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Parkside Dundas


Ben Alder
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A quick thumbs up here for the recently released  LMS cattle wagon- a decent kit of this has been long overdue IMO. It is of the earliest LMS build but can be tweaked into a later version fairly easily. From what I can glean, some were fitted with vacuum brakes  along the way, and if anyone can expand on this I would be grateful- finding info, or indeed images, of these wagons has been proving elusive. A batch build will be started once I have some idea of what I can do with them.

 

post-2642-0-44189000-1439133760.jpg

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By the look of it, it's for a D1661 wagon with a small drop flap door. According to LMS wagons volume 1 some of these had through vacuum pipes, but not vacuum brakes. 

 

That said, the same books says that the later D1840 wagons were through piped only, and has a broadside photo of one that clearly shows a vacuum cylinder. 

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Hi, in 'An Illustrated History of LMS Wagons' volume 1 (pages 24-26) it indicates that some of D1661 were built unfitted and others were built with a through vacuum pipe, but it doesn't refer to any being vacuum braked, either when built or as a later modification.  It also points out that there were variations in the depth of the drop doors - the pictures in the book show that these could either be shallow (one and a half planks deep) or deep (three planks deep).  As far as I can tell from your picture, the Parkside kit seems to depict the shallow pattern of drop door.

 

However the entry for D1840 says that these were "identical to D1661, apart from the drop door variations and the fact that all the lots comprising D1840 were fitted with A.V. hand brakes of Morton pattern and steam heating pipes....".  The pictures published in the book of D1840 vacuum fitted wagons all show wagons with 'deep' drop doors, i.e. not the kind depicted by the kit. Not quite sure whether this should be taken as stating conclusively that the D1840 vac fitted wagons only had 'deep' drop doors!

 

Despite the description of the brakes fitted to D1840 quoted above, all the pictures in the book of these wagons actually show vehicles with 8-shoe clasp brakes, with shorter hand brake levers than those fitted to D1661.

 

Hope this helps - it looks like an interesting kit to build!

 

Edit - just read Pete's reply - more succinct than mine!

Edited by 31A
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Yes,  I've read the LMS wagons entry on them, and it raises as many questions as answers! There are shots, usually in the background,of these types carrying BR bauxite livery so some at least must have been so fitted. The last build type would perhaps been a more suitable one for the BR era but it's a bit harsh to quibble when Parkside are still showing enthusiasm for the 4mm market. It must be discouraging for them to see the Big Two working their way through their range...

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I wondered how Parkside would model the diagonal strapping, given that you can 'see through' behind it - from the picture of the kit parts, it looks as though these are separate pieces.  On later wagons, the top ends of these diagonals seem to be attached to square blocks in the corners of the side framing, rather than just bolted at their top corners.  Looks as though this modification should be possible to the kit parts.

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A quick thumbs up here for the recently released  LMS cattle wagon- a decent kit of this has been long overdue IMO. It is of the earliest LMS build but can be tweaked into a later version fairly easily. From what I can glean, some were fitted with vacuum brakes  along the way, and if anyone can expand on this I would be grateful- finding info, or indeed images, of these wagons has been proving elusive. A batch build will be started once I have some idea of what I can do with them.

 

attachicon.gifIMG_0850.jpg

 There has been a highly detailed kit of this wagon in the David Geen kits range for several years. The instructions with the David Geen kit is fully illustrated with images of the prototype.

 

Mike Wiltshire

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I wondered how Parkside would model the diagonal strapping, given that you can 'see through' behind it - from the picture of the kit parts, it looks as though these are separate pieces.  On later wagons, the top ends of these diagonals seem to be attached to square blocks in the corners of the side framing, rather than just bolted at their top corners.  Looks as though this modification should be possible to the kit parts.

 

They suggest a strip of plasticard - supplied- but I will probably use a bit of brass strip.

 

 

Thanks- had passed this one by somehow. If I had known about it wouldn't have bothered with mine, but it has thrown up some useful links - many thanks. I'll post up the build once I get round to it.

Edited by Ben Alder
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Yes,  I've read the LMS wagons entry on them, and it raises as many questions as answers! There are shots, usually in the background,of these types carrying BR bauxite livery so some at least must have been so fitted. The last build type would perhaps been a more suitable one for the BR era but it's a bit harsh to quibble when Parkside are still showing enthusiasm for the 4mm market. It must be discouraging for them to see the Big Two working their way through their range...

 BR used freight stock red on piped wagons as well as fully fitted ones. Only unfitted ones were grey. And it would have been years before the LMS red was painted over, if at all, as the early BR era painting of unfitted wood framed wagons was to leave wood unpainted, with only the steelwork in the appropriate grey.

 

Paul Bartlett

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Thanks for that- very useful. That's something I hadn't picked up on before, probably because I've never had much dealings with this type of vehicle, so it seems  that I won't have to do a train of weathered grey after all- wasn't looking forward to that task at all...

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Slightly OT, but just in case anyone isn't aware of the buffers available from Parkside (Lanarkshire section). At a very fair price for a wagon pack for 4mm I am using  a considerable quantity of these beautiful little castings on Parkside, Cambrian and a few old Airfix Kits I have. The Lanarkshire part of the Parkside range has a quite extensive info on the sort of wagons each buffer set is suitable for. This is very useful for me alongside Paul B's lovely range of photo's.

The limited but excellent Slimrails range I use has cast buffers anyway.

Apologies if all you guys know this already.

Phil

Edited by Mallard60022
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They suggest a strip of plasticard - supplied- but I will probably use a bit of brass strip.

 

 

Thanks- had passed this one by somehow. If I had known about it wouldn't have bothered with mine, but it has thrown up some useful links - many thanks. I'll post up the build once I get round to it.

 

Thanks - that's interesting.  I'd wondered whether they'd include the diagonals as etched parts (in the way that Cambrian do with axleguard tie bars in some of their kits); I'm sure brass strip would be preferable to plasticard for robustness.

 

Another question if I may - 'LMS Wagons' mentions that some of these wagons were used for Ale traffic, and I wondered whether anybody knew where or when they were used for this?  I have no scope for cattle traffic on my layout, but already have a couple of BR cattle wagons branded for 'Ale' and this would be a good excuse to add another!

Edited by 31A
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Slightly OT, but just in case anyone isn't aware of the buffers available from Parkside (Lanarkshire section). At a very fair price for a wagon pack for 4mm I am using  a considerable quantity of these beautiful little castings on Parkside, Cambrian and a few old Airfix Kits I have. The Lanarkshire part of the Parkside range has a quite extensive info on the sort of wagons each buffer set is suitable for. This is very useful for me alongside Paul B's lovely range of photo's.

The limited but excellent Slimrails range I use has cast buffers anyway.

Apologies if all you guys know this already.

Phil

 

Thanks Phil, this wagon looks like a good kit and I may have a few myself for Wharfeside. The Lanarkshire Models buffers for this van would be our number B003 for the unfitted and B004 for the piped and vac fitted. If some were retro vac fitted then B005 would be the one or B008 for an option.

Vac pipes, VP01 and cylinders, VC01 are also suitable.

Hope that helps, for further info check out our website. :-  www.lanarkshiremodels.com

 

Dave Franks

Edited by davefrk
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Thanks all- lots of gen now gathered. A link to a link led me to Geoff Kent's The 4mm wagon Pt II -sitting on my shelf, and an inspiration  to wagon nuts everywhere, but overlooked in my searches. It has a couple of pages with reference material and photos on these wagons and has made things a good bit clearer.

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I've just gone and ordered six of these cattle wagons. Been looking forward to this kit since hearing about it in January/February this year. Even better to hear that with some tweaking, you can do the D1840 diagram. Will you be doing the D1840 alongside the D1661 diagram?

 

Be interesting to see how the completed PD kit looks when compared to the Slaters one I own (below).

 
post-605-0-98380900-1435926648_thumb.jpg
 

 

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Doing both varieties is indeed the plan. When it is done is another matter- I have twelve kits- sheep and cattle were big business at seasonal times in the Far North, and I will have to allow a decent amount of time for this one especially if I am going to be doing mods. I'd like to do another CR 812 while its fresh in my memory and there is a build up of ex-HR coach sides from uax 6's Silhouette cutter that deserve attention, along with the likelihood  of some more to come. A refurbishment of some of the LMS coaching stock is half done as well, so I'll clear the decks on some of these before tackling the Parksides, but I'll keep looking for any further info on them. I've got another couple of leads to follow up, so it won't be wasted time for them. Hopefully it will mean that my venerable Airfix fleet can be retired at last- several of these date back to 1970 and have been on every layout I  made, the first"adult" one being an interpretation of Thurso, so it shows you how far I've got in the last forty five years :scratchhead: ...

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I received my six kits today from Parkside Dundas and I have to say I am impressed with the kit as always. Hopefully I'll be soon sending my kits to a friend to be built and my hope is to have three D1661s and three D1840s. The D1840s will depend on how much tweaking is required to get the doors looking right. If it's too much hassle, then I will have two or three D1661's built and keep the others for a later date...

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This look great, I'll have to invest in 1 or 2. I've got a Slaters MR cattle wagon that was supplied with the incorrect underframe but as I got as much chance of getting that corrected as finding some rocking horse manure, I think these would be an excellent substitute.

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  • 4 weeks later...

On the subject of new kits, has anyone seen the new GWR Y4 Banana van kit yet? Just ordered five of them from PD...

 

**UPDATE**

 

I've had an email from PD :)

 

 

Hello Gareth
 
Thank you for your order for 5 x PC88.
 
This kit is due for release in the next 7 days.
 
We will contact you when available.
 
Kind Regards
Andrew
Edited by Garethp8873
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