Warehouse Wednesday: Swiss coal transhipment

An interesting view from a couple of years ago in Switzerland. Approaching Thun on the boat, we passed by this gantry for moving coal from ships to railway wagons. Via a great big pile, presumably a stockpile. 

A quick look on Google maps gives another angle, although oddly, the gantry itself hardly shows up. The gantry spans four tracks, and well as poking out over the water to unload ships. 

It strikes me that this would be quite a slow way to move coal, and I wonder why the stuff isn't moved all the way by rail. Or in a mountainous country, is this too hard? 

Also, what is the coal for? Switzerland is known for extensive use of clean power. Who is burning this stuff? 

Regardless, this would make a fantastic model. Good luck if you fancy making it work in HO, though, there's not much structure to hide the mechanical parts!

Warehouse Tuesday: Steinbruch Cement Works

Most people, when taking a boat along Lake Thun, will take pictures of the beautiful scenery. I did, but then there is this ugly cement works on the shore - and I pointed my camera at this too. 

I suppose you can argue it's not the ugly commercial site in the wold, but this is a stunning place, and here we have industry. There's no railway, and the road access doesn't look that impressive, so shipping by boat must be the order of the day. After all, there's no other reason to build it here!

Swiss shunters

 A quick look at some shunters I spotted in Switzerland. 

A pretty basic shunter in front of the sheds at Jungfraujoch station. I'm assuming it is radio controlled, as there isn't anywhere for the driver to hang on! Quite modelable in an oddball sort of way.

A class Tm232 in Lucerne station. Available in HO scale.

Bob the shunter.

Back to Lucerne for a Stadler Ee 922 electric shunter, which I am sure is the inspiration for the yellow Playmobil locomotive.

Mobil Box - Lucerne

 

I nearly gave Mobil Box a miss - the shop doesn't open until 2pm, and my time in Lucerne was limited. However, in the window were some fascinating G1 UK prototype locomotives, and I couldn't resist hanging around that end of town.As it was, I found some excellent souveniers for presents, and visited the Bourbaki Panorama, which was fascinating.It's not far from the lake, so I ate lunch watching boats. 

Back at the shop, I followed the owner in once he unlocked, and has a mouch. There's a lot in there - mainly plastic models and related stuff, but some trains. Also, a work area, so the place is obviously frequented by modellers who use it as a social area. 

The shop has been operating for 20 years - pretty good for what is a city centre location, and not a small one! 

Those locos in the window belong to the proprietors father, and for the right money (I didn't ask), they might be for sale. 

The electrical models appear to be mostly Marklin, but there is one that isn't, although I couldn't identify it. 

Sadly, all were to large to fit in my rucksack, so I settled on a card kit for a German lifeboat becuase it is flat and fitted in the back pocket of the bag!

A really nice shop with a freindly owner. Well worth dropping in. Check out the Mobil-Box website. 

Swiss wooden engine shed

I couldn't not photograph this engine shed when I saw it at Interlaken Ost station. I think it belongs to the Brünig steam railway, although the lack of soot (do Swiss steam engines emit smoke?) suggests it's home to a diesel locomotive. 

I suspect a standard design, as there is a similar shed at (I think) Berne station.

Noch Hausboot (14224) build

 

My kit of choice from the Thun model shop, is the Noch Hausboot (14224), which has the benefit of being tiny - the box is 10m long, and I was able to find a tiny spot in the rucksack for the trip home. We'll gloss over the price...

Anyway, knowing I still have kits from my Australia trip a decade ago awaiting assembly, I decided to get this one out of the way ASAP. 

It's laser cut from some very stout 2mm thick laserboard. Everything is, as you would expect, cleanly cut. The minimum of tabs hold parts into the fret, making removal with a sharp knife, easy. 

Th very thin glazing is cut to size and fitted (Glue'n'glaze) before assembly of the sides and ends with Roket card glue. No allowance is made for the plastic, but it is very, very thin, so the designer assumed you won't need it, and so it seems. 

Under the "hull" are a couple of skids, which don't show in the photos, but raise it up a couple of millimetres. I think this is probably prototypical, as you don't want the deck at water level. 

The only painting required is the lifebelts, everything else is precoloured. Building the model took very little time, and wasn't too fiddly, even in HO. 

I suppose that the "ropes" between the posts would look better made out of thread, or fine chain. It's the sort of modification a more advanced modeller could chose to carry out easily enough. 

A fun little kit, and at 8cm long, small enough for the souvenier section of my model display cabinet. 

Schaufelberger AG, Thun

 

Strolling around Thun, a really nice city with many pretty features, and very little in the way of tourist tat shops, I spotted a Marklin sign dangling from a department store. Looking in the window, it seemed to promise more than just a toy department, so of course, I investigated. 

There is a toy department, a great big one, on the third floor. But looking around, I could see stairs, but no escalator, to a fourth. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, I had a look. 

What I found was the sort of model shop any city would be proud of. Well stocked with plastic kits, boat and flying aircraft kits, glues and materials. The only omission seems to be paint. A few spray cans, including some Humbrol, but not a rack full of colours. Odd, that's the sort of thing that encourages repeat visits. 

Scenicly, all the main European manufacturers were represented with racks, and spinny display things, stuffed full of product. I liked the look of the 3D sheets from Noch, although I have seen these before, and Carson HO scale radio control vehicles. A quick play showed them to be very controlable. Not cheap, but hey, Switzerland. 

Of course there is a cabinet full of trains. A 30% sale was on, but with what I took to be DCC locos costing over 500 Swiss Francs, those are still scary prices, although the models are sublime. 

The Marklin Start-up sets look interesting. A step above the My World range, these are still dead rail radio controlled locos, for modest prices. Conversion potential perhaps? 

My biggest problem was working out what to buy. I didn't want to spend a fortune, and the space in my rucksack was minimal, so it had to be tiny. See what I ended up with tomorrow. 

In the meantime, the Schaufelberger AG website is here.

Berner Oberland train 'fridge magnet

Obviously, from a trip that involved around 45 train trips, I had to buy a model train of some sort. Now that wasn't going to be some fancy HO scale model - if you think UK locos are expensive, try Swiss ones! Anyway, I didn't see a model of anything I'd travelled on, and wouldn't have got it in the rucksack anyway. 

What there was, was a 'fridge magnet. Or rather a set of four. The Berner Oberland set shown above, a modern WAG set, one from the Jungfru, and a steam rack loco. 

At 12fr (read: £12) each, I was only going to buy one, and so went for the train I travelled on the most, for the six-minute ride from Wilderswil to Interlaken. 

Let's be honest, even if you allow for the model showing the pointy end of the train, not the one in the photo, it's not the greatest model. At 95mm long, I have no idea what the scale is, but around N gauge I suppose. 

The real trains are fantasic. Clean, efficient and with little flaps in the doors that open to fill the gap between platform edge and carriage. There's plenty of capacity too. OK, the train splits, but each end is longer than the Leamington to Marylebone service sometimes, and that's between a big town and capital city, not secondary city and the mountains!

Warehouse Wednesday: Swiss goods sheds

The Swiss seem to like moving things by rail. I lost count of the number of rail-served factoreis and businesses we passed travelling around. Many looked like the sidings were still in use too. 

However, the subject of this post is the traditional, wooden, Swiss good shed. There are plenty of these around too. I'm not sure many are used as much as the one at Lauterbrunnen, but some certainly are. 

Interlaken Ost's isn't railway, but it's still in place. At the other end of the town, near Inerlaken West, the shed is larger, but taken over by a sort of market style trader that reminded me of Jurby Junk on the Isle of Man many years ago. I suppose it's a tribute to these buildings that they are still standing, and ideal for his business. 

Working narrow gauge freight

Tuesday of my holiday involved a trip up the Jungfrau, an impressive series of trains and an incredible view from the top of the mountain. However, on the way back, as we passed through Lautebrunnen, I was amazed to see an ancient electric locomotive - shunting!

Since the next day was free, thanks to the Schynige Platte railway having closed for winter the week before, I decided to head back and see if I could get a proper look at this anachronism. To be honest, I didn't expect much luck, but as it involved a trip through the mountains, I was happy with a gawp at the scenery. 

On arrival, I spotted another target for my camera, and old-looking railcar tucked in a shed. Working my way along the street, and using the car park of a hostal, I bagged the photo above. It turns out that overhead electrification equipment gets in the way as much on the real thing as it does on models!

It didn't take long loitering on the station platform for me to get a better look though, as these things are still working. It seems that there are communities on the mountain without road connections - so everything has to be sent up by rail. The result - a parade of short goods trains running on narrow guage rack track!

It seems that these are the original railcars that have since been displaced by more modern, and less stylish to my mind, units. 

The little green loco, a WAB He 2/2 51–58, is over 100 years old. The class used to be used on the mountain, but this one is now kept as the shunter in the small yard. A yard which would make a nice model, apart from the knitting. 

Nowadays, more modern machines have taken over the mountaineering, but they are no less interesting. They are also very busy, in three hours, I saw a good train depart at least every 30 minutes, alternating with the passenger trains. 

You can tell the photo above is Switzerland - look at those corner protectors on the plasterboard. No strapping it down and wreaking the top couple of sheets here!

It was interesting that some trains had a proper driving cab at the front, but the plasterboard service was driven by someone standing on the front of the wagon, presumably using radio control. I saw this on the standard gauge a few days later, as a freight diesel shot through Thun station at speed with a couple of orange-clad guys on the front of a two bogie train. 

So, a fun morning on a day to misty to go up any mountains. Until this point, I'd never actually seen narrow guage railways earning thier keep with freight, and certainly not as much as this, on such a modern system.

Bühler AG, Interlaken

 

If you go down the Bahnhofstrasse today, you are in for a slight disapointment. They don't open on Mondays. Yes, you can look at the somewhat faded items in the display windows, and it's still more interesting than a lot of the shops in Interlaken, but frustrating. 

Get past of the odd opening hours, a feature of many Swiss model shops, and you are rewarded with a cornucopea of models. 

Four rooms and the corridor are stacked with models. Mostly HO scale trains, but plenty of other stuff too such as RC models and construction kits. There are paints and modelling materials, it really is well stocked. 

This being Switzerland, there aren't any obvious bargains, but for the UK enthusiast, it's the breadth of product on display that appeals, at least it diud to me. I came away with a pack from the Faller Basic Range, which weirdly, isn't on their website, and a Marklin Christmas wagon, which you can be sure will appear on this blog at some point. 

Well worth a visit, especially if you get bored of endless shops selling watches, penknives and fridge magnets. 

Buhler website.

That's not a model shop!

 

You're going to be hearing a lot about my recent Swiss holiday on the blog - partly because I enjoyed it, but mostly because prepering to be, and being, on holiday, hasn't left much modelling time. 

Anyway, here's the first post.

Arriving on Lucerne station, what do I see, but a Bachmann shop.

Is it full of model trains? 

Nope. 

Sadly, this is the boys from Barwell branching out. Pity really, as I was looking forward to some rather tasty review items from them...

As it is, I can say the vanilla donut was delicious, but it took ages to clean all the icing sugar off my clothes afterwards!