Grampian Area Report 12th November 2024

We've been making good progress on several fronts on Dunallander. We continue to meet at Roy's shed on Tuesday evenings and the occasional Saturday, with Roy spending a lot of additional time in the shed, and also other work being done away from the layout.

The path towards the Springbank mill has been realigned to make it more prototypical. Near the mill too, but on the opposite bank a small burn has appeared. Meantime, the site of the electricity sub-station has grown and following a tip off at Perth, we contacted the SSE Heritage unit, who were very helpfull and sent us a site plan, some historical and technical information and some images, resulting in Roy carrying out some baseboard surgery to enlarge the site.

Roy has now resumed tree making for the hill east of the main line and a fair sized wood has now appeared.

In August we visited the Stirling Archives to inspect three large-scale Aerofilms pictures of Dunblane dating from 1962/63. As a result Roy has done yet more baseboard surgery, involving about two square feet across the join with the northern part of the junction board.

We have gained a lot of new information about the goods yard, including the water tower and a previously unknown second goods dock.

After spending months of plastering, fettling and painting the goods yard we've found ouselves remodelling the entrance area and creating a lot of raised ground above the plaster between the entrance and goods shed.

Away from the shed, Mike has completed the buildings for Caledonian Place. Working out the levels here and building a demountable sub-structure will be the next task for the area.

On the locomotive front we have used the last few spares of Ballantine driving wheelsets to replace a broken geared axle on a GEM parallel boiler Patriot, several ex LNER locos have been coaxed back into life, and we have discovered we have all the necessary parts for completing a part-built Foxhunter WD 2-8-0.

We were invited to the Elgin Modelfair on the 2nd /3rd November where we displayed the viaduct board. It was a very successful weekend and again we have learned a few things from people who knew the area in the 60's. Below are some photographs taken by Tony over the course of the weekend.

Our next planned exhibition will be at Elgin next year with hopefully the completed layout.

June Grampian Area Group Report

DUNALLANDER UPDATE

Tony and John have continued working on the ground cover on the goods yard and Roy has been busy with the scenics, including some tree building, on the viaduct board ready for the visit to the Perth Exhibition. Mike has continued modelling the buildings and is now down to his last five.

The highlight of the month was the Perth Exhibition where we had the viaduct board as a demonstration along with a small screen showing some of Mike's buildings and photos of the full layout as it was at the Aberdeen Exhibition in October. We picked up quite a lot of information from people who knew the area and also a possible source of information for the sub station. During the course of the weekend a couple of bridge engineers paid the stand a visit and were very impressed with Roy's bridges, so a massive thumbs up for our bridge builder. The other highlight of course was once again meeting up with the team from the Forth and Clyde Group with their excellent layout Mearns Shed.

Below photographs taken by Tony during the weekend and two of Mike's latest building.

Faery Bridge

Alasdair Campbell's Jumbo

Mike's latest model building of 16 Caledonian Place

The Perth Exhibition would not be complete without the Saturday night exhibitor's BBQ at Wester Pickson Railway

May Grampian Area Group Report

DUNALLANDER UPDATE

Roy has completed the mammoth task of rewiring and is now continuing with the scenics on the viaduct board which we will be displaying at the Perth Exhibition on the 29th/30th June at the Dewar's Centre. The scenery work to date has involved the making of a lovely model of the 1911-built Faery Footbridge (Faery Brig) over the river, which is a very early example of the use of ferro-concrete, which Roy has modelled in plasticard. Roy has also fixed some fencing in place along the river and began laying static grass along with a spot of tree making. Tony and John, following the laying of plaster in the goods yard, are now doing the tidying up work including removing plaster from below the gaps under the rails and painting of the area has also began.

Mike is now making the final batch of buildings, primarily Caledonian Terrace, John has built and fitted the goods dock and Tony has been dealing with some of the loco issues highlighted during the Aberdeen Exhibition. A big thank you goes to Mick Simpson who is very kindly remotering our Britannia.

As mentioned we will be at the Perth Exhibition on the 29th/30th of June so if you are visiting please drop by and say hello.

A couple of photos of the progress Roy has made on the viaduct board

On arrival we thought there had been a bit of a disaster but it was only Roy finding a way to get some scenic work done on the centre of the board (calm down and keep plastering)