In the latter half of the 1840s, William Bridges Adams began to dabble in locomotive design with the help of several key figures, particularly the resident engineer of the Eastern Counties Railway, James Samuel. He had established a works at Fair Field, Bow in 1843 for the purposes of expanding his business building carriages and wagons for both rail and road and locomotive construction was a natural progression.
Together they developed the principle of the light locomotive which was
Just completed the first cassette of dummy wagon turntables to go outside the goods shed at Bricklayers Arms. This is a set of four, one table inside the shed and three outside. The set will sit at 90 degrees to the front of the shed serving one of the bays. There are six bays each with a set of turntables, three with three and three with four, plus another set of four at one end. Each set is joined by the running lines, one inside the shed and three outside.
To start, two long rails we
Once the children were safely tucked up in bed and with an unexpected hour to spare and not really fancying tackling anything big, I decided to make a chair. Scrap brass for the seat, a bit of wire, some solder and a lick of paint.
Last year I embarked on an ambitious project to scratch build no less than four locomotives by Messrs Rennie of Blackfriars, London.
In 1838/39 the brothers constructed five engines for the London & Southampton Rly., and two for the London & Croydon Rly. It is clear from studying the drawing published by Brees in his 'Railway Practice' that the design was a combination of Stephenson's Patentee and the popular and sturdy 2-2-2 by Sharp & Co of Manchester. However, having
A bit of history
The earliest record of a tenant in The Greyhound public house was a Mary Stiff in 1822. The Upper Grange Road (now Dunton Road) Bermondsey was likely a relatively quiet lane leading off the Kent Road before the arrival of the Bricklayers Arms Extension Railway in 1843/4. At first it was suggested that the railway should cross the road on the level, but the contractors Grissell & Peto constructed a bridge to carry the road over the four running lines. The inconven
Continuing the theme with some ModelU 3D printed figures, I've been experimenting with 'Tartan paint'.
Seems to work quite well on Rose's shawl as she has it out with Charlotte over some recent unladylike behaviour. I mean really! What is she doing out in the street without her bonnet on? Disgraceful!
Apologies for the horrible model makers fingers!
Loco No.126 was made at Ashford in 1848 but was not completed until 1850. The engine was either started at Bricklayers Arms and finshed at Ashford or visa versa (I would be grateful for clarification if anybody knows better). Primarily used on line inspection duties, it remained in service until 1861 when it was sent to Redhill as a pumping engine, returning to Ashford in the early eighties where it was scrapped.
The 4mm scale model is very small, I've posed it with a contemporary goods wago
Although somewhat irrelevant to my overall project south of Old Father Thames, I confess I've always rather fancied the look of these sturdy GER open wagons.
So it's been a pleasure to revive these two ex-Woodham Wagon Works kits of both 1870 and 1883 versions. I managed to complete the 1870 one which is my personal preference but then struggled to find a period photo of the 1883 edition which is why it is as yet unlettered or numbered. I also fouled up a bit with this one by setting
Ex petty officer Solly is in a bit of a pickle.
Having recently been suspended from active naval service owing to a regrettable incident with a cannon, he has decided to consume an increasing quantity of London’s best porter.
Unfortunately, not only did the calamity result in the loss of his right leg below the knee, it also neatly removed his left thumb. He now has to swap his crutch to the left in order to hold a bottle in his right hand. After several bottles this balancing act can
Well, having restored the lost images to my blog about the Rennie loco project I now realise that I've done more than I thought and this deserves an update.
Croydon is now complete although the above image shows that there are a few final jobs to do before it can enter traffic. There is a large black scar behind the drivers on both sides where i removed too much of the boiler/firebox to allow room for the driving wheels. This has now been filled, smoothed and painted to b
Visually speaking, work appears to have slowed up on my Rennie loco project. I have reached the stage where all the fiddly little detailing jobs need to be done and this takes time without much obvious progress. The current pair approaching completion are Satellite of the London & Brighton Railway, and Croydon of the London & Croydon Railway.
However, the list is reducing as each detail is ticked off and at present I'm awaiting some etches for the reversers. This is unusual f
Having recently acquired a discarded dandy horse from a house clearance off the Old Kent Road, Jean Floret de Cauliflower is quite the man about town. At least, his own frisky imagination tells him so.
However, this past week he has consistently upset every innocent pedestrian and skittish filly in Bermondsey.
Perhaps it is just as well that his wreckless behaviour may soon be brought to a dramatic finale. The work of our tiny but destructive foe Ano
‘Reflect upon your present blessings... not your past misfortunes ... fill your glass again, with a merry face and contented heart. Our life on it, but your Christmas shall be Merry, and your New Year a happy one!’
Sketches by Boz, Charles Dickens.
Not that these two will ever run at Bricklayers Arms but by request I dug out the old Woodham Wagon Works masters for a LSWR open wagon and made a new mould to produce the kit again. It went together very well and makes a lovely sturdy wagon. Not convinced about my choice of dark brown but I don't think the lighting helped. I'm in the process of reviving two GER open wagon kits as well, 1870 and 1883 versions, but more of that later. The LCDR van or 'covered goods wagon' to give it its proper ti
Another of my 'seemed like a good idea at the time' projects last summer was to create kits for each of the principal carriages of the London & Birmingham Railway.
Once again this was to be another diversion from Bricklayers Arms but a change is as good as a break, no?
Together with a good friend Tom Nicholls who has provided endless information, drawings, research and above all encouragement, I started at the bottom with the intention of working my way u
Royal William Pt.3
A little more progress and I've been able to trial fit the driving wheels. Clearance was a bit tight on the central boiler stays but I think this is due to the slightly over-scale flanges on the 00/EM tyres. A bit of fettling to the stays with a swiss file sorted the issue.
The leading axle is only a spare carriage one at the moment, just to get a feel for where the front axle rocker should be and to determine the correct height and levels etc. It's difficult to ap
Royal William - Pt. 2
Having made a bit more progress over the last few evenings, here is a little more about the loco itself.
The image below shows the mainframes with firebox and flimsy inner frames (more trunk guides than frames). The firebox and frames will be detachable from each other in order to remove wheels in the future, although I can't image a scenario where I would want to do that. The boiler and smokebox are also detachable in order to extract the motor if needs be.
London & Greenwich Railway - Royal William – Part One
The London & Greenwich Railway opened for traffic in 1836. Built on approximately four miles of brick arched viaduct, it was the first Railway to serve the Capital. Royal William was L&G No.1, built by Charles Tayleur & Company to Stephenson’s ‘Planet’ design. Although there is a fairly well known tinted drawing of this locomotive, we are lucky to have a drawing from the Vulcan Foundry archives, which confirms (or othe
I've had this loco simmering away in my work-in-progress tray for a year or so now. Originally it was to be South Eastern Railway No.13 'Vortimer' of 1842, but due to the way I've built the power bogie in the tender and the fight for space between the brakes and the pick-ups I've decided to complete it as L & C No.5 'London'.
Essentially 'Vortimer' was braked on both sides as far as I can tell, whereas earlier Sharpies such as this one were braked on the right hand side only. I will post
The construction of Rennie's 'Croydon' banking loco for the New Cross incline continues. Last night's milestone was managing to shoe horn a Portescap RG4 into the very limited space available.
Next job will be to make the sub assembly of footplate/outside frames and cylinders.
Mrs Rennie looks on wondering just who her husband expects to be polishing all that copper!
The London & Croydon Railway ran it's first trains in 1839, and typically for Railways of that period with no facilities to build it's own locomotives, the L & C turned to established engineering companies. Some of them, G & J Rennie for example had reputations forged in other industries but we're nevertheless keen to exploit the rapidly growing demand for engines to run on the newly created iron road.
Aside from a later locomotive Coryndon designed by John Chanter and built by P
London & Greenwich Railway No.1 Royal William - Pt.5
This is the last part of the series on Royal William for now until I make the Stephenson tender to go with it.
It's all done, an interesting project and a good opportunity to try out a few ideas on the cheap! So the lessons learned are as follows:
Sprung plunger pick-ups on such a tiny engine were more trouble than they were worth. In the end I simply fitted some tee shaped wiper pick-ups between the wheels. Easy, simple and ef
London & Greenwich Railway No.1 Royal William - Pt.4
RW is now painted and final tuning is underway. An issue cropped up on track testing that I had my suspicions might just be the case. It was ludicrously slow! The spur gearbox is very effective but the ratio much too high. So what to do? After staring at it for some time over a cup of tea, I decided it was possible to remove the final pair of gears and shunt the final drive gear back to take the place of the gear that drove the shaft.
Following a great little video recently produced by Anthony Dawson about the locomotive Jenny Lind of the London, Brighton & South Coast Railway, I felt inspired to give my own 4mm scale model a little break from the monotony of the display cabinet.
The original locomotive was the first of a batch designed by David Joy and built by E.B.Wilson of Leeds. Delivered in 1847, it was a very successful class of locomotives which owed much to the design of John Gray who had been Locomot
I hesitate to call this 'Bricklayers Arms Stables' because that's not what they are. However, they are the stables for Bricklayers Arms which is confusing I know but I'll explain.
Whilst Bricklayers Arms station building, goods shed, carriage and loco sheds and coke depot are recorded (some photographically, others as outline drawings) the original 1844 stable block is not.
There appears to be no record at all of its appearance. Therefore I have chosen to model the 1856 stables
