Working on a coal mine

Buying a pre-built layout worked out well for Andrew Morris, who soon realised he had something rather special on his hands.

Words: Chris Gadsby Photography: Chris Nevard Artwork: Andrew Mackintosh

What makes this layout great?

“Andrew has accomplished a delicate blend of old and new with this layout, making sure he stayed true to the one he bought while also adding his own flair for modelling.”

Many of us have bought something on eBay at one point or another. It may be that you only dabble occasionally, or you might be checking it daily for new railway slides to try and add to your collection. The great thing about the site is that you can almost always get exactly what you need for an excellent price. It might be a part for your car, a birthday present, or, in Andrew Morris’ case, a model railway.

“This layout, which I have since named ‘Graig Merthyr’, was spotted online by my then-wife and it was located fairly close to me as we were living in Wales at the time. It seemed as though it would be perfect. I won the auction, headed up to have a look at it and was taken aback when I first saw it. Something didn’t seem right, but at first glance I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Then I realised – this isn’t ‘OO’ gauge!”

TRACK INSPECTION

For a second I felt disheartened, but upon closer inspection I discovered that no, it was the right gauge, but all the track had been handbuilt from C&L sections of track and Scaleway points with the correct sleeper spacing for ‘OO’ gauge. It really threw my eye when I first looked at it. When I got the layout home and could give it a proper inspection, the same trackwork that had originally thrown me off completely blew me away. The quality of the work was astounding and encouraged me to up my game when it came to adding the extension. I’m not a rivet counter by any means, but still wanted a reasonable representation of a railway and couldn’t let the layout transition from stunning handbuilt track to off‐the‐shelf pieces.”

Within three months of ‘Graig Merthyr’ (the name taken from a colliery local to Andrew) changing home, Andrew had decided to extend it.

“The fiddleyard that came with the layout was a little travel-worn and the join between the fiddleyard and the scenic section consisted of a small piece which was, in my opinion, poorly done. It looked as though it was an afterthought. It did mean though that I had the perfect excuse to take it out, improve it, and add an extension at the same time. Since the layout is Welsh I opted to go down the coal route for the extension and elected to incorporate a bridge that would lead to another colliery and act as a scenic break. Rather than have the bridge right at the end of the scenic section as many modellers do, I chose to put it a foot or so inside the scenic section so that trains would disappear into the distance, rather than into a tunnel. The bridge is reasonably accurate for one I saw in the local area as I took plenty of photographs and counted the bricks to make the model.”

KEEPING IT REAL

When you buy a layout second-hand you can rip it all up and just use the baseboards, or you can keep everything as close as possible to the original design.

Andrew decided that the latter was the better option and kept everything as original as he could up to the Portakabin, which marks where old meets new.

“If you’re going to buy a layout and then rip all of it out then you might as well have just started from scratch in the first place! The only significant part of the original layout I’ve changed is the old steam shed, which I’ve converted into a modern fuel point as I run the layout in the BR blue era of the 1980s. With my collection I could run it anywhere from the mid-1960s onwards. I’ve tried my best to find information about when and how the layout was first built and have come up with absolutely nothing. All I’ve been able to do is guess that it was built around the 1980s, given the products used and the dates on the few boxes that I do have from the purchase. The station area still has points controlled by H&M point motors which are very old and give a really heavy clunk when they move, but they’re pretty robust. I’ve never had any problems with them. Overall, the buildings have aged reasonably well and I’ve not had to do anything other than replace the odd missing chimney pot, and lights have been added to the platform to put my own mark on the area, but with the build quality so good in the first place, why change it?”

Having such a good base to work with meant that Andrew could spend much more of his time on the finer details of the layout, using ideas that occur to him while he’s driving as inspiration.

“These details come from my memories of the area that was heavily attacked during the war. The bomb crater on top of the hill is a prime example. Today, they have all grown over, but if you go for a walk in the local valleys, you reach one and can tell by the circular nature of it and its size that nobody has dug that by hand. The manhole cover in the street allows a nice view of the sewer pipe below and those pipes have remained in my mind for a long time. When I was a boy, my friends and I used to go and play in some of the industrialised areas and we’d see these pipes. Never sure what was coming out of them as it clearly wasn’t water or sewage, we made the decision not to touch it as it was probably some industrial chemical. There weren’t the water regulations there are now.

“I made a change to the fiddleyard earlier this year, bringing it from a 6ft straight one to a 4ft traverser, but I think now that the layout is complete. I’m certainly not extending it again now that it’s 24ft long. Of course, it takes some dedicated modelling professionals to help everybody’s layout come together so I’d like to thank Justin at Scale Model Scenery, as well as Martin and Rhys at WWS for their assistance during the build, and a special thank you goes to Chris at West Hill Wagon Works who rushed through an order for me when I realised something was missing right before Chris Nevard came to take the photographs!”

A quick eBay search shows that there are plenty of model railways for sale at the moment, and at prices to suit almost every budget. Whether you’re looking for something that’s ready to go or something that you can build upon without having to come up with a fresh idea of your own, why not have a browse and see what’s available? You might just grab yourself a bargain along the way.

RAIL CRANES

Andrew has tried to lean on his experience working on the railway as much as possible with ‘Graig Merthyr’, and that includes his cranes.

“I wanted to include some things that not everybody has. It’s easy to buy things off a shelf but I wanted something a little bit different and cranes just seem to be my thing. The Plasser single jib crane is a resin cast kit which was a lovely kit to assemble and travels impeccably on the track because it weighs a ton! There’s also a crane I used to work on as an apprentice. This one is a Dapol kit on which I’ve made a slight alteration to the chassis to turn it into a rigid eight-wheel vehicle and I’ve adjusted the cab to give it a sloping roof rather than a flat one, as well as adding wire handrails. The match truck that goes with it was also a cheap find from Ratio that I’ve altered the jib length on as it was slightly inaccurate.

“The salmon wagon cranes were scratchbuilt but I have since found out that West Hill Wagon Works are making those cranes and generators, which is handy because I have another four wagons that need to be craned up. The next project is to make some long welded rail to go on the beds of the wagons which are long enough but flexible enough to go on the curves of the layout. I’ve tried a few things already but have not yet found a material which looks like rail, but bends enough to go round the curves.

3 things we like

FACTFILE: ‘GRAIG METHYR’

ABOUT THE MODELLER: ANDREW MORRIS

“I work for GWR at Longrock depot, but when I’m away from the railways, either full ‐size or miniature, I get out with my Welsh sheepdog as she is a ball of non-stop energy! Our favourite walk is along the beach as she loves the sea.”