Progress Report

With the warmer weather arriving the progress on the layout has slowed noticeably. All the spring chores that can't be put off any longer all need attending to, but that's enough of the excuses.

So what has happened?

Well all the work has been on the horseshoe shaped peninsula. When we removed this peninsula from Brendan's, all the track work and bench work was removed leaving a great big wall. To get the wall out and transported it was cut vertically into 4 large sections with a circular saw.  The resulting cuts caused a bit of damage and looked very ugly on the back drop. After a bit of pondering on how best to repair the wall / backdrop sections I decided to bite the bullet and remove and replace the existing cladding.

Most of the 3mm mdf sheets came off easily as they had only been screwed on however the area around the return loop had a lot of glue on it which need to be removed carefully with a chisel. Once the cladding was off I was able to replace the noggins which had been cut through.

I started on the inside of the horseshoe which is now complete other than cutting a few tunnel portals, and I'm really happy with the way it has come up.

Looking up the inside of the horseshoe from the access end

 Looking from the top of the horseshoe back towards the entrance end and reversing loop.

 The area on the outside of the horseshoe above the return loop. This area had a lot of glue and took lots of elbow grease. Fortunately it's not a full sheet in length.

A shot of the mess when standing at the shed door. This is the outside of the horseshoe, looking at the curved end. Can't wait to get some of the layout up off the floor and into position.

The curved end on the outside of the horseshoe.

Looking down the outside of the horseshoe on the far side, just two sheets to go.