About Me

Ian Millard

Age: 54

Location: Port Macquarie, NSW, Australia

Occupation:  Retired

This blog will document the construction of my model railway based on the section of the Main Northern line in New South Wales between Kankool and Temple Court in the Liverpool Ranges.  Ardglen is at the top of 1 in 40 grades in both UP and DOWN directions.  The era will be from 1980 to 1983, with various types of trains including block wheat and coal, general freight and passenger.  Up trains will generally be quad worked with ALCO’s being the primary form of motive power.

I have been railway modelling since about 1985.  In 2003, I discovered Proto87 track and wheel standards and decided this was for me.  I have always tried to achieve better detail in my models, and Proto87 allowed me to continue this level of detail in the trackwork and wheels.

Over the following 10 years, I learnt a lot about Proto87, with myself and a mate building a Proto87 exhibition layout called Bowen Creek.  This gave us the chance to experiment with Proto87 but when it was completed and started operating on it, we found some issues with diesel locomotive operation.  We initially thought that converting diesel locomotives over would be a simple task.  However, this was not to be.

In 2013, my mate and I started development on a suspension system that was designed to be retrofitted to existing diesel chassis.  Over the following 2 years it proved to not be reliable enough.

In 2015, the decision was made to abandon Proto87 in favour of the NMRA Fine:HO standards.  This standard allowed for a 1mm flangeway, which whilst not as fine as Proto87, was still acceptable to me.

Read this blog post for more information on the decision to change.

Thanks for visiting.