Narrow Gauge North

2024

A 009 layout by Richard Pike
Scale 009 (4mm/1ft)
Gauge 9mm
Size n’ x n’

In the event that the layout name is a dire insult in Welsh, an online translation informs me that Blwch Teganau means Toy Box.

Over the years I’ve built and exhibited a number of layouts in 4mm, both standard and narrow gauge and all have suffered from the same problems, inquisitive cats and fading grass from sunlight.  When I was little my father built an over and under 009 layout in a gramophone case.  So when a few years ago one of my children’s Ikea wooden toy boxes complete with lid became available I decided to replicate what my father had done.  The lid was the important part in my mind solving the previous problems at one stroke.

We have a halt with a siding giving access to a small railway maintenance yard, clearances are tight, very tight and the inclines are aggressive.  A water tower gives locomotives the opportunity to fill their tanks.  The layout is about compromise, the monument on the hillside is an O gauge gravestone and the bridge girders and drystone walls are N gauge.  It’s a continuous run with no fiddle yard, but everything is self-contained within the box which has a removable mains lead.