The Metropolitan drop-sided wagon got finished, finally.

I was slightly dissatisfied with my assembly of the body, so chose not to go overboard with replacement parts for the brakes and such. The brake blocks, hangers and push-rods are by RFM, because that was easier than fitting the parts from the kit, but the outside V-hanger, brake lever and guard are all the castings from the kit. Because SEF castings are rather good, they look OK IMHO. The buffers are also castings from the kit.

The livery is dubious. On the one hand, there is written support for the M E T. branding being in use c1909. On the other, I found at HMRS, a painting-specification drawing of 1912 for this kind of wagon showing Metropolitan written out in full along the length of the side.

It's a reasonable kit, but I think I will not build more of them when I do more wagons of this type. Replacing the floor to accommodate a modern suspension was a lot of work, and it might be easier to build from scratch in plastic with printed fittings. And I'm trying to eliminate filing and milling work on lead-bearing materias for health reasons.

Having cleared out one Unfinished Thing, I felt empowered to start another, viz:

This is an antique kit won from eBay a while ago. It's an ... interesting build. On the one hand almost everything actually fits, which is above average for pre-CAD etchings, and there are useful tabs and slots for main assemblies. The underframe was particular easy. On the other, each of the body sides is made from four laminated layers, two of them half-etched so prone to cockling under heat, with a further overlay for the body ironwork. That is not at all easy to build without a resistance-soldering set (and I have two of those but both are bust).

This is an example of something that today should not be etched. The body should clearly be moulded or printed.

The roof in the kit is flat plasticard. That's a flat-packed disaster in waiting, so I rolled one from 0.015" brass. That is really easy if one has rolling bars. The cover for the oil lamp is actually done as a three-part etched thing - seriously! - and that's not happening. I shall use a print or a spare casting. Also, the buffers from the kit shall be replaced with RFM prints.

Two nights ago it had got to this stage:

...and you can see how clean the soldering isn't. With a conventional iron it's almost impossible to get the layers to bond without clarting the surfaces. Hopefully it will scrub up OK; I'd removed a few grams of solder already before taking the photo. Note also the filler (Miliput super-fine) at the ends where the corners didn't come out clean. Body ironwork was added to one side last night and you're not getting a photo of that because it look leperous, but I think it will clean up OK. I'll show it when I've got some primer on it.

Livery is slightly tricky. I really wanted to do the as-built livery of c.1902, but the HMRS transfer-sheet doesn't have the markings. I shall end up with the 1908 livery (white lettering, diamonds, large LNWR) and the CATTLE BOX branding can be made up by scavenging the letters from depot allocations of brake vans: BUXTON, LONGSIGHT and CARLISLE should do it.

The colour is also not quite clear to me. It needs to be the NPCS brown livery, sometimes described as "plain chocolate", but how should I make that colour? The kit instructions say to use the "plum" coach colour: does anybody know if that is right?

On 29/08/2020 at 07:36, davidbr said:

The arrangement with sideways sliding sashes is called a Yorkshire sash.  Sometimes, the outside frames are proud and the centre one(s) slide behind them.  I made a couple for my workshop.  They are much more convenient than the up and down sashes as there are no cords or weights.

David, many thanks for that info.  Being from the West Riding myself I can see that such a common sense arrangement would have originated oop North.

Now fresh back from the yards at Winchcombe and Toddington on the GWRS https://www.gwsr.com/ I can report the following -

1: GWR 6 pane windows had panes 9.25" x 10.5" 

2: The bricks on both sites were 9" x 3" x 4.375" (actually 8 15/16" x 3" x 4 3/8")

3: Mortar was sometimes thinner than the 3/8" based on the 10-12mm stated UK practice - horizontal layers (bed joints) between courses were found to be 3/8", but vertical (head joints) were 1/4" - Confirmed - on these brick dimensions only  1/4" header mortar would permit the centring requirements of English or Flemish Bond - an extra 1/8" would have your header bricks noticeably out of centre after more than 4 bricks or so. 

There were more details noted, but first I have to interpret my son's numerals and put things down on a drawing to make proper sense of them.  My son noted the dimensions as I ran around quickly with the tape, shouting out numbers, and my dear wife sat in the car wondering what had become of her Bank Holiday Sunday drive in the Cotswolds.  

I was pleased to discover that my drawing of the Winchcombe weighbridge, based on counting bricks from several photographs, was only 3.52" out on width, 2.63" out on length and, amazingly, only about 1/4" out on height of the main walls.  Frankly I don't think I'll be making any significant changes to the drawings.

There appears to be another weighbridge building at Toddington, unfortunately inaccessible, which looks like a larger sister to that at Winchcombe.

As a slight disappointment it appears that the actual weighbridge table at Winchcombe is a relatively modern' installation - '1945 - POOLEY'  is cast on the plate.  Nevertheless some interesting detail of the raised 'non-slip' (?) surface.  See Henry Pooley & Son and W & T Avery on Wikipedia - I doubt that an earlier date for either company name would be considered unreasonable, and I would imagine these cast iron tables took a lot of punishment over years in service.

Something I discovered at Toddington was what must rank as possibly the smallest signal box on the GWR - 95" x 63" with four (perhaps five, it was hard to see) levers inside.  According to the info I have on the Tetbury signal box, that was 109" x 109", making Tetbury twice the size of this exampe on a square foot basis.   I don't yet know whether it's an authentic building that's been rescued and relocated, but it should be just the job for my planned three turnout layout, working title 'Blandings Parva'.  

BTW: Tetbury is now happily serving as someone's garden man-cave - https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1316901/Railway-fanatic-dismantles-signal-box--transport-150-miles-rebuilt-garden.html),