Can an 'Inglenook Sidings' switching puzzle also be a Wargame?

One of the YouTube-channels I follow is the UK based Budget Model Railways, which I find very inspiring as this father and son Enterprise has a creative and inspiring approach to model railway to find good and cheap solutions. They're also into 3D-printing, and it might seem like they're in some degree are also into military modelling and motorcycles as well. -All the things that I like, so what is it not to like about their YouTube-channel? If you haven't visited it yet, I highly recommend you to pay them a visit.

Lately they have focused on shunting- or switching puzzles like the 'Inglenook Sidings' in different scales and gauges. -A type of shunting puzzle that really appeals to me for some time, but I've never made my own even if it's very very simple (just 2 switches and some track). Recently they made an 'Inglenook Sidings' in O gauge (1:43,5/1:45/1:48) while claiming larger scale might work better for higher ages, and it could be an 'investment in your hobby' to start early. This really hit me; I'm mainly into H0/00/H0e/009 scale/gauges, but after going into something that should only be a limited adventure into G-scale, I find myself doing more G-scale-stuff now than any of my other scales and gauges. Due to I had to remove my Garden Railway I had some tracks in spare. Highly inspired by the YouTube-video from BMR, I also wanted to try out an large scale Inglenook Sidings shunting puzzle.

What is an Inglenook Siding?

I don't assume that all the readers of this blog is familiar with model railways (becausesome of you might be here for the wargamingstuff), so first of all; what exactly is an Inglenook Siding shunting puzzle? An Inglenook Sidings is a very simple model railway switching puzzle invented or influenced by Alan Wright. It's  decipting a small yard of 3 tracks and a head shunt, made by only 2 switches/turnouts and some tracks. There are some rules how many wagons each track should hold, and how many wagons you should use. In it's classical form the Inglenook Sidings holds 3-3-5 wagons + head shunt of 3 wagon and a locomotive and it's played with 8 wagons and a locomotive. This gives 6720 different combinations to shunt your train in the right order. For even more information about the Inglenook Sidings, I recommend you to visit The Railways Shunting Puzzles Website, as this is the most complete on the theme.

My own improvised and very temporary Inglenook Sidings

After I lifted the tracks from my Garden Railway I actually had the tracks needed to make a simple Inglenook Sidings; 2 turnouts, some straight tracks and I even had a couple of buffer stops too. So while my wife was out of the house an afternoon I laid out the trackplan on the livingroom floor to see what it was like. It's possible to make a classic G-scale (IIm) Inglenook Sidings holding 3-3-5 wagons and it just measured 3,14 meters x 50 cm.

After the track was 'laid' it was too tempting not to try it, so I collected some of my large scale rolling stock which was easily available after  the last running session at a friends. To make a wagon-randomizer, I just took a photo of each wagon and printed them so I got 8 different 'wagon-cards' in a small deck to shuffle and randomly select.

And then the game could begin. These are photos from my very first Inglenook-operation session:

The locomotive is RC-operated by PIKO, and that controller is so slow so it gives a feeling of a heavy train taking time to brake and come to a halt. -So some planning is needed when shunting.

Since only using military wagons on this game, I imagine that this also in a certain extent also could be a wargame, as it's the shunting crew's mission to make up a specific military train in a specific requested order (usually decided by orders, dispatcher, destinations or where they are to be shunted later) to serve different units with their requested supplies along the line or in the front.

Battles are often fighting over the logistics. 

While operating, my youngest son, Nikolai, came along and did one operating session as well, and we had a great time together!

So, can an Inglenook Sidings shunting puzzle also be a 'Wargame'? Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comment-section below:

A motorcycle tour with a twist

These days the weather is really hot and sunny in Norway, and way to good to be spent inside to paint miniatures,  modelling or play wargames. So when a friend in our MRC invited fellow members to a running-session on his garden railway yesterday in this nice weather the choice  was actually very easy. There was only one challenge; my friend does not live in my 'neighborhood' and our car was not available at the time. So it needed to be a motorcycle tour with a twist.

Luckily my 30 litre pannier could just about fit a G-scale locomotive and 3 goods-wagons.

So in the occasion of being a motorcycle tour, I brought my LGB Heeresfeldbahn locomotive and 3 wagons loaded with motorcycles. 

My friend's garden railway is really big and can accommodate much traffic, so my other friends trains also saw action at the same time. I think most scales, gauges, periods, regions and prototypes are represented in our club.

His railway is actually so big that multiple different routes are possible, and that might offer some challenges to the operation when the drivers gets occupied with drinking coffee and chat with each other... (Luckily everything was OK)

I borrowed some goods-wagons from a friend during the running session as I think they looks like some of those used on German Heeresfeldbahns during WWII. Perhaps I must consider to expand my fleet in the future. -But those boggie vans will clearly not fit my motorcycle panniers tough...

Thank you Erik for your hospitality, food, beverage and letting us run trains on your superb garden railway! 

Another Day Out, on another garden railway belonging to another friend and fellow MRC member

Since I had to bring my own garden railway to a closure I really appreciate that members in my MRC regularly invites to running sessions on their garden railways. It is a really social happening and get-together as well. 

My friend has a really large garden railway  and it is fully scenic:

For me this was also an opportunity to take my new 'railway ferry' for a run as a local Heeresfeldbahn freight for the Sturmpionere:

Following are some few impressions from our running session:

I also brought my W^D livesteam locomotive (by Roundhouse) and let it haul the 'Combat Engineer Ferry'

Trains & Coffee:

This is from an earlier running-session, but catch the author in a familiar position documenting one of our running sessions:

Thank you Gylmer for inviting us to run on your awesome garden railway and for your hospitality. 

Loading a ferry onto a narrow gauge train (not the other way around) - An easy model you can build

This modelling project did not actually start with a boat or ferry model, but with a railway wagon. It seems like 'Murphy's Law of Combat' also strikes when coming to modelling military railways. The LGB starter set I used for making my Heeresfeldbahn was originally a starter set for a German narrow gauge railway from the Frisian island of Wangerooge. It was a nice livery, but it didn't seem that LGB had much other rollingstock from that island railway except for those in the starter set itself. So the decision to repaint it and make it into a Heeresfeldbahn was easy. During a weekend trip to the German town of Kiel last autumn, I visited a small model railway shop there; Scharly's Lokshop. It deals mainly with second hand items, and in the shop I saw a very beautiful LGB model of an open goods-wagon from, off course, Wangerooge (!). If I'd knew that LGB had made more models from this particular railway, I would have considered not to convert the starter set in the first place. -But that was just too late now, so I ended up buying the Wangerooge-wagon anyway, just to repaint it grey so it would fit the rest of my 'ex Wangerooge  Heeresfeldbahn-livery'.

The Prototype

Since it was an open wagon, it would improve the look if some load could be added to it.
While I was searching for paint-schemes and information about the Sturmboot 39 in connection with modelling them as a load for my G-scale Heeresfeldbahn, I discovered that these Sturmboots also were used to power German military pioner ferries - Flosssackfähre, which were made up of a couple of large inflatable rubber dinghies - Grosser Flosssack 34, with wooden beams and deck between them. They could carry infantry, motorcycles and small PKWs.

Boxart from Dragons very nice kit of such a ferry. Too bad for me it's only made to 1:35 scale, as I needed one in 1:19 scale

The Model

I made the Sturmboot 39 originally as a homage for my son who had recently done his service in the Norwegian Coast Guard, where he was operating fast patrol boats.

Now he is studying to become a 'First Mate', and last summer he took a summer-job as a 'Mariner' at a ferry in Northern Norway to finance his studies. This inspired me to make those Sturmboot 39s into the propelling part of a (pioner-) ferry; a 'Flosssackfähre' by adding the rubber dinghies and wooden beams and decking as train loads in my new wagon.

I found a free STL-file of a Grosser Flosssack 34 at Wargaming3d, which I resized to 1:19 scale. The process form 3D-printer til ready for painting can be seen in the April Workbench update. Since the originals are made in rubber, I decided to use the real thing and cote mine with black rubber as well. I used some black plasticote spray found at a car accessories shop. This worked very well to cover the layer lines in the print too (which were printed in a medium resolution).

Now I found out that this wouldn't fit the ex-Wangerooge wagon after all, so I purchased another flat-wagon of the same type as was in my LGB starter set and I used for the Sturmboot 39s in the first place, to use for the 2 newly printed Flosssack 34s. 

Since it was looking the same (all black) I painted it slightly different...

...and got fancy and downloaded and 3D-printed a brakeman's cabin to add to it.

Bringing the painted flatcar, brakeman's cabin and the 2 Grosser Flosssack 34s together:

Then I could use the ex-Wangerooge wagon for the wooden beams and decking needed to make the ferry complete. First I had to mock up the ferry it self so I knew how many pieces of wood and in which lengths was needed to be cut to complete it...

...-and then it had to be stacked and loaded to the wagon. I chose to make a removable floor to the wagon to attach the load according to my last blog post, so I can choose to use the wagon for other loads if I wish.

Together with my earlier 'Sturmoot 39', the 2 rubber dinghies and the wooden beams and decking makes up a complete Flosssacfähre. 

When the complete German military pioner ferry of the Flosssachfähre-type are loaded onto railaway wagons it looks like this:

And loaded on the train 'the ferry' doesn't look so much like a ferry anymore (unless you've seen the prototype). But it shows that's possible to model a large scale car ferry and load it onto a narrow gauge train in a prototypical way. 

First run on a 'day out' (in a friend's garden as my own garden railway is temporary out of service) transporting a group of Sturmpioneren:

This 'military load doesn't look so offensive, neither does any of my other loads on my Heeresfeldbahn. Initially I optet for more offensive loads like armoured cars and fighting vehicles, but I've not seen pictures of such so I think my loads seems credible for a narrow gauge railway.