Thanks to the conversion of my Hornby long coned boiler 28xx into a representation of 2811 in 1912-1914 condition (2811 is currently still in disgrace but may soon be upgraded to an utter pig of a job in the next couple of weeks if things go reasonably well), I have become interested in GWR tenders used in the Edwardian period - God help us. The start was the observation that 2811 did not have the tender supplied by Hornby (a Churchward 3500 gallon tender), but had a Dean 3000 gallon one instead
While I have been mulling over the horror story that has been 2811's progress (or lack of it) since the early summer - as detailed in The Locomotive shop- 28xx no 2811 - I have been making slow but steady progress with 2301 class or Dean Goods class no 2322. The loco is based on the familiar Mainline/Hornby model - a bit long in the tooth, but capable of making a high quality model, especially with a replacement chassis (essential if you work in EM or one of the even wider 4mm scale gauges...).
This Parkside kit has been slwloy moving from the errecting shop through to the paint shop and the signwriter has recently finsihed lettering it.
The kit has been slightly modified, with representations of the brake rigging for the clasp brakes (ABS castings) have been added, as well as Coopercraft/Blacksmith ethced grills behind the windows.
However, the CCT has not (yet) been compenstated - if running trials indicate compensation of this long-wheelbased vehicle will help
As I discovered I had run out of crank pins a pause has been forced in 2811's progress. So I decided to have a renewed crack at the Nucast Armstrong Standard Goods.
Russell's locomotives of the GWR gives 2 nice pictures of 788 in pre 1906 livery - all glorious lining and indian red frames etc. Also 788 has a belpaire firebox which might give an extra mm to hide the motor and gearbox, always a problem with wasp waisted Victorian or Edwardian locos!
The original Nucast kit had a
I blame Gareth.
It all started with an innocent remark that I thought just betrayed our Yankee friend's touching ignorance of real railways: 'Aren't you going to paint your pre-1904 wagons red?
'Of course not,' I replied brimming with confidence 'Red was only in use until the mid 1890s so I don't need to.'
'Are you sure? I thought the Great Western Way said the balance of probabilities was on Red until 1904...'
'Nonsense. See.' I showed him the pages from the bible.
'Not th
Prior to starting this blog, I had been working on a number of wagons for my own, as yet unborn, GWR Cornish branch line. Last night I took some of them along to SHMRC and posed them on Hope-under-Dinmore.
Many of the chain clay private owner wagons were from the POW sides (pre-printed on salters/coopercraft bodies) - and very nice they are too. Very helpfully, POW sides will also change the running numbers for you, so you don't have duplicates - inevitably I only realised this after it was
A while ago I posted some pictures of wagons that were being contructed for china clay traffic, both GWR and PO. Amongst the images were a pair of GWR O13 china clay wagons, painted, lettered, but not weathered.
I dedcided that I would weather one (92971) quite lightly, the other (94100) more heavily. To weather wagons, I tned to dry brush and use acryilic paints.
First, 'light rust' was lightly dry brished over the underframes using a mop headed soft brush.
Then 92971
This is Mikkel's fault (something that Gareth of fond memory and posts past will be extremely grateful). Mikkel kindly commented that he had found one of my blog posts useful for visualizing the work required for EM/P4 RTR conversions. Unfortunately, the all too brief skirting over a great deal of faffing around with that particular conversion may give a false impression of the work - or thought - required.
The theoretical basic flow is something like this:
Invert victim in
Quite a while has passed since the last blog entry - I've been busy, but as the project progresses so the law of diminishing returns sets in: the closer you get to finishing, the longer it takes to see meaningful progress as details and testing take time, without the obvious leaps forward in progress that can be made early on!
The observant will also notice that 2322 is now 2525. This is because the interesting arrangement of cylinder covers (or lack thereof) at the front of the smoke box wo
Having forgot to pack the weathered O13s when I headed off to the club yesterday evening, I thought I'd best photograph something I did have in the stock box - some POs that have just had their final coat of varnish.
One of the problems with modelling PO wagons in Cornwall (and pre-1914 to boot) is the lack of photographic evidence. So, in order to keep the Empire Mills china clay dries and the industries on my own slowly gestating layout supplied with coal, I have made a few assum
In a well ordered and just society I would be able to blame Gareth. The fact that I can't is annoying me somewhat and I think that deep down he (Gareth, whose default fault assuages so many wrongs and set backs) is avoiding any blame just to vex me. But I suppose then he is to blame for something...
On that happy note on to the dirty wagons that are 'fresh' - if that is the right word - from the paint shop.
It's worth remembering how dirty the old railway was (and the modern one is
While continuing to work on the loco and tender chassis I have started compling the list of modifications that will have to be made to the body for it to represent 2322. As a reult I have been diggin around for information on the Dean Goods. The first point to note is that there were two different widths of footplate. Before 2450 they were narrow, after 2451 they were wider. Having run a ruler over the martin Finney drawings it looks like there is a scale 3 inch difference between wide and narro
The crank pins have arrived and I've managed to escape to the workbrench for short periods over the last few days.
The coupling rods have had Alan Gibson brass coulping rod bushes soldered in place to reduce the rather large holes in the Hornby coupling rods down to somthing appropriate for Alan Gibson crank pins. At the same time the chemical blackening was gently buffed away using a glass fibre brush.
The rods were then put to one side while I worked on the driving wheels. First,
It all started innocently enough - a gentle enquiry from a fellow club member about whether I'd be interested in converting RTR stuff to EM - not for him, naturally, but he'd had an approach from a third party and was it something I'd consider? Oh and I'd get paid for it too...
Well as an EM modeller, I'd done a few RTR re-wheeling jobs including a GWR City for the Sage of Fareham so I said yes.
Here is the GWR City I did for the Sage of Fareham. I swapped the Bachmann 3000 gallon ten
The Empire Mills project's next phase is, as I may have blamed Gareth for in the past, back-dating the china clay dries to the Edwardian period, which means it needs a new set of china clay wagons. I managed to find an interesting picture of what appeared to be a line of china clay wagons which had peaked ends and a solid roof - rather like salt wagons. Gareth, clearly in a mood of contrition, found a drawing of such a wagon belonging to the West Of England China Clay company. It looks like it w
Well its been a while, but I've not been that idle - stop sniggering Gareth.
ExpoEM went well - I think. I had a good few people drop by for a chat and the lecture seemed to be well received and promoted a fair amount of questions and discussion. Suffice to say that the 3 Mink conversions I was doing didn't get finished during the course of the 2 days. The only down side about demonstrating is you don;t get to see much of the show...
Anyway after ExpoEM I got roped into demoing at th
Here are some snaps from the latest outpourings from the Wagon and carriage workshop (or workbench...).
First are a pair of GWR V6 iron minks. They are Ratio kits, but the very dirty 37508 has grease axleboxes while the reasonably recently out-shopped 69721 has oil 'OK' axleboxes. Both are in the GWR 25" lettering for the period after 1904. Its my intention to build at least another three - 2 in the pre-1904 G. W. R livery, again with oil and grease axles boxes photographic or documentary ev
Its been a while since I posted - not that I have been idle. Gareth, following his move back to the USA, has now been supplanted by Ray Hodson as the person voted by me as most likely to be blamed, although in the spirit of fairness and because we live in an inclusive world I do not intend to let Gareth's retreat across the Atlantic to get in the way of the blame game when the opportunity arises.
Anyway, Ray. Ray volunteered me to demonstrate at this coming weekend's EXPO EM, doing modifyi
Ok, so where were we? Ah, yes the victim had been reduced to pieces (or at least stripped of its means of movement( and was ready for reconstructive surgery. So now it is time to address the thorny subject of wheels.
As I mentioned before, you have basically three choices: Aland Gibson, Markits and Ultrascale. So lets compare what you can get for how much using a Bachmann 2251 Collett goods as our exemplar.
Ultrascale offer a conversion pack that includes all wheels (in
While a 28xx is probably a bit big for a china clay shunting layout - a viewpoint I struggle with - the Hornby model of the straight framed version looked lovely so I had to have one.
The Hornby model is of 2812 in 1930s condition so not only will it need to be converted to EM gauge, but also back dated to 1912-ish. The early locos were builtg with short coned boilers, not the top feed fitted long cone of the Hornby model. However, the early locos started to receive D4 long cone boilers from
While mulling over the top feed issue, the tender issue, and summoning up the courage to start drilling holes in the spectacle plate - and above all because the laser cut plasticard side frames had arrived from Ultrascale - I have decided to make some progress with the chassis.
Stripping the chassis was not as traumatic as I feared and the wheelsets, coupling rods, and cross heads gently slipped out of the chassis into a heap on the floor.
The sandboxes were removed too, a
After the last entry about 788, I was ready to test fit the wheels and coupling rods to check that everything ran freely. (2811 is currently my chief problem child and I'll post about this when there is something positive to say.) I used a GW wheel press and quartering jig and was expecting this stage to be a complete doddle. Unfortuantely, the reverse was the case. Fitting the wheels and rods was striaght forward, but when the chassis was tested under finger power a tight spot was noticed. Wors
Well merry Xmas to you all!
It’s been quiet, but modelling has taken place. Two commissions have made their way off the Work bench recently. A Bachman 3F that was a saga, mostly due to problems with the wheels being loose on the axles. Nuff said.
The D16 went well after I managed to solve the problem of getting the gear wheel to stay put on the axle. Having tried pretty much every glue to hand without success I drilled down between the gear teeth and through the axle, inserting a bit
This is a preemptive blog post.
Gareth, who delights in pointing out my errors, omissions and oversights (for the good of my soul and development, naturally), is - I am convinced - at this very moment penning a massive missive asking oh so sweetly, but with hidden barbs of reproach, what has happened to the the locos mentioned in previous blog posts. 'After all...' I can imagine him writing 'you've done all those other conversions that you talked about today, what about the others?'
A
I converted this loco a few months ago - actually it was done behind Westcliff at the Watford show and took about 3 hours or so for the basic conversion, so it was running on Westcliff, thanks to Richard Butler's indulgence, towards the end of the Sunday of the show. The only problem (not that its really a problem, the conversion was so easy) was I sort of promised to do one for Richard when he manages to find the correct wheels in amongst his bits and pieces cache in exchange for a stock box!
