The Met Camm SLC is the first of the four coaches built during the cold season to escape from the paint shop and take its place between its two friends.
The build is almost identical to the other two. There are a few minor improvements because I now know more about the real things (and have of course now found mistakes on the other two). I also had a go at doing the roof overhang at the ends which is most definitely absent from the other two. This was done by adding a lip of 10 thou styrene rod (seriously useful stuff) to the end, following the roof profile. Once dry, the top surface was blended in with Milliput and the whole lot sanded smooth. I'm quite pleased with the result because how to do this was something that I've puzzled over for a long time.
The paint job is part of my long term quest to find a mix for BR Maroon that reproduces the look of coaches in sunny photos of trains in Cornwall. This one is mostly Precision maroon mixed with some Humbrol 100 (a sort of reddish brown colour), which is probably a better option than 153 (a plain red) that I used on the Thompson BG. The result is closer to Farish's version of maroon - not that this is necessarily 'right'. It still looks a bit odd in photos so maybe the next attempt will start from somewhere else to avoid the 'purpleness'... like darkening Precision crimson.
The lining was done without the aid of my Bob Moore pen. I got Ian Rathbone's book for Christmas and resolved to have another try with a bow pen (or ruling pen if you prefer). I've now invested in a couple of Haff pens which (if you try hard enough) are available from the factory in Germany. The lining on the SLC however was mostly done before these arrived. All of of the visible lines were done with a Riefler bow compass picked up for just under 7 quid on eBay and used to offset from the top edge of the sides before they were fixed in place.
Rather than try for thinner lines (which the pens can do), I tried to do the lines to match the other two coaches (I know... why didn't I do the same with the maroon?)... except for the wobbles. This idea slightly backfired because I did the yellow waist lines as two separate lines and got them too far apart. Having left it too late to remove them easily the Haff pen did finally come into use to narrow them down by lining over them with maroon... which was a last resort but worked a lot better than I expected.
The good news is that I learned from my mistake lining the compartment sides of the other two sleepers and put the line at the right height on this one so I can have the compartment side on public show without it looking silly... and post photos of both sides on here. Unfortunately the lines still don't align perfectly with the other two coaches. I think that the corridor side waist lining is a bit too low down but drawing the lines higher up doesn't work because the lining pen falls into the windows (guess how I know this?).
In other news...
The other three coaches are also (mostly) painted but the two Hawksworths still lack glazing and lettering and the Mark 2 is in the process of having the body side paint scheme wrapped around the ends slightly.
The Manor has seen very little progress. It's waiting for new name and number plates before making the transition (aka body swap) to green livery and a new identity. Unfortunately the plates I want are out of stock and I don't know when they will be in, so it will probably still be early BR black for the Manor at Railex.
I joined the 'N' Gauge Society after finding that the Modelmaster name plates were now only available that way (but sadly not the one I want). They did, however have plenty of coach transfers in stock... and now have a few less thanks to me.
Grenville is progressing very slowly in between other jobs. There really isn't a lot to do, I'm just not getting on with doing it. I'm still hoping that this will be ready for Railex but time is getting short now.
Another signal for St Ruth is also on the workbench. Some folks following the 3D printing forum may have seen a few words about finials, which it seems will now not be 3D printed, so back to turning them in the mini drill
At some stage I need to give all of my locos a test run to make sure that we have enough serviceable for Railex.
- 14
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