Mermods
I picked up a Flangeway Mermaid at the weekend and although it has a lot of positives the big negative for me was the solid panel on top of the chassis - see cnw6847's post which detracted from the fineness of the rest of the model. Given the price at GBP15.95 I'd have expected something a little more but having looked at it I felt comfortable that something could be done to improve it.
Step 1 - Separate the wagon body from the supporting frame, maybe it should unclip but I could see glue residue down there so I slid scalpel beneath the body.
Step 2 - Separate the tipping frame from the weighted chassis, again there was evidence of clips beneath but it didn't want to budge and I reverted to the scalpel.
The tipping frame is clipped to the chassis with two awkward clips on each side, placing pressure on these from inside moves them out sufficiently to remove the tipping frame from the chassis.
Step 3 - Remove the weight from the chassis by drilling through the melted plastic peg in each corner of the weight.
Step 4 - Replace the tipping frame onto the chassis. At this point I had intended to build up the chassis frame with plastic strip but given that it will be relatively obscured most of the time and looking at a skeleton chassis on Paul Bartlett's site I thought I'd leave it at that.
Once the wagon body is replaced I think the result is reasonable and certainly an improvement. The body, and chains, will be fixed back on after the wagon is weathered. The wagon will obviously need that weight that was removed, in this case it will be cut down by 5mm off the length and placed inside the wagon and with additional weight hidden beneath the wagon's load.
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