I've been away for a while, mainly due to personal tribulations, moving house, finishing uni for the year and trying to find a job to maintain our overheads. However this has not entirely stopped me from modelling when we finally managed to settle down. I now have a room all to myself to model and a garden (of which you may soon see some railway related activity once finances and time improve).

I last left you with my updating of some Hornby Railway Gresley stock. I finally managed get to a position where they are beginning to come together.

The technique I have follow mainly can be found here and in my eyes looks near perfect for what I want as a teak finish. The transfers are HMRS and are meant to represent them in the early to mid fifties when the original liveries were mingling with the newer blood and custard.

These coaches were inspired by an image I have of a D49 on a local train not to far from where I live. It was taken in 1954 and shows two coaches in teak and two in crimson and cream which seems perfect for a local train being pulled by a 4MT or V1/3.

They are defiantly not perfect, the lining on the Crimson stock is not the best and maybe a little too high to be deemed "proper" and the guards handrails on the brake coaches leave a lot to be desired however, I'll live with that.

The under frames with painting with a mix of under frame grime and roof dirt from Railmatch - a 2:1 mix in favour of the roof dirt. and the roofs were giving a similar undercoat of the mix but with a bigger ratio of roof dirt (5:1 this time)

The under frame sides for the teak stock where given a Humbrol 62 & 70 equal mix.

The interior were painted Railmatch teak (ironically) and washed down with Humbrol 98 which was wiped away. The seat where Vajello red and blue (I can't remember which but any of the more vibrant ones should be okay) the pictures and mirrors was just a silver and white gel pen which won't look to out of place once installed properly.

Next up - to weather them and hope some of the little niggles blend in and finish the roofs. hopefully by the next post they've finished with glazing, corridors and passengers.