End boards

Selly Oak needs to vacate it's worktop for a few days which prompts me to do an important job - make up the end boards used to transport the model. 

The principle is simple enough - the baseboards face each other to protect the scenery, and a pair of 12mm thick slabs of MDF are bolted at each end to hold the boards apart, making an open-sided box. It's a technique I've used for every layout since Melbridge Dock, and has served me well. 

Obviously, it helps if the boards are roughly the same size - they definitely need to be the same length, but then that's how my layouts get built. It reduces the model size for transport down to a minimum, and there aren't piles of carrying cases cluttering the place up. 

Of course, when you go to pick up the wood and realise you measured the height of the model and then forgot to double it for the end board measurement, you feel a bit silly. Still, I'm sure I can find some use for the scrap MDF...