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Great Southern Railway (Fictitious) - Signalling the changes...


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I was looking at some S&DJR trains c. 1900 - a truly rural line - a standard formation of five 6-wheelers was not so dissimilar from yours, but still with a higher ratio of first class: brake / 5-compt third / 4-compt first / 5-compt third. Lots of luggage / parcels space. Another rather similar situation on Midland services on the Evesham line. I mentioned the Birmingham suburban services - these used 6-compartment brake thirds. The 48 ft carriages provided for the Evesham services (contemporary with the other sets I discussed) were formed brake third / third / composite / brake third. The composites had 7 compartments, like the firsts used on the Birmingham suburban services, but divided up 4 first / 3 third. The brakes had just 4 third class compartments, i.e. a much larger luggage / parcels space - clearly rural trains were dealing with a much higher proportion of non-human passenger-rated traffic than purely suburban services, as one might expect. Overall the accommodation was 4 first / 19 third, not so far off that LSWR rake.

 

Conclusion: late 19th century Surrey was much more rural than one might suppose.

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So, an update:

 

My laptop is (quite literally) falling apart. One of the hinges has somehow torn itself apart. A new laptop has been ordered, being a slight upgrade, but this has somewhat wiped out my modelling budget for the next month or two. However, I've got plenty of kits, card, and scale drawings to keep me busy for the next little while. My card modelling experience has actually been coming in useful at work too, so I suppose that's good. 

 

I'll still be going to the Uckfield show in October, as I've already bought my bus tickets down, and it would be lovely to bump into any of you who happen to make it there. I continue to be recognisable by the brightly coloured hair! 

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5 hours ago, Skinnylinny said:

My laptop is (quite literally) falling apart. One of the hinges has somehow torn itself apart. 

 

I'll still be going to the Uckfield show in October, as I've already bought my bus tickets down, and it would be lovely to bump into any of you who happen to make it there. I continue to be recognisable by the brightly coloured hair! 

 

Same thing happened to my laptop a while back, fixed it with an offcut of steel sheet and some spare loco bolts!

 

I was planning to give the Uckfield show a miss under the excuse that the one and a half hour drive was too far - which I guess I can't use now if you're coming down from Scotland! Might have to reconsider - could tie in nicely with a trip to the Bluebell...

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2 hours ago, TurboSnail said:

I was planning to give the Uckfield show a miss under the excuse that the one and a half hour drive was too far

 

It'll be well worth the trip. I say that as a completely non-biased person of course.

 

Gary

Membership Secretary (Hon)

Uckfield Model Railway Club

 

 

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13 hours ago, TurboSnail said:

I was planning to give the Uckfield show a miss under the excuse that the one and a half hour drive was too far - which I guess I can't use now if you're coming down from Scotland! Might have to reconsider - could tie in nicely with a trip to the Bluebell...

I can definitely say that if the show is as good as it was last year (and from what I've heard it should be!) it will be well worth the drive. There was some absolutely exquisite modelling last year, and a good supply of traders too. Made a nice change for me to be able to get hold of Southern stuff, which is usually hard to find up in Scotland! 

 

To clarify, not only am I coming down from Scotland, I'm coming up by overnight coach, and going back down the same way. I'm sure Gary will forgive me if I fall asleep around lunchtime on his couch! 

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39 minutes ago, Skinnylinny said:

I can definitely say that if the show is as good as it was last year (and from what I've heard it should be!) it will be well worth the drive. There was some absolutely exquisite modelling last year, and a good supply of traders too. Made a nice change for me to be able to get hold of Southern stuff, which is usually hard to find up in Scotland! 

 

To clarify, not only am I coming down from Scotland, I'm coming up by overnight coach, and going back down the same way. I'm sure Gary will forgive me if I fall asleep around lunchtime on his couch! 

 

Well, I've got no excuse then! I'll make the effort...

 

Any recommendations on which day to visit the show? If I can spend one day at the show and one on the Bluebell Railway then it should make a pretty good weekend!

 

(maybe I should stop hijacking Linny's thread for this!)

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Feel free to keep hijacking! If it means more of the lovely pre-grouping lot show up, so much the better. 

 

I'll be there both days, and the show opening hours will be the same both days. I usually reckon on the first day of the exhibition being the best day to grab any bargains, myself. I may need steering away from South Eastern Finecast and Roxey Mouldings, even with my dodgy soldering skills... 

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I'll look forward to meeting you!! Ask any of the club members for me (or the purple headed one™) and they will know roughly where I am. There will be at least 3 current of former RMWeb Pre-groupers there over the weekend, I have advised everyone to come Sunday, so hopefully we can all meet!

 

Gary

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Returning briefly to modelling, I've decided that I'm not at all happy with the painting of the card LSWR carriages, so I'll be cutting out a new set of parts for each of them and airbrushing them rather than brush painting. Part of the difficulty with painting card is its absorbency, which leads to the paint thickening even as it flows off the brush. 

 

Alternatively, I could look into using shellac - can shellacked card be laser cut? This might give beading parts a little more strength as they can be extremely flimsy in raw card. Something to experiment with... 

 

Meanwhile, I'm hoping that I've left my lining transfers at the club. I've not been able to find anywhere that will print me a one-off sheet of transfers in white that doesn't either have a long waiting list or prices above what I can afford, so I'm going to try some hand-painted curves... 

 

20190917_101858.jpg.fc63c381e8b75d11e122ef848a485518.jpg

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I considered that, but given how flimsy some of the bits are, I'd rather do it beforehand. I don't want to go near this with a paintbrush of anything! At least not until it is firmly glued to something more solid... Flimsy is not the word. Some of these bits can be bent by literally breathing on them funny... 

 

20190905_192216.jpg.89acd8cd309489cd024ae6ec89ad7090.jpg

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Well, it turned out that my box of transfers isn't at the club after all...

I've lined out one-and-a-half splashers, but I'm not very happy with them - I need more practice, and these will get a lot of touching up in several sessions over the next week or so - so these will probably get repainted at some point in the near future. The lining was painted with Citadel acrylic paints and a very fine brush. I know that a bow pen would (with some practice) provide much better results, but for the next little while, funds are going to be very tight. Not only have I just had to replace my laptop, but I've found out that I'm likely to have to move house in the next few months. This may mean completely redesigning Linton, we will have to see.

20190917_192213.jpg

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I know what you mean about the absorbency of card, I've had that too, and I agree with Jim, if you get the end beading glued down then it won't move/break.

 

Over here (Canada) you can get Shellac in a spray can, is that an option?

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Even polyurethane is fine at a pinch for treating card.  One of my now very old card 'O' gauge coaches was sealed with polyurethane before painting and it's still fine even after lots of being handled and taken to exhibitions, a house move and being stored away in various boxes.

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My box of transfers has appeared, so further work has happened towards the lining of the Radial tank.

 

20190924_211901.jpg

 

I'm still not convinced by the curved lining, but it's getting there. The lining makes a huge difference to the appearance of the livery! Below the loco is seen posed with Kingfisher24's Highland Loch (which started out as an Oxford Adams Radial, and which donated a bunker full of coal to mine:

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And when I got home, I couldn't resist posing it on the shelf with some LSWR-liveried carriages I had lying around. I can see this being a rather nice train when completed!

20190924_230054.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

Not much to report I'm afraid - modelling time has been limited over the last two weeks, with the discovery that my flatmate has bought a house. Paperwork is still being done with mortgage brokers and solicitors, so I still have a little time, but I have been spending most of my free time flat hunting. This, of course, also means that plans for Linton are also up in the air at the moment, although I am hopeful for one particular flat which would have the necessary space...

A little work has happened on the lining of the Radial, and I have added some slim tension-lock couplings to two carriages which I bought at the Glasgow show back in February - decently bashed-about Triang clerestories which look to be intended to be LSWR 45-foot carriages, as the brake matches some drawings fairly closely - which had been painted in Southern green and were being sold for a song (£15 for both, if I remember correctly). A quick respray with Phoenix chocolate and salmon (after removing the lettering transfers to prevent show-through) and I have two carriages which, while not perfectly accurate (the waist panelling isn't deep enough for a start!) are perfectly plausible LSWR carriages which fill a gap in the roster until I can build more appropriate ones. The builder has done a fair chunk of work on them - adding footboards to bogies, completely new underframe equipment (although the lighting dynamos and battery boxes had to go and I'll be fitting lamps to the roof soon enough). I need to do something about that droopy front buffer on the 1st/2nd composite though! And yes, I know that technically such a train should have a brake compartment adjacent to the locomotive. I'll get around to it!

20191003_190900.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

All has been quiet in Linton, for too long! But no longer. It is the time of the annual migration southwards to warmer climes, for the Uckfield show. Always a highlight of the year, although the journey down, traditionally by overnight Megabus (sadly no other overnight travel options are available, at least not on my budget!) is usually less fun. I'm looking forward to seeing Gary (BlueLightning) again, and to meeting a few others from the Pre-Grouping section of the forum. 

Anyway, it is about time for the epic 12-hour journey to begin... If you live closer to Uckfield than Edinburgh (454 miles by road, according to Google Maps), what's your excuse? :P

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