Felixstowe Area “N” Gauge Group
JULY 2023 NEWSLETTER


NEWS FROM MEMBERS
Mike – I have prepared forty bags of OO scale trees for the exhibition sales stall. I am donating the whole sum raised to the club.
Each bag contains four quality trees, and would normally have retailed at £25-30. They are £5 a bag, so if you model OO as well as N gauge, grab yourselves some bargains. They should raise £200 for the club.


EXHIBITION UPDATE by Trevor
Since the last newsletter there has been another change to the line-up. The Ipswich club are now unable to join us with their second-hand items. I have therefore moved our own group's second-hand into the main hall and Sam has kindly offered to bring his layout as well. The room vacated will now be available as a quiet / rest room for members to have lunch etc.
Remember you will need to bring your own lunch with you this year. Tea and coffee will be provided by the group.
Chris is organising the rota of members / tasks, so please speak to him if you can assist. Help for setup is required as we only get access on the morning of the show so need to mark out, sort tables / chairs and get the layouts all setup and working in a couple of hours. The show opens at 10:30, so need to have this underway by 8AM. Those running layouts please remember to bring stock along to run.
Another Chris is organising the group second-hand stand. If you have items for sale, please pass these onto Chris. In the last newsletter Chris detailed labelling etc required.



LAYOUT NEWS by Chris
The layout I've been working on recently - The Coal yard, is coming on nicely. It'll be looking good for the exhibition, I've just a few more additions for it, but I won't get them all done this week.
It's always the way, just when you think you have thought of everything that you can think of to add, you then think of more - well, I do anyway!


I've often thought that I plan backwards, I start with a rough idea, get that idea on the board, then think of something else to add, so it all gets changed... When you consider that this project started out to just see if the Peco electromagnetic uncouplers actually worked (and they do, very well) on a scrap baseboard with one point and one uncoupler, it's turned into a major yard with nine points and eleven uncouplers! The board has also been extended a few times too, just by a few inches at a time.


LAYOUT PROGRESS by Alan
The factory now has a station halt. Just waiting for the Metcalfe platform shelter. (I suspect it will turn up in my birthday presents).



SONIC J50's by Chris
I've gone mad and bought a few, they are lovely models - beautiful casting, lovely runners and good pullers, probably pull way more than the real loco!
Hopefully, they will be good for long term shunting, I'll try them on the Coal yard layout and see how I get on.






LAYOUT NEWS by Mike
Last month I wrote that I wanted to copy an idea in the NGS magazine, of houses climbing the cliffs, as in south west harbour towns. Well, the idea has progressed a long way since then, as I decided I wanted to go the whole hog and include a harbour! The problem was that the boats I wanted to include wouldn’t pass through the arches of the viaduct.
So, the massive viaduct had to undergo surgery, with a pair of arches cut out. My original plan was to just insert a plate girder bridge, but when I did this lots of people told me that the bridge wouldn’t cope with the pressure on each end from the sideways pressure of the viaduct, and it needed more support underneath.
Cue club member Kevin. I asked him if he had any European style girder bridge parts in his spares box. As luck would have it, he had two complete bridges, one assembled and one still in kit form. By carefully cutting the middle sections out, I was able to build a very convincing underframe.
Suitably painted, and daubed with seagull poo, it received 100% approval from all in the Scalescenes modellers Facebook group.








The next exercise was to build one of the boats that I want to include, to give me a size guide for planning the harbour size. The Scalescenes fishing boat was well outside my comfort zone, too many curves and odd shapes. I’ve done it, but it’s pretty rough. It’s the most difficult kit I have built, and was sworn at more times than anything else I’ve built! It will eventually be rebuilt and this one binned, but it will serve its purpose for now…..




NEW TOYS A selection of other member's latest acquisitions.....

I picked up a few bits this month:



Dapol class 66 in Freightliner livery.
Pretty boring but I needed 66 in Freightliner green, and it was cheap from eBay!
Runs nicely.


Some wagon loads from a seller on eBay. They are a little pricey, but very good!
Here are coal, light limestone and sand, but lots of others offered for most wagons.
Search “precision loads” if anybody else is interested.

I’ve also picked up a pair of Dapol Network Rail Kestrels, very cheap from a Facebook group. I’m trying to build a train of Freightliner MJA wagons but they seem to be scarce, so these will help for now.
I might eventually build a full NR train…I won’t bother picturing them, as these wagons have been pictured a couple of times recently..


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Graham Farish Class 66 66779 'EVENING STAR ' GBRF.
This is a model of the last 66 off the production line, although there were kit-built ones after this.



Graham Farish Class 46 diesel D163 'LEIC & DERBY YEOMANRY ' BR Green



Dapol Class 66 66612 Unbranded Freightliner livery



Dapol Class 66 66111 EWS 'Weathered ' Highland Stag Hattons Ltd edition.



Kato Ge4/4-II 618 Bergun "Rhaetian Railway "

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I've been after a good condition example of one of these for ages, the prototype Deltic.
This one turned up in 'The Merseyside Express' train set at a great price, the advantage being the two Stanier coaches can bolster the coach fleet here and it comes with a controller too.
Upon inspection, I don't think this has ever been run so it's gone through my standard four hour running in procedure, and is running like a Swiss watch!