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THE SCALEFOUR SOCIETY 18.83 LAYOUT CHALLENGE |
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THE SCALEFOUR SOCIETY 18.83 LAYOUT CHALLENGE |
MINSTER-ON-SEA
by the Uckfield Model Railway Club and the Wealden Area Group of the Scalefour Society
A portrayal of the Station on the Sheppey Light Railway, Standards: P4, Scale: 4mm to one foot, Gauge: 18.83mmOf the standard gauge light railways of Kent, one of the most successful was the Sheppey Light Railway, conceived by the islanders in the 1890s and engineered by the well-known Holman F. Stephens. After being absorbed into the SE & CR the line was improved, enlarged and partly standardized.
Minster-on-Sea, one of the four through stations on the line served the village of Minster some one mile to the north. The 'on-Sea' part of the name was something of an exaggeration for the traveller with a walk of some two miles before the waters edge could be reached. The station offered very limited facilities with the provision of a small goods yard with cattle pens to deal with the local agricultural traffic.
The layout has been designed to meet the Scalefour Society's 18.83 Layout Challenge criteria of an easily transportable exhibition layout with a baseboard footprint of no more than 18.83 sq. ft. including a minimum of two turnouts. The layout portrays an actual prototype of a through station without the need for any compression. Up to five prototypical length trains can be accommodated with the minimum of handling.
The scenic part of the layout comprises of three 45in x 14in slightly curved plywood baseboards. Track work has been built using C&L chairs on plywood sleepers to P4 standards on cork underlay. The two turnouts are operated by slow action Tortoise motors. The two fiddle yards each comprise of a 40 in diameter three road turntable enabling trains to be quickly turned.
The station building, a typical Colonel Stephen's structure, is scratch-built using a variety of materials. Use has been made of carpet underlay for the undergrowth with additional products from the Woodland Scenics range to the fore. Much thought has been put into the presentation of the layout with proscenium arch, lighting, and a continuous full height backscene.
Rolling stock is varied and may not be truly typical of that which ran on the light railway. However the mid 1930s time frame in which the layout is set gives the opportunity to run models of pre-grouping prototypes that ran on Southern Railway lines in the north Kent area.
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