This is Bill Mudie from Adelaide in South Australia. I'm a Hornby Dublo enthusiast, more of a runner than a collector, mainly interested in my 24 x 21 foot shed which has a large "E" shaped end-to-end 3-rail layout in it.
The layout uses over 300 goods wagons, almost exclusively tinplate, some 70 passenger coaches, again tinplate with the exception of a rake of 6 Pullman cars, 15 locos, ranging from a converted pair of 0-6-0s running as one unit, to examples of many of the three rail locos of the pre-1959 period.
The layout can be controlled from any one of three switchboards, enabling a number of people to be involved in running trains at the same time. There is a "City" terminal and a Port (Port Julia) at the two ends of the line with three intermediate stations, all of which have separate local control. All the switch points except one are hand operated, mostly isolating, and with the size of the layout, there's a lot of interest in operating the timetable I have devised. The timetable which runs over a two hour period, real time, has a "local" passenger service every 10 minutes, an "outer suburban" service every 20 minutes, and a City-Port "long distance" service every 30 minutes. Goods (freight) services are slotted in between, one of interest is the Brick train, using twelve wagons (in fours) to run a service from the Port to "Fletton" (where else????) and from the City Yard to Fletton and the Port. A regular "Fish" train of 14 vans runs from the Port to the City and return, and there are "pick-up" freights as well as a number of coal trains which fit in between the passenger services. It all makes for a great deal of running around if I'm on my own. To be honest I can only run the passenger services, fish train, and a couple of pick up freight trains from the City to the Port in the two hour period.
As well as running trains I've lately been producing loads for Hornby Dublo and Triang wagons, based on the coal loads found in their wagons. The Dublo ones are for the Super Detail open wagons (both types), the hopper wagon, and for the D2 Mineral wagon. I'm currently working on a load to fit the SD Mineral Wagons. There are also 4 types of loads for the early Triang wagons. I can supply loads at aud$2.75 + postage. You can order on the e-mail.
A group of Dublo enthusiasts meets every week on a Wednesday at one of three layouts, mine, another 3-rail Dublo tracked layout, and one laid with Peco track with centre rail from code 80 rail. Although we sometimes run timetables, most of the time we just "play trains" and talk a great deal about all scales of toy trains, even those of 304mm to the foot.
My interests apart from Hornby Dublo include sound recordings, having in my collection hundreds of hours of train sounds, from South Australian broad gauge, to the narrow gauge "Puffing Billy" in Victoria. Since 1972 I've produced a number of vinyl discs, cassettes and more recently a Compact Disc of sounds of South Australian trains. The CD resulted from my obtaining a Digital Audio Tape recorder in 1982. All the sound on the CD is Digital and is very, very clean and crisp. Among the cassettes is one of Flying Scotsman, with some sound recorded in Australia during that famous locomotive's visit in 1988/89. I have 16 cassettes, the CD and 4 vinyl discs available at the moment. CD is $14.00, cassettes $10,00 and the vinyl discs are $4.00. If you'd like to know more, send me an e-mail, bilmudie@senet.com.au
If you are ever in Adelaide, give me a ring on 8296 9455 and I'll be only happy to show you the set-up.
Cheers, and thanks for reading.
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