Using base boards salvaged from the Mercers' School Model Railway Club Rye House model when the school closed in 1958, a new model was started in two-rail. It was not to have been a circuit, just end-to-end operation of a branch line terminus. Note the Pug 0-4-0T before conversion to GWR.
Gash track, bought from Walkers and Hotzappfel (later W&H) of Baker Street, was set down in thick brown paint on cork with ballast poured over it until dry and set. Wire-in-tube point operation was begun with one small lever frame.
The model was not properly planned and never finished but it survived East Molesey to languish in the loft at QH, only going to the tip when Deddington Junction was on the drawing board.
Colin discovered the original Letraset wet transfer system, used it on these two kit-built wagons, then wrote an article about it in the Model Railway News (September 1961). As a result, Letrset wrote to tell me about their new instant dry-transfer system and sent samples for my evaluation.
Around the same time, Colin decided to move to all GWR and made a white-metal K's 0-4-2T. It never worked properly as it did not have brass frames and so twisted and the mechanism jammed. An auto-coach was built from a Ratio kit to go with it. Both are now in the SMR museum.
They were stuck in a glass cabinet pending any possible working layout. They were still operational in 2008.
Change of scale
Lambourn
Raising the game in the interim years
The birth of Deddington Junction
Early years at Deddn Jn
Re-wiring and first refurbishment
The Grand Refit
Building Barford terminus
Hempton shed refit
Work in progress - latest news
Thirty Years On – Grand Re-opening
Gallery 1
Gallery 2
Gallery 3; fin de siècle
Gallery 4
The Deddington Junction mythology
Loco power
Rolling stock
Track plan
Electrics
Museum
Thomas and friends