Station !

A final push yesterday got the station area ballasted, track laid and the station with associated buildings in place. Nice to have the garden railway back in place.

 View of station, showing siding ...

 Gangers check the newly laid track ....

 View showing the lineside hut and water tower...

Diesel (battery powered) approaches the station area...

I had the battery diesel running round for a while - picked up some areas of uneven track, which required a jiggle of the ballast to correct. Plenty left to to do......

Buildings for the station area....

The main station, this will sit on some offcuts of decking, needs a clean and a few repairs but ready for use.

I'll use a small building as a line-side hut, need to stick on one of the side panels which has come loose and give the roof a re-paint.

a few checks .....

Took advantage of the sunny weather yesterday to do a few bits and bobs

firstly engineers check the clearances in the station approach from the signal box ...

 engineers find the track somewhat off-centre of in rockery cutting...

 a quick visit by the track gang (me) gets the track sitting centrally

 ---oXo---

After a rummage in the garage I got the the necessary bits of track out for the station area and laid them out to check alignment etc ...

not too bad - only about 3" out of alignment at the top end

Station approaches completed .....

Added the edging and laid the track for the station approach from the signal box

 put down the track down for the station approach from the top (in the trackbed section which I prepared previously)

 Now in full swing I got started on the station section - had a massive 'dig-o-mania' puting in the edging to the middle of the garden and dug half of the trackbed

a few more sessions should see the station section in place - more gravel to buy, the station layout to plan .....

Next section of trackbed prepared ....

A rather damp day yesterday but but I managed to get further by getting the next section of the trackbed completed.

On my next session will put the weed fabric down and get some more track in place; after this section is done I will be ready to get to work on the station section.

Half way round ....

 Nice to have some dry weather at the weekends, so yesterday laid out the next section of the track up from rockery cutting and round the corner at the top - talking me past the half way point.

On the garden front, the azaleas in the top border have been moved to fill in the bottom part of the garden and a new lavender border planted. The area in front of the next section of the trackbed has been dug over.

Loco gets a makeover .....

The battery operated multi-coloured loco (mostly yellow) has been re-painted a nice mid-blue to match the wheel colour; not much other detailing apart from some coal in the coal bunker...