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46444's Blog
 

Great Eastern Promise. Oxford BR N7 finished as Cambridge 31A's 69620

The Oxford N7 in my eyes is something of a bargain and Oxford have captured the look of these distinctive engines nicely.   It is representative of the N7/4 sub-class I believe so is only suitable for a small number of members of the class.   I wanted to model a Cambridge 31A example and discovered a number were allocated there in the mid-1950`s. Choosing an identity was made easier by finding a snap of 69620 at Cambridge Station in 1957.     One of the
46444

46444

2
Old Priory
 

2 - Track Plan

With my plan of using a 40cm wide "shelf" to run most of the layout, I was um'ing and ar'ing over to run a double track or a quad track. I like the sound of a double track, more space for scenery on the "shelf" areas of the layout, but I also like the idea of four tracks running together. Brighton to Victoria is both, but I do like the four track sections between Haywards Heath and Gatwick. I have made a plan for four tracks after checking 40cm would be wide enough for 4 tracks. The picture stil
Old Priory
 

1 - Prepping the loft

After spending the winter clearing the loft, boarding the floor and celotexing and hardboarding the eves, I now have a workable space. The loft still needs power and lighting and the centre area needs celotex and hardboarding, but progress is being made at last!   The plan is to run the layout around the outside of the loft on a 40cm "shelf" that allows me to still access the storage in the eves, have my computers in their current location (the loft is my man cave), but have a large ba
Turning the Clock Back
 

A simple wagon conversion (for a change!)

These photos are of my first RTR wagon conversion, a Bachmann LNER box van in BR livery. Re wheeled to P4 and Dingham couplings added. Running in original bearings so doesn't roll that well, but a very happy result for just a couple of hours work. Rather too clean but I like it. (I had scratch built some GWR wagons many years ago but as my layout was very cramped with no room for a goods yard I had ignored wagons until recently when a house move has given me a large railway room and now space to
pbkloss

pbkloss

0
TS's lockdown diary
Day 81: more building work

Day 81: more building work

More work done on the small building end, all the plasticard bits are now ready, but I failed to notice until I needed it that the tube of UHU is looking a bit sad, so that stopped play and I'll have to wait until a new tube turns up. In the meantime, I'll have to work out how I'm going to make the cutouts for the door and vent in the plasticard sections - they need to be much more accurate than the holes in the base card as any gaps will show. At present, the plan is to stick it to the card, th
TurboSnail

TurboSnail

0
Doggerland - A North Sea Railway
 

Episode 4 - Adventures in Refinement 2

The intermediate station, I think, needs the most work.  Based on Kirkby Stephen, albeit on a single track line, it' s the single track part that is causing me deliberations.  A milk loading siding has been added. Buildings will be Metcalfe S&C initially, pending an aspiration to design and build etched brass buildings in the future.:     I'm unsure whether to put a facing crossover in where the red circle is to allow a goods train to be overtaken, for instance, or two a
rockershovel's Blog
 

Cabin fever...

Just looked in my garage, and would have done better not to.    This would usually be the Racing season, and all the bikes are jammed handlebar to handlebar. None of the engines have been done, because I can’t get them to the tuner. My granddaughter hasn’t been, so the trampoline and swing are still cluttering the place up.    Changeable weather and boredom means the garden furniture is being dragged in and out...  
rockershovel's Blog
 

The Big Crew Change..

Last year, I was moderately optimistic about getting some more offshore work in before I retired, but present circumstances seem to have completely collapsed the market. Any revival in prices, has quite gone; headcounts are being slashed and viable enquiries for work are non-existent.    Looks as though The Big Crew Change is pretty much complete. This is an industry term relating to the retirement, willingly or otherwise, of large numbers of older staff, working on to cover the gap in
Daz9284's Blog
 

HHA Aggregate Hopper Conversion - Building

The next stage was to put the sections back together.   Firstly I glued the chassis back together and I used the parts of the cut off ends of the hopper doors to aid with strength. At the same time I cut some spare plastic that I had (used an old store card) to fit the width between the two hopper dividers and the width of the vertical hopper bay seperator (you will see what I mean in th pictures below).   While the glue was setting I glued the hopper sides together, after ma
daz9284

daz9284

3
Daz9284's Blog
 

HHA Aggregate Hopper Conversion - Cutting

Since I heard that VTG had purchased some ex FLHH HHA coal wagons for conversion to aggregate wagons, I have been waiting to see the released wagons so I could have a go. Thankfully, via a friend, I was able to get the drwings showing the dimensions of the cut 'n' shut wagons.   Firsly I took the HHA apart and stripped the paint off the body sides         The next stage was to print out the working drawing to scale to work out what I needed to do ne
daz9284

daz9284

0
Snitzl's Main Blog
De Snitzlton - Part 1.

De Snitzlton - Part 1.

I've been working on a small 0:4:0 shunting locomotive for Fun Town's market stall's. I decided early on to design a new locomotive drawing inspiration from the transverse cylinder engine "Albion" and a small shunting loco De Winton. To make things even more interesting, the loco would be operated with DCC and include a DCC uncoupler with an animated operator and also, other as yet undetermined animations to be added as the project progressed. The project starts with a compensating chassis machi
snitzl

snitzl

11
MES Body & Paint
Gray (?) Zeta 2 & Others

Gray (?) Zeta 2 & Others

I finished the 'Gray' Zeta.   I just need to make space for it on my large Gundam shelf.   Becoming harder, that...   I currently have no pics of it finished in robot form.   Pain to switch the thing.   I had painted in the stripes, along with washing the panel lines.   Ended up using sepia, to offset some of the vibrancy of the orange.   Still not gray.   I picked up a clever little kit on a supply run to the local; The clever little kit is exclusively
AlfaZagato

AlfaZagato

0
46444's Blog
 

Ivatt Rescue Part 2. A tale of an eBay resurrection..

This morning our Postie delivered a small package from the Bachmann Spares Department. Excellent service as ever.     Inside was the new tender chassis and coupling mounting block highlighted as damaged in the previous post.    Armed with a mug of Yorkshire Gold in a suitable receptacle with an Ivatt 2MT on it I set to work...        The smokebox door handle was replaced with a new brass Eileen's Emporium example. This was sprayed
46444

46444

0
TS's lockdown diary
Day 80: Hunslet powertrain swap

Day 80: Hunslet powertrain swap

The tiny Hunslet has had a simple change - from the original geared drivetrain to a belt driven one. The lack of a decent supply of tiny gears led to the choice to go to belt drive, even though the engineer in me protested. It's predicatably a bit more 'frictiony' now, but seems to work and is compensated for somewhat by the now lower gear ratio, so it's a bit slower too.    However, there's still one major issue with this loco. Weight! It's not heavy enough to get consistent pickup ye
TurboSnail

TurboSnail

0
pheaton's Blog
Keeping 26043 Alive....When your locomotive....says....thankyou!

Keeping 26043 Alive....When your locomotive....says....thankyou!

Its been a while since the last blog....   we start where we left off....me and my fellow 26 workers beavering away all over the depths of winter...changing windscreen seals....cutting out rot....repainting yellow ends....all for the start of the ever promising 2020 season .    Two visits already planned, 1 to Somerset and Dorset, and one to the severn valley....even my fellow diesel dept members thought we wouldn't make it...but we did...we finished all our body work and rep
pheaton

pheaton

5
Doggerland - A North Sea Railway
 

Episode 3 - Adventures in Refinement 1

I've been working on refining the track plan for the terminus station and I think I'm just about there (famous last words...)   The terminus has also gained a name.    And so, gentle reader, I give you St Catherine's Bay (pronounced Cathereen):     Goods Shed Goods Yard Goods Yard Locomotive release runaround Passenger platform Passenger platform Locomotive release runaround/van storage Passenger platfor
TS's lockdown diary
Day 79: SER brake progress (at last)

Day 79: SER brake progress (at last)

I've finally managed to print an SER brake without too much warping - there's still a bit, but much less noticable now. So here it is in primer. I've already broken off and re-attached one of the buffers, so I'll have to be more careful with the rest of it. Next job is to fit all the handrails, which is not going to be fun as there are a lot of them...  
TurboSnail

TurboSnail

9
Freshwater, Isle of Wight, in 2FS
ex-NLR 4 compartment first class carriage 6336 for Freshwater

ex-NLR 4 compartment first class carriage 6336 for Freshwater

Built by the North London Railway in 1864 as a four compartment, all-first class, 4 wheeled carriage, this vehicle was purchased second hand, over 30 years later by the Isle of Wight Railway (IWR), along with six other carriages. It was numbered 46. It retained the varnished teak livery, but bore the garter motif of the IWR, with its number in the centre. One of the first class compartments was down-graded to second class. When the Southern Railway took over in 1923, these 60 year old carriages
Ian Morgan

Ian Morgan

1
46444's Blog
 

Ivatt Rescue Part 1. A tale of an eBay resurrection..

We all need a another project to keep the modelling workbench busy don't we? Well in my case probably not..    However a perusal of eBay found a sorry looking LMS Ivatt 2MT described in 'As new condition'. My collection of Ivatt's never resembled the photos but I thought it was worth a punt for a cheap project.   On top of this I had a spare Ivatt 2MT 2-6-0 detailing pack to help things along the way.    My 'As New' Ivatt arrived safely and here are some photos. Tha
46444

46444

7
It will end in tears before bedtime
A little bit of a slight problem

A little bit of a slight problem

Working on van no 3 and I thought I would fit Bill Bedford sprung W Irons. They're a great bit of kit, if a little bit fiddly (but it was the first time I'm made them up so I should get better) and seem to spring really well. But it looks like I'm going to have to shave half the depth of each solebar off to get them to fit (and a fair part of the floor struts).    Do you know? I'm really not sure if I can be bothered :-)     I think I need to sleep on it.
Spodgrim

Spodgrim

7
Aussie National
 

37681

So my latest project is completed, or nearly. A repaint and minor detailing of the old Hornby class 37, which had been stored away and largely forgotten for 20-odd years.    Briefly I have... - Fitted new air horns - Fitted fixed-beam and high intensity headlights - Fitted some jumper cables (possibly not all of them) - Fitted new cab steps in the correct location (removing the class 47 steps wasn't easy)  - Altered the nose grilles - Removed the buffer be
D6150

D6150

0
Strive for progress, not perfection.
 

A small but significant building

All building work now finished! The office from the goods shed was completed last night and finished this evening. I have some vehicles to weather down, and probably some goods to create and detail along with a few other snags and figures but it’s almost time to clean the track and run something. Crane is almost complete with steps added to the platform, and for anybody making the yard crane, look for the truss rods taped to the back of the instructions! I must have picked up other si
Charlie_k

Charlie_k

0
TS's lockdown diary
Day 78: Bagnall primed for action

Day 78: Bagnall primed for action

I love primer - it makes a model look so much more finished! It's also shown up a couple of areas I need to fill, or remains of support material I need to get rid of. The main bit being at the back, where one of the buffer holes cracked out when I was drilling it out for the buffers, leaving a big hole in the bufferbeam. I swapped to a needle file to do the rest after this!    

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