Castle Aching

[Regularity]

44 minutes ago, Nick Holliday said:

I have a full set of Scottish ones, including GNoSR, in my loft insulation.

Odd way to keep heat in your house…

 

Still, each to their own.

[Edwardian]

My experience of white metal wagon kits so far is limited to D&S.  The magic purple gel, however, is the key to success and sanity with anything white metal, I have found; soldering may still be best, but I reckon I'll be dead by the time they fall apart (assuming I've even managed to build them all before the Grim Reaper comes calling).

 

With these D&S kits, there was no explanation of how all the compensatory brass stuff was supposed to be constructed - in the good old days kit manufacturers assumed kit builders knew what they were doing! - but since none of my other stock is built with compensation, I already know I'll just have to lay level track! So I ditched all that.

 

I do like fold-up brass W irons, though I don't insist on them where I have a plastic kit or 3D printed item designed to do without them.  The D&S ones are a little bit flimsy, however, in the context of the brutish weight of white metal they're married to. 

 

As to the rest, they don't exactly fall (or even necessarily fit) together like other kits I've tackled, mainly Slaters and Cambrian plastics, and the degree of fettling and faffing certainly means they take me a lot longer to beat into submission than do their plastic counterparts (my modelling lacks subtlety and finesses, I realise). There is certainly a knack, though, which makes things progressively easier when building one after another.  The same is true with plastic kits, to be fair, and over the weekend I re-learnt the funny little ways of Cambrian Kits.    

 

But, plastic does make for more rapid progress, so here is something of the start I have made:

 

 

Left to right we have Cambrian Kits Gloucester 15' fixed end 5-plank. Apart from the alteration of V hanger bracket on the solebar, it's as God and Mr Cambrian Kits intended. I am considering filing down the face of the axleboxes and considering a way to replicate a cast 'W N R', which would be a nice touch, but we'll see.

 

Next is a 16' Cambrian chassis under the old Triang insulfish van body. I've always loved those Triang vans since I had my first as a small boy, which I painted blue to match the Triang Nellie I had.   Like some other ancient Triang toolings, you get a nice moulding that can be the basis of an upgraded model, and these cry out to be used with a new chassis on a freelance line. So, after a bit of umming and ahhring, I decided that the WNR could have one or two as modern successors to their 15' outside framed vans (more on those shortly).  I was then reminded that Linny had already pulled this trick, with their usual exquisite results,  so I have to apologise for the WNR having the same wagon as the Great Southern Railway.  One can only assume some personal connection between the companies' respective hierarchies led to the sharing of drawings.

 

Last is a Cambrian Kits Cambrian Rys 2-plank dropside body married to a Cambrian Kits Gloucester 15' underframe.   

 

 

Edited August 3, 2021 by Edwardian
spelling

[CKPR]

On 03/08/2021 at 11:19, Nick Holliday said:

I was just wondering what was so wrong with the old MWC kits

Some of the earlier ones were very hard to assemble  in alignment due to the masters being at fault  [e.g. "Wagons have their compensations", Model Railways March 1980] and they are generally not as easy to build as say ABS or D&S  kits or more recent  kits from 51L / Wizard or Dave Geen. To be fair, the range was upgraded a couple of times to deal with these issues and it might depend upon whether you have an earlier or a later kit.  As you rightly note, the built -in compensation  tends to, well, compensate for the issues with the bodywork as you can usually get a wonky wagon to run well when using separately fitted W-irons.

 

Don't get me wrong, you can build a decent wagon using the MWC kits and I've got a fair number of the Scottish ones in my stock boxes but these days I tend to give any unbuilt ones a miss. I could do with more CR pig iron and mineral wagons, both of which I've made from MWC kits,  but these days I'd probably find it easier to scratch-build them rather than tackle any more MWC kits.

Edited August 5, 2021 by CKPR

[CKPR]

34 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

Triang insulfish van body

Which is very similar to a L&YR van (Diag. 3)

[Edwardian]

7 minutes ago, CKPR said:

Which is very similar to a L&YR van (Diag. 3)

 

Now a roof door would be fun!

 

[CKPR]

Get cracking with the microstrip and a single ply of loo roll !  NB  the half-width roof doors are on one side only on the older L&Y vans but this might be different on the WNR.

[Compound2632]

52 minutes ago, CKPR said:

Get cracking with the microstrip and a single ply of loo roll !  NB  the half-width roof doors are on one side only on the older L&Y vans but this might be different on the WNR.

 

One I made earlier:

I believe that roof doors were universally half-width (for structural reasons) except on the later L&Y covered goods wagons that had inverted V framing on the ends supporting a longitudinal roof beam. Although I'm not so sure about the standard GS&WR type. 

[Regularity]

There was another Triang-Hornby van, which was I believe based on a H&B van for the body.

[Edwardian]

1 minute ago, Regularity said:

There was another Triang-Hornby van, which was I believe based on a H&B van for the body.

 

Yes. Infamous in that the depiction is structurally illiterate. 

[Compound2632]

But looks passable on that Cambrian Gloucester underframe:

 

 

True, the 45° bits of the corner ironwork look as if they're floating in mid-air. There are those who have laboriously infilled the sides to bring the boarding flush with the framing but that seems to me to be more trouble than it's worth - one would be better off starting from scratch. I was just thinking about the possibility of adding X-framing then realised that the 45° bits really are at 45°, not pointing at each other along the diagonal. One might do better chiselling them off.

[kingfisher9147]

Worsley works does some interesting brass kits

[Regularity]

11 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

 

Yes. Infamous in that the depiction is structurally illiterate. 

Maybe, but as the basis for something on the WNR, would it not serve a useful purpose?

[Edwardian]

8 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

But looks passable on that Cambrian Gloucester underframe:

 

 

True, the 45° bits of the corner ironwork look as if they're floating in mid-air. There are those who have laboriously infilled the sides to bring the boarding flush with the framing but that seems to me to be more trouble than it's worth - one would be better off starting from scratch. I was just thinking about the possibility of adding X-framing then realised that the 45° bits really are at 45°, not pointing at each other along the diagonal. One might do better chiselling them off.

 

3 minutes ago, Regularity said:

Maybe, but as the basis for something on the WNR, would it not serve a useful purpose?

 

I have considered this very treatment, Cambrian Gloucester u/f, to produce a fitted ventilated van for the WNR.

 

The problem is the incorrectly recessed side-planking. On the H&B wagon, the planking is flush with the framing.  This is because the diagonal iron brackets are affixed to internal bracing.  They look rather odd floating above the recessed planking.

 

It seems to me, then, that you need to do one of two things.

 

Either you build up the surface of the sides to conform with the prototype, which is a route to a passable H&B wagon ....

 

Or, you add raised cross braces to make sense of the brackets.  This would be an attractive option and good for a freelance wagon, however, query whether vertical planking would be appropriate? Vertical planking is probably more appropriate for outer cladding, over the frames. 

 

That's as far as my thinking got, and why I have not attempted a version of this van yet.

 

[CKPR]

There are three generations of  these pre-group vans in  the Triang-Hornby line as Hornby produced a NER refrigerator van in the early 1980s to replace the H&BR van , which  of course replaced the old Rovex 'insulfish' van in the early 1970s. The NER van was pretty good and just needed a proper under-frame to make it into a decent model. 

Edited August 5, 2021 by CKPR

[Edwardian]

29 minutes ago, CKPR said:

There are three generations of  these pre-group vans in  the Triang-Hornby line as Hornby produced a NER refrigerator van in the early 1980s to replace the H&BR van , which of course replaced the old Rovex 'insulfish' van in the early 1970s. The NER van was pretty good and just needed a proper under-frame to make it into a decent model. 

 

Good suggestion.  here the diagonal brackets are placed directly on flush planking, which properly reflects the construction of the wagon, with an outer cladding of vertical planks over the framing. 

 

 

Images from Hattons

 

I'm not sure whether it is an accurate model; it looks like the GNR and GNR-derived LNER vans, but the proportions don't look right (the prototypes I'm thinking of were longer in relation to their height than these models) and they had horizontal, not diagonal, corner brackets.

 

I'm guessing this is not more than an approximation of a real wagon, but, as it is one that is constructionally literate in the way the H&B one isn't, it could be a great little freelance type on another chassis. 

[Skinnylinny]

24 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

I have considered this very treatment, Cambrian Gloucester u/f, to produce a fitted ventilated van for the WNR.

 

...

 

Or, you add raised cross braces to make sense of the brackets.  This would be an attractive option and good for a freelance wagon, however, query whether vertical planking would be appropriate? Vertical planking is probably more appropriate for outer cladding, over the frames. 

 

That's as far as my thinking got, and why I have not attempted a version of this van yet.

 

Something like this? 

Granted, on a Dapol chassis that I had to hand, rather than a Cambrian one, but the concept is the same.

[Edwardian]

11 minutes ago, Skinnylinny said:

Something like this? 

Granted, on a Dapol chassis that I had to hand, rather than a Cambrian one, but the concept is the same.

 

Yep, so you've beaten me too it again!

 

More modelling, less musing is prescribed, I think!

 

But the general point is right, lots of usable bodies out there, take the humble Triang 7-plank, stick one of these on a Cambrian underframe and you're away!

 

[micklner]

RE worked to LNER Days.

 

 

 

 

Edited August 3, 2021 by micklner

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, Skinnylinny said:

Something like this? 

Granted, on a Dapol chassis that I had to hand, rather than a Cambrian one, but the concept is the same.

 

It does look like they did that while we were just talking, doesn't it? The transfers have only just this minute been applied...

Edited August 3, 2021 by Compound2632

[Regularity]

2 hours ago, Edwardian said:

It seems to me, then, that you need to do one of two things.

 

Either you build up the surface of the sides to conform with the prototype, which is a route to a passable H&B wagon ....

 

Or, you add raised cross braces to make sense of the brackets.  This would be an attractive option and good for a freelance wagon, however, query whether vertical planking would be appropriate? Vertical planking is probably more appropriate for outer cladding, over the frames.

Me? I don’t need todo anything…

 

Must admit that I was thinking more of the X-braced option. Some vans did have this style (e.g. MR D664, GCR vans), so I wouldn’t fret over it, just fret it out from styrene.

 

[Edwardian]

21 minutes ago, Regularity said:

Me? I don’t need todo anything…

 

Must admit that I was thinking more of the X-braced option. Some vans did have this style (e.g. MR D664, GCR vans), so I wouldn’t fret over it, just fret it out from styrene.

 

 

A covered wagon with timber X bracing over vertical planking is not something I recall having seen. So, if you know of one ... 

[Regularity]

10 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

 

A covered wagon with timber X bracing over vertical planking is not something I recall having seen. So, if you know of one ... 

yeah, the one you are about to build…

[Edwardian]

Just now, Regularity said:

yeah, the one you are about to build…

 

Yeah, thought so!

[Skinnylinny]

14 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

 

A covered wagon with timber X bracing over vertical planking is not something I recall having seen. So, if you know of one ... 

Not on the sides, but on the ends?



https://hmrs.org.uk/photographs/outside-frame-peaked-roof-goods-van-body-on-blocks-built-grcw-gloucester-no-0587.html

[Edwardian]

3 minutes ago, Skinnylinny said:

Not on the sides, but on the ends?



https://hmrs.org.uk/photographs/outside-frame-peaked-roof-goods-van-body-on-blocks-built-grcw-gloucester-no-0587.html

 

Yes, if only it were the other way around!