Returning to some stock construction for a while, I've been working on a large bogie fish van inspired by the ones used by the Londonderry & Lough Swilly Railway in Ireland. The seed for this idea was planted when looking back through my book collection and coming across the Peco book on modelling Irish Narrow Gauge by David Lloyd. David built a van for Coolcalaghta by using a converted Airfix Siphon G.

As his layout was representing a 3' gauge line and mine is 2'6" gauge I felt that the siphon might be a bit too big so I looked for a suitable alternative. The Parkside Dundas GWR 'Bloater' kit presented itself as a decent enough alternative.

The sides have been used as standard from the kit, but the end panels and floor have been narrowed to match the overall width of the ratiobash that I completed recently.

It's half complete at present, but has progressed slightly since these photos were taken, the roof is now almost ready to go on and the body has had additional roof profiles added and longitudinal braces added to keep the roof nice and level. It is sitting on Parkside Dundas Vale of Rheidol bogies, and the solebar has been added from plastruct strip rather than using the kit one as the W irons would have meant more modification would have been required than just starting from scratch.

I've also added truss rods from a strip of Evergreen L section plasticard, some brass wire and single core wire casing. This is the end result:

The full width L section will become less visible when it's painted black, and when it's up the right way it obviously becomes less visible anyway.

This method has also been applied to the Ratiobash, something I've been meaning to do for a while. Both vehicles are now the same height too as I've adjusted the bogie pivots on the Ratiobash.

Here are the roof braces to ensure it all stays nice and level when applied as the sheet is quite thin to remain a realistic thickness when clad with tissue.