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Phew! Superb weather but rather too nice to be stuck indoors doing any modelling. Even now (ten past eight), my modelling room is uncomfortable as it gets the sun all afternoon and evening. So, I've been mainly out in the garden reading and having my meals al fresco. Looks like this might carry on for a few more days. However, I did make some further progress with the Standard 2 tank before it got so hot. Using the second batch of custom etched parts from Rumney Models, I've made the cab roof, lubricator drives and fire iron rests. Still got some lamp irons and the shed/SC plate mounting to go, then it's complete. The roof is just temporarily clipped in place and will not be fixed till after painting, glazing and fitting the crew. This latter is a bit of a dilemma. As a push-pull loco, it should have driver and fireman in the cab when loco first but only the fireman when pushing (as the driver is in the driving trailer coach). I'll probably go for the two on board. I took the loco body out into the garden and took a few shots showing the new parts, hence the strong shadows. Dave.

92061 is now painted, weathered, and ready for action. An initial outing on South Pelaw was rather unsatisfactory. The pickups were not properly adjusted for the new wheels, so progress was rather intermittent. This problem has now been fixed, and I have also added pickups for the centre wheels, which makes a difference on my test track. During this process, one of the shafts that holds the gears in place within the chassis simply dropped out through the spokes while the locomotive was on its side. It slotted back in place with a slight click, and has stayed in since. We will see how she runs on South Pelaw, and as long as all goes well she will join her sister engines for a mammoth running session at RailexNE in a few weeks time. No crew are evident in shot above, and these have since been added. You can see the driver (a modelu one) lurking in the background of the picture below. Those of you who know about these things might have noticed that an air hose is missing from the front of the locomotive. I inadvertently broke it off, and this has now been fixed. These pictures do highlight the rather overscale screw coupling, which grates with me a little. On the other hand having a reasonably large loop to pick up under exhibition conditions does make life easier and less stressful. The handrail knobs look a bit big too ... Overall this has been a satisfying and fairly quick (for me) project. Now it is on to final weathering of the ore hoppers, tidying up broken bolsters, and fixing one or two missing transfers.

Exploring the blog concept with a view to maintaining a record of weathering processes, materials, tools and techniques. Entries will be sporadic and entirely dependent upon time and memory.