Garden Railway Forum

Hello,
Lets all get too know how we got started in this wonderful hobby of ours!

I started with a crate of mamod track, a couple of broken mamods, and a couple of Triang Big-Big Train diesels, and some assorted stock. Technically they're my dad's, but I've sort of taken possesion of them. these came out every summer, ever since I was little, and layed out in the front garden, much to the suprise of passing trains on the Ffestiniog! Then a couple of years back I decided I wanted to persue the idea of trains in the garden, I sort of felt more proud of it in the garden.

I started of with a old mamod set I got for half price on ebay. Now I'm on too my second railway with 3 steamers, 4 carriges, 4 wagons, a brake van, two concret buildings, and a kit built halt.

I started with a normal green SL1 started set (oval, 2 wagons) then, I purchased more track with upgrades for the Mamod, an IP railcar, then more track, then Columbine and more and more followed...

Yeah thats the set that I got.

Good value arent they, sure gets you going on steaming. I'd recomend any starter to try a mamod set, and purchase an IP railcar with it.

Yeah, but be sure to get a old mamod set, not the new one they're now producing, as I here they're not as good as the old ones.

I started with modified big bigs on my dads line and it just went from there.

Well I think that the reason why I got into garden railways was my dad, even though he isn't a trains enthusiast. When he was my age, his parents(my Grandparents) brought him a mamod steam tractor. Sadly, due to the complications of life, he hadn't time to play with it, ans so it got put away in a cupboard for 20 years, untill i found it aged 5 whilst looking for a thomas the tank engine toy.

I dont know how I got into it. I think, when I was little, he had a 00 set, and he once bought a Roundhouse video. I watched that (still have it!!) and loved them. I wrote to Santa asking for one (an american live steam loco - I must of liked Sandy River!!!) and of course, my dad woundn't buy one of those, so I got a Mamod set. Being Mamod, it flew off the tracks and was pretty hopeless, so I lost interest so it got put away. About 8 years later, I found it again, got it out and had a play. That what has led me to whats going on on the MHLR!!!!

I got started into trains after i bought a few stationaries my first train was a RS2 I bought from the states and now im hooked
have bought 6 mamod trains now but would love a roundhouse now

I started with a Mamod SL1, but the interest in garden railways started a long time before....
My father used to get a Bassett & Lowke catalogue every year, for some unknown reason. He never did any modelling or anything with live steam. Anyway there was an "O" gauge loco advertised in it. Every Xmas and birthday when I was asked by my parents, what I wanted, that loco was at the top of my list...Not surprisingly I never got it It cost an absolute fortune in those days... £48 !!!! At around the age of 11, I saw a clip on TV (only one channel then.... BBC) about a club of people running "S" scale in a garden setting. I was intrigued and I guess that implanted the idea of a garden railway in my brain. In the early 1960's I managed to get my Mamod stationary engine to pull itself on a short stretch of homemade track on the garden path, and that was that at that point. Eventually sometime in the first half of the 1980's (age by then, in the 30's) I managed to buy one of the first Mamod loco's for the sum of £35, brand new . My Xmas and birthday wish after the purchase of the loco was a pack of SM32 track, which I usually got and my railway slowly grew by approx 12 yards each year ! Thankfully at that time we had a very small back garden !

For a short time the loco was remote controlled by stud contact. I added a tender with a butchered servo which had the printed circuit removed, so it worked as a motor. Applying a low voltage current in short bursts would turn the servo spindle by small amouts each time. A bicycle brake cable was attached to an enclosed drum fitted to the servo. The brake cable ran from the tender to the reversing valve lever on the loco. A battery pack of two 1½ volt batteries was wired to a double pole reversing switch, and one wire was attached to the track, and the other wire attached the studs (small round headed brass screws) in the centre of the track. A sprung "skate" fitted to the bottom of the tender picked up power from the studs. Flicking the switch quickly, moved the reverser lever by very small amounts, forwards or backwards. It worked quite well but I was obviously limited to running the loco on my own track. Eventually a year or so later I had managed to save up enough money for radio control, and so it progressed

thanks for that info John very informative

Yes, very interesting.

I started with a secondhand Mamod RS1, plus an RW3 & RW4, which I bought from the members stand at the Merstham Steam Rally in 1996.

The 1st house I rented had an uneven patio, so running this set was very temperamental with lots of derailments. The 2nd house had an overgrown garden so I had to run the set in the kitchen/dinner which was not very good as solid fuel smells are difficult to get rid of.

It then spent time in its' box whilst I stayed with my father until buying my present house.

Unfortunately the plan for building my back garden (you do not get one with a new built house unless you pay extra, and what they give you is of very poor quality), and thus the garden railway has been put on hold following a change to my employment status and life's priorities. Hopefully start again when the weather gets better next year!

I now have a built in wardrobe bursting full with Mamods, an MSS, Cheddars, Big Big Trains, Faller E-Trains, plus odds & ends, all waiting for the garden railway. In the meantime I am using an oval of track in the kitchen for my running of some locos.

Chris Cairns.

I always wanted a garden railway, but the spark was ignited when I saw an advert for a DVD called The Garden Railway. I purchased the DVD and as soon as I watched it, I started making plans......
When I got some money for my birthday, I brought 12 yards of track and an accucraft Lynton and Barstaple wagon. My first engine made use of the motor bogie from a Big big hymek. Now i've collected several pieces of rolling stock as well as the 2 steam engines

I wouldn't necessarily say it started with Big Big Trains, but I did have a couple of the sets that I used to play with on the patio when I was little!

Around about my 7th Xmas (or it could have been a few years later), I was introduced to live steam. My Uncle (PTLRCecil's dad) bought me a Mamod Traction Engine. Had great fun with that. On visits to relatives over the years, I visited my uncles garden railway (The old SHLR - Ask PTLRCecil for more details) and always took an interest from then.

Not much happened after that til my last year or so at Uni when I was bought a faller diesel which my uncle had converted to dual speed battery operation. From there I picked up bits and bobs (including 2 rare AMF diesels! These were the American Big-Big Trains, but with slight modifications to the moulded body) and started building a few bits of stock. My first steamer was a black mamod (which didnt work well at all, even by mamod standards!), which was then thrown back on ebay to finance a 45mm Iver. It was then decided it would be too much hassle to convert to 32mm, and this was thrown back on eBay, til I eventually ended up with a well modded mamod going by the name of YDG. YDG stands for Yr Ddraig Goch, or in English 'The Red Dragon'. In Ffestiniog tradition, this loco displays its name in Welsh on one side, and English on the other.

And to the future...I'm about to order the first kit parts for a Lady Anne. And who knows, i might even start to lay some track this year! If this is the case, look out for progress in the projects area.

Martyn

I started with a Mamod SP4. After 10 years (this year) of collecting i now have over 70 toy and model steam engines...

Anyway a few years back Cheddar Models (with whom i am good freinds with ) Offered me the prototype Iver at a price i couldn't refuse. I know have 9 locos and have 'formed' a railway company but haven't started construction yet

I've just been looking at the pics of your prototypes elsewhere in the forums. Very Nice!

Thanks-I like prototypes

An MSS 0-4-0T and a circle of Mamod track. That is still the current situation