Cadian 127th Regiment

Thursday 24 December 2020

226 - Merry Christmas and on to 2021!

Image used without permission

Happy Christmas Eve everyone!

And an early Merry Christmas for tomorrow.

I hope that you and your families are all ok as we come to the end of what has been an incredibly strange and difficult year.

Hobby content has been a little low on here for a while due to lots of different reasons but I'm positive for the new year and for me to be getting some more things done to show you.

The main reason for lack of posts is because in October 2019 I broke my ring finger and my little finger on my right hand, my dominant hand, and all ability to paint and use hobby tools was gone.

By early 2020, I had been referred to a consultant who explained that I wouldn't get the movement back in my fingers without surgery. It was a pretty easy decision for me to go with the surgery.

So surgery was booked in and all good to go but, like many many others, it was cancelled due to covid.

With no idea when I might be able to have surgery, I've just plodded along with minimal use of my right hand.

Luckily, and I do count myself as very lucky, my surgery was booked in for October and went ahead without any problems. The surgery was a PIP joint replacement operation, which basically involves giving me artificial joints in both fingers.

I'm now on a nice long road to getting the movement back to my fingers, though it will never be as good as before.

This is why I'm hoping 2021 will be a better year personally for hobbying.

I hope everyone has a good Christmas and New Year and that 2021 provides a chance to do the things we want to again.

225 - Praetor Armoured Assault Launcher Part 2

Hi everyone. Hope you are all doing well and surviving covid and lock down.

Work commitments have meant I've not had huge amounts of time to get any hobby done. Admin support for the NHS has meant a lot of extra and different work.

I have managed to sneak some hobby time in and have been making progress on the Praetor Armoured Assault Launcher.

I think I need a bigger washing up bowl! This is some of the parts for the Praetor getting ready for a scrub in some washing up liquid. I'd removed some of the flash but hadn't removed any excess resin at this point.

Some of the larger pieces before their wash. The track units, interior side panels, floor and top armour sections.

Here's the interior section for the left side. There was a little bend on the interior piece but glue and pressure fixed that.

And this is the track unit itself. Nothing too complicated here. There was no major work needed to make this ready to glue, just a few spots where some sanding was needing to get rid of wastegates.

No pics of the stage before this unfortunately. The other track unit was just as easy. I started by gluing the floor piece to the side unit. The rear section needed a little bit of sanding to fit.

Sitting pretty. Everything sits nice and flat so there is no wobble.

Next up is to get the top pieces sorted. So the front top section, there's a mid section, the missile launcher housing itself and the left and right armour tops.

Thanks for reading through.

Stay safe.

224 - Railway Project - Part 14

Hi everyone, thank you for popping by for the latest update. I hope everyone is well and managing through the lockdown.

Let's jump straight into this one:

Disaster has struck across the layout! Either that or someone has been using rolling stock to hold some fences up while they are glued in place. Yeah, they we're being used to hold the fences up.

Oh no, another disaster! Oh, wait. Yeah just more fencing.

This fence is already up. And has had a coat of brown wash to try and dull it down a bit and make it less "new".

The main station now has some flowers and bushes out front. Ties it into the landscape more. You can see our tarmac mix laid down as well. This was made using a very small amount of ballast and tarmac scenics.

We'll end this update with a nice shot of the whole layout. Definitely can tell the progress when looking at some of the older photos.

Thank you all for scrolling through.

Keep safe and keep modelling.

223 - Railway Project - Part 13

Hi all. Thank you for dropping in. I hope that everyone is safe and well with the ongoing Covid-19 situation and that people are coping as best they can.

With the lock down here in the UK, I've haven't been going to my brother-in-law's house to do anymore to the layout. He is still working on it but progress is slow.

So this update is where we got up to about 6 weeks ago when I was last there.

Now we're getting into the little details. So some fencing was added. This will be treated to a wash so it's not quite so new and clean.

Some different fencing with some pre made tufts and a lone tree added near the housing.

The larger hill has received the treetment (get it tree-tment, sorry). The pre made tufts and flowers were added as well. My brother-in-law wasn't entirely convinced when I told him to buy some packs of these but they just provide a bit of height and colour variation to the hillside.

You can also see where we've weathered the retaining walls and laid the tarmac road.

Finally, the manor house got the extra details too. Some tufts and trees and a hedgerow with gate.

It's nice to finally see the little bits coming together on the layout and it's starting to look a bit more finished rather than an expanse of green with some track in the middle.

Thanks again for taking the time to read/view this.

Keep safe and keep modelling.

222 - Railway Project - Part 12

Hello everyone. I hope you are all keeping well with the current goings on in the world. Maybe I'll get around to painting some models....or not!

Anyway, my brother-in-law and I did mange to get a little bit more done to the layout before everything decided to go completely mad.

Now that we've got a lot of the groundworks etc done, we started thinking about little details. So first of all we have a bus stop, sign and bin. Metcalfe kit naturally. Nice and simple but will look good by the station.

Then we also have some benches. Again pretty simple to put together.

And they look very nice when they are complete. Not in need of much weathering either.

More benches! This time picnic ones.

Complete with umbrellas. Will look very nice by a certain building.

And finally a loading crane, complete with chain and hook.

Thank you for dropping by. Hopefully this has been a nice distraction from the world.

Keep safe and keep modelling!

221 - Railway Project - Part 11

Hello and thanks for visiting for Part 11 (!!) of the railway project.

Last time we got some ballast down, now it's time to start building on that detail.

Now it was time to start getting some flock and grass down. This is all from Woodland's Scenics, unfortunately I haven't got the specific code for which one's we used. The sidings and left side incline got a nice covering.

As did the right side hill. We also wanted to add some retaining wall to the siding on the outer loop. Our initial attempt was just a little bit tall.

And that was the same with the other end of the wall.

With a little bit of measuring and cutting, we got a nice height wall that scales nicely with whatever is in the siding - such as the Intercity shown above.

Not content with the one wall, we got to work building another by the main station. Only a low wall this time. Just something to stop cars or wayward pedestrians falling off the embankment.

The wall does extend all the way to the station itself. Here it is almost finished. Just a few more pillars to add so it doesn't look quite so odd.

And that's today's update done. Thank you for looking through the latest update.

Keep an eye out for more and a big announcement!

220 - Railway Project - Part 10

Hi everyone! Thank you for dropping in for Part 10 of this railway project. Still no name for the layout- I blame my brother in law!

Today's update will be about ballasting! Exciting isn't it?

We actually decided to do a test of our ballasting on a small section of track before diving into the whole thing. The process we used is one that's tried and tested by railway modelers:

- pour the ballast on the track and be happy with how it lies, so not covering the sleepers completely

- mix water and PVA glue 50:50 and add a little bit of washing up liquid

- apply to the ballast using a syringe

- leave to dry for a minimum of 24 hours

Here is our test section once fully dried. Not too bad. With a bit of weathering it will look a lot less clean.

So we cracked on and did more ballasting on the inner loop.

And even more ballasting on the sidings on the inner loop. This section looks quite impressive and has enough space for some little scenes going on.

And ballasting in front of the station which really does look good. Starting to look like a railway now!

The weathering will be done using washes and possibly the airbrush to just add grim just to make the ballast look less like it's come fresh out of a packet.

Thanks for taking some time to view this update. Stay tuned for more!

219 - Railway Project - Part 9

Hi all, thank you for taking a look at Part 9 of the railway project.

I think that now we are on part 9, I can't keep listing the previous parts so you will have to look through the archive at the bottom of the page if you haven't seen them before, sorry.

In the last update, we had laid down a load of fine fill to create roads and texture and generally make the layout look like more than some insulation board glued together.

Having laid the fine fill, we then went about removing it. Only small amounts though. Using the buildings and platform as a template, we removed the fine fill that would be underneath. This then means that the platform sits a little lower than the landscape, making it look less plonked in place and more part of the scenery.

The same was done for the rural station on the inner loop. A Stanley knife and scraper were the only tools needed.

Station back in place and looking less like it's floating above the ground.

Across the back of the layout, by the viaduct, we wanted to add some retaining wall in. Unfortunately, the Metcalfe retaining wall kit isn't the same height as the Metcalfe viaduct. Whether this is a genuine mistake or the kit is designed to not work with the viaduct, I have no idea.

So we added a block of celotex underneath the retaining wall to give it the right height.

And then started to shape the celotex to look a little less like a big concrete block.

Then it was time to go back to coloured fine fill to blend everything in together.

Even more fine fill!

And this is how the layout is looking at the moment. Pretty much all of the celotex has now been covered with our makeshift landscaping material.

Our next challenge is to start ballasting the track and getting some flock and static grass down. Wish us luck! And thanks again for taking a look.

218 - Railway Project - Part 8

Hi, it's time for part 8 and I think it's about time my brother-in-law and I came up with a name for the layout, I can't keep calling it "The Layout".

If you're interested, the previous posts can be found here:

Having rescued the layout on the last post, we could finally start cracking on with the landscaping.

Filler mixed with green paint first to give a good base colour, cover up joins and add some ground texture.

Quite a large section to cover and blend into the base board.

The base colour becomes a bit more "earthy" as you come round to the main station area. We tried to keep this smoother with the buildings being on here.

More green filler was applied in the far corner and along the top edge of this section.

The nice smooth filler continued down the ramp that we added in as a transition point.

And the green continued in the top corner here as well.

We are planning on creating a road that will run from the main station, down the ramp to the inner loop station and beyond, so this area received some dark grey filler to create a more industrial base.

And the road will also continue through the viaduct.

Finally we used the earthy filler to block out nay spaces that hadn't been touched, such as the large blank space on the opposite side of the inner loop.

Thanks for reading through and again wishing you all a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.