Some modellers new to the hobby are understandably daunted at the prospect of adding semaphore signals to their layout. What do they do? How do they work? what are the different colour semaphores signals for? What are upper and lower quadrants?...

It is not essential to use an underlay for your layout, but it is definitely a good idea as the underlay will help to suppress the noise of your trains when running around the layout. The underlay absorbs vibrations of the train running so you...

All Hornby track is compatible with Peco track. There is a misconception that different brands will not work together. This is not the case as all track for OO scale has 16.5mm spacing between the track. There is a small difference in colour of...

The only difference between normal paint and airbrush paint is that the airbrush paint has been thinned with a thinner and can go straight into the airbrush saving you the time and effort of having to thin the paint yourself. If thinning the...

Ballast comes in varying degrees in coarseness, fine medium and coarse. For OO scale the most realistic would have to be medium. OO gauge is 1/76 scale so measure a few ballast stones and multiply the size by 76 to check whether it would be...

Yes, you can use a black undercoat if you are painting something white but ideally you should look at using a white primer. If you have to use a black primer, you may need to give the white a few coats to achieve a pure white colour as the dark...

This depends on what type of figures you are using for your layout. If you are using white metal figures they often come with spikes on the bottom of their feet, so it is just a case of sticking them in to the base. However if you plan to put...

Yes, you can use water to thin acrylic paint as acrylic paint is a water-based paint. When you are using a brush to paint your model, water is the best thing for the job. When you are thinning your paint use just a small amount of water to start...

P4 (also known as Protofour) is as true to the scale of 4mm to 1ft (1/76 scale) as you can get, giving a true representation of a properly scaled OO gauge railway. This is what OO gauge should have been in the first place rather than manufactures...

A ballast spreader is a plastic box about two inches square. On the base, there are two grooves that sit on the rails. Inside the spreader there is a slanted piece of plastic with three slots in the base, one in the centre and one either side and...

Crackle medium is a weathering agent in a bottle, it has the appearance of a varnish. When you have primed your model and added the base coat of colour, simply paint on the crackle medium and leave to dry. You will see that the paint now has a...

The purpose of a varnish is to protect the paint of your model. This is especially true if you are using your models for wargaming as the models are being handled frequently. Without the varnish the paint will start to fall off with constant...