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