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On Ravensers Bookcase

A blog by Ravenser in RMweb Blogs

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Things on the workbench, or gathering dust on the bookcase....

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"I've started so I'll finish...."

It's a sign of something - not a good something - that I find myself doing my New Year stock take /resolutions in the middle of January Twelve months ago I set myself a fairly ambitious programme of catch up and finish. This was tempting fate, I suppose, and Fate duly obliged, wielding a large blunt instrument. At the end of that January, my then employer embarked on a third major round of redundancies . The redundancy process and jobhunting took up most of my time and energy in the first h

January 16, 2011

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Payment on Account

I haven't updated the blog for rather a long time. The truth is that I've been rather quiet on the modelling front - but a bit less quiet than it appears. Now the prospective exhibition booking has slipped into next year, I'm suddenly feeling a bit disinhibited. All the things I couldn't really work on because they weren't relevant to a BR Blue period I can now work on again. So.… Some progress has been made on the wretched Coopercraft Tourist Brake Third this year. Unfortunately it is

September 30, 2018

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Work in Progress

I didn't get round to my annual New Year's Resolutions posting this year - a bad sign. Thanks to a new job and various domestic renewals not a lot of modelling was done in the couple of months before New Year, and even less posting on here took place. Nevertheless rather more modelling took place in 2016 than was written up in this blog. The trouble is, it left rather a lot of unfinished business. For the last few years I've been stating with depressing regularity that I'm not going to take

February 12, 2017

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Damage Control 2 - Prototypes and Identities

Blacklade is in the North Midlands, with services to Birmingham, Nottingham and Sheffield via Chesterfield. The latter either extends through to Leeds or is worked by W Yorkshire units. In the 1980s this means that 3 depots would obviously supply units - Derby Etches Park (DY), Lincoln (LN) and Tyesley (TS). Oddly South Yorkshire never had a DMU depot, despite being a fully fledged PTE - their units came either from Lincoln or Neville Hill (NL). There is a minor metaphysical issue about Etch

June 25, 2015

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Baby Deltic 1

I'm conscious that the blog has been inactive for a long time , and it certainly feels as if I've been inactive too However a certain amount of modelling has been done - I just haven't written it up. One project that has been making intermittant progress is the Baby Deltic referred to in an earlier post here http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/296/entry-12459-baby-needs-some-new-paint/ Much of the progress has been painting - however despite seeing this as a "quick win"

June 29, 2014

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Set 2 - We're Getting There....

I haven't posted much recently in my blogs - but some modelling has been going on in dribs and drabs over recent months The two Ratio ex MR suburban coaches which are to form Set 2 have made intermittant progress and have now reached the stage shown: and The second being the recycled and rebuilt kit I originally made in my teens and which completely dismantled itself when I applied ModelStrip to it This is now a composite, with 4 first/3 third . Passengers have been pai

February 2, 2014

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Work in Prospect

This is one of those posts that could go on the layout blog (here http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/343-blacklade-artamon-square/ ) but as it amounts to a note-to-self of stock construction jobs that need doing, it's more logical to put it on my workbench thread . So here it is... I had the layout up for an extended play a couple of weeks back. Things came out of boxes that had spent an awful long time in them . For the first time I actually got round to trying to run a Civil

September 21, 2013

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Set 2 - A Conundrum

This is a quick posting , just to record that there's been a bit of progress with Set 2 since I last reported on it , but mainly in the hope of flushing out some info to resolve a problem that is delaying progress: Here is the underframe of the Brake 3rd (the composite is identical) - I have played about with contrast on the image so you can see the framing . Posed on it is a Comet LMS battery box casting Two problems are immediately apparent . Firstly, the battery box casting is j

June 22, 2013

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Set 3 - Grouping Non-Gangwayed

Despite having two sets of coaches on the go already , I seem to have drifted into starting a third. Admittedly the LNWR set is almost done - just a bit of weathering still to do , and the new project is supposed to be a quick win.... When, early this year, I decided to use various steam era kits and bits I had accumulated to operate a steam period on Blacklade I quickly found I was very short of brake coaches. As money was tight at the time , I looked for the cheapest options to plug the ga

June 1, 2013

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Set 2 - MR suburbans : Part 1

For my next trick, as they say, I have a pair of Ratio MR suburbans. These are intended to form the second set of steam age coaches on Blacklade The reason for selecting these is simple. In my early teens, before discovering modern image modelling , I perpetrated several Ratio MR coach kits . The best of them, replacing my first attempt at a kit , was this gruesome object . It's also pretty well the only one to have survived . I remember I was quite pleased with this at the time The

March 17, 2013

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The End is Nigh

Despite the silence I have in fact been doing some modelling over the last couple of months - I just haven't written it up . However this is to record that I have finally finished construction of the Ratio Van B . It still needs lettering , spot painting and weathering, and there's plenty of scope for things to go wrong in all of that, but the last tiny scrap of etched brass has been stuck in place . At least the last one that I'm sticking on - there are still a small number of tiny bits on the

June 4, 2012

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Fools rush in

It's been a long while since anything was posted here - most of the modelling in 2011 was on the layout, where the bulk of the major work still outstanding was tackled , but some progress has recently been made on stock as I currently have a little spare time . Firstly the Ratio Van B. Work resumed last Autumn , only for me to find that that I couldn't find the etched sheet . Eventually I swallowed hard and decided to improvise. This meant fabrication of replacement door hinges from microst

March 19, 2012

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Motley Assortment

It's about time I posted some stuff I've actually done, rather than grumbling that I've not got much done. These wagons were done in September , but I've not got round to posting them till now. A mixed bag of elderly wagons on their last legs... Exhibit A , as they say in court, is a down at heel Walrus, unaccompanied by a Carpenter: I have to confess that I've tweaked the photo very slightly in Microsoft Digital Image 2006, to compensate for the effects of flash , though the adjust

January 18, 2011

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Sometime in the last century.. ORBC

ORBC by Ravenser original page on Old RMweb __________________________________________ ??? posted on Fri May 04, 2007 5:24 pm As I'm hoping that I will actually get something done over the bank holiday weekend, I thoughtt I'd better salvage the spiel about the Bratchill 150 from the old forums. Having gone back to RMWeb2 , I was confronted by my New Years Resolutions from January last year: I must make some progress on other fronts this year. I have a lot of DCC inst

October 30, 2009

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Paint Your Wagon

My attention span has obviously atrophied and my focus suggests an eye test is required urgently. In short , rather than pressing vigourously ahead with the van B, I've become side tracked into finishing two wagons. The Walrus has been the subject of long-standing lament round here. In a fit of mental aberration I decided to paint the thing - only to find that it is clearly determined to fight me to the death. A first coat of my home-mixed tin of "off-black" produced a distinctly thin cover

August 10, 2010

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Marking Time

This is by way of a holding entry - because of a difficult period at work I've not managed to do any modelling for about 6 weeks, and consequently there's been nothing to report. I was really hoping to make some serious progress on the backlog this year , only life comes along and throws a spanner in the works... However I did manage to get to Ally Pally this weekend, and while I was there managed to purchase some laser cut flush glazing for the Bratchill 150 from Shawplan. I gather these a

March 29, 2010

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"Here's one I made earlier"

I had a bout of fitting Sprat and Winkle couplings a couple of weeks back - the vans (see below) were done and released to traffic and I duly dug the MCV out of the stockbox - quick win , low effort and another model back in traffic. I was half way through when I noticed: Remember that the shunting micro is Transitional . Airfix kit - modified without top flaps to represent a rebodied wagon. So it's out of period and can't be made in period - these rebodyings started around 1970. It wou

February 2, 2010

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Payment on Account

Just before Christmas , Mallard60022 started a thread on "The first models I am going to build in 2010 are.., which you can find here: 2010 model promises As I said in there, I seem to have posted rather a lot of implicit promises - or at least pointed memos to self - just below in this blog. And as Mallard60022 has recently posted shots of his efforts to redeem his own pledge, I suppose I ought at least to post an installment payment... Well, for starters , the Walrus is done. Not paint

January 23, 2010

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Taking Stock

It's the time of year for casting an eye over projects unfinished and unstarted, reviewing progress and considering what's been achieved, and making resolutions for the New Year. We could start with the 2009 New Year's Resolution (buried in a transfer off the old site far below): That one I actually kept, more or less. A few bits and pieces were bought - a couple of second had wagon kits, a 153 (but that was a carry over from the 2008 Rolling Stock Programme) , a Central 158 and a ch

January 2, 2010

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Fruits of my Labours

After a rather more protracted effort than it should have been, I've finally finished the vans and here they are: From left to right , ex LNER fruit, BR vent van, and rebuilt BR Shock. And yes , the Fruit and Shock still need couplings. Unfortunately I've noticed the chassis on the vent van is not 100% square . It seems to run fine, because it's been out on the shunting plank without trouble - it was only some time later that I noticed a fractional rock when stood on a mirror. Since

December 31, 2009

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Unfinished Business

There will no doubt be a proper way to do this, but I can't find a facility that allows me to store snippets of info... I don't know when Andy will be locking down RMWeb3 and whether I will still be able to gain access to old PMs, so to save embarrassment, - dimensions of a batch of PNAs , as kindly supplied by the Fatadder in May (scratchbuilt bodies, for the use of...) . I haven't actually got round to using them, mind, but perhaps this year.(It's the time of year for reviewing outstanding opr

December 31, 2009

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Shock to the system

The small shunting plank is firmly Transitional. It may use diesels (or an honourary diesel - Y3) but it's the sort of inner city goods depot you really can't justify existing after about 1970. Consequently the modest fleet of stock for it is very traditional indeed: no air brakes here. The ex LMS fish van is meant for it , and various circumstances resulted in me acquiring and building one of the new generation Parkside kits for the BR standard 12T van . Potentially very useful for the plank

December 5, 2009

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Troublesome Wagons

Now for a proper update (rather than transfers from the old forum) Some progress has been made in the last 2 months, though sometimes it doesn't feel that way. The two SSAs are finished , though I'm not 100% satisfied they're OK... One is in blue and is not quite as free rolling as I'd like , while the other is in EWS red and has given a good deal of trouble with the weathering. Really , I think the proper tool for the job - depositing a fine even layer of grime - would be an airbrush.

November 2, 2009

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PMVs, wagons and a Pacer

Now to try the third part of the old ORBC. This contains several things I'm still working on or have only just finished... ORBC - Ravenser http://www.rmweb.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2497&start=50&hilit=ORBC"> original page on Old RMweb __________________________________________ posted on Sat Apr 25, 2009 11:30 am Time for a bit of an update. Contrary to appearances , there has been some progress on the modelling front. The Parkside PMV is painted ,

October 31, 2009

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Later the same century...

This one's gone wrong somehow - try the link http://www.rmweb.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2497&start=25" page on Old RMweb Comment posted by russellwar on Mon Jan 07, 2008 2:34 pm <br /> <cite>jim s-w wrote:</cite> <br />No, you fit the glazing after the paint. You do need to cut your own but there is a small overlap between the etch and the hole. I have asked a lazer cutting company about the costs of getting windows cut - if its viable i'll let you

October 30, 2009

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