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Back home now from Wales. Stopped off at Aberystwyth on way home and could almost use a pic of the scene of destruction on the seafront for my layout! New shed for the VoR looks impressive and there was a little diesel shunter working in the yard but couldn't stop to investigate. Anyway, having got bored of what I was meant to be doing I made a start on the Nigel Lawton 20hp Simplex that arrived the other day. This is a very well packaged and presented kit with some really interesting design features that I will highlight as I get to them. I have made one of these before so am hoping I can remember some of the tricks as it was a couple of years ago now. The chassis went together very nicely and is now finished and working except for the pick ups which is a part I always hate doing on models. To make maters worse this kit came with all wheels insulated so either have to do two pick ups or fit a jumper wire to one side which I am very tempted to do. One thing that I did remember from the other kit was the difficulty with fitting the couplings so I milled out a hefty chunk of the threaded cross members before fitting them. Another thing is that I am not going to fit the second motor to make the fan work as had real trouble with this last time and the extra space inside will make room for an ice cube speaker for the DCC sound. These locos are pretty small remember , about 55mm long and 35 wide so need all the space I can find. The body is coming along nicely and greatly aided by the thoughtful design. Much use is made of sacrificial tabs to hold things in place and the whole thing is held solid by the great big bit of brass across the middle which is only removed at the very end once the frame itself has been made up and is holding everything together. The instructions do say to glue the body sections together but I have soldered all but the very smallest of detail parts. Am really pleased with how this is coming along and hope I can find some time to play with it tomorrow.

Currently on my work bench is a wagon I have been after for some time, a Ratio kit for a GW Open C. I think I am right in saying this is a 30 year old kit, but the crispness in some of the mouldings is still rather good, all be it slightly let down in some of the finer components. The solebars come moulded as part of the sides, I think this has the net result of making them significantly over width (while the body looks like it matches the drawings in Ackins et al). I have chosen to model the example photographed within Ackins (which is also repeated on the Ratio packaging). When finished it will be painted in the post war GW livery and loaded with some large diameter pipes for delivery to the reservoir at Cheddar. Construction started with the 2 piece floor, I removed the necessary ribs from the underside to provide clearance for Bill Bedford springing units, before gluing the two halves together. An inch length of Brass U channel was superglued in the centre across the joint to add further strength. Next the body was constructed, ensuring all was square, before carefully cutting off the corners of the headstock to get the required angles. Buffers were replaced with some castings of the later type (again working from the Ackins photo) Moving onto the chassis, it suffers from an unusual problem. The solebars are too wide apart (by approx. half a mm each side) which makes the etched W irons look a bit strange recessed so far in. To solve this I took the plastic W irons Ratio supply, removed a channel for the bearing to move in, and glued in place overlaying the etching. (God knows how you get this kit to work in OO!) Finally break gear was cobbled together with the Ratio shoes, V hangers and leavers along with various scratch built brackets and rods, working from photos. Not 100% accurate, but good enough for the layout.

Currently on my workbench is… well… my workbench. The workbench I have used for the past few years is a cheapo laminated chipboard job from Argos. The former office desk was forced into the role of being my modelling desk when we moved to Newbury in 2008. It has now taken a fair amount of abuse from my modelling torture kit, so it is only right that it continues in its role in my new house (until I accidentally cut in half or something or other). In my new house the desk will be up against a radiator and I already suffer frequent losses of small items to the carpet monster (that darn carpet monster!!!). I was also quite concerned that I will now loose small items down into the inside of the radiator. I decided that I would install a backing to my desk that will hopefully prevent small items from ‘pinging’ away. I purchased x3 framed cork note boards from Staples and went about screwing them onto the back of the desk. Being lazy, I decided to screw them onto brackets and let the boards hang off the desk (as oppose to cutting the boards and mounting them on the top of the desk). There was still an annoying gap between the cork boards and the desk when they were screwed down so I tacked down some white ‘L’ shaped plastic to cover up the gap. Now I will hopefully see a significant reduction in my time spent crawling under my desk looking for small brass bearings. The added bonus is that I can now use the cork to pin up instructions and notes, which will be very helpful.

After the diversion caused by the arrival of my CB09 blade holder, which works very well, I have returned to exploring how to construct a laminated coach side. After preparing the drawings for the framing, described previously, it proved to be relatively simple to create the other layers - merely a matter of deleting unwanted elements from the original drawing. The outer layer is, of course, the framing, then the main body side that only has the window cut-outs and, finally, the inner layer with cut-outs for the drop-lights. I show these three layers, together with a montage of all three, on the AutoSketch screen-shot below After cutting these out on a single sheet of card, I could not resist painting the layers and assembling them as a 'proof of principle'. I coloured the layers individually, which was very easy to do - no need to work carefully around the edges, as on a moulded kit! The photo below shows the laminated side, mounted against a side of my Low Siphon, to show how a finished model might look. The opposite side is, largely, just a mirror-image of this one, which is a simple command in the AutoSketch software, but there is a trap for the unwary! The doors are still 'hung' the same way round so, after flipping the entire drawing, I selected each door individually and 'flipped' it back to the original orientation. Some coach designs will, of course, not be symmetrical, so separate drawings would be needed for each side. Having sorted out the basics and learned how to 'drive' the software and the cutting machine, it's now time to get on with some proper modelling. I intend to use 10 thou plastic card and will try the scheme suggested by uax6, in his thread at http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/79446-coach-bodging/?p=1272768 , to achieve the 'tumble-home' in the sides. For the chassis, I will use a simple brass sheet, folded at the edges, while the undergear will use a 'Brassmasters' Cleminson assembly. Mike Next Post p.s. as a target to aim for. see MikeTrice's 6-wheel coach construction at http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/79025-a-guide-to-using-the-silhouette-cameo-cutter/?p=1278380 I shall be pleased if I get anywhere close

So here we go new year and another new project. I have been wanting to crack on with my 009 version of Bilton coal drops for a while after building the RT Models Harrogate Gas Works Pecket & Drewerey so whilst im patiently waiting for RT's release of the Barber kit i got tempted at Wakefield show to visit LAngley and purchase one of their war office hunslet kits to bash around, thanks in no small part after chatting to the owner of the excellent Purbeck layout and chatting to him about his version of spencer and how he built his. Anyway, a little back ground, the Harrogate Gas Works line was a 2ft guage line running from the Leeds Northern main line (Harrogate -Ripon) where there were coal drops at Bilton junction, the line then ran through open countryside round the north side of Harrogate to the corporations gas works at New Park. The line was known locally as the Barber LIne, so named after the 1st loco Barber, named after the managing director of the gas works. It opened in 1908 and was quite successful, so much so that another loco was needed by 1920. After the ww1 there was a surplus of narrow guage engines that never made it to the front. WD 1340 was purchased from store and was rebuilt by its makers Hunslet in leeds to 2ft guage and also had its cab and boiler fitting cut down to fit in the very restricted loading guage to fit through the tunnel into the gas works, on arrival it was named spencer after one of the gas works directors. From the outset Spencer wasnt very successful, it wasnt as powerful as Barber resulting in a deviation of the line to lessen a gradient just so it could haul a train without slipping. Spencer eventually became a little more successful after it was found it would steam best on briquette coal, as came about when normal supplies of steam coal were scarce due to the general strike. Spencer settled down to a faily steady life as Barber's stand by and worked on the line until 1943 when the peckett arrived and was finally cut up in 1946 so ive read, heres a link to the only known phot of spencer in steam: http://www.warofficehunslet.org.uk/ukphots/WD1340Harrogate.jpg As you can seen the cab is heavily cut down from standard and also the chimney is smaller than standard as well. There is a good picture in a book about the line of an advert from Hunslet in the Railway Magazine in 1920, showing Spencer fresh from conversion looking very handsome to go to Harrogate. Obvioulsy they were trying to drum up some business to get rid of a few more suplus locos! So thats the history lesson over, now heres where the knives & saws appear........ First of all i needed a minitrix 2-6-2 chassis said the instruction, now i wasnt paying what they were going for on that well known auction site just to chop it up so i took a gamble and went against the instruction and got a 2-6-0 for just under 30 quid which i thought wasnt too bad, so before i started the kit i stripped the chassis down gave it a good clean and made sure it was ok before i started messing with it. The main difference with the chassis is that the valve gear needs to be moved from driving the centre wheel sets to the front wheels, no mean feat for me who has very little in the way experience bashing steam engines about...... So it began with it stripped down and the useful bits stored, it was time to start hacking the chassis block. I was quiet surprised as to just how much metal needed to be removed according to the instructions. Most of the front of the chassis needed removing to as to get the front frame extensions to fit, now the instructions on the langley kit are ok as a guidline but i found myself getting a bit lost as to how the motion plate & fornt extention peices fited on. It took a bit of head scratching and a couple of nights work to get my head round it all and the castings tidied up a little but tonight i managed to get some bits glued together. The first bit to secure was the new motion bracket as you have to split the original motion into two separate sides. After that the front extention was glued and squared up, although im not convinced just yet...... Now here is the fiddly bit and the bit i have been dreading, rebuilding the valve gear. I followed the instructions and the very useful diagram of walschearts valve and managed to get it through through in my head. First job was to slip down the new cast cylinder mounts on the chassis extension, i took off quiet a lot of material, perhaps more than i should of but managed to get one side lined up, next stage was to secure it to the new motion bracket. This was very fiddley and one of them jobs you could do with having 3 hands! Next was getting the crankpin in the hole and making sure the gear ran smoothly easier said than done..... after a lot of trail and error i got one side of valve gera on and running very smoothly so chucked a bit more super glue about to lock the monting point up and then it was onto the other side, same process as before but i couldnt get smooth at all. 3 hours it took tonight of stripping down and rebuilding but i have finally got the gear on on running smooth. I found that bending the con rod out slightly heped as the cylinders are further out than they were for an N guage 2-6-0. Also what i found through a lot of trial and error is to make sure the fly crank & fly crank rod are set as close to the centre of the wheels as possible, alos i found that there is quiet a lot of play n the minitrix rods that making sure there is enough room around the motion bracket for the bits to move around, if not it gets tight very quickly and will undo any glued joints youv just done! After much cursing, cigs & tea i have finally got a rolling chassis of sorts together tonight. Heres a couple of pics shoing the vavle gear in place and the front extension glued in as well. The front bogie was added to check clearances and all seems to be well. Only problem now is ill have to take out the crankpins again when i put the idler gears, wheels and coupling rods in/on...........so ill be pretty much back to square 1 getting it all running freely again, but i suppose ill know what im doing this time, famous last words! I think thats it for tonight, apologies for any spelling mistakes and if its a bit of a ramble but its late and this valve gear has driven me round the bend. Hopefully by the weekend ill have a fully working chassis again and then i can crack on hacking the body about to get that distinctive cust down cab. Any comments critisims always welcomed, and if any one else has built one of these langley kits please let me in on any tips! Thanks for looking James

This is a follow up to my last Post which was devoted to Hornby’s release of Special Edition Duke of Gloucester. Hornby R3191 Duke of Gloucester left versus Hornby R2717 Apollo right What do I still think of the model? I am not so sure about value for money. Hornby R2717 Apollo left versus Hornby R3191 Duke of Gloucester right Hornby R2717 Apollo came with a wealth of added detail parts fitted at manufacture – almost too many to list. HornbyR2717 Apollo - a closer view Apollo came with individual lamp irons and detailed smokebox handles. There were holes for the lifting eyes in the front frames and the inside supports for the smoke deflectors were modelled. Hornby R2717 Apollo – the cab area What seems to me like a majority of the boiler pipes and fitting on Apollo are modelled with separate plastic mouldings. Inside the cab a number of the handles and instruments are again separate mouldings, the handles often picked out with paint. The cab roof itself comes with a sliding ventilator. What about my own Special Edition Duke of Gloucester? Hornby R3191 Duke of Gloucester – the cab area I have made a start on personalising my own model. I have picked out some of the operating handles in red and I have changed the overhead warning stickers to the 1960’s variety using Pressfix Transfers from the HMRS range. HornbyR3191 Duke of Gloucester - a closer view with straightened hand rail My previous post drew attention to improving the mechanical performance of the Duke of Gloucester model. However as noted by a number of you the visual appearance of the boiler handrail was not good – I would do something about it. No going back I should have slid out the handrail first - but but I didn't! For whatever reason the handrail knob by the whistle was fixed in at a jaunty angle about 0.5mm too high. I tried pushing from inside the body and then twisting to break the bond between the metal handle and plastic body. All I succeeded in doing was pulling the head off the knob, and bending the handrail wire (which is why it would have been better to slide it out of the way to start with). There was nothing left for it but to take the pliers and pull out the offending knob – no I have never wanted to be a dentist. The tools - and replacement knob I had one spare hand rail knob left over from a Mainline locomotive. Whilst not an exact match I thought that it could be made to fit the enlarged hole left by the misaligned Hornby knob. Oh dear I used a 0.5mm drill bit to clean up and realign the hole for the shaft of the hand rail knob. I then used a 1/16 inch drill as a countersink to hide the base of the Mainline knob. The plastic of the body is very soft and you can do plenty of damage just by rotating the drill bits by hand – so no need to even think of using a power drill. Phew – back together A touch of matt black paint around the hand rail knob and no one would ever know! There is I believe a significant difference in price between the Railroad Duke of Gloucester and the Special Edition. Yes – one comes with two etched name plates. Hornby also I think refer to extra painted detail. Perhaps they mean the silver paint to the hand rail wires? Well the layer of paint has its benefits because any damage caused by handling can easily be covered up. Nearly very good? Another view of my Own Special Edition. This is the same view that I used to start my previous Post but now showing the repositioned handrail knob. Hopefully the handrail is an improvement. As to the model – is it fair to compare Hornby Apollo with Duke of Gloucester? I guess it depends on what you think the Hornby advertising is trying to say. I would say that the Duke of Gloucester Special Edition is not in the same league as Apollo – much more Railroad standard. I guess Hornby might say a more detailed model would have to cost more - but how much more? Maybe another clever approach would be to offer the engine with a bigger bag of bits for the serious modeller to fit - a bit like the old Rosebud / Kitmaster models but updated of course?

There was a time when men were men and horses weren't lasagna. I’m currently building some horse-drawn vehicles for the little yard behind my goods depot. I began with Langley’s whitemetal kit for a GWR 5 ton wagon. This represents one of the standard designs often seen in photos from pre-grouping days, especially in the London division. It should be said at once that it isn't a finescale kit - indeed it's a bit rough in places. But with a little work I thought it would be OK for a position in the middle-ground of this little layout. The kit as supplied. At 20£ this is no cheap kit, though I imagine the three horses and carter are part of the reason. There is little flash, but most parts do need a bit of filing and tweaking to make a good fit. The instructions are reasonable, although some details of the assembly are left to the imagination. To improve appearances, I filed thick bits down to a leaner shape. I added rails between the side boards, and used wire in drilled holes to secure items (as per photo above). I compromised on the stanchions that support the "raves": These are moulded as solid triangles, but replacing them is not really practical, I think. In primer. The seating arrangement follows the elevated “Paddington” pattern (as opposed to the much more basic “Birmingham” style). The parts provided for this looked overscale to me, so I basically rebuilt the whole seating arrangement. The fore carriage was fitted in a way that allowed it to actually pivot. There are shire horses and then there are shire horses! The one on the left came with the kit along with two others. The one on the right is from Dart castings. I opted for two of the latter. I replaced the supplied chain with something finer. To fit the chains to the horses, I sunk bits of wire into the beasts, fitted the chain and then bent the wire to form a small loop. For the lettering, I needed yellow letters. There are no ready-made transfers available for these vehicles, so I plundered the HMRS GWR goods wagons sheet, building up the wording letter by letter. The spacing to accommodate the framing was also seen on the prototypes, although it is accentuated here due to the thicker castings. The HMRS sheet does have yellow letters, but not enough for my purposes, so as an experiment I used white letters and coloured them afterwards with a yellow marker. I wouldn’t really recommend this – it works OK at first but you have to be very careful with the subsequent varnishing or it will take the colour right off. I’m not entirely happy with the lettering, but life is short. Done. The chain in the middle is a rough indication of the chains and skids used for locking and braking the wheels when parked. I do like the ‘osses. I was going to call them "the Finching Sisters" in honour of the two lovely ladies on Robin's Brent layout. Then I realized they were male. In position in one of the cartage bays. Although one or two details don't stand close inspection on this vehicle, I am reasonably satisfied with the overall outline and feel of it. The wagon seen from inside the depot. Not sure what to add in terms of load. It is tempting to do one of the sky-high loads seen in some photos (eg here), but I think it might become visually over-powering on this vehicle. Maybe on the next one. Off-topic: Looks like a leftover from the new year decorations has found it’s way into the goods depot. Happy New Year everyone! Notes on the prototype For what it’s worth, I’ve added here some of my own notes on these vehicles. Note that they are mainly based on my own observations from photos and drawings. I do have "Great Western Road Vehicles" by P. Kelley, but despite some useful illustrations, this book does not really go into much written detail on the horse-drawn wagons. Perhaps "Great Western Horse Power" by Janet Russell is better, and worth a purchase? Design These wagons were used for standard and heavy goods cartage. There were different types built to this style, some with six “bays”, some with five. Some were built for a single horse, some for two or more. The tare and tonnage varied considerably across the different designs. They had the “Paddington pattern” of seat arrangement, where the seat was elevated above the wagon. Hoops could be fitted to accommodate sheeting. A light version of the same design was used for parcels delivery vans, with hard tops. Distribution The wagons were especially prominent at Paddington, where photos suggest they were the all-dominant type in the 1900s. However they were also used elsewhere on the system (even as far as Cardiff, according to one drawing). In some areas they seem to have been rare though, eg at Birmingham Hockley the dominant goods delivery wagon was of a quite different design. A photo from Slough in the 1920s shows the type I have modelled alongside one of the Birmingham style vehicles, so the different types did appear together at some locations. Livery In Great Western Way (original edition), Slinn states that by the 1900s, station names were applied to larger horse-drawn vehicles whenever there was room for it (as seen on my model above). I have a theory, though, that this practice ended sometime after 1905 or thereabouts: Looking at photos after that date, station names are no longer present, and the “Great Western Railway” and numbering is all on one plank. Slinn also states that numbering was in random positions, but as far as I can see the numbers on these vehicles were always at the front end of the wagon. Perhaps Slinn missed the fact that the relative position of the lettering and numbers was necessarily “handed”, because we read from left to right (ie on the left hand side, it would be written “667 Great Western Railway” and on the right hand side, it would be “Great Western Railway 667”). According to Slinn, the lettering for horse-drawn vehicles in the 1900s was yellow or gold, shaded or not. I doubt gold would have been used for wagons like these, and there is no apparent shading in the photos I have seen. So presumably plain yellow (but the shade of yellow not clear?). I have sometimes wondered whether the lettering was in fact white on some wagons, because it stands out with very high contrast in some photos. However, looking at photos of parcels vans (which are known to have had white letters on their hard tops) it seems that the letters on wagons were darker than white, so presumably yellow. Later in the 1930s, horse-drawn vehicles adopted a different chocolate and cream livery and a different lettering style.

The new printed sides for Victoria Bridge are now in place, painted, glued and merged around the edges with the existing wooden structure. I have painted the whole thing a creamy colour which is right for the thin uprights either side of the bridge, I just need to add a teracotta-ish shade for the main arch and structure beneath the deck. It is starting to look the part: OK, I'll come clean and admit some of this sky was photoshopped in, but it is mostly genuine! Most of my stock (apart from a few wagons) are temporarily boxed up while some house rearrangements are ongoing... a fellow RMWebber kindly loaned a Pannier tank to complete the 1950s scene: Thanks Alistair! The detail on the bridge front is nicely picked out by the paintwork. I'm also quite pleased with some weathering experiments on some old Peco wagons. They look a bit overdone, and almost cartoonish close up, but seem to tell the right story from normal viewing distance, as part of the 'picture' in the frame. The secret to enhancing the detail on the wagons, I discovered, is to paint the whole wagon with matt black enamel paint, then immediately wash it away with hot water from a tap. The hot water of course fails to wash away much of the dark shade, particularly the paint in-grained in the detail and among impressed gaps, leaving the effect you see above. I'll continue the experiments! ---------- Playing with some photographic angles at the Wyre Forest MRC club night, we couldnt resist trying some modern stock, albeit rather mis-matched. It struck me that for the odd half hour at shows, the model of 'Victoria' bridge could double as an 'Edward Albert' (the bridge of the same design a short distance upstream, which for now still carries coal to Ironbridge Power Station). If the Class 70 shown here had some matching coal hoppers, it would be a good approximation... http://www.ironbridgeguide.info/ironbridge_tour/tour_03.shtml (scroll down) http://www.flickr.com/photos/93173492@N00/4034964717/ Maybe I could have a stick-on cooling tower to announce a 'modern image freight' interlude! The real Edward Albert bridge differs from Victoria Bridge in having double track. Victoria Bridge was built with the same wider deck, but only ever had single track, the top deck being narrowed somewhere along the line. (The wide abutments bear witness to this.. replicated in my model). I quite like the look of the mixed load of china clay slurry and steel diverting its way though the Severn Valley. As long as it was explained well enough, it might be fun for odd moments with the micro-layout out on the road! Stock again courtesy of alibuchan of RMWeb fame! More coming soon.. including project 'shed' (I have been busy preparing a large rectangular bit of garden...)