Peter Bateson chuckles to himself when he sees people admiring his model trains. “They are made from pet food tins and the wheels are the lids off fish paste jars,” he says.

“I made the GWR Dudley Castle locomotive and LMS Royal Scot around 20 years ago. “They were entered into Sutton Coldfield’s Model Railway Society’s exhibition at Fort Dunlop in March 1987 where they won the chairman’s prize.

“It took me two years to make them but now no-one ever sees them. For a while I had them on the top of the dresser at home, but they were just collecting dust.”

Over the years, Peter, 72, from Sedgley has made a medieval castle, a pirate ship, Noah’s ark, a circus truck, a zoo, a Gloster Gladiator aeroplane, a Bugatti racing car, a lighthouse, a gipsy caravan, Elvis’s Graceland, the Queen Mary and a 1909 Rolls Royce.

“I have made models all my life,” he says. “When I was a child I used to send off for the kits and in those days you didn’t just glue them together, it would take a lot more work.

“Before I met my wife Joan I was divorced and making models kept me occupied. When I decide which model I’m going to make next I go to the library and get a book, find out how big the object it and scale it from that.

“The Georgian mansion was my first big project and it took three years to make because I made the furniture as well.

“I used a necklace chain to make the chandeliers, I made the gas lamps out of beads, ping-pong balls were used for the street lights and cocktail sticks for the fence. “I also made the piano, the fireplaces, seats, the grandfather clock and even the kitchen scales.”

Peter used to be a mechanic at Sid Griffiths Vauxhall Dealers in Lye.

“When I was a mechanic I had to be good with my hands,” he says. “We were taught to weld and solder things, but now mechanics have to know all about computers.

“I have been retired for eight years and I always have to be doing something because I don’t like to watch TV.

“I make a lot of models for close friends and family. I have to be inspired and then I am enthusiastic about making the models. I don’t take orders, I make what I want to make.”

Peter has also made an intricate model of the shop in Wednesbury that his wife grew up in. But he says he doesn’t make a profit from his creations.

“All I do is make enough to fund the next model,” he says. “If I was running a business I would have gone bankrupt because people pay hundreds of pounds for doll’s houses but I sell them on for around £40.

“For me it is not a way of making a profit it is a hobby and I enjoy doing it.”