|
Andoversford Junction - into the BR era.
The real Andoversford Junction closed to passengers in October 1962 and the track was removed in 1964. It is now a housing estate but the pine trees still remain! I thought it somewhat inappropriate to "bulldoze" my model embankment and replace the station with a housing estate but not too difficult to bring the layout into the 1950s and back to the 1930s or 1920s. When I started collecting locos and stock many years ago, I bought BR liveried examples as well as GWR items so I didn't need much of an excuse to vary the era from 1930s GWR to 1950s BR. It also gave me the excuse to run some more interesting stock, including the ex-SR U and N Class 2-6-0s which were common on the MSWJR from around 1953 until 1961. I needed to duplicate the water tower and signal box as these were repainted into "cream" or "daffodil yellow" after Nationalisation, as were the station and waiting room (I haven't duplicated them yet!). The gas lamps were removed at an unknown date (possibly even before WWII) but I've left them in situ. This is still work ongoing and, of course, when the GWR bug bites again, I have to be able to revert back to the glorious years fairly swiftly. As Andoversford was not "modernised" it's not too difficult to do. The line did see the odd brand new DMU on test from Swindon but no diesels were used in normal GWR or BR service. I have never seen any evidence even of any GWR diesel railcars on the line but I do have one in my collection just in case! The 28xx, 2805, is an old Keyser kit not very well built by me but the running chassis (built by someone else!) is pretty good. Its my first attempt at weathering a loco and stock.
|