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Modellings tips and answers - Adding lights to a layout

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Don't forget to read our latest modelling tips and unboxing videos located at the bottom of the newsletter.

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Railway song of the week

The O & K Train Song by John Harrod references the Orenstein & Koppel (O&K) locomotive works, preserving a remarkably specific slice of early industrial railway history in musical form. Rooted in the Kentucky fiddle tradition, this version retains the tune's raw, unvarnished character, giving a sense of how it may have sounded to listeners in the early 20th century. Click on the picture to discover it:

This week in history

On July the 30th 1900, the Central London Railway (unofficially known as the Twopenny Tube) opens between Shepherd's Bush and Bank. It served 13 stations when opened and was later extended to reach 20 stations before being sold in the 1930s.

Picks of the Week

When you're looking to add DCC sound to your OO gauge layout without breaking the bank, pre-owned locomotives can offer exceptional value. These three diesel locomotives have all been professionally tested and come ready to run with DCC decoders already fitted, saving you the time and expense of fitting your own. They represent different classes and operators, giving you plenty of choice depending on your layout's theme and era.

The Hornby Class 56 in Fastline Freight livery is a Rail Express Limited Edition model that comes complete with its certificate. This heavyweight freight locomotive, nicknamed a "Gridiron" by enthusiasts due to its distinctive grid-like horn covers, is fitted with a factory-reset DCC decoder and arrives in exceptional condition with no signs of wear. Meanwhile, the Hornby Class 47 in Rail Operations Group livery comes from Hornby's Railroad Plus range and features TTS sound fitted as standard. This model is as "as new" and includes additional weight to improve running characteristics, making it an excellent entry point into DCC sound operation. Rounding out the trio is the Hornby Class 37 in Network Rail livery, also from the Railroad range and fitted with TTS sound. Like the Class 47, this locomotive has had additional weight added to enhance performance and all functions have been fully tested and confirmed working.

Using kits in N gauge

If you are the proud owner of an N gauge layout then you might be considering building some rolling stock from kits, but where do you start?

A great place to start is a wagon easy assembly kit, they require little more than clipping or gluing a few components together and painting, so they are a great way to learn how models are built without being too challenging. The kits typically come with a chassis, one-piece moulded body, metal weight, wheels and couplings.

Our top tip is to paint any components that require it before you construct your model, this will help you to create crisp edges and your model will look great.

The Peco's Quality Line range contains 25 different N gauge wagons, which are very easy to assemble. Here are a few examples, including a 7 plank open, refrigerator van, salt wagon, tank wagon, plate wagon and a tube wagon.

For those that would prefer to start kit building in N gauge with actual buildings rather than rolling stock, you might want to consider the Kestrel Designs kits by Gaugemaster. Again these are entry-level so you can expect the models to be relatively basic, but that means they are easy! One of the key features about the Kestrel range is that most of them come moulded out of coloured plastic so although you can paint them if you want, they can be used whilst you are getting around to it.

The kits can be a little more involved than the Peco wagons and there will be more gluing involved, but still a really good starting place for kit building.

Kestrel has quite a range covering many dioramas as demonstrated here with a farm set, a country station, telegraph poles, factory, church and 3 storey town shop.

Modelling tips

We keep on adding modelling tips to our website. Here are a few:

You can read all the articles sorted by categories or from the most recent published one on our website.

Unboxing videos

You want to know what is inside the boxes of modelling products? We open them for you! Subscribe to our YouTube channel to be notified before everyone else or simply click on this selection. Please note that videos are at the bottom of each page.

You can access all the unboxing videos by visiting this page or simply click on the link called "videos" on our websit e.

Events and exhibitions

Find all the latest events and exhibitions for the model railway world, on the UK Model Shop Events directory. Hopefully, 2026 will give us plenty of opportunities to attend events all over the country.

Do you need to order?

Send us an email or give us a call to check availability or to reserve anything, whatever scale you model in. As usual, if we do not have in stock what you are looking for, we will order it for you and you will get it fast (usually within a week if the manufacturer has it in stock). We place weekly orders with most suppliers.

Remember, you can park for free for one hour on the High Street. So no excuse not to come and visit us!

Upstairs Downstairs is open Tuesday to Saturday 10am till 4.30pm. Obviously, our website is open 24h a day and we can post to most locations, including Europe, USA and Australia.

Upstairs Downstairs
3 Pier Street
Sandown, PO36 8JR
Isle of Wight
Tel: 01983 406 616
http://www.trainshop.co.uk or find us on Facebook

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