Forest Green

The layout

Forest Green Mark 2

The original Forest Green was exhibited at the Exeter Model Railway Exhibition in 2012. It ran well and generally received positive reviews. This led us to build a new version specifically with exhibitions in mind, which made its first appearance at the Exeter Show in 2013. From 2014 it appeared at other shows in the south west, as well as at Sileby in Leicestershire and the Great Central Railway.

The setting is a former Midland route through South Gloucestershire in the early 60s, so several diesels are appearing, and the boundary changes mean that both Midland and Western Region motive power are in evidence. (I think this is called variety or progress or sacrilege!)

The Cotswolds location features Forest Green, a through station near the junction with the branch to Kemble. Traffic is mainly local, with some through workings from Gloucester and the North to Chippenham, Westbury and the South Coast. We all wanted a Gloucester and Wilts cousin for the Somerset and Dorset.

Building Mark 2

From baseboards to lighting

Work started on Forest Green Mark 2 in September 2012. New baseboards were built and track was laid to a similar plan, with some operational improvements. The baseboards are conventional timber frames with plywood tops. The scenery has a polystyrene sub-frame with expanding foam sprayed on top, which was then carved and textured to create the cuttings and tunnel mouths.

The buildings are a mixture of scratchbuilt and modified proprietary items. Our lighting engineer, Chris Sanders, provided illumination in many of them, including the pub! Once the main structures were in place, we undertook test running to prove reliability before moving on to the final details.

The trackwork is code 100 from Peco, which allows us to run a wide range of stock; when well ballasted we feel it gives a realistic appearance. Stock has been weathered and has some added details, the majority of the signals work, and many buildings have lighting.

Where it began

Ray White’s original

The layout was originally designed and built by Ray White about thirty years earlier. He was a keen historical modeller, so the railway was set in the Edwardian era with a mixture of Midland and GWR stock, and Malmcester was a terminus in the Cotswolds on a branch linking the Bristol–Gloucester main line with the Great Western near Chippenham.

After Ray passed away, his wife, Iris, kept the layout as a static exhibit until she asked Rob to dismantle it and find a home for its many wonderful features. As it had never been seen in public, a group of us took on the challenge of resurrecting it for exhibition, with a little encouragement from Dave Harding.