OK, I'm not quite sure how these blogs work, or if I've got file uploading right... let's try it and see, shall we?

Well, it's scary, but somehow I've got through the first year of university in Edinburgh, and returned to sunny Sussex just over a week ago. Having recovered from a nasty stomach bug (it actually was a dodgy curry, ironically enough) and been given a clean bill of health by the doc today, what better than to crouch over some noxious chemicals and sharp blades for a while? No, not the usual student pastimes I got a modelling project I'd been looking at for a while out. Just something gentle to ease me into a hobby that hasn't seen much happen since Easter, on account of exams.

I'd been fortunate enough to pick up a couple of the old Hornby "shorty" clerestories in LNER teak (not exactly prototypical, but I like them, and they look good enough behind the Hornby bomb-proof LNER 0-6-0 that I use when younger visitors come around to play trains) and had been looking at them for a while trying to figure out what it was about them that bugged me.

The coaches in question.

Then suddenly, one of my flatmates hit the nail on the head when they spotted the coaches on my windowsill. "Where do the people sit?" So I sat down today armed with a pair of scissors, some thick, gloopy glue and the brilliant Bill Bedford coach interior kits that can be printed off his website for free (though, having had to trim the non-corridor ones quite substantially, I might try corridor seats in the next coach).

The results (apologies for the shoddy handiwork, which is in no way representative of the kit!) ended up looking something like this:

I wasn't aiming for a finescale appearance, just a means to stop light travelling diagonally through the windows. As I say, these coaches are mainly for younger visitors, and will have to withstand the occasional sticky fingers, so I'm not putting too much time into them. However, I think that this has made a huge difference to what is otherwise a very basic coach model. What do others think? Worth the time?