So Where do I start?

I've been interested in model railways since I was a youngster. What kicked it off was the Hornby Royal Mail train set that my parents got for me one Christmas. It's a typical start for most model rail enthusiasts that I know. The little oval of track was regularly built up and then I'd I power the small Class 37 diesel locomotive at breakneck speed around it, then all too soon it was time to put it away. An additional little 0-6-0 Steam loco was added with a couple of wagons and my dad even mounted the oval of track on a 6x4 board so that I use my 'layout' whenever I wanted.

As I got older, a natural interest in the real thing developed and I trawled the country, camera and notebook in hand whilst I got the fix of the full size variety. The train set took a back seat at that point, and as the mid to late teenage years took over it was duly sold on. Skip forward about 15 years and whilst waiting for a train, on my way down to London for work, I was scanning the magazine section for something to cure the boredom, when what should I see but a magazine called Model Rail. I bought it and started to read the thing from cover to cover. This was the spark I needed and my interest was renewed - I couldn't believe how things had come on in the years since I'd last had my hands on a model train. The next few months were spent researching and making myself aware of just how far things had come on since my childhood model days and a decision was made to start the hobby again - not only because I'm a big kid and love making models, but also to recapture a bit of the lost youth of train spotting.

After a while I'd started to get together quite a collection of stock and whilst modern models have fantastic detail, to me they look too perfect and lacked the realism that I was after. Again a process of research, trial and error, experimentation and absolute disaster followed, but slowly and surely I started to get better at painting, airbrushing, detailing and scratchbuilding - the results being I finally had models of exactly what I wanted and more to the point exactly how I'd seen them.

So with the very brief history lesson out the way, we skip forward again  to present day, so welcome to the blog. It won't be for everyone I realise. If you are one of those collectors who values the models still in their original box, untouched by human hands - I'd look away now. Don't say I didn't warn you as I'm sure you'll cringe at what I've done to some things! That said it's my hope that what I will end up with is not only a great working model railway, but also something that looks and feels like the real thing.

There's no real track plan to show as yet - it's all in my head - so for the moment I'll concentrate on rolling stock and infrastructure. The idea is that the layout will eventually represent a fairly modern day scenario, but to be honest I have stock from many era's and so the occasional 'time slip' may occur. The location setting will be somewhere in the Midlands, hence the name - Cradley Bridge, a result of me living in the Black Country between Cradley Heath and Stourbridge.