there is a spelling mistake; it will be corrected. Also many of the switches have to be labelled as well.]

Oct 7th – Found a few spare pins so have finished the through tracks in the hidden sidings. That leaves the two curves to and from the station. Oh, and I still have to finalise the tracks on the up (west) end of the station.
        I have ordered a sheet of Aluminium so that I can make a temporary control panel for applying power to the majority of track sections and, hopefully, some of the uncouplers. Now I need to find some switches.

Oct 6th – Spent last few days trying to work out the best way to do the hidden sidings. In the end, I took a chance and go for it as it happened. The result is a very slight strain on a few joints, but I won't know if it really works until I can actually start running trains over it. However, now I have run out of track pins and so everything has ground to a halt until I can get some more. Just 6 1/2 weeks to go to the exhibition!

Oct 2nd – Well, things have started moving again (though not trains at this stage). A couple of days ago I mocked up the hidden sidings west end but it didn't justify a photo as there were problems. However, this afternoon I laid out all the pointwork for the east end.
        A brief explanation of the tracks starting from the bottom left. The first two are holding spurs with two functions. First they can be used to hold trains that are too long to fit into the loop. The train pulls into the west end spur, backs up into one of these two and then can run back out onto the main line at a later time. The second function is to hold locos to allow a train to be reversed so that it can pull back out onto the down main crossing over to the up main via the centre track in the station. The next two tracks are the up and down main tracks. Above them are two loco spurs and finally there is a long train spur for the up direction.
        From the front the six tracks on the right are respectively a) the long-train/relief loop, b) the down main, c) & d) bidirectional storage for shorter/push-pull trains, e) up main and f) up equivalent of a).

Archive material with more photos.