Entry posted by The Fatadder
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Somehow managed to find a fair bit of modelling time over the weekend, meaning I managed a lot more progress on the coach projects.
First up was the RH D95, The last remaining side was prepared and fitted following the same method as described in Part 3. The only difference being that less material needed to be removed in order to clear the new windows (as a result of not having separate droplights.) I'm guessing these must be amongst Comet’s older kits, as the level of detail is a lot less than the LH D95 (no etched holes for the hand rails / door bump stops.
Once dry, they were cut and filed to the correct length (again colouring the back of the plastic side with black marker pen so that you could quickly see once the etch and plastic were flush.
Next it was onto the ends. First the moulded grab handles, lamp irons and corridor connecter were carefully carved off. Using the pips on the back as a guide, about 1mm was removed from each side, this gives a profile which roughly fits into the coach end. The top was roughly filed to remove the bevel and to reprofile the corners (to add the steeped angle which was lost when narrowing the sides). The raised detail was then removed from the back of the end, followed by some trial and error removing more and more material from the sides of the end moulding until it fitted cleanly into the coach. The final job was to remove approximately 1mm of plastic off the bottom of the end, to line up with the bottom of the sides.
In order to get the ends to fit recessed into the coach moulding, its necessary to remove material from the end of the chassis moulding. Making a cut on the inboard side of the two raised pips, and another cut on the buffer beam above the buffers. Again this was test fitted against the body to ensure clearance, before gluing the ends in place onto the coach body (and applying the necessary filler to tidy up the joins.)
The final job on the body was to open out all the holes for the grab rails / door handles, and to glue on the hinges. (I have to admit to making a bit of a mistake here, not realising that they needed to be drilled and fitted before doing the sides. I have used some etches instead which are far too flat, and too wide, but better than nothing…)
Moving onto the underframe, I soldered up some Frogmore etched battery boxes which were all glued in position. Along with fitting some new vac cylinders for the LH D95. The H33 also was fitted with its additional small battery box, along with new Frogmore boxes for the other side. The incorrect bogie mounts were chopped off, and the area around the new bolt opened up. A square of 80though Plasticard was cut approx. 20mm by 20mm, with a hole drilled for the bogie bolt. This matches a flat section in the underframe between detail around the new bolt location.
Once glued in place, the bolt was Epoxied in position. (this method gives sufficient clearance for the interior above the bolt head.
The below photos show the improvement in ride height on the modified H33 next to a Mainline C77, with an unmodified D95 for comparison (both are still riding on the BR1 bogies for the moment)
So that leaves only a couple more jobs prior to painting, fit end hand rails, fit door stops to side, fit dynamo and some linkages to the underframes. I am also contemplating replacing the corridor connectors on the inner ends of the D95 and the H33 with the MJT or Modellers Mecca working ones. I will keep the castings for extra detail on the outer breaks. At some point in the year the new bogies will be sorted, but that can wait until after painting…..
Hopefully I will manage to get these last few jobs done in the next week, as I have a Finney 2251 coming in the next couple of days which I can't wait to start and the Cotswold Models 54xx which needs an evening of soldering up…
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