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About this blog

This blog complements my Pre-Grouping Blog by covering my modelling activities in the Broad Gauge era of the Great Western Railway.  As with the earlier blog, I intend to cover the various methods by which I construct elements of the Broad Gauge scene.  For more background see https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blogs/entry/17705-a-different-type-of-railway/

 

Entries in this blog

General

Broad-brush Planning

One thing leads to another ... back in 2013, I started a blog to cover my growing interest in 19th -century railway models. Since I chose to model the GWR, this inevitably brought me onto a collision course with the Broad Gauge. At first, I thought of this system as something that was only associated with the 'primitive' stage of railway development. It was something of a surprise to realise that broad-gauge trains ran almost until the end of the century: the 'last gasp' being in 1892. As I have
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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General

Broad Gauge Mail Coach - part 3 (research)

Much of what we now accept as standard railway practice was actually developed towards the end of the 19th century, so that it is easy to forget that there was a long period of evolution, before the 'norms' with which we are so familiar became established. Whereas we have plenty of photographs to guide our perceptions of the later years of the century, our 'picture' of the earlier years remains much hazier, so it is easy to lose sight of the many major changes that occurred.   For exam
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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General

Broad Gauge Mail Coach - part 1

In my first post in this blog, I explained that the inspiration behind my exploration of the Broad Gauge was the discovery, when researching family history, that during the 1860s, my wife's great-grandfather worked for the GWR on the South Wales line at Bullo Pill.   During his time there, there was a serious accident in 1868, south of the station, when the 5 pm fast Mail train from New Milford ran into the back of a special cattle train, making its way laboriously from Carmarthen to G
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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A Matter of Colour

I’m currently pondering what colour I should use for the body of my Broad Gauge ‘Rob Roy’.  References to the colour originally used on Broad Engines declare it to have been ‘Holly Green’ but opinions differ on what shade that name represents.   According to Christopher Awdry’s book: ‘Brunel’s Broad Gauge Railway’, the Boiler Cladding was ‘Holly Green (Dark Blue/Green)’ until 1881, after which ‘Chrome Green’ was adopted. (he quotes the Broad Gauge Society as the source of this informat
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General

One Step on a Broad Road

After spending a long time reading and thinking about Brunel's broad gauge railway, I knew I had to make a start somewhere. The thought of plunging straight into a layout was proving too daunting so, I decided to buy a display case of the type sold by Antics models This case has a plain wooden base, measuring about 330mm x 80mm, onto which I could build a short length of broad-gauge (BG) track.   I wanted to build my track base using materials and techniques that mirror the original co
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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General

What big wheels you’ve got!

I reached something of an impasse at the end of my previous entry in this blog. Lots of problems to be addressed but no clear routes to solutions.   Possibly the most striking feature of the ‘Waverley’ class 4-4-0s was their wholly-exposed coupled driving wheels. I therefore felt strongly that this was an aspect that my model had to capture. Unfortunately, there seems to be no commercial source of 24 spoke, 7 foot-diameter driving wheels and, while I fantasised a little about building
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MikeOxon in General

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General

Finding some details

I visited the Forest of Dean recently to see the site of the Bullo Pill accident and to try and unearth more information about the area. The 'Gage Library' at the Dean Heritage Centre in Soudley holds a large number of maps and books, with staff who are very willing to help.   I have already posted one of my photos of Cockshoot Bridge, close to the accident site and couldn't help thinking that there was a resemblance between the modern LED signal and a Brunel 'disk and crossbar' signal
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MikeOxon in General

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General

Splashers!

This is a lengthy post, containing a lot of detail about the methods I devised. When I started to write it, I realised that I had already forgotten some of the steps, so I have made this detailed description as a support to my own memory!   From the very start of my plan to construct a model of a Broad Gauge ‘Waverley’ class locomotive, I realised that those bicycle-like splashers were going to be difficult! They are a very prominent part of the locomotive and fit closely around the ri
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Broad Gauge at Didcot

A visit to Didcot Railway Centre is always good, when in need of a little inspiration!   In this case, I was invited along to help introduce my grandson to the delights of steam trains. At 3 months age, he seemed to enjoy a ride in the steam railmotor but was not too sure about the joggling over points.   Meanwhile, I slipped away for a look around the Transfer Shed, where various Broad Gauge replicas are stored. Outside the shed, a length of broad-gauge track shows the detai
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General

More Waverley Thoughts

Over two months have passed since I last wrote about my attempts to build a model of a Waverley-class 4-4-0. To re-cap, I have built a boiler, by using the Broad Gauge Society (BGS) kit for a Gooch Standard Goods, and have cut out some inside frames from card, to carry 24-spoke driving wheels taken from a Tri-ang ‘Lord of the Isles’ model. After putting these parts together, rather roughly, I felt that I had achieved an approximation to the appearance of the prototype.   As I continued
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Broad Gauge Mail Coach - part 4

I’ve been spending quite a lot of time thinking about undergear for my Mail Coach. Apart from building a kit for an N6 Horse Box, which included fairly detailed brake gear, this is an aspect I have tended to ignore in most of my scratch-built models.   I have described myself as an ‘impressionist’ modeller but, somehow, now that I am exploring the Broad Gauge and an earlier period, I feel a certain responsibility to try to be more historically accurate.   The Broad Gauge Soci
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MikeOxon in General

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General

Next Stage – Making Rolls

In the previous entry, I described my approach to making sandwich frames. While that was only a small part of building a chassis, I decided to change tack and have a look at how the ‘super-structure’ of the Broad Gauge kit goes together. As I have mentioned before, I am considering how the boiler in this BGS kit for the Gooch Standard Goods might be used to create a model of the ‘Waverley’ class 4-4-0.   To put it mildly, the instructions with the kit are somewhat terse in their descri
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Smokebox – or Can of Worms

After my previous entry about the Gooch Standard Goods, I had thought that adding the smoke-box would simply be a case of copying the method I had used to fix the firebox. In the event, things were to prove not so simple!   The main parts for the smoke-box comprise front and back plates, a wrapper (with a hole for the chimney) and a ring, described as “boiler ring (back of smokebox)”. A moment’s thought pointed out to me that this ring would have to be threaded around the boiler before attachi
MikeOxon

MikeOxon

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General

Planning a Mail Train

Having ‘cracked’ the main problems with building my Mail Coach, I have started thinking about the other vehicles that made up that ill-fated train. According to the accident report, the engine ‘Rob Roy’ was pulling three passenger carriages, and a luggage van. It is stated that the leading carriage had a break compartment in it, and that the third carriage, which was the mail carriage, also carried a guard.   This leaves me trying to decide what the other carriages might have been. A M
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Luggage Van - Underframe

I notice that I have not written anything here since June and, recently, Mikkel wrote in his blog : "I hope we get to see some more of your BG work soon?" so, here goes:   The heat wave has made my work-room very uncomfortable, so I decided to do a few small jobs on carriages. In my previous entry, I commented unfavourably on the perspex undergear parts in the Broad Gauge Society kit for a luggage van : "I’m not sure why the designers chose this material and method of construction but
MikeOxon

MikeOxon

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Brunel's Britzka

It’s some time since I modelled horse drawn vehicles but recent discussion on @Mikkel's blog raised my interest in the subject again.  In Janet Russell’s book: ‘Great Western Horse Power’, there is a photograph of the Britzka carriage in which Brunel travelled while surveying the route of his planned Great Western Railway.       This vehicle caught my imagination and the first question it raised was: “what on earth was a Britzka?”. The question led me to research many l
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Broad Gauge Mail Coach - part 5

My progress, since the previous post in this series, has been slower than anticipated, mainly because of the need to build a chassis that deviated from that intended for the BGS kit. I also took a few false turns, which led to a significant amount of re-work.   In the comments following my first post about this coach, I said that I prefer scratch building to kits. I suppose what I really meant is that I like to do things my own way. The down side of the scratch building approach is tha
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Simple Carriage Build

As a diversion from the problems I am experiencing in completing my Waverley-class 4-4-0, I have put together a Broad Gauge carriage body, using photo-printed sides.   I have previously described making various standard-gauge coaches by using my Silhouette cutter to cut out several layers, some of which I pre-printed from photographs of actual coaches. I gradually refined and simplified my methods, resulting in the construction of an early Passenger Brake Van (PBV), which I built back
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Fire Fly valve gear

I joined my grand-children for a visit to ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ at Didcot Railway Centre on 7th October. During the afternoon, I slipped away for a while, for a look inside the Broad Gauge shed. Fire Fly replica at Didcot After my exploration of early valve gears, while working on my 'Waverley' model, I decided to look at some gear 'in the flesh', so to speak, since I find it hard to read engineering drawings sufficiently well to get a real 'feel' for the hardware,. It's always a bit o
MikeOxon

MikeOxon

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Making a Sandwich

Having sorted out my ideas about the make-up of the Mail Train involved in the Bullo Pill accident, I have been turning my attention to the locomotives. The Mail Train was headed by one of the big ‘Waverley’ class (a.k.a. ‘Abbott’ class) 4-4-0 engines, for which no model kits are available. The unfortunate cattle train, which the Mail Train ran into, was headed by a Gooch ‘Standard Goods’, for which the Broad Gauge Society (BGS) supply a kit.   The Gooch ‘Standard Goods’ engines were the mos
MikeOxon

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General

A Coal Wagon for Bullo Pill

When I started to build my model of one the Broad Gauge ‘Bogie-class’ engines, it was purely on a whim, because I was attracted by their jolie-laide appearance. At that time, I thought they were South Devon engines, generally confined to the West Country.   I had brought my model close to completion when some further research revealed that they were also familiar engines in the Bullo Pill area, which was exactly where I had started my Broad Gauge modelling!   My model of
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MikeOxon in General

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Waverley - Between the Frames

Looking at the frames of my ‘Rob Roy’ model, I realised that there is a very visible ‘yawning gap’ between the frames, which really needs to be filled with something. It never bothered me with ‘narrow’ gauge ‘double-0’ models but a 28 mm gap is a different matter altogether.   The instructions for the Broad Gauge Society (BGS) kit of the Gooch Goods, on which I have based my model, contain very little information beyond: “note: the kit provides for two slidebars per cylinder but it was
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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Update on Waverley Valve Gear

Someone once said that “I assume ...” is one of the most dangerous statements that can be made.   In my previous post , I described my study of the valve-gear of early locomotives, starting from the Stephenson ‘Patent’ design, which set the template for much of the first half of the 19th century. I managed to find detailed drawings of the valve gear on Gooch’s Goods locomotives and I assumed that the arrangement in the Waverley class would have been similar – after all, the boilers were of th
MikeOxon

MikeOxon

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'Rob Roy' on track

I've been putting off cutting out a second set of frames for too long, so have now made a determined effort to finish this task, before the Christmas hibernation period.   Of course, it's always easier the second time and the techniques I'd developed for building frames worked well, the second time around. As before, I printed the drawings that I had made, using Silhouette Studio software, to paste onto brass sheet for use as cutting templates. Once the frames were cut out, I attached
MikeOxon

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General

Six-wheel Luggage Van - 1861

One of the vehicles I need for my planned 1868 Mail Train is a Luggage Van, which was the last vehicle in the train that was involved in the Bullo Pill accident.   When I noticed that the Broad Gauge Society (BGS) has launched a new series of laser-cut plastic kits, which included an early luggage van, I thought it would be interesting to try building one. As readers of my blog will know, I like to scratch-build as much as possible but there is always a lot to be learned from building
MikeOxon

MikeOxon in General

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