Exhibition Time

As guests of The Astolat Model Railway Circle, we will be exhibiting our Thornycroft Sidings N gauge model railway, at their annual show:

Sunday January 22nd 2017
from 10.00 a.m. 'til 5.00 p.m
at
The Surrey Sports Park, University of Surrey,
Richard Meyjes Road, Guildford, Surrey, GU2 7AD.

Thornycroft at Basingstoke Model Railway Show (2016)

We look forward to seeing you!

Ed

Thornycroft Sidings video #3

The third video of our Thornycroft sidings model railway. This time the G6 shunting engine (stationed at Basingstoke), arrives with empty lowmac wagons, and departs at night with some PB class lorry chassis, heading from the Thornycroft Factory to Basingstoke Station. Interspersed with cameo scenes from around the factory.

Thornycroft Sidings video #2

The second video of our Thornycroft sidings model railway. This time the G6 shunting engine (stationed at Basingstoke), is organising its loads of covered lorry parts on 1 plank wagons, heading from the Thornycroft Factory to Basingstoke Station.

 
Ed

Basingstoke Transport Festival - Thank you

On Sunday 8th May (The hottest day of the year so far), we attended the Basingstoke Transport Festival as guests of the Thornycroft Society. Who have put this event on every year for the past 24 years (in partnership with Basingstoke and Deane council). The Basingstoke Transport Festival is a large free transport show/ rally showing all kinds of rare, vintage and unusual road vehicles, at the War Memorial Park in Basingstoke. Supported by many stall holders selling new and used; tools, car parts, models, toys, gardenware, clothing, and the odd sweet and food stall to keep you going.

This year after a Thornycroft Society member saw our layout at the Basingstoke Model railway show, he suggested and asked whether we would like to attend their event as a way for visitors to gain a better understanding of what the factory looked like "back in the day", after all it had a huge impact on the town and its ex-employees, some of whom were at the festival. The Society also put on a small exhibition of old photographs and diagrams of the vehicles produced by the firm and images of the factory - Some we had not seen before. Of course, also on show was a selection of restored Thornycroft lorries.

So, we spent the day chatting to some of the ex-employees and relatives, although they were not old enough to be around in the period of our model (1930's), there were a few who were there from the 50's and 60's who could remember some of the railway line and the buildings. Providing stories and reminiscing about the factory, vehicles and what the buildings were used for. I think all gave our model the stamp of approval, and providing us with a little more insight into what went on.

It was also well received by the general public who passed by - probably not expecting to see a model railway layout on display at a transport festival, but many could relate to it's location and perhaps gain knowledge of the history around Basingstoke, Including the young children who enjoyed it so much, they had to be dragged away by their parents!

Not your normal model railway show, but certainly a great day out. Thanks to all those who passed by and said "hi".

Picture montage showing the Thornycroft society tent and our stand (during some rare quiet time).

Our layout was powered off grid by a Volvo lorry battery (supplied by a kind member of the club) - quite fitting for a transport show!

Ed

show time reminder

As guests of The Thornycroft Society our Thornycroft Sidings N gauge model railway, is scheduled to appear at:



The Basingstoke Festival of Transport ,

War Memorial Park, Crossborough Hill, Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG21 4AG

Sunday 8th May 2016 11a.m - 4 p.m.

It will probably be the only model railway on show amongst a plethora of vintage vehicles.

Thornycroft Sidings video #1

The first video of our Thornycroft sidings model railway. The O2 (M7 as no r-t-r locomotive available) passenger train passes the Thornycroft factory on it's way to Cliddesden. Pulling a tri-composite coach.

 

Ed

Show Time

As guests of The Thornycroft Society our Thornycroft Sidings N gauge model railway, is scheduled to appear at: 
 

The Basingstoke Festival of Transport , 
War Memorial Park, Crossborough Hill, Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG21 4AG

Sunday 8th May 2016 11a.m - 4 p.m.

It will probably be the only model railway on show amongst a plethora of vintage vehicles.

Thornycroft J Class Lorry

David

End of Show

Thanks to everyone who saw and liked Thornycroft Sidings at the Basingstoke and North Hants. Model Railway Show on 12th/13th March 16.

Being based in the local area it attracted interest from residents who tried to work out its relationship to the site we know today - a supermarket car park and pertol station! How times have changed. A couple of visitors let it be known that they worked in the factory in its later years and others invited us to show the layout elsewhere, one of whom is associated with Thornycroft heritage so, watch this space for further news of where you can see the model.

David

And a train with all the wagons we brought with us for the show. Being pulled by a generic tank. The poor m7 just keeps on slipping with anything more than the passenger coach.

Ed

day 2

The trains have been running relatively smoothly today. As the afternoon gets quieter we have a bit of fun with making long trains.

Here's one that stretches the length of the model.

Ed

End of Day 1

So the end of day 1, at the Basingstoke Model Railway Show.

Our layout was pretty busy all day, with many visitors trying to work out where about the Thornycroft factory used to be in relation to the buildings and road that are there today. With a few telling us stories about the factory, railway line and the lorries that were made back in the day.

I Managed to quickly run around the show and these layouts (below) stood out for me (with my particular interests in small scaled modelling).

Top left and right: Bottle Kiln Lane 

Bottom Left: Plas Halt

Bottom Right: Llangerisech

Obviously apart from Thornycroft, I think Bottle Kiln Lane wins it for me today. I think the detail, and the way the railway sits in its surroundings is something I had not really seen before, watching the train through the overgrown shrubs and trees. The detail in the kiln was also impressive - I liked it.

Back again tomorrow (Sunday 13th March) - So hope to see you there.

Ed

First day of show

Here is a picture of thornycroft ready for the people to see. It was a pretty smooth setup considering it's the first time we have set it up for exhibition.

Ed

Thornycroft Stand Banner

Don't forget to visit us this coming weekend, we will be at: 

The Basingstoke & North Hampshire Model Railway Show 

Aldworth Science College, Basingstoke, RG22 6HA

Saturday 12th March, and Sunday 13th March 2016

Thornycroft exhibition stand banner

As with Cliddesden, I designed a banner for our exhibition stand. It's a representation of part of the side and signage that was on the main frontage of the "Power House" - the tallest building at the Thornycroft factory site. It took many days to put this together, to try and make it as realistic as possible. I think it looks pretty good and came out great from the printers.

It's full colour, and printed directly on 5mm Foamex (30cm x 184cm). We simply hold it in place with a few clamps to the stand frame.

Please do come by and say hi.

Ed

Thornycroft Backscene

As mentioned in this previous posting the backscene started life as a computer generated 3D model using Google Sketch-up. Using the virtual camera in sketchup we were able to create a view that would be used as the basis for the backscene. This took many attempts to get this to an acceptable view. We must of tried 5 different views, which were simple black and white wire frames, each one being printed out and tried in situ on the layout. This was made 10x worse by the fact that some model buildings carry on through into the backscene. We decided there was going to be no easy way to have a realistic scene that could be viewed from all angles, without some sort of distortion. However if the viewer was to be in the right position then it will look as though the model carries on "seamlessly" into the backscene, creating trompe-l'œil effect.

Final coloured in backscene

Once we were happy with the wireframe view, this was exported as an image file from Sketchup and then painfully "painted" with photoshop, using graphic textures we had previously used on the model building.
It was felt that a bit more skewing was required to force more perspective. Different light and shade was applied to give further illusion of distance. Once coloured in, this was again printed out, and tried on the layout. After a bit more tweaking, the backscene was finally ready to be printed.

The backscene is 120cm x 21cm, all of the previous test printouts had been on single A4 sheets joined together, but in order to create the final seamless backscene it had to be professionally printed.

Once back from the printers, the backscene was mounted onto the MDF backboard, using spray mount adhesive, trimmed to fit, and holes cut out where lighting is fed into the model buildings, and the track goes into the factory.Once slid into the channel at the back of the layout, the backscene finally finishes off the layout.

Backscene in place on layout

On the whole we were pretty happy with it. Something had gone slightly wrong with our measurements, in the fact that the white building on the right does not correctly align with the model. But overall we feel it gives a good impression of the factory.

The public début of our Thornycroft Sidings N gauge model railway, is scheduled to appear at: 

The Basingstoke & North Hampshire Model Railway Show 

Aldworth Science College, Basingstoke, RG22 6HA

Saturday 12th March, and Sunday 13th March 2016

Ed

Cliddesden in Print

Our Cliddesden model railway is featured in Railway Modeller magazine March issue. On sale from February 11th to March 10th 2016.

If you visited this Blog having read our article in Railway Modeller and want to know more then the best way to navigate this Blog is to select a topic of interest from the word cloud (titled Labels) shown in the left hand column.

This Blog covers the modelling of Cliddesden Station and Thornycroft Sidings in N gauge. Either layout is available for exhibition within about 30 miles of Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK.

Thornycroft Sidings has its public debut at the The Basingstoke & North Hampshire Model Railway Show, Aldworth Science College, Basingstoke, RG22 6HA on Saturday 12th March, and Sunday 13th March 2016.

David

3D model of the rest of the Thornycroft site

Many months ago I had an idea of how we could create the backscene for Thornycroft sidings. This involved creating a 3D computer generated model of the rest of the factory site - the other two-thirds of the 20 acre site. The idea being that we could place a virtual camera at the end, and I would almost have an instant backscene depicting the rest of the site.

Using google sketchup I gradually modelled the rest of the buildings using the photos available on britianfromabove.org.uk, The idea was not to create a 100% accurate model, but something that could be used as a framework/ outline, which could then be "filled" in using a graphic editing program.

More on creating the backscene later. But thought it was worth showing a view from the other side that will never be shown on our layout, as a lot of work went into modelling these virtual buildings.

The large rectangle on the left is the backscene "window", to the left of that is where the real model sits. (basic shading effect from sketchup applied):

For reference the real view from a photo:

J.I. Thornycroft and Co Motor Works, Basingstoke, 1939 - Britain from Above

Ed

Public début of Thornycroft Sidings

The public début of our Thornycroft Sidings N gauge model railway, is scheduled to appear at: 

The Basingstoke & North Hampshire Model Railway Show 

Aldworth Science College, Basingstoke, RG22 6HA

Saturday 12th March, and Sunday 13th March 2016

This is a great show and we exhibited there last year with Cliddesden, winning best in show. Thornycroft was a massive employer in the town, and to have the debut showing in Basingstoke is quite fitting.

We hope to see many of you there, and maybe sharing some of your stories about the factory.

We still have a few things to make Thornycroft exhibition ready, notably the back scene, stand banner and a tidy up. More on those later.

Ed