Smoke, Fire and Lights: Multi-Sensory Model Railways

Of the many things I usually enjoy that I have missed during lockdown, one of them is rail travel, as no doubt may others have too. Living through such unusual circumstances though can give us an opportunity to explore the unfamiliar. Exploring the unfamiliar opens up possibilities to discover aspects of ourselves we may have perhaps been unaware of for so long, in particular our creative capacities.

To make up for not being able to go on real railway journeys, lockdown has seen my focus my attention more towards miniature railway journeys, where I have been making some additions to my model railway. With many of having to spend more time at home to help reduce the spread of Coronavirus, railway modelling has seen a boom in both rediscovery of the pastime through train sets being brought back to use after being packed away in attics for years and new uptake of the hobby, which has seen model railway firms, including Hornby, experience a boom in sales even higher than during their usual busiest time of year at Christmas.

Carols service in miniature

Since there is no pandemic in miniature world, various situations and events that many of us have missed since lockdown began a year ago can be recreated. During the Covid-affected festive season, when it wasn't possible to attend or participate in a carols service that many of us look forward to, I did the next best thing, which was to create one in card. Using a parish church kit designed by the card model maker Scalescenes, to bring around some much needed festive cheer following a very difficult year for us all, I had aspirations to make the scene 'come alive'. One of the best ways to do this in miniature is to add lighting. With the availability of inexpensive LEDs, interior lighting has helped model railways to take on an extra dimension, including scenes after dark and creating an atmosphere. Remembering the scene in my favourite festive drama, The 1984 BBC adaptation of John Masefield’s novel The Box of Delights, where the 1000^th Midnight Mass was held at Tatchester Cathedral despite Abner Brown’s attempt to stop it, the scene of the congregation arriving at the cathedral and the service opening with O Come All Ye Faithful provided my inspiration for what I wanted to recreate in miniature. Using a set of clergymen and choirboys provided by Langley Models, an altar and pulpit I put together from card off-cuts and adding a warm white LED gave me a result I was ‘delighted’ with.

LED-lit shed scene

Being diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome, I still every so often experience high-level anxiety and sensory overload. But during dark nights over winter, I have find something soothing about low levels of lighting as well as stimulus in multi-sensory environments where there is, for me, a manageable level of different levels of lighting, sounds and textures. This something that my layout has become for me with some new features I have added during lockdown. Though my layout already had working street and station platform lights and some LED-lit interior scenes, to add a little more stimulus, using a flickering orange LED, I added a working brazier to my shed scene. 

The 1966 Triang Hornby catalogue
featuring Cuneo's painting

Lighting is often an effective aspect in making painted or modelled railway scenes come alive, as it adds atmosphere, which the renowned railway artist Terence Cuneo (1907-1996) did so effectively in many of his painting, including one of a scene he was commissioned by Triang Hornby to do a painting for the company’s 1966 catalogue featuring a class AL1 (Class 81) Electric locomotive (one of the models in the range). Cuneo enhanced the scene featuring the AL1 by adding a bluish white electrical spark from the pantograph's contact with the overhead wire and also included an 0-6-0 Jinty tank engine in the picture to provide the appealing smokey atmosphere. A year later, the company would go a step further by including lighting effects in locomotives, releasing their first locomotive with a working firebox glow, a 0-4-4 Class M7 Tank Engine. Hornby’s advertising promos for the new locomotive included ‘turn out the lights to see the fire’, something which I have found myself doing more of since not just adding a flickering brazier, but adding some lighting to some of my locomotives and rolling stock, including adding interior lighting to the coaches. Powered by a 3 volt button battery turned on and off by a magnet and latching reed switch, interior carriage lighting (a Layouts4U kit) not only brings attention to the coach interior, including passengers I also added, but its glow of the surrounding scenery when the main light is turned off provides extra stimulus, together with a flickering tail lamp.

Smoke, firebox glow and LED-lit brazier

The effect that has been the most stimulating for me though is the addition a Seuthe smoke generator to one of my locomotives. Fitted by Olivia’s Trains of Sheffield together with a firebox glow, sound and a working lamp, the addition of smoke creates a particularly soothing feeling for me, especially when the lighting shines through it. Indeed one of the reasons for the special appeal that real steam locomotives have for many is seeing station lights shine through the smoke and steam, especially if in a large covered terminus station late at night. Seuthe smoke on a model railway also adds smell, though rather than burning coal, vapourised minerals from the smoke oil. Different colours and shades add to the multi-sensory experience after dark when they shine on different textures of the scenic material used in the scenery and on the weathering effects on the rolling stock, a particularly soothing effect that wasn’t planned but I happened to notice was the glow of the firebox on the cornfield. Another unexpected effect from the mineral-scented smoke was the eerie atmosphere is created when passing through the modelled woodland!

Carriage lighting

An extra multi-sensory level is also added with the range of sounds, further enhancing the night LED lit atmosphere. Using a Twin Track Sound (TTS) Sound Van, an innovative product by Hornby, a range of different sounds are available including ambient station sounds of loudspeakers, carriage doors opening and closing and passengers coming and going. Together with a background birdsong, the sound also gives a layout a sense of place, almost like it is living. Further complemented by the chuffing sound of steam and the chugging sound of a diesel multiple unit (also fitted by Olivia’s Trains), one can almost physically sense the trains working, as if you are in a real railway station environment.

Adding such effects to model railways are not only so positive for the senses, but they also help bring a layout to life, as well as putting the fun into railway modelling and being good for on'es mental health. My layout has not only kept me stimulated during lockdown, but it has also given be a space to enjoy a degree of normality in miniature, which will hopefully become possible again for us all before too long.