Starting out small

[Chatty]

Good Morning


Looking through some old magazines in search of inspiration and I came across an article in September 2013 Railway Modeller on Ian Futers style layouts.

Although, I have been away from British modelling for at least 2 decades umm...I thought I can recall earlier layouts from the 1970's as mentioned such as Lochend and Ashleigh and some other others, names of which I cannot recall, built in EM and P4.

I wondered then, as I do now, how was the level of interest kept up given that they would be operationally limited.  I guess Ian interest was kept up by turning over layouts fairly rapidly.

Has anyone on this forum built 3 turnout (or maybe 4) layouts along the Futers' style?

Kind regards

Geoff

[BobB]

The layout I'm in the middle of building is an adaption of one of Ian's four point style layouts. He used the highlands to run a Minitrix class 27 into a terminus station which had a run-around loop, a bay siding and another back siding. All I have done is shifted it down south and put a load of hidden sidings and a reverse loop underneath so I don't have to handle the trains.

Operations are somewhat limited with such a small layout but realism can be achieved and that's what I try to get to. The one thing that used to frustrate me was the need for manual uncoupling. A principle reason for returning to N was automatic uncoupling, promised by Farish and only promised and achieved by Dapol. In my opinion, many a simple branch (GWR ?) is ruined by needing a hand from the sky to let the engine run around.

Just my personal take on things !

[Sipat]

Have a look at the layout in my signature for an idea of a minimum space layout.
I dont feel limited. I can run any type of freight train along with any 2 car dmu. Have up to 5 trains on scene at a time. Shunt and operate a passenger service too