00 gauge North London WCML

Finally got time to watch Dave, very good  :thumbs

You most both be exhausted by the time you get home.

Well done.



Ed

It was nice to meet you over the weekend, it's certainly a busy layout and attracted a lot of interest at the show.

I hope you found a good place to eat Sunday evening, and a good journey 'back up north' on Monday.

Thanks guys yes it was a busy weekend I never got a break on the sunday. Sunday evening we ended up in pizza hut at the retail park by the station. Monday we traveled back to up to Wakefield to see Rachel's mum we finally got home to Co Durham late tuesday afternoon. Next year we have an invite to Milton Keynes in february so we will be better prepared by then.  :roll:  ;-)

Our next outing with wemblesden will be to Scunthorpe on 9th - 10th May (bank holiday weekend) I will post more details regarding the venue once I have them.

At last, I managed to watch it all through Dave.

Firstly, I have to say that's some impressive layout !!  Can you get it all set up at home or do you work on sections at a time ?

Ever since I first met you, it was clear your electronics ability could probably have put NASA to shame - not only am I amazed at how much of this wizardry there is in Wemblesden Park but also how neat and tidy it all looks.  No wonder your viewing public is impressed.

When you explained the few problems you'd had, you lost me with "reed switches" - reeds to me grow on wetlands and were used for thatching ………………….    "A couple of little jobs to sort" you said.  Turning on a soldering iron taxes my grey cells ………………. :oops:

Then there's the intro music - by you it says.  I know you have, or at least had, a recording studio at home - did you compose and play the music yourself ?  It served it's purpose admirably.

An excellent video explaining the ups and down of running an exhibition layout.  Many congratulations Sir.  :cheers

Thanks Peter. 
Wemblesden is actually my home layout and is normally set up in the garage. I only get to see it from the viewing side at exhibitions although I do have a load of mirror tiles along the back wall so I can get a rough idea of what it looks like! I have just posted a load of photos to the wemblesden facebook page. It will be 7 years next month from when I first built the 1:8 scale model of the layout with baseboard constriction starting propper later in the July of 2013. The layouts first outing was to locomotion at Shildon back in 2015 when I took the first video of it in action. I learned a lot from that show and spent the next 2 years rewiring and improving the electronics before going back out to perth green show in 2018. There I learned a few more issues like the track expanding and shorting out the block sections so they were cured using a hot glue gun to add insulation between the rail ends. It all finally came together back at Shildon later in 2018 followed by a good performance Newcastle (where we met up). Railex ne last year saw the introduction of the sound system whilst Stevenage was the best show to date. Currently the layout is back on it's support framework in the garage but needs all the electrics plugging back in. 

A reed switch is basically two pieces of springy metal inside a glass vacuum tube. The bits of metal make a contact when a magnet is brought near the tube. The switches are mounted between the running rails and all the locos are fitted with magnets that operate the switches. These in turn switch the relays that operate the points and signals + the holding of the trains in the storage yards.

I still have my music studio I need to go and clear some space once I have typed this as I have my friend coming over tonight to restart work on an album we have been working on since last year. The music I used in the video is all my own work including the ropey singing! I do have quite a bit of my music uploaded to my soundcloud account. There will be a link on my facebook profile.

The video was an interesting one to do as I wanted to try and capture what it was like to attend a show as an exhibitor. Unfortunately the charging socket I fitted to the layouts sound unit didn't charge the camera so after leaving it in the van charging off the solar panel for the remainder of saturday I had to spend £12 on a usb charging adaptor from tescos. A real shame as saturday was a really busy day with a massive crowd of people round the front of the layout. At least now we are sorted for future shows! On the whole the layout performed exceptionally well for its first time away from the north east and was only let down by one CDU not switching a point (this was bodged by wiring the point directly to the 16v ac supply) and the ongoing none hold issue that I tried to repair in the video.  

[yt]r9HdyuA-YTQ[/yt]

Quick update. First Wemblesden has been invited back to locomotion Shildon for this years Oct show so I will post the dates up nearer the time. Our next outing will be to Scunny in May. Since our last outing the layout has been reassembled in the garage but then I have been tied up with other stuff so not much chance of getting anymore done on it just yet. Hopefully I can crack on in a couple of weeks once I have finished doing jobs on the house. Most of you will know I am a musician and do most of the background music for my videos. I'm also in a band with a couple of mates and I have been co writing and producing our first new album over the past 12 months. Our first single Universal Credit is due to be released over the next couple of days here's a link to a preview…

https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/strangerthanfiction1/universal-credit

Just a quick heads up regarding our next show outing to Scunthorpe in May this show has now been cancelled due to the ongoing health issues in the UK. Hopefully things will get back to normal in time for Shildon in October.  

An old clip now but included as it features one of the buildings I modelled for Wemblesden..

[yt]NO4E6VjKkwo[/yt]

Starting a new and unusual project in N gauge…


[yt]stf_oYbqPIE[/yt]

[yt]kiZr9U3aDtI[/yt]

 ;-)

[yt]nZ1ZCFwrJ3g[/yt]

A great project you have decided to do there Dave

As you say it will test your modelling skills but we all need to do that to improve and keep our interests going.

Will be great watching this develop


Brian

Cheers Brian. Spent an enjoyable few hours in the 'railway room' yesterday scratch building the first bridge for the new layout.

[yt]0QQ_m8xxHk8[/yt]

Missed a few video updates…
[yt]DGKucX5s3s4[/yt]




[yt]kO3gsbSZ5R8[/yt]





[yt]bI-Ian2Gsq8[/yt]





[yt]6YaY1r1-BlI[/yt]

[yt]k6-MeU8kB8M[/yt]

[yt]EJf_xWvPmzQ[/yt] [yt]lUl3GhdDmTs[/yt]

Hi all been a long time since I posted any updates. Ok the quick version…
First off I finally have got back into full time employment after many years of temp jobs.

Wemblesden has now been retired to the loft and is currently undergoing a major rebuild to fit in the space. The layouts last outing was in march last year to my local show where the layout picked up two of the three awards that were up for grabs. My Swiss layout is now being built as an exhibition layout and is being worked on in the garage. I have also taken over as project manager for the Bradford Low Moor layout that is under construction down at my local club. For those of you on facebook have a look here  

https://www.facebook.com/groups/lowmoormodelrailway 

Dave.