Rich - if anyone would have said that I'd have a couple of diesels on my test track a year ago I would have thought them deluded....
However, I confess I have always liked the class 25s having lived next to them (near Toton sidings for a good few years) and having heard that particular sound which a Sulzer has. Unfortunately,once I had one and offered power to it and saw how easily it runs in contrast to my steamers, my interest was well and truly aroused!
Fortunately, the 0-4-4T chassis ar
There is something about a double headed train..... Perhaps its a Midland thing?
The 25 and 24 were common partners I believe, and I think look good together.
I suppose I ought to get on with some proper modelling again soon. I seem to have lost impetus since November, and I've quite a bit to do still on Little Midland before I can indulge in a blue period layout.
.
More has gone into the work box than has been done during the past year-
I kid myself I'm saving it up for early retiremen
Greetings,
Two very different offerings tonight.
Firstly, the completed chassis for my Johnson 0-4-4T kit, kindly built for me by Damien at 2mm Locomotives. I will attempt to blacken this by brush, as I don't intend taking anything apart as its all working well enough. Now I have no excuse for not soldering the rest of the locomotive together..
Secondly, dearie dearie me. The arrival of a couple of GF blue and greys to keep my class 25 company... well it doesn't look right r
Well that's as far as it goes with this class 25 .
I did reduce the window frame depth a little after all, just by cutting and fitting in some overlays from thin clear acrylic sheet, which I think improves the overall appearance, and the FS wheels are fitted ( though not blackened).
I'm quite pleased with this overall.
I can see the attraction of diesels when it comes to conversion to FS and juice pickup.
This runs at walking speed on my little DC controller.
I haven't thought about chippin
Seasons greetings.
Just an interlude, I can assure you, but I have aquired a class 25 and wanted to make a few mods to make it look better.
The one I bought was the weathered blue model, and the first thing I noticed was the depth of the glazing, and that the windows were too small. A brief question on the 2FS forum indicated that there were other issues with the doors and exhausts on this now dated model.
I thought about a class 24 cop-out, but have always preferred the looks of the 25, so d
I picked up this Langley Models signboards kit for the grand price of £2.80 a few shows ago, thinking they could be assembled to bear a strong resemblance to the one at Glenfield, even though they are shown as 2 separate boards with the name Arundel on the packet.
Yesterday evening I decided to modify them and paint them, in order to put them together in the distinctive angled shape shown below ( probably has a technical name ).
I have spent the last couple of hours happily doing exactly that,
Greetings to anyone still out there.
I have to confess to being a tad lazy in moving the Glenfield model on. Thoughts of vegetation has not exactly filled me with excitement, and other mini projects, such as a signal, has been tried and consigned to the bin to be tacked again.
So it's not that I've been doing nowt, its more that the bits of tweaking have not warranted an entry really.
For example, I've rearranged the buildings in the goods yard slightly and added some fencing.
Today I th
Greetings.
While helping at the MRS open day at Derby Silk Mill on Saturday, Dave Harris kindly dug out their archived plans of the West Bridge branch during a quiet moment.
At last I could try to resolve some of the mysteries about this little elusive Leicestershire station!
The plans were every bit as detailed as I'd hoped, and answered most of my questions.
It shows there were 2 lever frames and a signal frame, having one home signal to protect the crossing facing the up ( Leicester) d
Hallo again.
I spent a couple of hours this afto working up some ( static) crossing gates for Glenfield.
I was intending to use brass and solder, but I couldn't easily source the sq section I needed, so decided to go ahead in plastic, after I found some strips at my local ironmonger-come- model shop.
Drilling the posts proved to be the biggest test, and several broke up as there was so little space on the posts.
In the end I cheated* just a little, but I think the results are pretty close
Greetings.
Over the last few days I have been experimenting with making pine trees using sea moss and scatter.
I have not used this material before, but it seemed to be good for this small scale.
I made up some grey slurry from PVA, polyfilla and grey acrylic paint for the bark coating, and used an idea I've seen somewhere about pushing soft wire up through the trunk to give it strength and allow it to be straightened safely.
I needed to try to create some pines for theembankment and the hil
Greetings.
I thought I would post a picture which shows the slight progress made this week:
As you can see, I have rewheeled some olf Farish 4-wheelers to run on easitrac, and added some simple eye and hooks to couple them closer.
Not ideal using these 1:148 relics, but an easy way of getting a rake together quickly - and they do look rather nice!
Also in the background you will notice that the curved siding now has a loading dock temporarily placed. The exact use of this bit of trac
Due to having the kitchen replaced and completing redecoration of, I have had little time to do any modelling this last week or two. The time I have spent has been in teasing my two tender engines into traversing all the track on the layout ( well, I use the word "all" quite loosely, as there's only 4 turnouts and about 2 metres of easitrac in total!
Things I'm happy with so far:
The general flow of the scenery; the buildings; the fact that the electrics work and now trucks can be shunt
A quick view of the landscape as it evolves. Not finished yet, more scatter to add then some zappy grass here and there....
It's looking a bit too moorland-y at the moment. Hopefully with some darker green woven in, some trees and hedge it will look more like Leicestershire!!
Chris
If not, it'll have to be settle and Carlisle after all
Well today I had a couple of jobs to do about the place, and then planned to go into town to visit the Parking shop for some more permits- (we are having a new kitchen installed next week so need plenty).
Then I discovered that the shop is only open until 2pm, so I have taken the opportunity to take a coupl emore pics.Haha.
First off, the back view which I described yesterday:
Please excuse the surrounding mess!
Next, Glenfield Frith tunnel mouth. This in reality was tighter than
Hi,
A couple of photos showing some weekend progress, mainly on the backscene:
Perhaps not the tidiest woodwork you will see, but in my defence I only had a limited offcut of rrecycled flexiply! B)
I also painted the frame and back, although I didn't photograph that. My attempt at creating St Pancras blue went a little awry - ah well!
Finally, here is a collage of the whole board after filling in with sculptamold:
Regards,
Chris
I came across an interesting photograph of Glenfield last week. It shows it as a working station pre-1928 - I am thinking probably around 1910ish.
The little goods shed is clearly in use, loading to and from the platform for particular goods.
The implication is that the loop was mainly used for coal.
However, I still haven't managed to find out whether the curved siding was for any purpose, or just an over-run for the loop.
This is holding me up on the scenery, and if I can't resolve
Hi folks.
I have has quite a quiet week on the modelling front for a variety of reasons.
Progress on the scenery has not happened- apart from having to repair the low relief hill above the tunnel mouth which somehow got damaged - serves me right for standing it upright I suppose!
Ran an engine at the weekend and discovered an electrical fault which took me some time to track down. Turned out to be caused by the clay having moved a rail slightly - enough to make contact with the rail
Here is a photograph showing a tad more progress, mainly in the station buildings dept.
I have had a stab at the small booking office/hut which stood at the end of the platform by the road. Again I have photographs of 3 sides of it, but have adlibbed the aspect at the rear facing the goods shed. The latter you may notice I have given a rear entrance/loading area. I am not sure at all that this existed, but decided that it would add a bit of extra interest!
The lavatory block now h
As I have now completed some of the buildings, I thought it would be interesting to site them on the layout.
The effect is quite encouraging - to me at least, it is beginning to look something like Glenfield as it was in the photographs.
Of course, I still have to finish painting the little booking office shed thing, and the toilet block; and there is the gatekeepers cottage to construct yet; but hopefully you can begin to get an impression of what the place was like.
Chris
Greetings.
I have been able to fit some modelling on Glen"Miller"field in between f*rting about ( excuse French) with that 1F chassis and sorting out the usual weekend stuff like seeing my grandsons and getting some exercise.
Since sculptamolding the scenery, I have been itching to lay the yards and level crossing/ roads. I used good old air drying modelling clay, as I found this looked good on the abandoned Barnswell board. Rolled out with the best rolling pin, hopefully a good clean up
LO peeps.
Unfortunatley I didn't make the RMWeb day last Saturday.
I was intending to attend, but a MRS tour of Kentish Town and Betjeman's Midland was the same day, and I had committed to go on it.
I am sorry not to have met up with people again, but the London tour was unique, led by an ex-Kentish shed driver.
I have taken my 1F chassis to pieces ( again)- still not happy with it! Was not running at all smoothly.Luckily I resisted the urge to hurl it at the wall!
I was awaiting a ne
Hallo again.
If you think you saw this thread already today well you did, but in trying to replace an incorrect photo I somehow managed to delete it!
Anyway, I'll try to remember what I wrote before...
I have now completed wiring in the point motors on Little Midland, and the buses are in place and I just need to cut through the brass sleepers at the ends of the layout before I can try it out. All points are switching, which is encouraging.
I have also been having a go at a couple o
Greetings.
I spent a couple of hours I had spare last night resculpting the polystyrene landformers referring to the photos I have recently received.
Although these photos show Glenfield sixty years later than my model will, I am thinking that there would not be much of a change in that time to the actual shape of the land.The real advantage of them over older photos in my possession is that a couple of them are obviously taken early in the year with little foliage to hide the contours.
While
I'm not sure whether anyone else finds this research stuff interesting, but I have received some replies from various helpful sources about Glenfield.
The kindnesses which many modelling people show still astounds me.
Take Roger, for example, who I am in an email discussion with. He used to live near Glenfield in the 1960s. He called into the Leicester records office for me to consult maps of various ages to try to answer some of my questions!And then took the time to correspond his findings
I think Rich's suggestion (see last entry) is a likely explanation for the loop, see the photo below which shows wagons standing there, which appear to be loco-less and brakevanless at one end. Of course they could be being shunted, which would still reinforce Rich's point.
There were few passenger trains and none at all after 1928; while Desford Junction, a couple of miles up the line would offer far better passing opportunities - with signalling too!
The coal trains from the Swannington e
