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Models & Leisure white metal loco kits. (Premier Kits)


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Very nice I have one of those aswell in P4 I seem to remember he sold the splashes as a separate item if you wanted to do P4 .scaleforum was at a collage in London at the time it was the first scale forum that I'd been to and London road was being exhibited that was it I was hooked on the LNWR

John

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PS - I now also notice none of the wheels have counter balance weights, amongst other details........
But then I don't normally see these loco's static, they pull trains on the layout.
Static pictures seem to bog you down with the minutiae of details.

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PS - I now also notice none of the wheels have counter balance weights, amongst other details........

But then I don't normally see these loco's static, they pull trains on the layout.

Static pictures seem to bog you down with the minutiae of details.

Surely they had the space between spokes opposite the coupling rod boss filled on leading and trailing wheels filled in and the space between spokes about 45 degrees away from the rod boss on the driving axle filled in in rather than balance weights?   Relatively easy to make up compared to crescent weights.

 

We have a Star body on an Airfix chassis, It may well be M&L  it was a good model for its day after we fitted a Hornby 28XX Tender and shorted the airfix wheels to the chassis to get rid f the skid inducing pick ups. Sadly it is no match for the Hornby Star.

 

I have an unfinished Grange body for a Mainline Manor chassis, it was awful, not sure if M&L but the cab roof sloped back and the boiler was nothing like a GWR No 1 boiler.

 

I have a County 4-6-0, it may be M&L  scale width unlike Dapol Hornby with scale width Tender, its on a Hornby Hall Chassis with lather turned Hornby wheels and will pull 2 X Dapol Counties backwards.  Lovely model but its 30 odd years old so could be Bristol Models.

Edited by DavidCBroad
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The balance weights on these wheels are extremely difficult to reproduce since they are not flush with the face of the spokes.

I have a couple of Coal Tanks where I've used plasticine to replicate the weights in the spokes, but eventually they dried out a bit and rattled their way to freedom.......

... and Michael, I did manage to have them set back from the front face, the wheels were pre Gibson, probably Sharman's.

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....I have an unfinished Grange body for a Mainline Manor chassis, it was awful, not sure if M&L but the cab roof sloped back and the boiler was nothing like a GWR No 1 boiler.

....

Was the No.1 boiler in the Grange kit the exact same set of castings as used in the Star? If so, I'm trying to work out why it looked decent on one, but not the other...

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This thread reminded me that I had one of the M&L Star body kits in my stash so I pulled it out to have a look at it. Most of the castings are fairly neat but a close examination of the two boiler halves show a lot of surface pitting. Also when putting them together I notice that the left hand side is about 1 mm shorter than the right. When the boiler bands are lined up in the centre the band on the firebox is out of alignment and there is 1/2 mm difference front and rear. I'm assuming that these castings may have been made when the molds were getting towards the end of their lives.

 

The listing in post 17 of the ex M&L kits in the Gibson range shows that they made quite a few kits at the time. Can anyone list the full range including the time expired kits? Also does anyone remember who made the white metal kits of the Scott Atlantics and Lady series Saints and what became of that range?

 

Dave R.  

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.... does anyone remember who made the white metal kits of the Scott Atlantics and Lady series Saints and what became of that range?.

Westward. The range was held by Chris Parrish, who unfortunately passed away recently, so presumably the Westward, Perseverance and Puffers brands die with him.

Edited by Horsetan
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It was Westward who did the Scott Atlantic. Unsurprisingly it was almost identical to the Westward Lady/straight framed Saint. However, the Scott kit had a long coned boiler rather than the short cone which was more common (I think) on the Atlantics. Also the 3500 gallon tender supplied with the Scott kit was one with the Collett style deep frames.

 

DrDuncan

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  • 2 years later...

I have an M&L  GWR 850  class saddle tank with etched chassis.   I was just looking at it this afternoon, and thinking I must build this. So I soldered the two halves of the saddle tank together to get a better idea of how it might look.    The castings are not too bad, Far better than K's  would have been , but some bits are a bit chunky and will require some fettling.  If I am to carry on with it I must get a temperature controlled soldering iron.  I had to heat mine up then switch it off so I could use it without melting the castings. 

The chassis is very basic , and will need some work to make anything worthwhile of it.  

All in all though, I think it's worth doing, and one at least did last to the very early 50s at Reading.

 

Rob

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  • 6 months later...

Now joined the club just picked up a Ron Cadman premier kits Highland Railway Yankee tank which arrived today everything still wrapped and sealed in their original tissue wrappers and bags but a quick looks makes me think it looks like it will be a good kit so looking forward to starting it.

Edited by Londontram
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14 hours ago, drduncan said:

I’ve got a Great Bear to build in EM and I have a lot of thinking to do about what to do with the fold up OO only chassis.

 

DrDuncan

When I rebuilt my Dock Tank I cut the chassis down the middle and soldered new spacers under the stubs of the existing ones and it seemed to work OK. I am a bit of a bodger though....

 

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1 hour ago, Barclay said:

When I rebuilt my Dock Tank I cut the chassis down the middle and soldered new spacers under the stubs of the existing ones and it seemed to work OK. I am a bit of a bodger though....

 

WP_20200715_09_36_14_Pro.jpg.fe0418a1fc6d859fa7cda865da575e36.jpg

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I've done that for the J38 I'm building in P4 from a SE Finecast kit - despite using the designated EM/P4 frame spacers from the kit I found the frames weren't far enough apart to fit the Mashima 1426 in between, so I cut them down the middle with a Dremel disc-cutter and soldered the 00 spacers to the stubs.

 

Alasdair

 

Edited by AJCT
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7 hours ago, Barclay said:

When I rebuilt my Dock Tank I cut the chassis down the middle and soldered new spacers under the stubs of the existing ones and it seemed to work OK. I am a bit of a bodger though....

 

WP_20200715_09_36_14_Pro.jpg.fe0418a1fc6d859fa7cda865da575e36.jpg

WP_20200719_15_58_24_Pro.jpg.58902117c17ca87a77fdb9fdd986b821.jpg

The issue will be the effect moving the frames will have in the cylinders.  I think I will use a replacement comet 4 cylinder set which are mounted on their own sub frame.

D

 

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