Dave the Busker

Aye, I should probably clarify when I'd said that the kits I'd made only needed one mod, the door height, I just meant to imply the individual kits I had made so far, which didn't include anything like tunnels, goods sheds, engine sheds, etc that would need bigger clearances for TT120, which I've not experimented with. Sorry for any confusion!

The Greenwood kits look really good, but painting isn't something I'm very skilled at so the printed kits like Metcalfe are more suited to me. On the subject of Metcalfe being over scale for N, here's one I'm working on tonight. The building on the left is a Wordsworth 00 kit made at 63% for TT:120 scale, the one on the right is Metcalfe N. The first floor windows more or less line up exactly on both.

I don't get the impression that Metcalfe are in any way negative about TT, just that it's not something they can make a business case for at the moment. Of course, that does leave the door open for others and if someone does come in with more kits as good as theirs in TT scale then I'll be looking at them too. The Metcalfe kits I've got so far look very much in keeping with the scale of everything else on my layout, but I had this thought about the door today so I thought I'd share. A nice and simple bit of kit modding to make them even more suitable. 🙂

I know a few people have messaged Metcalfe about if they'd ever consider a TT:120 scale range of buildings, and as I understand it the response has been that they've just invested a lot in new equipment for the 00 and N kits and so investing in TT isn't in their immediate future. The N kits I've built for Hollybush actually look mostly a decent fit for TT, with just one exception. The doors on some kits, particularly houses and shops, look just a fraction too short. However, as the kits have door frames that the doors fit into, I've found that printing out some TT scale doors from the print at home download kits I've got from Scalescenes or Wordsworth and fitting them in the N doorway makes it look a much better fit for TT. Do you think Metcalfe might find it more feasible to make an N/TT kit which just has a couple of extra, slightly larger, doors included? Photo: N scale Metcalfe shop with Wordsworth 00 door printed at 63% for TT:120 scale.

A new bakery just opened up on the High St... Another Metcalfe N kit that doesn't seem too small (to me at least) for TT. I wonder if, even if they aren't considering a TT:120 specific range, if they might think about marketing their N kits as N/TT in a similar way to the way some get marketed as H0/00.

Picked up some very cheap N gauge figures on eBay. Had fairly low expectations for them, but only really intending for them to be used in places where they wouldn't be seen much, just to suggest the presence of people, bus passengers for example. They arrived this afternoon, and while they're no match at all for the detail of something like Noch, they're actually not as bad as I was fearing. A few of them are now on board the Oxford Diecast bus, a couple more on the Matchbox, a few on the platform at Dalrymple. Help make the place feel more inhabited without having to splash out the budget for more detailed ones just now.

Personally I've found fitting magnetic couplers a huge help for the HST. Not had a single coupling issue with mine since I fitted them, coaches or locos.

Thanks for reminding me why I told the YouTube algorithm not to push his videos at me 😂

Excellent, looking forward to watching that!

Had a quick look, and sadly it's not just held on by the side ads, no such luck. I presume the rivet is in the same place as in the videos I'd watched, but it looks to be covered over by a metal plate I can't easily move. Ah well, everything else can wait until I've more time. One little job I can do on it today is to turn it from a London Tour bus into the 52 to Dalmellington I used to take to Hollybush to see my grandparents, and have the ads be for my band and my family's old picture framing business. (don't worry mods, that's not actually advertising anything for sale here now, Burns Gallery closed about 20 years ago!)

I'd watched a couple of videos on restorations of these models while I was waiting for it to arrive, so I was expecting a rivet but didn't see one. There's definitely some movement around the side stickers, so I think perhaps someone's had a go at it some time in the past and taken the rivet off and stuck it back together. I've got the perfect bad weather for a rainy day project right now if I had the time to work on it today 😂

Picked this up for £2 on eBay. Matchbox 1/124 double decker bus. Looks like the advertising signs are holding the roof on, so there's a little project for when I've got some spare time. I'm going to try taking it apart to add some passengers, change the ad to something more Scottish and repaint it to a livery more suited to my layout's location, either SPT or Western Busses.

Another weekend building Metcalfe factory kits

Looking forward to see another TT layout take shape 🙂

A bit of 08 shunting action around the new factory buildings