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The Stobs project


Richard Hall
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I'm having all kinds of problems with baseboard construction, but at least the viaduct is almost finished.

 

DSCN1525-L.jpg

 

My workbench is starting to look like Hawick yard in 1971, with piles of track panels (well, 500mm lengths of Finetrax anyway).  Hopefully I will be able to start tracklaying this month if I can get the baseboards to stop quivering like a nervous whippet.

 

Richard

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 01/03/2020 at 18:53, Richard Hall said:

The railway lands...

 

DSCN1608-L.jpg

 

Starting to make a bit of progress here: baseboards are near enough finished and I'm hoping to start tracklaying next weekend.  

 

Richard

 

 

Looking really good Richard, that viaduct is a belter!

 

Cheers

Dave

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March 1971, and track recovery work has reached just north of Barns Viaduct, leaving the severed stumps of the Up and Down lines.  A dismal sight. 

 

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Fortunately this is a model railway so the clock is running backwards. Tracklaying should be done in the next week or so.

 

Richard

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  • 1 month later...

Good to see some progress on this one, it'll be a cracker.

 

I've got some of the locos you might well end up with, as I'd originally built a layout set just south of Edinburgh on the WR. All N gauge, not 2mm of course.

76049,60052, A1s, peaks etc etc.

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On 22/04/2020 at 23:22, millerhillboy said:

Good to see some progress on this one, it'll be a cracker.

 

I've got some of the locos you might well end up with, as I'd originally built a layout set just south of Edinburgh on the WR. All N gauge, not 2mm of course.

76049,60052, A1s, peaks etc etc.

 

Progress has been slowed down by recent events.  The scenic section is stored at my workshop, storage loops are at home where I have been working on them, and railway modelling isn't included in the list of permitted reasons to leave home.  However I now have storage loops (named "Shankend" and "Stobs Camp Sidings"), a working DCC system built from MERG kits, and I am starting to work through some of the motive power that I will need.

 

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These two are very much work in progress - both lowered and with the nasty boiler "skirt" cut away.  The grey one has been converted to tender drive and has a proper underside to the boiler: the black one is still loco drive, with lead weights in place of whatever lightweight alloy Farish used.  It doesn't look quite as nice but it's a lot cheaper - I had to sacrifice a (slightly damaged) B1 to get the tender drive for the grey one.  The original tender from the grey loco will go behind a K3 when I get round to building that. 

 

Identities - grey loco will be 60969 (photographed through Stobs in 1961 and 1962).  Black one was going to be long-time St Mags resident 60824, then I realised that 60824 and 60969 both had outside steam pipes.  It seems a bit daft to have to make up steam pipes for the black loco when there are plenty of other identities available.  Nominate your favourite WR "V2" here...

 

Richard

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Good work and nicely timed as this just popped into my stream....

 

So this might be of passing interest but I thought I'd snap it as its literally lying right in front on me in the workbench which is now the home office these days.

I was actuall looking into replacing the front pony wheel with a see through one and also adding draincocks which are quite significant on the V2

 

IMG_6491.JPG.5117b6d1650cf132380129f2671e01d8.JPG

 

Interested to know how you went about getting rid of the awful skirting actually, never seen that done before. Mines is also lowered which I knew was a well known mod to these.

 

Also on your black one how do you have the space above the front pony, my one has a block there which a springed mechanim sits in that keeps the front pony on the rails I assume.

 

 

Edited by millerhillboy
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1 hour ago, millerhillboy said:

Good work and nicely timed as this just popped into my stream....

 

So this might be of passing interest but I thought I'd snap it as its literally lying right in front on me in the workbench which is now the home office these days.

I was actuall looking into replacing the front pony wheel with a see through one and also adding draincocks which are quite significant on the V2

 

IMG_6491.JPG.5117b6d1650cf132380129f2671e01d8.JPG

 

Interested to know how you went about getting rid of the awful skirting actually, never seen that done before. Mines is also lowered which I knew was a well known mod to these.

 

Also on your black one how do you have the space above the front pony, my one has a block there which a springed mechanim sits in that keeps the front pony on the rails I assume.

 

 

 

60824 with steampipes!  Now I'll have to choose a different identity: if Stobs does any Scottish shows you'll be getting an invitation as a guest operator, with locomotives. Looks a bit too clean for a St Margarets V2 if you ask me.  You can still see the lining...  

 

The skirting was removed with a sharp scalpel, at right angles to the footplate and about 45 degrees to the boiler.  I carefully cut round the sandbox fillers leaving them in place to support the footplate.  The plastic is very thin:  I used UHU adhesive to fix some lead weights inside the bodyshell of 60969 and it melted the top of the boiler.  There's a lot of filler in there now, and a Plastikard banjo dome.  I still need to tidy up the ragged edges along the bottom of the boiler on the black loco, with some shaped Microstrip to help hide the damage.  The profile of the lower motor casing fairly well matches that of the boiler so I'm going to try glueing thin Plastikard overlays to the motor, carefully shaped to be a close fit to the body.

 

On both locos I have chopped off the chassis level with the front of the cylinders so I can replace that square cast lump with something frame-shaped.  The grey loco has Plastikard front frames profiled to clear the wheels as per the real thing:  I haven't yet done the same for the black one.  I binned the spring-loaded system and instead packed the front coupler pocket with lead.  The wheels are from a Dapol Grange bogie from Coastal DCC, shimmed to eliminate any sideplay.  The axle hole needs opening out slightly as the Dapol axles are larger diameter.  I also have spoked trailing wheels, source unknown, really weird things with 6 spokes but the right diameter and still look better than solid ones.

 

It's a lot of work, but the Farish V2 is a very old model and out of the box it looks more like a K3 than a V2.  Alan Cumming suggested lowering it, and I reckon that makes more difference than anything else.

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:-) Count me in, I've got a lot of St Margarets roster and I'd love a chance to run them.  Genuinely please count me in irrespective of where you are showing, I'd like that a lot.

 

Great work on the V2 sideskirts, as you say its an old model now but at the time I remember it being the pick of my bunch compared with Farish A3s, A4s, the fact it had seperate handrails seemed amazing I recall!!

Yours will look superb in due course, although I do wonder if the model is an easy candidate for a refresh by Bachmann and bringing up to date with a tender drive etc. Bahcmann do have a habit of doing that kind of thing to me, I recall putting the finishing touches to a Foxhunter models kit A1, just as the Bachmann one came along!!

 

I too was going through the spares box trying to find a spoked front wheel for the V2, the solid one looks so awful now. I was trying I think it was either B1 or A1/A2 wheels but everything seemed to foul the spring loaded system which is why I was interested in your approach.

Alan actually lowered this V2 which was a great boost.

 

I hope you don't mind but I'm going to attempt to cement my invite by posting more Waverley stuff

post-81-0-20392100-1526154623_thumb.jpgpost-81-0-73931300-1526154950_thumb.jpgpost-81-0-36331300-1531520356_thumb.jpgpost-81-0-14361100-1512686307_thumb.jpg

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  • 3 weeks later...

Here we go.  Scenic boards for Stobs are now at home where I can work on them.  Starting with lifting and relaying the track south of the viaduct as I'm not happy with the alignment.  Never mind, here's 61184 with a Niddrie-Canal Class E: a taste of things to come.

 

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Modellers in larger scales might be unaware that an N gauge "Clayton" appeared in shops this week, completely unexpected and unheralded.  Here are D8585 and D8560 hammering upgrade past Stobs on a summer Saturday Dundee-Blackpool excursion.  If an N gauge RTR Clayton doesn't get people modelling the WR, nothing will.

 

Scenic work on the layout is progressing at glacial speed.  I blame the weather.

 

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 16/09/2020 at 15:35, millerhillboy said:

You'll have been pleased with the somewhat surprising appearance of the clayton model for this layout!!

 

Pleased?  I'm absolutely furious.  I spend two years trying to assemble an appropriate loco fleet for June 1961, and then that happens.  

 

Just kidding, it's a great model but has forced me to change direction a bit.  Rather than pick one moment in time I will now aim to run a representative selection of trains from the last ten years of WR operation.  

 

Meanwhile here's another fragment of Super 8 cine footage: filmed from beside the platelayer's hut to the north of the viaduct a St Margarets B1, looking nice and clean but with a "blow" on one of the cylinders, ambles away from Stobs with a Carlisle-Hawick local.

 

 

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14 hours ago, Richard Hall said:

 

Pleased?  I'm absolutely furious.  I spend two years trying to assemble an appropriate loco fleet for June 1961, and then that happens.  

 

Just kidding, it's a great model but has forced me to change direction a bit.  Rather than pick one moment in time I will now aim to run a representative selection of trains from the last ten years of WR operation.  

 

Meanwhile here's another fragment of Super 8 cine footage: filmed from beside the platelayer's hut to the north of the viaduct a St Margarets B1, looking nice and clean but with a "blow" on one of the cylinders, ambles away from Stobs with a Carlisle-Hawick local.

 

 

That looks really good and I know what you mean about the time periods. I am involved with a model of Horton in N gauge on the S&C. We decided to have some leeway by giving the period autumn 1964-67 when Kingmoor closed. It has given scope for a number of locomotives (including Claytons Blue and Green)  as well as the BR Corporate Blue intermingled with the Red of the earlier 60,s period.  Board and track down and scenery nearly ready to commence, but work and Covid have delayed things by around 5 months. I did think of doing a Waverly model before settling on Horton, and looked at Whitrope and some other sections. Given space I would love to do Whitrope Siding in OO, with a big depth of layout to give that bareness  and barran wind swept feel pre the forestation. I look forward to watching your project develop.

Cheers

Mac 

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Couple more photos for Iain Mac:

 

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Unusual motive power for a Kingmoor-Millerhill freight: a "Crab" clanks over the viaduct towards Hawick.

 

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BRCW Type 2 on a Carlisle-Hawick local passes a typical North British platelayers hut.

 

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Banking to Whitrope: a J36 gives a sturdy shove to a southbound freight.

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  • 1 month later...

Clayton on the Waverley:  D8560 heads north with what looks like a set of freshly overhauled and painted wagons ready to be fed back into the wagonload network at Millerhill.

 

(In other words I haven't got round to weathering any of my kit built wagons yet.)

 

DSCN2313.JPG.21e7dad056fd0d32e669462df24b899d.JPG

 

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ah great stuff Richard, very envious of the layout now.

 

I've also been building brown vans from the NGS, but mines went straight to 'worn' state!! I think vans are like 16tonners in that the variation in colours in both the van sides and roofs is almost unbelievable.

 

Like the CCT in the consist as well

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7 hours ago, millerhillboy said:

ah great stuff Richard, very envious of the layout now.

 

I've also been building brown vans from the NGS, but mines went straight to 'worn' state!! I think vans are like 16tonners in that the variation in colours in both the van sides and roofs is almost unbelievable.

 

Like the CCT in the consist as well

  I reckon I will need about 120 wagons for Stobs, up to around 60 at the moment.  Mostly N Gauge Society kits.  You're not wrong about the variety of colours, but there is also the mix of different van designs, a big jumble of heights and roof profiles.  I found a photo of one class 4 freight where the first fifteen vehicles were vanfits of fifteen different types.  I have been poring over photos to try and ensure I have the main freight flows covered - banana vans, fish and meat, Presflo / Prestwin cement wagons, oil tanks, grain hoppers etc etc.  I would say about half the vehicles were vanfits, about another quarter either Conflats or Highfits (often sheeted).  I'm aiming for that kind of mix.

 

The CCT is a Roger Chivers kit, just been made available again by his son and is available on Ebay. It's a Waverley "must have" based on this photo alone:

 

https://railphotoprints.uk/p741678313/h163BDDD7#h163bddd7

 

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10 hours ago, Richard Hall said:

The CCT is a Roger Chivers kit, just been made available again by his son and is available on Ebay. It's a Waverley "must have" based on this photo alone:

 

https://railphotoprints.uk/p741678313/h163BDDD7#h163bddd7

 

Very nice, I just ordered one.

 

Where did you source the 7mm wheels please Richard?

 

The layout is coming together very nicely, already oozes the Borders.

 

Cheers

Dave

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