Where to begin. I'm old enough to remember steam operation on the Great Eastern main line. I had my first train-set when I was five years old: who else remembers the Tri-ang Princess Elizabeth and Hornby (2-rail) Clun Castle when they first appeared?
In the late 1960s I built an EM gauge East Anglian based layout, but then I became a founder member of the Great Eastern Railway Society (GERS) and for twenty years its Journal Editor, so little time for model railways.
I always thought Colchester loco shed would make an ideal model, as it was a long and narrow site. Through the GERS I had access to various plans and photographs and although my interest was the period 1948-1959, it was soon clear in that timescale, the infrastructure changed in various ways, signals, lineside buildings, addition of ohl and a "semi-permanent" feature in terms of the breakdown train crane, went for scrap etc.
So in the last 15 years or so, the model has evolved as near as possible to scale (and my skills allow) as it was in 1955, albeit the rolling-stock covers my area of interest 1948-1959. Moving from EM to OO was a simple choice, as it was easier to convert my EM locos to OO, than rtr locos to EM!
Bertram Mills Circus visited Colchester every year, and I've built one of the four trains, the milk train with streamlined B17 had to be modelled, and fish trains with K2 were "infamous"! All my rtr items get some "treatment" in time, such as renumbered, weathered etc, etc!
Sorry about the "waffle" but, if I can help with anything Railways East Anglia......
A view looking towards Ipswich from shed entrance road. (See also last photo)
Down train passing shed and over Brick Kiln Lane level crossing, which by mid 1950s had some of the crossing timbers removed to make it pedestrian only.
On the left the original loco coal bank, before being replaced by the Mitchell 1ton tub coaler. J15 arrvives on a Brightlingsea branch train. Signal box scratch built albeit windows and doors from a sketch I sent York Modelmaking.
Bertrum Mills Circus train, hauled by 1734 the only K2 put into post war LNER livery to run on the GE. Livery didn’t last long, as the loco ended up in the Channelsea River at Stratford, and on return from Works was in BR black
Colchester breakdown train. Mixture of Dan Pinnock's kits and scratchbuild.
Hornby B17, (yet to be "treated") on up milk train. Superb photo of this train for real at Witham.
Stephen Poole E4 kit from c1970 in front of the Mitchell 1ton tub coaler.
This was the end of the tram route from the town where bus is standing. The lorry is backing into the loco shed road access. The green building in the centre is one of the three water tanks serving the railway station, laundry and loco shed. Station on right.
Paul
In the late 1960s I built an EM gauge East Anglian based layout, but then I became a founder member of the Great Eastern Railway Society (GERS) and for twenty years its Journal Editor, so little time for model railways.
I always thought Colchester loco shed would make an ideal model, as it was a long and narrow site. Through the GERS I had access to various plans and photographs and although my interest was the period 1948-1959, it was soon clear in that timescale, the infrastructure changed in various ways, signals, lineside buildings, addition of ohl and a "semi-permanent" feature in terms of the breakdown train crane, went for scrap etc.
So in the last 15 years or so, the model has evolved as near as possible to scale (and my skills allow) as it was in 1955, albeit the rolling-stock covers my area of interest 1948-1959. Moving from EM to OO was a simple choice, as it was easier to convert my EM locos to OO, than rtr locos to EM!
Bertram Mills Circus visited Colchester every year, and I've built one of the four trains, the milk train with streamlined B17 had to be modelled, and fish trains with K2 were "infamous"! All my rtr items get some "treatment" in time, such as renumbered, weathered etc, etc!
Sorry about the "waffle" but, if I can help with anything Railways East Anglia......
A view looking towards Ipswich from shed entrance road. (See also last photo)
Down train passing shed and over Brick Kiln Lane level crossing, which by mid 1950s had some of the crossing timbers removed to make it pedestrian only.
On the left the original loco coal bank, before being replaced by the Mitchell 1ton tub coaler. J15 arrvives on a Brightlingsea branch train. Signal box scratch built albeit windows and doors from a sketch I sent York Modelmaking.
Bertrum Mills Circus train, hauled by 1734 the only K2 put into post war LNER livery to run on the GE. Livery didn’t last long, as the loco ended up in the Channelsea River at Stratford, and on return from Works was in BR black
Colchester breakdown train. Mixture of Dan Pinnock's kits and scratchbuild.
Hornby B17, (yet to be "treated") on up milk train. Superb photo of this train for real at Witham.
Stephen Poole E4 kit from c1970 in front of the Mitchell 1ton tub coaler.
This was the end of the tram route from the town where bus is standing. The lorry is backing into the loco shed road access. The green building in the centre is one of the three water tanks serving the railway station, laundry and loco shed. Station on right.
Paul
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