Vanguard 5374

I find most 009 conversions of the loco to be too wide as the body is broad, there is a plastic bodied one that is better to convert but these are rarer. The chassis is good but basic, I’ve been stockpiling them for conversions that I have planned and this one was spare.

A little surprised at how this simply clips together, but it’s using parts from the spares box to make some extra locos. Matchbox diesel shunter body with a Bachmann Underground Ernie inspection loco chassis underneath, it’s a friction fit so I can just pull it apart when needed. The chassis happens to have a 8 pin decoder socket too so I could run it under DCC if I wanted. Next step is to remove some of the detailing, use fittings where possible, build up the bufferbeam in order to use it with OO gauge rolling stock.

Yes, Hornby have announced a new set this year.

Has everyone forgotten about Peco offering 1/120 items again?

I’m eyeing it up for a Jinty, yes there are a few differences but it’s more than close enough.

Tomica Mercedes Benz Citaro Keisei, quite toy like but does have potential. RHD is a plus 👌 Tomica “London Bus” is to a scale of 1/130, shown along with the Matchbox Leyland Titan. If anyone knows of a prototype for the “London Bus” I’d love to know.

Another model going for test printing, meanwhile I’ve purchased some chassis from Halling in order to make my locos motorised. If money allows I may purchase a few Hornby locos to cannibalise

Cruel closeups of the Sentinel I am working on for 1/120, including dummy chassis. Few bits to tweak and few areas to modify before release but I’m mostly happy - what do you think so far? Conventional locomotives will follow this one 👀

It does scrub up rather well, not bad considering how much I paid for it.

With time I may supply some items as 1/101.3 for the TT3 modeller but my main focus is 1/120.

Something else on the go for the TT modellers 🤔

Having been stung in the past selling STL files for home printing with a non commercial license and then seeing prints of those models sold by a “business”, I will not be sharing any STL files. I’ll be supplying kits directly to those wishing to model 1/120. https://spannershedmodels.weebly.com https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100091797274445

A few projects I have in the go, all of which are being developed as body kits for 1/120 modellers: LNER J70 LNER Y1/Y3 Generic 4 wheel carriage (many variants being worked on) Full write up to follow in the morning 😴

For now I’ve put the Jinty on the back burner but have gone down the Terrier route, amazingly a Farish Hall does lend itself into being reasonably close to a Terrier in TT in almost all aspects (wheelbase, wheel size) bar gauge. 14.75mm long axles, 1.5mm plasticard spacers and a little bit of work later gives me this. I’m still doing the driven axle and pickups but if it all works I’ll be doing further conversions.

It’s been used for N Scale so I’d assume the basic kit would work well enough as long as the models are free wheeling? One model that I have found to be close to scale (1/116 approximately) is the Matchbox Superkings Hovercraft, a model of the SR.N6 Hovercraft. Can’t vouch for how accurate it is but you can buy them cheaply if you wish to adapt one.

I’ve been working on another Leyland Titan (aka Matchbox London Bus) tonight and again it’s another 1/120 scale model that may be overlooked at first glance. The body is in two parts, allowing for the top deck to be removed, I’ll be gluing the two halves together and filling in the holes before sanding it all flush. The Leyland Titan is an cheap project to work on given how common these models are, the next one I do will be an open top tour bus. What I love about 1/120 is that we already have plenty of items out there to modify, it’s just a case of finding what will work.

I’ve been playing with a few items again recently. The bus is a Matchbox item and will be altered/detailed to suit my needs. The Lesney Pickfords van is being detailed and painted up in a fictional removals livery. The Micro Machines Ford ‘32 Vicky is a childhood toy and will be painted as a hot rod. The joy of planning a museum type layout is almost anything can go, within reason. The Guy Vixen is now bare and due to get a coat of primer.

I am due to have test prints of this loco and another for the chassis arriving shortly so will be doing a few test builds. When I know it’s 100% correct and fitting to the chassis, I’ll be offering the kits for sale.

That's my site, I used to produce 009 stuff (mainly) back in the day but now I'm tinkering with TT. If you're on Facebook, I post most updates on this group. Thankfully Halling provide STP files of their motor bogies, so I've been able to adjust the J70 to suit and build a Y1/Y3 around the bogie. I'm at the point of doing the CAD work with test printing to do next month.

Have filled in the web form in a bit more detail but after seeing the Fireless announcement, why not announce something that hasn't been done in British outline RTR before - a British outline tamper*? I'd put a Plasser & Theurer 08-16 through as a choice to provide a range of models, liveries etc. * - Bachmann may have made one but it's a continental machine, sold as a OO model despite being HO and is vastly outdated. I've had two and sold one on, the other providing bogies for a OO Scale USP5000C

I'm not a manufacturer but I feel if it was at a basic CAD stage when Accurascale announced their version perhaps a look at the market would have made the higher ups say "Oh they're doing that, the market will be smaller. Perhaps we will do something else or upgrade an older model to modern standards?" I wish we would have manufacturers announce models as an intention again like we used to, now we have surprise announcements of a model coming out that duplicates. Don't follow OO too closely but it's been a common event for a while now, it almost feels like every company has been guilty of duplicating or a victim of being duplicated at this point.

I find it strange how we see models duplicated with many of our beloved manufacturers, when you consider there are many models that have yet to get a RTR release. I can't exactly draw up a list of models because it'll have bias and it would be too long but surely looking away from the normal choices and going for something different could be a winner? Instead we see another model offered by two manufacturers. Again.

After a very long time I am doing models for this layout which will hopefully be built this year. Plasser USP5000C 77327 is being slowly measured up in order to make a CAD model for printing. I've yet to see a OO model of this type so will be pleasing to get it built. I'm struggling to find a commercial source of bogies with 9.5mm wheels and a 20mm wheelbase so it may end up using the mechanism from a Bachmann 07 Tamper. Work on the 08-12 (73913) shown previously is coming along too, with an aim of getting one printed and built this spring.

I’m one of those rare people who will wish to build a kit or scratch build even if a RTR model is available 😊 The chassis being made open source on its own, with anyone being able to download the CAD files to print their own parts, will surely give people several alternatives not under Hornby’s radar. Thank you, at the moment I’m ordering parts and pricing up items to make a shopping list for building these items. Won’t be cheap but certainly won’t cost the same as a Hornby loco. I’m designing two versions, a direct worm to drive version as above and one using a N20 motor on advice from a friend, making a gearbox of sorts along with it to give an alternative option. When the files for the chassis are out there, there is no reason why someone can’t tweak them to adapt it for another motor or gearing.