Quester's Gallery
Browse a selection of fantastic layouts from fellow model rail builders.
Do you have a model railway layout you'd like to be featured on the Model Railway Quest website? Send me your best photos along with a short description and I'll add your layout to my gallery page. I'll be choosing a Star Layout every month - and the winner gets to receive a "stunning" (according to Grumpy Camera Man) Star Layout Plaque. Send your layout details to modelrailwayquest@gmail.com and write Gallery in the subject line.
Bole Quay (OO) - David Jennings
April 2024
Brunswick East - Les Pace
Brunswick East is loosely based on part of the large Brunswick shed complex in Liverpool and is inspired by a small track design drawn by the late Iain Rice in one of his modelling books.
It is set roughly in the early 1960s, but with some builder's licence to run odd locos that would not have been seen in this part of the country especially the LMS 1000 and 1001 locos.
I decided to try to model it in the late evening/night, using a black cloth cover, and the layout lights rather than the usual external lighting. I'm hoping this makes it a little different, similar to Dawn Quest's Brief Encounter Monochrome layout which I really like for its originality.
All the locos on the layout are DCC and I also use DCC concepts points that allow the layout to be operated remotely with the train driver app.
The track is Peco code 75 finescale and the layout also has a digital turntable. Also I'm able to fill up a loco tender using powdered coal from the coaling tower.
This is being exhibited for the first time at my club show this year - the Northampton Model Railway Exhibition in Roade. hope that I have the time before the show to add firebox flicker to the steam locos and some wet finishes and puddles to the layout to make it look like it has been raining and to reflect the depot lights.
"Chameleon Cuthbertsville - Cuthbert
Under Lorden (1:35 scale) - Ted Winter
Under Lorden is the fictional branch terminus of a narrow gauge line running along the coast of Dorset, hence the Southern Railway colours of the station. The locos and rolling stock, however, have their origins in Wales.
The layout is built to a scale of 9 mm/ft, approximately 1:35 scale, which means just about everything has to be scratch-built. Choosing this scale allowed me to use EM scale wheels and axles running on 18.2mm gauge track to accurately model a 2ft narrow gauge railway. The track uses code 124 rail spiked to every wooden sleeper.
The one carriage and both locos I have at the moment were built from styrene sheets of various thicknesses, and even the frames of the locos were made from 1.5mm thick styrene. The wagon bodies, though, used Daler-Rowney mount board to which paper sides printed with the body colour, planking effect and lettering were applied. Black ironwork cut from card was separately added.
Buildings were also designed on the PC as card kits and, like the wagon bodies, were professionally printed to avoid the fading and change of colour that would occur using my own inkjet printer - I found out the hard way!
Whinburgh and Slitrigg (OO) - Richard Barrow
Here are four pictures showing part of my 00 gauge loft layout Whinburgh and Slitrigg. This is my representation of the Carlisle to Edinburgh ‘Waverley Route’ as it was in the early 1960s, and was inspired by published photographs taken by the likes of Derek Cross and WJV Anderson.
The model railway is still work in progress after 20 years of effort. I see model railways as an art form and try to use texture and colour to good effect.
My layout is Bole Quay, a OO gauge small layout based on a real quay in Kings Lynn, Norfolk, UK. I mostly like small locomotives and industrials and this provides me with somewhere to run them. I’ve modelled it as quite run-down!
My diorama measures 1200 mm x 600 mm and is currently unnamed because it's semi-modular and also because, when taking pictures, I constantly switch out scenery including trees, structures and even overhead line catenary! Maybe I should name it "Chameleon Cuthbertsville!" (Consider it done, Cuthbert - Dawn x)
My problem is I have too many different types of locos/trains from different countries and eras so I wanted to match the scenery with them as best as I could. The diorama is loosely based on the countryside sections of French high speed lines which are known for looking mostly dull and unremarkable. This was a deliberate choice as the simple nature made it easier to switch out scenery for modelling different eras/trains etc.
Do you have a model railway layout you'd like to be featured on the Model Railway Quest website? Send me your best photos along with a short description and I'll add your layout to my gallery page. I'll be choosing some of the best for a featured blog post. All you have to do is send your layout details to modelrailwayquest@gmail.com and write Gallery in the subject line.