I applied Deluxe Materials Scenic Rust to the skip, this pack contains a bottle of very fine 'Rust powder' and a binder which feels like a very dilute PVA. These are mixed together and applied to the model. Once dried a 'Rust developer' is applied which makes the layer of material actually produce real rust.
After about 8 hours the rust is fully developed and you end up with a very rusty skip.
It works rather well on corrugated cardboard to make rusty corrugated iron.
David
A little bit of cleaning up last night and I assembled the extended skip chassis. I need to add a tiny bit of filler at the joint between the original Binnie chassis and the extra parts but hardly any. I put a coat of Humbrol matt 113 on with a brush and this had the effect of really showing up the detail and just how good the printed parts had come out.
I hardly did any work on top surface of the extension and I'm really chuffed with the smoothness which the printer achieved.
Yes, I did get my spelling right and mean braking not breaking.
The Binnie Engineering Hudson Tipper wagon is a staple of 16mm narrow gauge model railways. Understandably Fen End Pit has quite a few and one of them was converted many years ago to have brake standard to give a little variation. I'd often thought about converting a couple more to give one braked wagon per train of skips but never got around to it.
I decided that this might be a good challenge for my new 3D printer so
One of the most enjoyable bits of stock construction over the last year was this Dave Bradwell Brakevan chassis kit. Paired with the body of an airfix/Dapol kit I was very pleased with the result. The chassis kit is ??16 and was very well designed and etched. The etch looked fiendish at first glance but I found the step-by-step instructions very good. While it took a lot of time and concentration to put together it was extremely satisfying.
I suspect there might be a Dave Bradwell J39 c
Exhibiting a layout can be a hard work and great care has to be taken to avoid damaging the layout. Stock and 'removable' scenic feature are also liable to damage in transport so packing can be very important. Having an 'everything in its place and a place for everything', approach limits both the potential to forget to take things and the potential for damage.
So this week I've been making boxes to help transport bits of Fen End Pit.
First up is are the boxes that fit the new large engi
Friday night meant a meeting with friends and the handing over of a length of 22mm diameter brass tube freshly purchased from Eileen's Emporium. I'd decided fairly early on that I wanted to replace the rolled etch in the PDK kit with a length of tube and I think I've made the right choice. Although the etch was rolled the fact that it had a number of holes already etched in it when it was rolled had meant that the curve wasn't completely smooth, also as it was still about 5mm larger in diameter
A fair amount of fettling got the boiler to a decent fit around the splashers. I also enlarged and elongated the holes for the washout plugs, soldered a piece of scrap brass behind them and then drilled this with a hole into which a tiny length of nickel silver about .8mm square was soldered to form the bolt.
I adjusted the upper part of the frames to match the drawings and the boiler length by taking them off, re-drilling and positioning the handrails and then putting them back on agai
Last week I finally managed to get back on to doing some scenic work on the main layout, I was waiting until I had both platforms cut and assembled and that was waiting on getting the platform 2 building built. I managed to get the track through the platforms painted and ballasted and then the basic ground works cut in polystyrene, scupltamolded and painted.
This evening I drove a few trains around to celebrate. The Brush Type 2 arrives with the pickup goods while the Cravens DMU wa
I was contacted last week by Keith Barker of the Ely MRC, he had been occupying himself during lock-down sorting out old media files on his PC. He had located some video of a model narrow gauge cement works railway taken at the Stowmarket in 2001 and thought it might be my layout. He was happy for me to post it up on Youtube, so I added a bit of a commentary and it is now there for all to see.
I built 'The Works' in the 1990's and exhibited it for a few years prior to selling it some
The last few weeks have shown a good deal of progress on the layout. The remaining framework for the baseboards have been completed and the infrastructure is coming together. It is good to see a nice smooth and level surface covered with the templot drawing. Today I trimmed the old MDF backscene from Empire Basin, reducing the height slightly as the baseboard is now higher than it was. I've also purchased some timber to frame the backscene so that it can be held firmly against the wall. The inte
After over a year away it is time to return to the blog. A lot has happened during the last couple of years which has got in the way but I'm to be back in a position where I can share what I've been building.
Progress on my scalefour model of Clare has continued slowly. The most noticeable progress being on the area around the level crossing. Thanks to some help from members of this forum I was able to get some plans of the '1865 standard' crossing keeper's cottage. Like all standar
A bit of standard gauge for a change. I took delivery of a couple of the new Bachmann grain wagons which have been on order with Hattons for what seems like years. I've got a P4 wheel set in it now and replaced the coupling with Alex Jacksons. I can (just) remember seeing these being loaded at Sandy on the occasions when I used to cycle over there to watch some proper main-line trains in the later '70s. By then they were in a 'rust based livery' but I think they had been going that way for some
The welcome return of High Level Kits caused me to order, amongst other things, one of Chris' 'Rustlers'. I've had an 4mm Impetus Ruston 48DS in various states of rebuild for the 35 years I've had it. My attempts to motorise it have been many and varied but I'd always been stuck driving only one axle. The advantage of the Rustler was that it drives both axles using High Level's usual high quality gears. I had to make my own 4-wheel chassis to fit the gearbox in but this wasn't too difficult usin
Last night was spend productively in front on the PC drawing a wagon turntable. The plan was inspired by the York Model Making stand at Scaleforum and is an attempt to try and get something laser cut. The first drawing was e-mailed late last night so I'll be interested to hear back on feasibility and cost. Dependng on these I may try to get a number produced. If any one might be interested then please let me know. The design should be ok from P4 or EM, I think I'd need to draw a different versio
Over the last week I've been experimenting with my MERG CBUS components and JMRI with a view to producing a way to make a mechanical signal box frame which is interlocked and interfaced with a PC. The requirements I've set for myself are as follows:-
I want a mechanical lever frame, with proper chunky levers to pull. I've already build one from the Scalefour stores produced by the Shropshire & Herefordshire Area Group (######).
I want the frame to prevent me from setting conflicting
The last few days work means that the goods warehouse to the rear of the layout is pretty much finished with the exception of some weathering, downpipes, ground cover etc. etc.
From viaduct level you get a good view of the entrance which has some detail inside with loading platform, some internal walls and various notice boards cut from the Scalescenes goods shed kit. I'm wondering about the area around the signal box. I'd originally thought about adding a water tower into the scene but
Or in other words all 16 ton mineral wagons might look the same at first but they are not all equal.
In this case we have a slope sided 16 ton mineral from Parkside , a standard 16 ton with morton brakes from Airfix and finally on the right a fitted 16 ton with the longer wheel base, tie rods between the W-irons and a somewhat rusty bauxite livery.
All I have to do is remember to couple the fitted wagon next to the locomotive to increase the brake force available.
David
Reading Geoff Kent's 'The 4mm Wagon - part 1' gives the answer to the question on the Airfix brakes.
The kit provides two mouldings, only one of which is required, and two identical brake handles, the one on the same side as the brakes should be fitted with a Morton clutch.
So, I've removed the brakes from one side and cut the brake handles off the V hanger on the other. pushing it slightly upwards and used a piece of rod to represent the end brake rod and the Morton clutch. At the same
Yesterday was that great annual treat of a trip to Scaleforum, the journey to Aylesbury almost made me miss the delights of queuing around the M25! The list of bits was rapidly procured (with the exception of those from High Level kits where the focus was on talking to customers rather than rapidly serving (this is not intended as a complaint, that is a large part of the point of Scaleforum) - note to self: next time buy online!)
I purchased a 12x24 motor to replace the 14x24 which I had pu
I usually only blog about model railway stuff but I hope you'll excuse this little ramble because it does include some pictures of trains! After a significant number of years and now the kids are both big enough to look after themselves my good lady wife and I had our first foreign trip. The boss wanted to 'do' some Christmas markets and we settled on Berlin. We'd never been and as she had spent 5 months behind the Iron Curtain in Moscow just after we started going out it seemed an interesting d
I was reminded of the rather nice drawing of a set of coal scales in Roy Link's superb Crowsnest Chronicles book and while I can't match his version with lots of beautifully panto-graph milled pieces I thought I'd have a go at modelling it up in CAD to 3D print. As this model is in 16mm:1ft scale it took a while to print (a little over 5 hours) at .03mm layer height on my Phrozen Sonic mini 4K. I printed double of some of the smaller pieces just in case there were issues.
As the scalefour layout takes a rest while waiting for major house redevelopment I've been working on stock. Given that the E4 and various other coaches are complete I thought it was time for 'something different'.
Until this point Fen End Pit has been an all Simplex affair (ok, apart from the Lister) but given the Ruston and Bucyrus dragline it seemed only a matter of time before the Ruston locomotive salesman came calling for business.
I've always liked the LAT and LBT ever since I bui
So, having declared that the layout was 'back on track' in my last posting I then didn't put anything on the blog for another six months, what has been going on? To be honest, not much; modelling has been pretty much confined to my usual Friday nights out with practically nothing going on between one week and the next. Some of the reason for this has been practical but most has just been down to not being 'in the mood'. I'm sure most people get those times when they look at a modelling project,
I've spent this afternoon trying to draw up a plan for the new layout. I'm waiting for PPD to come back with an etch for the narrow gauge Ruston and felt like an afternoon in front of the PC. Having received the structural engineers report which means that hopefully we should soon get a quote from the builder I hope this isn't tempting fate.
I started off taking a scan of the OS map into Templot and then trying to draw track over it. This is an interesting task as I'm sure that what you thi
Last Wednesday I was lucky enough to get off work early and join some friends in an evening visit to the North Norfolk railway for a trip on the line and a tour of the engine shed and works. This was an excellent event and a good time was had by all. We can now all count up to 34 with ease! (you had to be there!). Although the light was fading towards the end I was still able to get a picture of the J15 Y14. What a superb locomotive and HOW COULD Hornby GET THOSE HANDRAIL KNOBS SO WRONG? (sorry
