Heather Kay
Western Thunderer
Some time ago, we went through some personal upheavals. Circumstances and health changed, meaning we - Best Beloved and I - were not able to complete a long term 7mm scale project. We decided to sell a lot of the stock and kits and bits to fund other interests.
One of those interests was to build a scale model of Wolverton Station, on the West Coast Main Line, north of where Milton Keynes is now. The period would be the late 1950s, so before the OHL went in, but would give running opportunities for steam and diesel traction.
The scale was to be 2mm to the foot. That's correct. We'd drop 7mm O Gauge and go directly to 2mm Finescale, without passing Go and collecting £200.
Amazingly, we worked out we could get almost the entire layout in our large shed. We got quite a way on with planning, but sadly time and circumstances rather squashed things. I blogged about the project, and made some useful discoveries and found out a lot of useful information about the subject.
The viewing side in this plan is the right hand side. Mentally rotate the image ninety degrees clockwise, and you’ll get a better idea.
This is based on the 1930s OS map of which we have a copy. I have traced and redrawn, including selective compression at each end. The purple lines represent the modelled area. The Wolverton works buildings such as the Old Lifting Shop and the Paint Shops would be represented on the backscene. I still hadn't quite worked out how the Park would survive compression — until we started mocking things up on the baseboard, it was going to be a bit speculative at best.
The off-scene areas would have track that will loop back, allowing continuous running on the main line in both directions. A train would pass left to right, then turn the loop (it wasn't decided whether this would be inside the shed or outside) to pass right to left. Potentially, we could have had four trains in each direction. The Newport Pagnell branch would give pretty much the only operational running.
I would like to say the project is dormant but not dead, but realistically it may never see the light of day. It does, still, occupy my idle moments, so you never know. One day, Wolverton may be recreated in 2mm scale in my garden shed.
One of those interests was to build a scale model of Wolverton Station, on the West Coast Main Line, north of where Milton Keynes is now. The period would be the late 1950s, so before the OHL went in, but would give running opportunities for steam and diesel traction.
The scale was to be 2mm to the foot. That's correct. We'd drop 7mm O Gauge and go directly to 2mm Finescale, without passing Go and collecting £200.
Amazingly, we worked out we could get almost the entire layout in our large shed. We got quite a way on with planning, but sadly time and circumstances rather squashed things. I blogged about the project, and made some useful discoveries and found out a lot of useful information about the subject.
The viewing side in this plan is the right hand side. Mentally rotate the image ninety degrees clockwise, and you’ll get a better idea.
This is based on the 1930s OS map of which we have a copy. I have traced and redrawn, including selective compression at each end. The purple lines represent the modelled area. The Wolverton works buildings such as the Old Lifting Shop and the Paint Shops would be represented on the backscene. I still hadn't quite worked out how the Park would survive compression — until we started mocking things up on the baseboard, it was going to be a bit speculative at best.
The off-scene areas would have track that will loop back, allowing continuous running on the main line in both directions. A train would pass left to right, then turn the loop (it wasn't decided whether this would be inside the shed or outside) to pass right to left. Potentially, we could have had four trains in each direction. The Newport Pagnell branch would give pretty much the only operational running.
I would like to say the project is dormant but not dead, but realistically it may never see the light of day. It does, still, occupy my idle moments, so you never know. One day, Wolverton may be recreated in 2mm scale in my garden shed.
Equally, someone got in contact via the original blog with news his father was one of the district survey team that measured up that stretch of line for the OLE installation. He'd kept the drawings made of the original Stratford Road overbridge, station building and platform structures. Again, we've not followed up, but that would have been a goldmine of information!