Carrick Island - new project
Posted: Sat Nov 02, 2002 10:15 pm
I am putting Highworth to one side for a bit to cool off since it is just one headache after another and I need a break.
What I'm currently doing is a narrow gauge route set on an island 'somewhere off the coast of southern England'. It's fiction and is set in the present but these are working railways, not a tourist line (although summer tourist traffic is a big earner). The island's first railway was built in the 1860s to bring tin ore down to the docks and to a tinplate works, and passenger trains were introduced about a year after opening. This line operates along the north shore of the island. A second line was built about 1880 and served the southern coast along with a farmed timber plantation, and small coal mine. In about 1900 a third line was built to link these two and to serve a stone quarry. In 1910 the three railways were amalgamated under a Joint Committee. The grouping of 1923 did not affect the island since these lines were an irrelevance to mainland railways. In 1948 they did not come under the remit of BR due to a simple clerical error and so have remained privately owned until now.
The island has been built using TSTF and real terrain has been used, and real place names (the terrain is actually Cornish) but the industries, vegetation and settlements of the island are largely ficticious. I have written a comprehensive line history so that I can aim for some sort of beleiveable background and meaningful traffic operations.
The route is an unashamed excuse to use all the 2x scale NG stock currently available (thanks Kevin, and ta John for the new coaches). The three lines still use a good deal of the original 3 companies stock, with Tallylyn locomotives and coaches on the gentler northern line, more powerful Ffestiniog engines and bogie coaches on the more precipitous and heavily engineered southern line with a mixture of Corris and WHR stock on the quarry/coal mine line.
The route has it's inspiration in several sources: Madder Valley Railway, Isle of Man, Isle of Wight, Talyllyn, Ffestiniog, Wantage Tramroad and a few other bits n bobs (both gleaned from the modelling press and from snippets of half baked ideas formulated while on holidays to places like Sark and Lundy). I hope the result will be quite unusual.
Terraforming is all done, I'm just filling the sea at present and then it is out with the surveying poles across the hills...
Now - a request. I am not a 3D modeller as you know. I can use quite a lot of models from the various freeware sources run through SFM to 2x size but will be short of railway - specific buildings like station shelters, signal cabins, loco/carriage sheds, coal stages, water tanks and so on. Plus small industrial plant like little engine houses, pump houses, crumbling corrugated tin sheds and screens etc. If anyone would be interested in assisting me (we can invent the style of building and company colour scheme as we go) then please drop me a line.
What I'm currently doing is a narrow gauge route set on an island 'somewhere off the coast of southern England'. It's fiction and is set in the present but these are working railways, not a tourist line (although summer tourist traffic is a big earner). The island's first railway was built in the 1860s to bring tin ore down to the docks and to a tinplate works, and passenger trains were introduced about a year after opening. This line operates along the north shore of the island. A second line was built about 1880 and served the southern coast along with a farmed timber plantation, and small coal mine. In about 1900 a third line was built to link these two and to serve a stone quarry. In 1910 the three railways were amalgamated under a Joint Committee. The grouping of 1923 did not affect the island since these lines were an irrelevance to mainland railways. In 1948 they did not come under the remit of BR due to a simple clerical error and so have remained privately owned until now.
The island has been built using TSTF and real terrain has been used, and real place names (the terrain is actually Cornish) but the industries, vegetation and settlements of the island are largely ficticious. I have written a comprehensive line history so that I can aim for some sort of beleiveable background and meaningful traffic operations.
The route is an unashamed excuse to use all the 2x scale NG stock currently available (thanks Kevin, and ta John for the new coaches). The three lines still use a good deal of the original 3 companies stock, with Tallylyn locomotives and coaches on the gentler northern line, more powerful Ffestiniog engines and bogie coaches on the more precipitous and heavily engineered southern line with a mixture of Corris and WHR stock on the quarry/coal mine line.
The route has it's inspiration in several sources: Madder Valley Railway, Isle of Man, Isle of Wight, Talyllyn, Ffestiniog, Wantage Tramroad and a few other bits n bobs (both gleaned from the modelling press and from snippets of half baked ideas formulated while on holidays to places like Sark and Lundy). I hope the result will be quite unusual.
Terraforming is all done, I'm just filling the sea at present and then it is out with the surveying poles across the hills...
Now - a request. I am not a 3D modeller as you know. I can use quite a lot of models from the various freeware sources run through SFM to 2x size but will be short of railway - specific buildings like station shelters, signal cabins, loco/carriage sheds, coal stages, water tanks and so on. Plus small industrial plant like little engine houses, pump houses, crumbling corrugated tin sheds and screens etc. If anyone would be interested in assisting me (we can invent the style of building and company colour scheme as we go) then please drop me a line.
