BLACKMILL 4mm '00' Finescale. Present-day North-West England

"Blackmill" is intended to portray the privatised railway operations around the North-West of England in the last couple of years. Most of the rolling stock to be found on the layout can be found in and around the Blackburn and Manchester areas. The trackplan of "Blackmill'' is based upon the current track layout at the western end of Blackburn station with suitable alterations made to fit the space available for the layout. The layout is operated via a Lenz Digital Command Control (DCC) unit. This is a system where the operator keys in a specific number on a keypad and then ''drives" the train with no need for individual isolating sections of track. Another advantage of DCC is the continuous power feed to the track, which enables locomotive lights and other functions to be controlled via the keypad. Look out for the two DMU's with working door lights! Trackwork is Peco Finescale Code 75 and Tortoise slow-acting point machines control the points. Watch out for the moving road vehicles running on the Faller Road System. This is a buried steel guide wire, which is followed by a magnet attached to the steering system of the vehicle. The vehicles themselves are powered by small internal rechargeable batteries.

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Photographs/images by Mick Bryan and Les Green.