GWR Bird class - finishing touches
Bullfinch is just about done, apart from some small but enjoyable final touches such as crew, glazing and some suitable lamps. Here it faces off against City of Truro! The plates are from 247 Developments and It's numbered for the post-1912 numbering scheme.
The kit has been terrific fun and while the end result is more impressionistic than anything else, it does look different enough to the City to represent the small-drivered 4-4-0s and is certainly a nice runner.
I can't remember if the City was sprayed with a rattle-can or airbrush, but it would have been done using Railmatch's later shade of GWR green, whereas for the Bird I opted for Precision's 1906-1928 shade, and applied it with an airbrush. The black bits were then brush painted with Lifecolor "weathered black" which dries quickly and is a very matt, almost dark grey shade. I've still to give the tender a good going over.
There are a few things I'd do differently if I was building another one. My rivets are rubbish - must try harder - and the boiler bands are a bit on the heavy side, albeit matching the ones on the Airfix firebox. A job I might get around to sometime is moving the cranks in-board a bit as they don't need as much clearance as they've got here. However, I'd be loathe to alter the quartering so that might be a job that waits until there's some other reason to take apart the chassis - hopefully not for a while!
Of course I would like a curved-frame Bulldog but I have to be realistic and say that I'm already at capacity with GWR engines - not that there aren't a few more in the kitbuilding queue, including such lovelies as a County Tank, 2021 class, Armstrong goods, a De Glehn compound and a few others. Better get cracking!
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