A few words on recent progress hereabouts...
The second bogie for D604 is now complete and looks much like the first one, so no need for any photos there. There are a couple of small jobs remaining before the new underframe bits get painted and then it should be 'job done'.
We've been away in Wales for the past week sampling the Garretts on the Welsh Highland. Definitely a good way to see Snowdonia but take a coat because this narrow gauge stuff has no heating... especially if you want t
After a somewhat late night yesterday evening getting them finally assembled, the two chlorine tanks are now finished.
Here are a couple of photos.
Overall I am really pleased with the way these have turned out. They have taken a lot of effort to build, mainly in the initial etch design and the painting and final assembly stages because they are such complex vehicles. I have also discovered a few tolerance adjustments that will be included in any future builds.
As Association
Another quick update on the progress with this build.
As you might have seen in my holiday post, a second tank wagon seems to have sprung into being, the idea being that it's not much more effort to paint two of these than it is to paint one... well, that's the theory anyway.
Rather than yet another progress photo of a wagon slightly less incomplete than last time, I thought I'd look at another little conundrum.
Having finally got two wagons ready for painting (somehow there always s
A quick progress update on the Chlorine tank. The end stanchions have now been persuaded to go together and have been attached to the chassis, as has the brakegear.
This of course also means that I can now try the tank in place along with some of the timber packing that goes underneath the tank and at the ends. The tank still needs a good clean out to get rid of the residual wax.
The good thing about 3d printing is that it's a piece of cake to create the domed tank end and then subt
So far so good with building the first of the wagons from my recent etch - a 1957 vintage Hurst Nelson Chlorine tank.
I was impatient to try out the experimental version so that's what I'm building. So far it is going together as intended and the centre section of the solebars has achieved the skinny look that I was hoping to get when viewed from the top and the chassis seems very strong because it's got metalwork in all of the places where the real thing has metalwork.
The ext
A few photos from South Yard's day out at Nottingham. A good day out was had by all and it was nice to catch up with some 2mm friends for the day.
The layout worked well all day and I got lots of nice comments.
The new backscene being cut out from its surrounding card. In the end I went back to watercolour because I'm too new to Acrylic and things just weren't going in the right direction.
All packed up and ready to go. Very neat (not!).
The layout on show complete with pai
One of my jobs for St Ruth is the preparation of the operating sequence so that we don't get stuck in a rut of just running the same trains up and down. I've done this by referring to the WR working timetables for Cornwall for the late 1960s and the excellent carriage working information available on the BRCS Yahoo group. This material has provided plenty of ideas for introducing variety into our train services without the need to depart from reality. One of these ideas was the working of a slee
There has been quite a lot of activity chez mois in preparation for St Ruth's forthcoming appearance at Nottingham, mainly on the buildings front as those watching the St Ruth blog will have seen. This has meant something of a hiatus in areas like locos and rolling stock because once I get started on these the buildings won't get a look in.
Those who saw St Ruth at the Oxford Expo in 2010 may have noticed a lack of many things including (but not limited to) coaches. This show came at an awkw
I've volunteered to take the tractor test bed to the Tutbury gathering next month so I've been doing some more work on it ahead of that. All of the work so far is 'below stairs' so visitors may not see much visible difference from it's state last year at Chelford but in fact quite a lot has changed.
The first big change is that the curtain track has now been relaid to run dead straight instead of following the line of the Esso siding. This makes manual steering more predictable - pre
There hasn’t been a huge amount recently that has really justified a blog posting on its own but there has been plenty going on so here is a potted summary of recent developments and the covoluted paths by which they progressed through the works.
Another Stephen Harris tank is now ready for the paint shop. This one is a class ‘A’ tank. I went for one of the early ones with the shoe suspension and without bottom discharge because that’s what the transfer sheet covers. On the whole though I’m
Some further experiments based on the 'ask the audience' responses from last time with those mineral wagons.
First the 'house coal' sized stuff.
The outer two have heaps added using Das clay to look something like the grab loaded wagons visible in photos of Kingswear (which were probably destined for Torquay gasworks, but never mind). The coal is stuck on using Jerry's tip of mixing black acrylic with the PVA which seems to cover up the whiteness of the Das quite nicely.
Left to righ
As a late December evening draws in, 4574 and her crew prepare to set off for home with just a brake van in tow after having delivered a few wagons to South Yard. The cameraman manages to capture the scene with the train almost silhouetted by the solitary lamp that passes for illumination on the platform these days.
Normally I'd post a seasonal message on the St Ruth blog but what with one thing and another I didn't get chance to do the usual pre-Christmas photo session, so you'll have
There have been one or two models that have had an extended stay in the paint shop over the winter. Since we have the Epsom and Ewell show coming up later this month, I have knuckled down and managed to get everything out of their various paint boxes and back together into something resembling models. There are still a few finishing touches to do here and there, but here is the latest crop.
Just back together today is the second of the Stephen Harris 35T tank kits. A class A version this tim
Planning for Hayle North Quay has progressed a bit. I have now sorted out a 2d plan by combining a transparent bitmap export of the plan from Templot with some colouring in done using Inkscape. The overall depth of the layout will be 22 inches at the ends and 24 inches in the middle.
The Octel office block and the whole of the Esso depot have been subjected to quite a lot of fore and aft compression but hopefully I've still managed to keep the character of the place.
I've also also
Just back from my summer hols during which we spent a couple of weeks in Italy.
As relaxation was definitely on the agenda I thought it reasonable to take along a few modelling bits just in case the opportunity presented itself. Most days were spent playing with the traffic on the Italian autostradas to tick off the usual Tuscan destinations but I managed to grab a couple of spells on our quieter days while the other members of the family were keeping out of the heat and struggling to find s
There hasn't been a great deal to report here recently. It's not that I haven't been doing anything, just that a good deal of it has been kit assembly or repeat builds.
There is one job that I did started shortly after the 2mm Expo that I thought would benefit from a few words here. We were a bit more relaxed at the Expo with mixing and matching locos to different trains. At one point this ad libbing caused us to come unstuck. My Hymek was moved from its usual local passenger turn and put on
Having a little early autumn interlude in Somerset now that number 3 child has departed the nest. Usual recipe... cottage, log burner, kits, books, local ales, walking, cycling, the odd visit to the local steam railway... 'oh, I didn't realise it was that close, fancy that eh?'.
Also trying to see if I can do a blog post from the tablet, so anything might happen...
Kit assembly with suitable surroundings...
Suitable reading material. I've been saving this book for a suitable occasi
Stretching the same title a little further, some new metalwork arrived with the postie today...
The main items on here are a couple of chassis for Associated Octel 1957 vintage chlorine tanks. The two etches are different from each other because I want to try two different ways to put a tank wagon chassis together. One is (I hope) conservative and steals as many ideas as possible from other people's designs. The other design is intended (if it works at all) to achieve an even more spide
...and then there were two!
The second bromine tank has now made it through the ordeal of the paint shop. Now I have a model of the tank that started my interest in Associated Octel, complete with its no nonsense lettering and skull on the tank end... and a further use of virtual modelling to make something real.
Painting and prep... this time I used some IPA on a cotton bud for another round of cleaning the 3d printed tank. The print also needed a rub down with some fine wet &
No I am not about to enter a phase as an Olivia Newton John fan.
What has been going on hereabouts is quite a lot of time spent staring at a computer screen doing what might be called Virtual Modelling. The intention is that this work will (one day) be turned into actual vehicles but there is still some way to go before then.
Having recently finished a prolonged stint producing decal artwork (somehow these things always appear to be a lot less work at the beginning) I decided to spend a
A light dusting of snow has fallen on the Plymouth area this morning. The coal men have turned up for work but retreated into the office to keep warm and get a brew going while they wait for the trip freight. Meanwhile D6309 has turned up with a couple of 16 tonners which it is positioning for unloading so they'll need to be venturing out again but it looks like they may be in for more snow before they are done.
Merry Christmas everyone.
Unusually we managed to find some real snow on our post Christmas steamy day trip to the GCR at Loughborough today. It's surprising how different conditions can be just 40 miles from home.
The GCR also provides a welcoming refreshment room with a real fire. The all day breakfast went down very well too.
We go to the GCR quite regularly. Somehow we always seem to get this loco
The last train of the day and the gas lamps are lit at Rothley
The loco ready to reti
D604 is now ready for traffic. I'd like to say 'finished' but I suspect that some further attention to the chassis paintwork may still be needed.
There was one body detail issue that needed to be sorted - I was not too happy with the empty rectangular vent openings in the roof. After trying to find prototype photos to figure out how to make them more realistic I noticed that they were only visible as openings in early photos of D600 and D601. Later roof photos of these and roof photos of D60
In the previous installment the etches for the D600 bogies had just arrived in the post leaving me wondering whether I could actually build a bogie from them...
Thankfully it turns out that I can
Some of you will have seen the partially completed bogie at the AGM on Saturday (and a jolly good day it was too). I had hoped to have two bogies built, painted and on the loco before Saturday, but the etches arrived rather later than I had planned so it was too big an ask. Instead D604 had to
