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Finn’s layout started as a simple N gauge oval with a standard DC control.
Peco points for turnouts and flexitrack was added to the oval and mostly Lyddle End buildings and a few Graham Farrish ones acquired for the layout.
By the summer we decided to build a landscaped layout, the first ever for both of us, which had to fit into a passageway.
Construction started in the autumn of 2012 using a polystyrene insulation board of dimensions 1.6m x 0.76m x 8cm with off cuts used to build the high relief. The theme was a pastiche of the Cornish landscape of Tor, tin mine, estuary, castle, farm, small town and old granite quarry with Z gauge track as a narrow gauge line from the quarry and mine.
Rough designs were made to-scale on paper before transfer to the board after consultation between grandson Finn (hero I.K. Brunel) as Railway Chief Railway Engineer- and grandpa Simon as Chief Railway Navvy.
Construction incorporated tunnels under the high relief and a cut-out for an estuary to incorporate a ‘viaduct’. Modrock was used to smooth out the contours and flock used for colouring with added help from nana Val in gluing on the fine detail.
The theme was a period in the 1930s and 40s of the Great Western Railway with GWR 060 Pannier Tank and 262 Engines with GWR chocolate/cream corridor coaches plus early BR red compartment coaches and additionally assorted trucks and a guards van.
Advertising signs by Trackside Signs, plus bespoke ones made by them, complimented the layout to inject additional visual realism. Construction was completed by Christmas.
