05) Building the Locomotives and Rolling Stock

The indusrial loco belongs to Dave Thornton, although it is not much use to him now that it has an EM tenshodo mechanism!
All other locos are owned by Lee Davis. They are mainly Lima, with a thorough clean of the motor and drive chain, good running in, extra pickups and Ultrascale Wheels.
The locos have been detailed in the bufferbeam area by Lee. Alan has added the "goalposts" for the Spratt and Winkle couplings and they were weathered by Trevor Smith.

37173 heads towards Callerton with the morning explosives trip.	31183 arrives at Fawdon with vans full of chocolate!	31283 waits the green light to return to Tyne Yard.
The layout in a finished state. 31183 is held at the Roger Murray signal.		Oooooops! The catenary mast was vertical before it was loaded in the car for the journey to Alan's house in Durham.
31183 draws in to the Fawdon siding while control at Gosforth holds the Metro on red. The bonded warehouse and Drill Hall buildings are on Blyth Quaside and are remnants of the extensive Blyth and Tyne railway system that was abandoned in 1963 in the Blyth area.. The buildings were photographed using a digital camera, manipulated in PaintShop Pro, printed on matt photographic paper mounted on thick card.	This is the view from the Wansbeck Road bridge that provides the scenic break for the Callerton end of the layout	There are two photographers on the footbridge in front of the Regent Centre footbridge. This is the picture they captured. The Newcastle United supporter with his can of McEwan's lager takes no interest in the trains.
The signal is by Roger Murray and the call on signal, interlocked with the red light, is a modified Eckon kit.	31283 heads north through Burton-on-Trent. (The layout is Calcutta Sidings owned by Phil Eames.)	31283 was being tested - note the "goalpost" for the Spratt and Winkle couplings. The goalpost has to be accurate in both height and protrusion from the bufferbeam. On the first running session of Round Trees Sidings, we found that repeated derailments were caused by the hook of the Spratt and Winkle coupling fouling the pipework on 31283.
31283 has Ultrascale wheels at the outer ends of both bogies with the smaller diameter of the centre wheels represented by Alan Gibson wheelsets.	37173 with full bufferbeam detail but no goalpost for coupling.	The industrial shunter belongs to Dave Thornton and is an early Judith Edge kit running on a 25mm wheelbase tenshodo motor bogie. Running sesssions have demonstrated the need for more weight and the need for some kind of match truck to provide better electrical pickup.
The Colin Craig etchings are very fine and with time and effort (by Alan this time) make a real difference to the Hornby VDA van	Those with the eyesight of an eagle will not only notice the etched brake lever, but will also notice that the underframe is an accurate representation and not a Hornby transfer from another model. The underframes were cast in resin.	The short lever version. This van is painted white to reflect sunlight to try and keep the chocolate cool inside.