Philden Street Yard Episode 2

It's Episode 2 of Philden Street Yard. Time to see what's happening 20 years ago down south in Melbourne in 1:87 scale. This time, it's.... DOUBLE TROUBLE!

Wonder what that's all about?

STEAMRAIL's D3 639 Arrives

Hooley Dooley! Would you take a look at this? One of the final additions to my Philden Street Yard layout may very well be the jewel in the crown of my small bookshelf layout. It is a Phoenix Reproductions Victorian Railways D3 class steam locomotive complete with DCC sound that had quickly sold out when first released early in 2022. But... after already adding some Steamrail heritage passenger cars to my roster in March, as luck would have it Metro Hobbies in Melbourne just so happened to list 6 for sale on their eBay store on a weekend when there was also a 20% off selected Toys & Hobbies promo happening. I've always stopped short of considering a HO scale Australian steam locomotive on account of the price, but 20% off? This was my chance. After making my purchase, I also shared the link to a Facebook group that I am a member of, and by next morning they were all gone.

I love the working red and white marker lights on the D3, not to mention that big, beaming headlight!

What makes the D3 No. 639 special, is that it's the STEAMRAIL preserved Vintage Train locomotive. It allows me to run a 100 year old steam locomotive on my early 2000's era Melbourne layout with my 3 x STEAMRAIL Victorian Railways E cars, and still be prototypically correct. Well, so long as you ignore the few years that 639 was renumbered back to its original no. 658. It's a long, and often confusing history on what is a popular restored steam locomotive that is still in service today after almost 120 years that you can read all about on Steamrail's website here. For me? Well, as I've said previously I never built this layout for passenger operations, so its pretty cool to be able to incorporate a heritage tour train being stabled overnight in the back sidings of my inner Melbourne layout.

There's not much to simulate in the way of operations other than to have the 639 arrive with a short rake of passenger cars after a tour train has terminated at Melbourne's Spencer Street Station (as it was known in the early 2000's). The loco then runs around the carriages, and shunts its' train into the number 1 road behind the view of the soon to be named Distribution Centre. I can fit all 3 Steamrail cars in the number 1 road, just not the locomotive. The steam locomotive ironically then needs to move to either of the diesel refueling tracks to stable for the night. Next morning the train is reassembled and returns to Steamrail's Newport Workshops for storage until the next Vintage Train Tour.

Strangely I forgot to turn the rear marker lights on when taking this picture... oh well, next time!

As I'm not going to be able to jet off to Melbourne for a weekend steam train tour anytime soon, adding this gorgeous little steam loco to my small roster may be just the ticket I need for an imaginative railfan weekend at home! The detail on the model is phenomenal, and the sound is superb! SDS Models and Phoenix Reproductions together have done a fantastic job in producing this model. For all who missed out, I believe there is a small second run being released soon in some different variations, although admittedly Australian HO scale steam locomotives do happen to sit on the expensive side of the hobby. In my case however, with a likely downsize to a small apartment happening in the very near future, I had just finished selling anything that didn't belong on this layout that would likely end up in storage for who knows how long. Perhaps this was a case of better directing my hobby money towards something I will get a lot of use and enjoyment from? I don't know. I just know I like the D3 very much.

For anyone who follows my YouTube channel, you would have already seen the short video I filmed of D3 639 wandering about my layout in the first week that it arrived. But in case you missed it here it is again...

The addition of the D3 brings my sound equipped locomotive fleet to 4, with 2 x Auscision Indigenous NR Class locos still to come. I'm still wrestling with the merits of converting my Freight Australia P Class to DCC against simply pre-ordering a Freight Australia G Class loco that will already come DCC sound equipped. A pair of Bulldog B Class locos, a pair of NR's and a pair of box cab locos in the form of an ex-NSW 422 Class and a Victorian G Class... and a steam train for good measure. That's a different loco for every day of the week. For a small bookshelf layout it's hard to justify anymore than that.

But for now, the sounds of steam have been a pleasant addition to Philden Street Yard.

Working The Yard D3-639

Well, this may go down as the best addition I could possibly have made to Philden Street Yard's small roster! The Phoenix Reproductions and SDS Models D3 Victorian Railways preserved steam locomotive No. 639 has hit the rails for the first time this week, and it looks and sounds gorgeous! After being tempted with the Auscision STEAMRAIL preserved Victorian passenger cars as I explained in a previous post, I chanced upon a now sold-out model of the STEAMRAIL as-preserved No. 639 listed on Metro Hobbies' on eBay shop. They must have just received the last remaining models available and listed them on a day that eBay happened to have a 20% off deal on selected Toys & Hobbies. There were six of the DCC sound equipped 639's available, and by next morning they were all gone!

Somehow over the course of deciding what locos in my collection I would convert to DCC sound, and which ones I would just move on, I've ended up with a sound equipped steam locomotive hauled 3 car STEAMRAIL tour train that will require the occasional overnight stabling in Philden Street Yard. As you can tell by the speed of which I produced a short video clip on my YouTube Channel, I'm absolutely blown away by this model!

Adding some STEAMRAIL rollingstock

There's a lot to like about my latest unexpected addition to Philden Street Yard. For a layout that wasn't designed to handle passenger services, it would seem that I finally have a passenger train!

The runaround loop in the yard is too long for the 3 car tour, so it has to be split up.

What started out as an idea to add a single Powerline Models West Coast Railway ACZ passenger car to simulate a empty car transfer between Melbourne Yard and Ballarat, ended up becoming a 3 car Steamrail tour train instead. After watching Will James's STEAMRAIL Otway Explorer video on YouTube, I found myself counting how many years it had been since I last took the train from Melbourne to Warrnambool and back just for the fun of it. Those red passenger carriages with the yellow strip down the side just seem to beckon you to jump on board for an adventure. When you're living in Queensland and a visit to Victoria has become as impossible to organise as a trip to the moon, buying a pair of ex-Victorian Railways model heritage passenger cars becomes the next best thing.

As the Steamrail cars were available as individually boxed carriages rather than having to resort to buying a set of 4, and given that Will had an exclusive 10% off at Australian Modeller offer through his channel, I bought the SECOND CLASS car 46BE that was shown in his Otway Explorer video, and the blue and gold BAGGAGE/GUARDS VAN 18CE. The day they arrived, I was so taken with the quality of these passenger cars that I bought another! This time the combined FIRST/SECOND CLASS 3ABE with the white toilet window in the middle.

I only bought 3 individually boxed STEAMRAIL Passenger Cars rather than a full set.

I quite like the sprung diaphragms and the protruding handrails on the Auscision E cars.

I don't know if West Coast Railway's B65 shunting the Steamrail passenger cars was ever prototypical, but it has had to do for now until a more accurate locomotive for the occassion arrives. As is often the case, going down the path of adding something new to the layout usually generates more spending, and adding some Steamrail rollingstock was no exception! In a stroke of good luck, I just so happened to find the perfect locomotive to haul this short tour train from its place of storage in Philden Street Yard to the passengers waiting on the platform at Melbourne's Southern Cross Station, or the former Spencer Street Station as it was back in the day. It is in the mail on its way north as I type this, so I'll keep it a secret for now.

46BE is the SECOND CLASS car.

18CE is the passenger BAGGAGE/GUARDS VAN.

While 3ABE is a composite FIRST & SECOND CLASS car.

Adding the 3 Steamrail passenger cars to my roster, (and the soon to be revealed locomotive that will haul them), was made a little easier by my earlier decision to move on my DC model of the Steve Irwin NR75 Ghan locomotive rather than afford the extra cost of converting it to DCC sound. I'll have two NR Class locos anyway once my long awaited Indigenous pair arrive shortly, but this next locomotive will easily become one of my small layout's highlights. You'll just have to wait and see.

The locomotive can run around its train in staging via the loco escape track beneath the overpass.

The Number 1 Siding can hold all 3 cars in the secure laneway down the back of the distribution centre.

So, it's back to work on my next book and another small layout project that I announced earlier this week. With the exception of purchasing one of Auscision Models' upcoming G Class locos, Philden Street's roster is now effectively done! There's a few buildings and fine details to complete, and then its ready to be exhibited. When that will be, who knows? Plans keep changing by the week. I hope to have some more news on our circumstances soon.

'Till next time...

Philden Street Yard Episode 1

Welcome to Episode 1 of Philden Street Yard, the video vlog. The latest additions are hard to miss in this episode. After watching countless uploads from the VR Newport Workshops Open Day this month, and the video wrap of Will James's Otway Explorer excursion, it seems the bug has bitten, and I'm in the process of puting together a new train. I say train, because something new to haul them is on its way. Just what exactly may that be? Well, you'll have to tune in to a future episode. For now, sit back and enjoy the sound-on experience from Philden Street, shot entirely on the new iPhone 13 Pro.

I'll have a more in-depth look at these cars in an upcoming blog post. There's a lot happening behind the scenes right now. More to follow.

Working The Yard B80

Here's my 3rd video operating session, this time with my latest sound equipped locomotive B80 The Murraylander doing the do in The Yard. I love the subtle differences between B80 and my B65 West Coast Railway 'Smurf'. Don't know if anyone else has picked up on the difference in the sound file between the two? I swear that B80 has a slightly different low idle sound compared to the B65. Unless it is me imagining things, Auscision Models have done an amazing job recording the sound files from actual B Class locos. Sound on to enjoy!

P.S. Puffin' Bill the Puppet is back! Think I have to keep him opening and closing all my videos from this point on or it just won't be the same. This one's for you Anthony!

Changing dates, plans, circumstances

Hands up those who will be lucky enough to exhibit a layout at a model train show this year?

Now hands up those who were planning to, only to have plans change due to life or exhibitions being cancelled or postponed until next year?

Just like my previous incarnation of Philden, I decorated the layout's framework with some relatively inexpensive stick-on vinyl lettering I bought from a seller on eBay.

My hand has gone up for the second question. After realising that my layout was not near ready enough to attend this year's Bundaberg Model Train & Hobby Expo in March, (subsequently cancelled), the next show to be postponed for another year is the Toowoomba Model Train & Hobby Expo that was scheduled for June. With the prospect of even further shows being called off as the year unfolds due to ongoing uncertainty, there now seems no point in my rushing to complete the final touches for me to exhibit Philden Street Yard. Not when the year has thrown a curve ball or two our way up here on the Sunshine Coast.

Cancelled model train shows aside, there is a sense of hilarity to the bad luck that seems to be hampering any real progress on my layout of late. It's only February, and already this year I've had to contend with contracting Covid over my summer holidays and watching our small business take a huge hit as a result. Having my model railway blog hacked by a crime syndicate that sent me a ransom note the next morning. A weekend spent recovering from a bad reaction to my Covid Booster shot, followed immediately by an emergency trip to the dentist after having a corner of my tooth break loose. And now it seems we'll soon be faced with the task of packing house and moving. None of which is really conducive to working on the layout or my next book!

Why a crime syndicate wanted to hijack a model railway blog is beyond me, but it took a full evening to gain backdoor access to my own blog, reset passwords and deny access to the host who was doing all the damage from an iPhone right here in Australia. It then took two full days to restore all the links on my blog which had been redirected to Alibaba and Eastern European lighting stores! And the person had the cheek to email me with the header "I'm the one who accessed your website last night, please pay..." naturally I didn't open the email to read the rest. Both my blogs are now protected by a second level of security requiring mobile phone code authentication before being able to log in. But for a moment I had no control over Philden Model Railway as the person had reset all the administration functions and commenced redirecting all the web traffic elsewhere. Thankfully that's now all behind me.

The timing of having to move is equal parts good, bad and to be expected. We've been sharing a house with our son and daughter-in-law while they saved up for a house of their own. Now they're about to take their next big step in life leaving my wife Denise and I to finally become empty-nesters! But after a year which has seen our business decrease 50% on account of my wife being unable to work since last March with a long term back complaint, having your landlord wanting to raise the rent $165 per week is a bit much. It seems that all over Australia we're not alone. Rent, fuel, everything is going up. The challenge will now be to find something a little smaller and a lot more affordable by mid-year. Once again, my bookshelf layout concept will need to prove itself resilient in the face of yet another house move.

The finishing touches of decor being applied to Philden Street Yard.

Anyway, enough with the negativity. The finishing touches to the layout's decor had just been put in place and everything was looking good for the layout to make its exhibition debut this year. I bought some custom cut vinyl stick-on lettering and motifs on eBay over my summer of having Covid, as it was the only activity I felt up to doing. I lined them up to decorate the front fascia of my small layout with names of towns in Victoria where freight trains would have operated to in the late 1990's to early 2000's. It gives the layout a sense of place and helps create the illusion that the staging yard is more than a place to just park my trains. The large Philden St. motif on the end panel lends the boxy appeareance of the layout a little bit of home decor. Instead of making the layout feel more at home however, I now need to get the clear perspex front panel cut to size solely to protect the layout when we move house.

The end decor motif met with the wife's approval.

It also heightens my frustration with pre-orders for people who rent. I'm now sweating on the arrival of my Indigenous NR Class locos before I have to start packing up my layout and boxing up my model trains. With the Freight Australia G Class already earmarked as my next locomotive acquisition for Philden Street, I guess I'll probably be getting my pre-order sent to my Son's house as I don't know when it will come out, or where we will next be living for that matter. They're all small nuances I know, but still...

My journey around Victoria on a 3.3 metre long model railway... Wodonga - Tocumwal - Shepparton - Deniliquin - Echuca - Swan Hill - Bendigo - Boort - Mildura - Ouyen - Philden Street Yard - Geelong - Dimboola - Warrnambool.

It may only be February, but plans for the year keep changing each and every week. The only certainty is that I have an already booked trip to Uluru over Easter to look forward to. Denise and I booked that last year as our 50th Birthday presents to each other. We'll nicely get to do that short holiday before we have to return and house hunt in earnest. A lock-up garage and a living area big enough to house the layout is a must!

The finished fascia lettering leaves only the warehouse roof and Philden Street overpass and the two partly-constructed buildings to complete.

Maybe the second half of the year will find me with some new stories to tell, a layout that is finished, and an exhibition that will actually go ahead. Who knows? It feels like a lot can happen between now and the end of the year! For now, I really need to get to work on completing my next two books...

Cheers!

2022 ~ My 200TH Post!

There's a few milestones to acknowledge in this post. Not only was my latest book Build a Bookshelf Layout featured on Will James's January edition of Australian Model Railway News, (see below), but a new sound equipped locomotive has been added to Philden Street's roster, I think I may finally be getting over an extended bout of C-O-V-I-D, and... oh, this is my 200th blog post!

Watch the January 2022 Australian Model Railway News

To see my book open the first Australian Model Railway News for 2022 was a blast! There's a lot of great model railway tutorials and reviews on YouTube, but Will's monthly roundup of what's happening in the world of model trains has quickly become a staple part of my hobby life. With almost 3,400 subscribers to the Will James: Railways YouTube channel, my book was seen by more than 2,000 viewers in the first 24 hours after the show was posted. And keep in mind that Australian Model Railway News is yet to celbrate its 1st Birthday!

To have Will reach out and enquire if he could include my book on his monthly segment was a wonderful gesture, and very much appreciated. For the month of January, I sold more copies of Build a Bookshelf Layout worldwide than my other 16 books combined over the whole of 2021. Australian Modeller are also stocking Build a Bookshelf Layout, and there have been several other hobby shops and bookshops arranging to get copies for their store as I type this. So thank you everyone, and thanks heaps Will.

As for my 200th post... It would have happened a lot earlier, if I hadn't tidied up my blog around the same time that I dismantled the original Philden layout. There were a lot of product reviews and planning processes that I openly discussed in past posts, that I deleted thinking they were no longer relevant. Strangely they would have been interesting to look back on now that I am immersed in Philden version 3, or Philden Street Yard as it is now known.

B80 is another sound equipped Auscision Models B Class loco, painted in The Murraylander scheme.

Now for another spot of good news. In January I welcomed B80 The Murraylander into Philden Street Yard's fledgling sound equipped roster. After running a fine tooth comb through my collection of locomotives, I added up how much I would be out of pocket if I converted them all to DCC. I wished I hadn't! So a few weekends ago, I rounded up anything that didn't belong on this layout, and pretty much sold them all through some Facebook groups to put the money towards getting my DC locos finally sorted out. I used some of the proceeds to buy the DCC sound equipped version of B80, and I think it cost me something like $413 delivered from Auscision Models' eBay store. I got the same great service with free postage, only with the added bonus of a 5% off eBay Plus voucher.

If you compare the cost of installing sound and DCC in an existing DC locomotive to the price I paid above, it works out much, much cheaper to just buy a sound equipped locomotive if possible. The quotes I received were all in the $250 to $275 range to have someone install DCC and sound into my existing locos. I believe there was a 20% increase from one of the decoder suppliers in January, and that's 20% in U.S. dollars. I guess that explains the sudden spate of sound equipped locomotives now showing as sold out on most websites. Anyway, I was lucky enough to purchase an 8 pin DCC Lokpilot chip for my Freight Victoria A Class from Metro Hobbies when they got some in recently. Then a week later saw that Hobbytech Toys in Perth listed the 21 pin version on eBay that I needed for my Freight Australia P Class. The DCC non-sound chips cost something like $60 each. A81 and P19 will now be my quiet pair of locomotives for me to run when Denise is watching her TV shows.

My Victorian rollingstock is more than enough to fill my staging yard. B80 will run my Western Victoria standard gauge freight trains to Horsham, Dimboola and Adelaide if needed.

So that will soon bring my working stable of locomotives on Philden Street to five... three with sound, and two without. That leaves my Ghan NR Class sitting in limbo, waiting to see what I will or won't do with it. I believe Auscision will announce this weekend that their next run of NR Class locos are in stock, which means my Indigenous NR Class locos should finally be here too. But, and this is a big but... I'm hedging my bets that there will be re-runs of some popular liveries that quickly sold out with the 1st release, i.e, NR75 in the special Steve Irwin Ghan livery. If so, I'm ready to snap up the sound equipped version, then look for a buyer for my DC version. It's by far the cheaper option than getting the locomotive sound converted with an after-market decoder, and that is if you're lucky to find one with the correct sound file.

There's a lot happening behind the scenes up my way at the moment now that I'm back working and trying to play catch up. Workwise, the C word has ensured a very lean start to 2022 after falling ill immediately after a 3 week Christmas closure for my small business. And some planned changes in our personal circumstances means that Philden Street Yard is going to be packed up and go into storage for an extended time later in the year anyway. Along with needing to get to work on my next two Philden Model Railway books, I really need to make time to clean my track so I can be ready for an operating day when my NR locomotives arrive. I may only have another 6 months to enjoy operating this layout before it gets packed up.

It's a foggy morning in Melbourne as B80, B65 and FL220 are prepared to be put to work.

I'm glad I moved a few things on to afford adding B80 to my collection. I've long liked the look of the locomotive, but never quite understood what the one-off livery was all about until I looked into it some more. It was the only other B Class loco that really fitted my 2000-2004 era. And the three locos above look great lined up alongside each other.

Until next time, stay safe, and thanks for reading my 200th blog post. I hope there's another 200 to follow!

Working The Yard B65

Here's my second fully edited operating session on Philden Street Yard. For the sake of the story, West Coast Railway's B65 is on lease to Freight Australia and has been based as the yard shunter in Philden Street while Freight Australia's P19 and A81 are in the workshop waiting fitment with decoders. B65 is 'working the yard' with wagons from Shepparton that have just been taken off the Tocumwal Goods. Sound equipped loco highlights, so sound on. Enjoy!

P.S. No puppets were harmed in the making of this film.... yet. But I now have to keep Puffin' Phill under lock and key, as a friend wants to 'get rid of him' next time he's over for a visit.

P.S.S. I also sourced a Lokpilot 8 pin decoder for my A Class to get one of my DC locos converted over to DCC. I'll keep my Freight Victoria A81 as the quiet loco on my layout for when I have the TV on. I still have my Freight Australia P19 and Steve Irwin NR75 Ghan locos in limbo, waiting for me to decide on whether to convert them to DCC or DCC sound equipped. I can't afford to fix either of them just right now, and there's no 21 pin decoders to be found anyway, so it's a problem for another time. I just need my sound equipped Indigenous NR's to arrive!

Working The Yard FL220

Here's a look at Philden Street Yard's first fully edited operating session. For the sake of the story, FL220 is 'working the yard' with a couple of container flat wagons that had just arrived off the Wodonga Superfreighter. Sound equipped loco highlights, so sound on. Enjoy!

Sitting on the shelf

I finally have my staging shelf operational. But like shelves, it has come with highs and lows.

From the high of a book launch and converting my layout to DCC, to having to lay low for a while with COVID. That's pretty much been my January so far. Any thoughts we had of 2022 being a better year lasted less than a week! After coming down sick, waiting 4 days for the local testing centre to restock their kits so that we could get a booking for a test, and queueing from 4 am for the thrill of having a little pokey stick shoved up your nose, my time off work over the Christmas period was extended by an extra 2 weeks.

Ordinarily that would be my cue to get some stuff done on the layout. However, while I can honestly say I've had a worse case of the flu in the past, the thing I found with getting COVID, was that every ache and pain I ever had at some point in my life decided to come back and visit. Although I'd finished building, sanding and painting the staging shelf over 3 days prior to Christmas, thanks to COVID I couldn't find the strength to pick up a pair of rail cutters! Fortunately, as is the case with most things, the worst passes and things begin to return to normal. Hah! Normal... like anyone knows what that is anymore!

The staging shelf sits to the left side of the layout, and the 2 tracks that lead from the layout beneath the Philden Street overpass transition onto the staging shelf where they fan out into a 4 track yard with a 5th track serving as the arrival/runaround track. Before Christmas, I had lined the perimeter of the staging yard with a strip of timber to eliminate the risk of having anything fall off. I used some 30 x 11 mm lengths of pre-primed finger jointed pine and cut, glued and clamped them into position before sanding and painting the entire staging shelf in the same gloss white water based enamel to match in with the rest of the layout.

I lined the perimeter of the staging yard with 30 x 11 mm edging timber.

Slowly, (over the course of a week and a half while feeling washed out), I did the strenuous task of laying and wiring track on a staging shelf a little over 1.5 metres long. I say that sarcastically, because ordinarily it would only have taken most modellers a single afternoon to complete!

I glued the track to avoid having nails come through the base given the plywood was only 7 mm thick.

I glued the track into place directly onto the painted surface with some Weldbond extra strength white glue, and the finished arrangement of black track on white looks neat and tidy, almost like an abstract piece of model railway art. I'll also decorate the front fascia of the staging shelf with some black vinyl-cut stick-on letters as I did with my last layout, just to give the overall appearance a museum like finish.

I carefully cut and filed the opening for the DCC control panel face to mount it to the layout.

My Christmas present from my wife was a NCE Power Cab DCC system, and I was able to cut and mount the panel to the front of the staging shelf and still have the main digital receiver component tuck in safely beneath the plywood surface. I just used a pair of connector clips to bridge the bus wires to the staging shelf tracks so that the whole thing is easy to disconnect and pack into our car in sections for whenever I'm able to exhibit the layout, or have to move house.

I also found a guy who goes by the name of beanburgh on eBay who 3D prints throttle holders for most brands of DCC handsets. I'm all for supporting the little guys, so for $10 plus postage my NCE throttle now has a permanent place to stay safe alongside the control face plate.

Although I've still wired 2 of the 4 sidings to be able to have the power isolated via a toggle switch, the entire layout is now wired into the DCC receiver, and trains are now controlled by my new DCC throttle. All two of them!

View from the staging shelf looking towards the layout.

That for me is a problem at the moment. Not just because I'm still waiting on my pair of pre-ordered Indigenous NR Class locos to arrive, but because of the worldwide unavailability of DCC decoders. No-one seems to have them on the shelf, (another pun intended).

I guess what that is making me do is figure out which locos I really want to convert to DCC sound, and which locos I will just convert to DCC non-sound. As my layout resides in our lounge room, I'm quickly learning when not to fire up the joyful sound of an EMD 16-567-BC engine, (usually whenever my wife has claimed the TV for an afternoon of watching Virgin River). Having a few silent locos on the roster may not be a bad idea! It will at least help ease the cost of converting my existing DC locos. Anyway, having just had so much time off from our business, January has shelved those plans for now at least, (and there's another shelf pun).

View from the layout looking towards the staging shelf.

Its nice to finally have a propper staging yard. I can load up a 4 wagon train on each track in staging, and one by one work each train to a specific siding in Philden Street Yard. When staging is empty, and Philden Street Yard is full, I can work them all back again. Compared to past experiences operating little cameo shunts like this, having a sound equipped locomotive actually slows down the operating session, and makes each move more thought out and purposeful.

Maybe it was all the time off I had, but the amount of time per day where I'll walk past the layout and think 'I might just run a train' has gone up considerably. From that point of view, I think that converting my layout to DCC has been a success. I discovered a few little hiccups along the way that I was able to resolve, mainly with code 100 track that required some filing away on the backside of the frogs, but the main thing is that it works, and works well. Converting a layout from DC to DCC also helped give me some timely material for my next book Model Railway Trackside Tips. All my years of trial and error may finally pay off.

B65 prepares to take its train from staging to its destination in Philden Street Yard.

I guess whenever you reach a new milestone like this in our hobby, it quickly becomes the new standard. From that point of view, all future locomotive purchases have just become all that more expensive. Compared to the cost of retro-fitting DCC sound to a locomotive, it's actually better value to purchase a sound-fitted loco upfront. That's where I'm left sitting on the shelf at the moment, (I'd better make that my last shelf pun for this post)! Finding the right balance of locomotives to fill out my roster between what is available now in DCC sound equipped and ready to run form, retro-fitting sound to my existing locos when DCC decoders are out-of-stock, or pre-ordering DCC sound locomotives that have no gaurantee of being here before I'm faced with moving house again, is causing some procrastination on my part. And its something I don't seem to have the answer for right now.

B65 arrives at Philden Street Yard with a short grain transfer.

In the midst of all this, one of the new additions to my rollingstock roster I am extremely pleased to have added were some VHGF hoppers I bought from Trainworld in Melbourne. I had one lone Auscision Vline/Carlton United Brewery VHGF that I'd acquired second hand from somewhere, but hadn't realised that Trainworld in Melbourne still had their own branded hoppers available until I stumbled across them on their website. At $180 for a pack of 3, they are equally as good as the Auscision version and give me a 4 wagon grain train that can run as a transfer trip to my industrial district. I can now start planning how to incorporate it into my operations. At this stage I'm thinking my unnamed Distribution Centre may be best served as a micro-brewery, as it could take in hopper loads of malting barley, and ship out loads of palletised beer in my VLCX louvered vans.

Building the staging shelf was the final big project I needed to complete on Philden Street Yard. Converting the layout to DCC was another substantial investment that I can also now tick off my list of things to do. Sound chipping my remaining locomotives may take some time figuring out when decoders will become available in stock again, so maybe I should now turn my attention to completing the few remaining structures on the layout and finishing the namesake overpass. When I can pull myself away from sounding the horn on my locos that is!

Building the staging yard

The staging yard framing is now in place beyond Philden Street overpass.

After 12 weeks of nursing my torn knee back to health, I finally ventured into the garage for the first time since mid-September to start work on my staging shelf for Philden Street Yard. If I hadn't torn the meniscus in my right knee, I would have had the staging yard operational by now and be working on the finishing touches in readiness for the layout's first outing in 2022. Unfortunately that will no longer be the Bundaberg Model Train & Hobby Expo next year as hoped. The application deadline was just too soon for me to gaurantee having Philden Street Yard completed by March. I'm now hoping for the layout to debut at the Railway Modellers Club of Queensland's Pine Rivers Train & Hobby Expo on July 9 & 10, 2022.

The staging shelf is something that I've given a lot of thought to, while also managing to resist the urge to turn it into a second scenic module. As such, its just going to be a big 1575 mm long, flat expanse of sidings holding trains waiting to venture into Philden Street Yard. I'll be painting the timber framing white to match in with the existing layout furniture, and am still deciding exactly what I'll do for the surface. Either clear stained ply, painted satin black or painted gloss white are the leading contenders so far. But for now, I at least have the framework finished.

I drilled 2 holes to glue some dowel locator lugs in place.

The 6 mm dowel joins are glued on the staging frame only, and slide into the holes on the layout end.

The staging yard's ply surface will have a lip that straddles the join to butt up against the existing track.

The next job for me to complete is to line the top of the staging shelf with 7 mm plywood, which is the same thickness I used on the layout. The ply surface will give the lightweight frame the rigidity it needs and I'll glue the track to the surface to avoid having track pins come through the plywood. I can then work out where I'll mount the power cab faceplate for the NCE Power Cab DCC system that I'll install over the Christmas break.

The staging framework for Philden Street Yard is in place, while my new Queensland micro sits below.

After Philden Street Yard, I now only have plans to build the Queensland micro layout that you can see is already sitting below the staging yard shelf for Philden Street Yard. The paper plan shows the track design for the little 4 track switching layout, and I just need to trim 90 mm off the end of the frame so that it lines up with the IKEA shelving units that it rests on.

It feels good to be working on the layout again! Bad knees aside, I at least used my downtime wisely to finish the first of my Philden Model Railway books. It is currently waiting in the publisher's queue over the Christmas break, ready to have the first copies printed when they return in the new year.

The other big thing for me right now, is the anticipation of turning Philden Street Yard into a sound equipped theatre of model train bliss! The NCE Power Cab system is wrapped and waiting under the tree, and I have a DCC sound B65 West Coast Railway B Class and an FL220 CFCLA 422 Class rearing to hit the rails. With 2 more DCC sound locos on the way in the form of my long awaited Indigenous NR Classes, I'm wondering if 4 DCC sound locos will be enough? (I do have a trio of quiet DC locos in the form of NR75, P19 and A81). But the temptation is always there to add just one more! I feel it would have to be another Victorian locomotive however to even up the score. With what's available now, and what has been announced for the future, that leaves only the C Class, G Class and BL Class in my era if I wanted to play the waiting game. Or another B Class right here and now, that would have to be either B74 in preserved VR livery, or the B80 in Murraylander yellow which I also quite like.

I'm not sure what to do there as I also like the ex-NSW 442's in the form of the R&H Transport JL404 and CFCLA JL406. From what I'm led to believe they were mainly Sydney-based locos in the early 2001-2004 period. For a change, its a real nice problem to have.

Black Friday FL220 Arrives

Ex-NSW 422 loco FL220 has been spotted in Philden Street Yard, Melbourne.

There's a new arrival that has been spotted in Philden Street Yard following the 2021 Black Friday Sales! CFCLA's FL220 was seen on the dual gauge line only minutes after the Postman had knocked on the door. What you don't see in the photo is that my latest Auscision Models addition is also DCC sound equipped. Unfortunately I won't get to hear it until after my wife lets me unwrap the NCE Power Cab that I am getting for Christmas.

I'd had my eye on this model ever since selling off my Northern Rivers Railroad 422 after I'd moved on my previous NSW North Coast layout. And while you can't have everything, it is especially nice to again have a 422 Class loco back in my possession. This time wearing the CFCLA or Chicago Freight Car Leasing Australia livery that this loco was reintroduced in back in 2001. Its been a long time favourite livery of mine, and fits well with my Melbourne based early 2000's era layout given it was a regular runner to Appleton Dock throughout the 2000's. In fact, I'm sure I even saw this locomotive once up here in Queensland at Acacia Ridge Yard parked with a row of Interail locos. Either way, leased locos do get around, and they make for a great excuse to include some older generation motive power.

I love old locos that are given a second lease of life! They don't make me feel so old.

It turns out that admiring it will be all I'll get to do for the next few weeks as my knee has deteriorated further. I'm itching to get into the garage and build my staging shelf to be ready to install my DCC throttle to the layout, but it's painful to even stand on it. As a result, I've let the application deadline for the 2022 Bundaberg Model Train & Hobby Expo pass me by. There's no way that I can guarantee having the layout completed in time for March, when I'm now at the point of contemplating closing our cleaning business in the New Year, a little earlier than we'd planned to. A lot will depend on how well my knee recovers over the Christmas break and I'm now hoping that Philden Street Yard may get an invite to the Pine Rivers Show in Brisbane instead.

I wasn't going to consider adding anymore locos to my roster until I had seen the painted samples for the G and BL Class models. A 20% off sale however made the FL220 too good to pass on, and funnily enough, Auscision posted sample pics on their Facebook page just days later. Either the G or the BL would be a staple loco for an early 2000's Melbourne Yard, but with another house move in the foreseeable future, if I pre-ordered one I doubt it would arrive in time before I face the task of packing up house again.

The next arrivals I'm waiting on are the much anticipated Indigenous NR Class locos. From what I've heard they should be here early in the New Year.

Philden Street Yard - Launch

My Secret Project is on track to be completed over the Christmas Holidays!

Well I've made it this far. After six months of hints and teasers with what I was building, I can now leave the Secret Project Philden V3 days behind me and announce that my new switching layout is to be known as PHILDEN STREET YARD. However, the new layout wasn't the only secret project I've been up to.

  

That's right. Alongside constructing a new HO scale switching layout, I've also been hard at work preparing the first 3 instalments of my new Philden Model Railway Presents range of books. Aimed at quickly turning newcomers to our hobby into intermediate modellers, (without taking two decades to do so as was my experience), the first title BUILD A BOOKSHELF LAYOUT will be available at the start of 2022. Exciting as that is, the books are funnily enough a Phoenix that has risen from the ashes of 2020/2021....

You see, choosing to build a freight only switching layout was a combination of wanting more operational potential than my previous efforts, and scaling things back on account of an absolutely hellish 2021 that at one point had me contemplating selling everything, and at least temporarily exiting the hobby.

I'm glad things didn't quite come to that point, but if you recall my Philden Road Finale post on Friday 13th August, I've been navigating a pretty rough year that just hasn't gotten any better. Not only has my wife still been unable to work since March due to a back injury, but I then went and tore my knee up while trying to run our cleaning business on my own. Anyway, as a result of this unexpected spare time, the new layout has come along nicely, to the point where I'm planning to debut Philden Street Yard on the South East Queensland exhibition circuit sometime in 2022. I take that as proof enough that there's always a rainbow after a storm.

At 1720 x 450 x 450 mm, the shadow box layout was built to fit into our car.

Which brings me to the whole how did I end up switching from modelling South East Queensland and the North Coast of NSW, to modelling a relatively modern urban Melbourne scene?

Well, I guess it was a combination of wanting to both keep my Queensland Granite Belt idea for a small project of its own, and also wanting a fresh start with something new. A modern Melbourne layout was just the ticket, while my next little project in 2022 will be a 1400 mm x 350 mm QR 12 mm narrow gauge Granite Belt themed micro layout that will sit beneath my Philden Street Yard staging shelf. Set in the 1990's and based around a great little Inglenook track plan I have already mapped out, I'll have the added bonus of being able to call upon good friend and experienced modeller Anthony Veness to help with some of the details.

My Walker Models Goods Shed has been heavily rusted and survives into its' third Philden layout.

Combined, these new projects were all neccessary to garner enough material for my newly launched range of Philden Model Railway Presents books. Moving forward, I had the choice to try one more time with novel number five in the hope that a new publishing contract might be in the offering, or just say 'stuff it!' I really want to have a crack at producing my own series of Australian themed model railway books. Announcing a range of upcoming books all at once immediately establishes the blog as a brand, and means that I can enjoy both modelling and writing for the next two years, instead of being tied to a keyboard writing a novel with no time to run a train.

Expect to see my wife Denise beside my layout in the near future as we develop a small trade stand for her to manage selling my own range of books alongside me whenever I exhibit Philden Street Yard. It's the right time for both of us to be trying something new, given that we're not getting any younger, and working any harder physically after recovering from injury is just not going to be possible heading into the next decade.

The loco refuelling tracks are at the heart of operations on Philden Street Yard.

So let's get to talking about Philden Street Yard.

Philden Street is a fictitious little HO scale yard set in Melbourne, that incorporates both broad and standard gauge service tracks. Its fictitiously set somewhere in the vicinity of the Melbourne West Yard and ex-Footscray Wharf branch along the Maribyrnong River. As far as my penchant for building small-ish layouts goes, its a kind of Philden Version 3 if you wish.

The staging shelf I'm building for Philden Street Yard will be a more complex track arrangement designed for home operation, and as such I'll dub it Home Yard. As oppossed to the simple 2 track shelf that will suffice for model train shows which I'll nickname Show Yard. Trains arriving at Philden Street Yard are met with a headshunt capable of handling two lashed-up NR class locomotives, and runaround capacity for between 2 to 3 wagons. Not bad when you're talking about a scenic portion only 1720 mm long! The incoming train is then broken up and Tracks 1 & 4 are shunted on either side of the yet-to-be-named Distribution Centre. The outgoing train is then assembled on the branch line, the locos are sent to the refuelling tracks (Tracks 2 & 3), swapped for a fresh locomotive, and the train returns to staging.

From this operational design point, I just had to select the right mix of rollingstock and locomotives that would keep things interesting.

Green Bulldog A81 is sitting on the dual gauge Track 1.

Back in 2019 I pre-ordered the Indigenous NR Class locomotives for my previous layout, so knowing they were coming I planned to centre my roster around the pair of them. Fast forward to 2021... and well, how can you really plan a layout around pre-orders in a pandemic? You can't. The last thing I could afford to do was tie-up money on a pre-order that may not arrive before 2027. So my first rule was to avoid purchasing anything that wasn't available right here, and right now!

Secondly, having wanted to do something a little different, I'd already started collecting some Victorian outline models over the past few years thinking I'd build a small micro layout at some point in the future. So I started planning something that could be compact enough to combine both standard and broad gauge operations in the one track plan, given that any commercially produced models of these types share the same common HO scale track anyway. After the problems I encountered trying to include both 12 mm and 16.5 mm gauge HO scale track on a previous layout of the same size, this was a relatively simple task.

The backdrop view of the Melbourne Yard Cement Sheds gives my layout a sense of place.

I came up with the idea of using super glue to add some leftover code 83 rail to the outside of my code 100 HO rail on one stretch of track to create the illusion of having a dual gauge line. The code 83 rail sits lower than the code 100 and doesn't create any hinderance to operation whatsoever. In reality its just there for looks, and I run whatever train I'm inclined to on any track I like, guilt free. It turned out to be a stroke of genius for the concept of this layout.

Luckily there was still a good choice of Victorian locomotives and rollingstock readily available to suit the 1997 to mid 2000's period that would match the time era for my eagerly anticipated Indigenous NR Class locomotives. With the money coming in from the sell-off of my previous New South Wales locomotives, rollingstock and XPT set, I was mindful to just purchase the bare minimum of what was needed to make this layout come together. I started out with a Freight Australia P Class locomotive, a West Coast Railway B Class locomotive and a V/Line Freight X Class loco, 3 different classes of locomotives in 3 different liveries. All Auscision Models, and all of which happened to be on a special sale price at the time through Tate's Trains down in Geelong. Just when I thought I had my broad gauge fleet finalised, my friend Anthony surprised me with an added thank you gift for sending my old layout his way in the form of a long sold-out Freight Australia A Class which brought my broad gauge fleet to 4 locomotives.

I already had a nice little fleet of National Rail era rollingstock and containers from the previous layout that have transitioned across to my new layout to help keep the cost down. It essentially left me only some long sold out Freight Australia VLCX louvred vans to hunt down through a Facebook group to round out my broad gauge roster. Somehow in the face of a tough year, I'd managed to get everything I needed for the new layout on a budget. Until... early one Saturday morning when I checked a group post on Facebook and saw that someone was selling their still new, NR75 loco in the 'Steve Irwin' Ghan scheme. Sometimes you've just got to get that one model you missed out on when it was released unannounced. So I treated myself to a third NR Class locomotive, knowing full well that it didn't match the era of my V/Line Freight X Class, more on that in a moment!

So there you have it, that's how Philden Street Yard came about. It was then up to me to finish building a layout that was relatively affordable, lightweight to transport to model train shows, and most importantly would hold my interest with operating it for the rest of my years.

The as yet unnamed Distribution Centre is this layouts' major traffic source. It was originally bought to be a backdrop flat industry on my last layout, Philden Road. Being able to build it in all its glory was another of the reasons behind Philden Street Yard's construction.

To that extent it seems to have come together quite well. The 1720 mm long x 450 mm deep shadow box layout will be accompanied by a 1580 mm long x 450mm wide staging shelf. A decent staging shelf is something that I've neglected in the past as I've always been tempted to use it as additional layout space. While I'm looking forward to taking this small layout to model train shows, I won't be taking the whole 3 metre long set-up. Instead, I will build a smaller 600 mm two track clip-on staging shelf for when Philden Street Yard is exhibited. It only needs to be big enough to hold a throttle pack and give the appearance of having a locomotive disappear beyond the Philden Street overpass. It means that I will be able to pack the layout and a small trade table in our car for when I take Philden Street Yard to a show. It will be nice as a husband and wife team to plan some weekends away with my latest layout alongside a small table offering my own railway books for sale.

Not blogging this layout's construction step-by-step as I have in the past was also something that I planned when starting work on Philden Street. I took the motto of build it first, and worry about what you share on the blog later. Very early on I thought that this layout would make some great subject matter for a book, given that it was now my third small bookshelf switching layout. So I put writing the book/books on top priority ahead of writing on my model railway blog. As you read this, I have already released two new books in 2021, and the first in the series of Philden Model Railway Presents books is on track for an early New Year release.

Long posts such as this may now be a thing of the past. When I need to leverage more career time as a writer, that's the way it needs to be. What has worked however, are the Secret Project posts that I was able to auto-cue over a three month period in the space of just a few evenings. Proof has been the 300% increase in blog readership over the past 6 months. It seems people are more interested in guessing what I'm trying to do rather than reading through a long post of me getting sidetracked with everything that is happening in my life. So expect another new regular series of posts to take the place of my Secret Project PV3 updates. Perhaps cryptic updates on my Queensland layout, or a photo-of-the-week from Philden Street. Or maybe both?

And just when I thought I had the new layout all sorted.... a simple operating session at my friend Anthony's place early in November changed everything. When he hooked up his newly acquired DCC sound equipped locomotive, (on my old layout of all places), and put the model through its paces, I knew I was in trouble! Adding sound to a simple switching layout takes operating it to the next level. Each shunting move becomes more deliberately focussed, the application of air brakes draws out the realism beyond a simple fast flick of a turnout, and the shut-down sequence brings an air of formality to the end of an operating session. I was instantly hooked!

In less than a week I had phoned Auscision and upgraded the pre-order for my Indigenous NR locomotives to DCC sound, and purchased a new DCC sound equipped B65. To offset the cost a little, I sold my original DC version B Class and the X Class, which if you recall the V/Line X Class didn't exactly match the same time period as my newly acquired Ghan locomotive anyway. That just moved the era I model forward slightly to 2001 to 2004, and also opens the door for another locomotive to join my fleet somewhere in the future. Possibly a G or BL Class to tie everything together. So that's pretty much this layout's roster done and dusted. It's then onto the next little project, and no more looking at Victorian things to buy!

In a nice end to a tough year, my wife will have a complete NCE DCC Power Cab system under the Christmas Tree for me to open on Christmas Day! The A Class and P Class Freight Australia locos along with my Steve Irwin Ghan will remain. I'll get to deciding what to do with adding DCC decoders to them down the track given that there's a worldwide shortage of them at the moment anyway. Or maybe I'll just wire the layout so I can switch between running DC or DCC, depending on whether I'm taking it to a show, or my wife just wants some quiet while she watches TV. It's a nice problem to have!

And the operator's view of Philden Street Yard. The most enjoyable switching layout I've built!

And finally, I should really share a little of what modelling an inner-Melbourne freight yard means to me. Living in Queensland, and having modelled New South Wales outline in the past, I think people forget that I once lived in Victoria, in a little town of just over 1,000 in South Gippsland called Foster. I moved there with my parents when I was still 14 in late 1986. I finished high school there in 1989, and in that year managed to do my work experience with V/Line as a Station Assistant at Leongatha, even getting to sit in the 2nd Man seat of a P Class loco from Leongatha to Spencer Street Station and back. I started an apprenticeship with the South Gippsland Shire Council at the start of 1990, and my goals were to spend my holidays travelling across Victoria by train, and buying my own land on which to restore an old train carriage as my model railway room. Instead, I met my wife Denise in that little town while she was on holidays, and moved to Queensland with her in early 1991. The rest is history.

From those years however, so many sights, sounds and smells have stayed with me. Watching the weekly Barry Beach Oil train meander through Foster. Witnessing the last train to Yarram. Cold mornings waiting in Foster for the V/Line bus on its way to connecting with the train to Melbourne's Spencer Street Station. And what a delight the old Spencer Street station was. A sort of Soviet-era utilitarian concoction of orange-bricked madness. And beyond it, Melbourne Yard. The place where I imagined tracks headed out to every corner of the globe, when in reality they all ended up in lonely towns like Yarram.

I never fully realised the privilege I had of witnessing the slow demise of a country railway line like those four-and-a-bit years I spent in Foster, until I returned years later to see that in most places there was nothing left behind. These years whenever I visit Victoria, I find myself jumping on a train to Shepparton, or Warrnambool and back, just to take a ride and see what's there. Or stopping the car in towns like Tocumwal, Echuca or Ballarat in the hope of seeing a freight train.

Philden Street Yard for me is the last of those surviving reminders. An inner-Melbourne location that as its backdrop suggests is just years away from being demolished in the name of urban-renewal. It still handles freight by rail to some of the towns and cities I imagined visiting by train back when I was 17. Only the locomotives too are now on borrowed time. A's, B's and P's. All dinosaurs alongside more modern NR class locomotives.

It's a curtain call. And the layout is a stage. Welcome to Philden Street Yard.

Philden Street Yard, Melbourne, Australia circa 2001.