Here's the premise: take a rake of four freelance Mainline 5-plank wagons and strip their makeweight bodies off. Acquire via eBay some Parkside-Dundas PC45 Medfits (bowler-tip to Max Stafford for their i.d. on the legendary Shankend Clayton photo), and measure-up. Ascertain that the missing link is an LMS 20T Goods Brake (PC58) and add this to the pile. Start the task.
That little lot coincided with starting the new job about eight weeks ago, and while I've been markedly less rowdy on the
Fortunately, I was on-message with research of my signature villages of the Waverley's watershed. In this case, Lilliesleaf (served by and named on the running-in board of Belses) and its one and only inn, The Plough.
Happily, the off-white and black decoration of Lakeland pubs (that I'd adopted to give the build some momentum) was borne out by some GCSE-level Googling. I'd stress at this point that my familiarity with Lilliesleaf is confined to driving thoughtfully along the village stre
This was about the most basic of kits, albeit crisply moulded for its day and blissfully free of flash - I suspect it was minted in pretty new tools thirty-plus years ago. There were a few finger-smudges on the off-white walls from handling straight from the shop way back when. Except for a couple of things detached and loose in the box, everything was still attached to its sprues.
First off, I sprayed the walls with Hobbycraft Ice-Cream aerosol. The walls came moulded with a very subtle
In a moment of extreme old-school modelling nostalgia, I couldn't resist this, for less than the price of a round for the band, on eBay:
Yes, that's the original shop-soiled seventies packaging, and here's a close-up:
Gulp! quite a horror isn't she?
Join me soon, as I set to work on The Sow's Ear, an irresistible Borders Inn....
Next time:
a summary of the kit as supplied and its evident compromises
opportunities and areas for improvement, based on some field observation.
This week I acquired the CD shelving I'd long promised myself, having identified it as the main delay factor on the layout front. How the divil does that work, you ask? Read on and I shall tell you.
The under-layout mainly comprises cascaded Ikea storage units, of which eight drawers are earmarked for T&RS. Instead of this however, they've temporarily been full of CDs. For about a decade. With nowhere to safely store locos off-layout, as a result it has taken on the car park appeara
Reminder to self: make a list of what's outstanding on the workbench this month.
4 Dapol SPV to retro-work into white fish vans for pre-May'68 workings, these reached the masked for primer stage last weekend, they have since received a spray coat of Plasti-kote 'Ice Cream' which looks about spot-on for these future Blue Spots. Also coupling replacement required.
4 Dapol ex-SR CCT to distress into various stages of 'sludge brown' weathered livery, masked and sprayed with Railmatch 'rail
...because British Rail is closing the Edinburgh - Carlisle line. Instead, arrangements for the carriage of parcels previously conveyed by train have been made with Eastern Scottish Omnibuses. Your local parcel agent is Mr. Lightfoot, Baker, at Killochyett and packages will be received during shop hours, not the longer hours previously operated at Stow station. Regrettably Thursday is half day closing, the last bus to Edinburgh is the is the 1135 Service 95, to Galashiels, Hawick and Carlisle
On the Waverley images thread the temptation is getting ever stronger to stretch my layout envelope back to 1966 to permit me to drop the fires on steam's reign. Developments in N have nearly tempted me to consider that as a viable alternative, too. So imagine my delight when a mate conspiratorially mentioned, after refreshment had been taken, that he was returning to the hobby and tackling Glasgow Queen St in 'N.' This way, should I decide to pick up any 2mm T&RS, there'll be a place for
Blessed be the forum without glitches: this is the third time I've begun to write this blog entry since the problems with UK2 manifested themselves. All being well, here is the concluding (sort of) instalment of what happened to my trio of Bachmann tri-grille 47148s, Hattons bargains tied up with string etc...
Having tackled 1536 and 1547 in Early Blue, as Waverley Route visitors, and seeing Bruce Mac's evocative snatched shot of D1958 whizzing through Riccarton Jct with a single BG in tow,
Does what it says on the tin really. Photographed in artificial light, 1547 features a blank headcode at No.1 end as discussed on the Waverley images thread, and photographed at Melrose in December '68. To get her north onto what we assume was a 2M52, I've optioneered a night mails at No.2 end, 3S01. Same disclaimers apply as to finishing sister 1536.
In the end the headcodes were the easy bit. Give them a good clearout from inside the bodyshell, stanley blade and pencil rubber method worked a treat, taking care to square the edges. I recommend an episode of Midsomer Murders for this (subject to regional variations), serves two locos.
I used cut & paste - literally - headcodes from Heljan Claytons, reversed onto clear sellotape, and mounted straight back onto the inside of the cab front, adjust by eye, dilute to taste. The hardest b
There's a pretty masthead for a blogger, eh!
1547 was i.d-theived yesterday, the method for mechanical removal of Bachmann's tampo printing is now pretty efficient, extending to the headcode glazing. I really like the side view of this livery, it is prototypical and looks plain wrong. In the sense that compared to two-tone green it's plain, and in location of all the decals it's so wrong compared to the standard blue of December 1968 on... You can imagine it in the drawing office after Bee
Here's a festive post for the vanishingly small number of you who have ever heard of 'Early Blue' on Brush Type 4s, and the swelling ranks of Waverley Route afficianados.
Take one Bachmann 47148, in Bachmann's esoteric original 'tri-grille' configuration, the trailing edge of a Stanley blade, pencil eraser, screwdriver and sheet of Howes rub-down transfers for a real retro modelling feel.
The end result, as applied to fewer than 20 locos, but representing a York machine that worked the l
This blog is to act as a conscience and reminder to crack on with the Sulzers now crowding onto the workbench, a return to working on locos in earnest after a few years' gap, and the first time I've had the nerve to open up new generation diesels.
First up are a quartet of Bachmann Brush Type 4s and a BR/Sulzer Type 2, which despite only coming onto the bench last night progressed rapidly today.
D5233 - D7603 tweak.
The output: 64B non-boilered 25/3 D7603 Waverley machine, from Bachm
Well, they're discussing it on another thread, so what better more tongue-in-cheek way to launch my Workbench blog than a look at a W/B job from last season; none other than a Silver Fox KESTREL in BFYE, painted according or at least as close as I believe possible, to the corporate blue livery guidelines, which principally applies to the extent to which the yellow wraps round the radiused cab ends. Visitors to my layout thread on ye olde RMWebbe may have seen her lurking in the background of ge
