Jump to content
 
  • entries
    140
  • comments
    952
  • views
    147,684

Callow Lane - rolling stock interlude - impure thoughts and removal of hair shirt...

Captain Kernow

Entry posted by Captain Kernow

1,593 views

 Share

I got a bit tired of cobbling (or 'setting') a few days ago, and the unexpected receipt of a very kind gift of a Mainline bogie well wagon from a friend got me thinking about rolling stock again, so I dug out a number of other recent purchases, albeit this time more recent Bachmann productions.

 

Notwithstanding the relatively unpredictable excitement of running things on TT2, I've found that completely unsprung and uncompensated short-wheelbase items do stay on the track when running on Callow Lane, so this gave me more impure thoughts. Whilst most of my stock is sprung or compensated, the thought that I could 'get away with it' by not doing so, decided me to undertake a few 'quickie' conversions by way of a distraction.

 

Apart from the bogie well wagon, I settled on three recent Bachmann releases - an ex-LNER steel open, an ex-LNER box van and an ex-SR 'pillbox' brake van.

 

I was a bit concerned about not compensating or springing the brake van, but the moulded detail on the underside, coupled with a decent dose of seasonal laziness and a desire not to accidentally cut right through the plastic to the top surface of the verandahs, decided me to have a go at making the longer wheelbase brake van completely rigid, too.

 

I know that this goes against the majority of advice for building/converting stock in P4, but hey, the 'it's my trainset' rule kicked in, and so I decided to put my faith in a decent amount of weight in the vehicles instead.

 

The alternative to leaving these vehicles rigid, by the way, would probably have been to installed Masokits springing units, but I didn't have any of these, and I just didn't fancy the extra work involved in butchering the Bill Bedford units that I did have in stock...

 

In the end, all four vehicles turned out fine. I considered filming the high-speed push-along trails through all the sharp point work on Callow Lane (B6 and A6), but I didn't in the end, suffice to say, they all hold the road just fine. :)

 

Here are some photos (sorry, but I haven't weathered any of these vehicles yet).

 

General view of the wagons concerned:

blogentry-57-0-63205300-1356985049.jpg

 

Box van:

blogentry-57-0-80614900-1356985084.jpg

 

blogentry-57-0-11445300-1356985107.jpg

 

Box van chassis - only a little plastic behind the axle guards had to be removed to fit the wheels. These are Exactoscale 3-hole discs, the axles are running in the original plastic bearings - these wagons won't be doing a huge mileage in their time, shuttling up and down between Callow Lane and it's fiddle yard... ;) I did add some simplified brake stretchers between the brake shoes, which were drilled 0.4mm and brass rod inserted. The brake shoes were also trimmed, with some plastic being removed with a sharp scalpel on the rear/inner face of the brake shoe, to ensure it didn't foul the flanges:

blogentry-57-0-43023600-1356985273.jpg

 

blogentry-57-0-47461800-1356985291.jpg

 

The steel open essentially has a similar chassis to the box van, although in this case I had fitted brass pin-point bearings a while ago. This required the Gibson axles to be slightly shortened in the electric drill (done by filing the side of the pin point with the drill rotating, just enough to take off 0.5mm or so, this wouldn't have been necessary if I hadn't fitted the brass bearings). This one is so free running, it meanders off for a little perambulation if you so much as breathe on it... :rolleyes:

blogentry-57-0-85483800-1356985401.jpg

 

The pillbox brake van:

blogentry-57-0-00365900-1356985461.jpg

 

With this one, there wasn't even any need to remove any plastic from the axleguards. I did pare the backs of the brake shoes back again, prior to fitting the Gibson wheels. The addition of the Bachmann brake rigging gives the brake gear a bit of welcome stability:

 

Happily, the brake van also holds the road well, and was subjected to the same high speed push-along speed trials as the others, plus the usual 'every which way/permutation of shunting with a loco'... :)

 

One thing I found was that the more recent Bachmann wagons had enough room for two layers of 'roof lead' in place of the metal weights provided. The bogie well wagon was already quite heavy, so I didn't add any weight there. I also added a bit more lead inside the body of the box van, which now weighs in at 67 grams.

  • Like 24
 Share

9 Comments

Recommended Comments

  • RMweb Premium
ullypug
  • RMweb Premium

Happy New Year Tim

Now they do look very good.

I know what you mean about unsprung wagons working on P4. Having had a few discussions with the 'Shirehampton Heretic' (aka Martin Goodall), we've come to the conclusion that providing your track is laid with a reasonable degree of care, the small amounts of play in supposed rigid axles actually provides enough 'compensation' to work in P4. I think weight's the key personally.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
  • RMweb Gold
Mikkel
  • RMweb Gold

Nothing like impure thoughts to move things forward :-)   Wagons and track looking very nice indeed.

Link to comment
Tim V

My experience is that uncompensated/unsprung stock does stay on the track if pulled, forget it if you want to push it. Mind you I'm talking pushing 15 - 30 wagon trains, on a small layout it might be OK.

 

Back to the hair shirt.

Link to comment
  • RMweb Gold
Captain Kernow
  • RMweb Gold

Your comments have reminded me that I wanted to add that I would prefer to spend time fitting sprung buffers to wagons like this, rather than compensation/springing/ Still, I would add that I've had no problems propelling or hauling these, in conjunction with other wagons, on Callow Lane.

 

Then again, 15 - 30 wagons would fill the layout, leaving nowhere to propel them to, so problem solved either way!

Link to comment
  • RMweb Gold
Captain Kernow
  • RMweb Gold

Ahhh Tim! Once sprung buffered always sprung buffered!

Well............... yes......

 

 

 

...and no! (there must be a limit to how much sprung bufferedness one can accommodate within a given time period!) ;-)

 

But in this case, I will probably relent and fit some, certainly to the LNER wagons. Depends on whether I can get some sprung examples of those stocky SR buffers for the van...

Link to comment
Pete Harvey

Tim

 

That looks very nice.

 

A question for you: All of your ballasting looks very nice and tidy to be honest it looks like the person in charge of the crew that laid it suffers from OCD, I know that you still have to add the rest of the greenery and scenic affects to add but was the ballast that neat in real life on the GWR as I'm not old enough to have ever know the GWR in real life?

Link to comment
  • RMweb Gold
Captain Kernow
  • RMweb Gold

Hi Pete,

 

First of all, with pedantic hat on, the responsibility for the PW at Callow Lane was with the Midland/LMS, and only went over to the 'Western' following BR boundary changes in the late 1950s...

 

Much of the ballast will be 'grotted up' with the addition of DAS modelling clay, in the same manner as per Chris Nevard.

 

However, if you look at photos of the period, even into the mid-1960s, and even on freight-only lines, you will frequently find an immaculate ballast shoulder and a weed-free railway...

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Jon020

Lovely Tim.., surely with your smooth PW, springing of these wouldn't be necessary anyway... almost giving me hope :unsure: . As for the ballast... I always "aim" for as neat as possible... it can always be mangled later

Link to comment

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...