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Modellings tips and answers - Inspiration - N gauge wagon kits and buildings

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

This week in history - A busy week in 1987 for railway openings: on the 25th July the East Lancashire Railway reopened a stretch of line between Bury and Ramsbottom to operate as a heritage railway. Meanwhile a little further south on the 31st of July, Queen Elizabeth II was busy presiding over the opening ceremonies of the Docklands Light Railway. The initial system operated two routes from Tower Gateway to Stratford and Island Gardens.

Brian sent us this picture of his narrow gauge layout "Almost quite on the Western Front". We find it very atmospheric and inspiring. Click on the picture to see it in larger size.

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.

We keep on adding modelling tips to our website. Here are the latest ones:

You can also access all the articles by visiting this page or simply click the link called "tips" on our website.

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.

Upstairs Downstairs is currently open for collection only. Simply call us to arrange a time. You can also place your orders on the website for dispatch anywhere in the world.

Upstairs Downstairs
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Sandown, PO36 8JR
Isle of Wight
Tel: 01983 406 616
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