1970's motor-cars for goods yard staff.

[PhilJ W]

21 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

 

I'd love to know.

 

I had a decade or more long break from using enamels until the past year, and when I started using them again I was really astounded by how quickly modern enamels "flash off", making them far harder to use than the old-style ones. Now need to completely re-learn painting technique!

I thought at first that someone was confusing them with acrylics but apparently not. Perhaps Humbrol and other paint manufacturers have tried to make oil based paints quicker drying like acrylics forgetting that sometimes slower drying paints are better in some circumstances.

[C126]

Now going quite 'off topic', thanks for confirmation @Nearholmer and @PhilJ W !  I wondered if my memories of painting Airfix aeroplanes forty years ago were rose-tinted, or perhaps the room this week was too hot.  Hey ho, something else to grumble about in old age...

[Northmoor]

On 07/02/2021 at 16:55, Nearholmer said:

Set myself a memory test, and have got 17/20.

 

The residents of the road that my mother still lives in, c1973, with their transport. Very few if any of the women worked, so jobs are those of the men.

 

Gives a bit of a view of the demographics of car ownership.

 

Widow - walked.

Window cleaner - secondhand minivan, repainted with brush and a tin of paint. Recently graduated from a motorbike and sidecar.

Chief mechanic at local garage - Always something new and immaculate, a perk of the job.

Teacher (my father) - moped or 'bus until he got a post near home, then he walked.

MoD Radio specialist - Half-timbered Moggy Minor.

Bricklayer - walked, miles if necessary to get to a site, carrying his gear.

BR Van driver - walk or bus.

Bank clerk - Mini Traveller that only got used at weekends, walked to work.

Retired - walked or used taxis.

Retired - staggered (to and from the pub lunchtime and evenings)

Gardener/nurseryman - push-bike, a really ancient but immaculate one.

Insurance agent - Morris Marina.

Retired Bank Clerk - 1950s Austin A40 Estate, grey and highly polished!

????? - walked

Widow - walked

Draughtsman (and seriously good railway modeller) - Reliant 3-wheeler.

Council road labourer - walked.

 

A decade earlier there had been only two people in the street with cars (the garage mechanic and the bank clerk with the old Austin, which was quite new then).

 

 

That's a really interesting recollection.  I grew up in rural Pembrokeshire in the 1970s/80s and by comparison, car ownership in that sort of area is/was very high.  I can't recall many households without a car because unless you drove, you basically didn't go anywhere!  There was one bus into town from our village per week (this was an improvement, when we moved there in 1974 it was one per month). 

 

The number of cars with "one careful lady owner" (including my first, bought from the garage when we spotted our neighbour had traded it in) would have been surprising to someone from urban Britain.  This is probably true of many agricultural areas; kids all learn to drive ASAP (despite the expense) and farmers' kids learned especially early.  One lad I knew was spotted driving a combine harvester on the road when he was nine years old and no, he wasn't sat on someone's lap.....

[Nearholmer]

It changed rapidly, and using 1963 (20 houses, 2 cars), 1973 (as scheduled), and 1983 (at least 15 cars, and still rising) gives some indication. 

 

BTW, its not an urban area, its a small (now medium-sized) town on the outer fringe of London commuting distance. The big, huge, change "then" to now has been the disappearance of many local jobs, particularly retail, branch-banking, MoD, light industry, as the town has gone from fairly self-sufficient at c15 000 people to largely dormitory at c25 000.

[64F]

7 hours ago, C126 said:

 

Many thanks to both you and @BernardTPM for these suggestions.  I admit my confidence in painting small models has had a hit, with my starting yester-day to paint 'on the sprue' a model Foden Haulmaster (why does the enamel dry so quickly?!), but I will give it a go when the shops open and I can buy some more colours.  Thanks again to you all.

If you do go down the black window route I suggest doing one window at a time, painting from the inside where as possible, and immediately wiping a scalpel around the edges on the outside in order to get a nice clean line and remove any overpainting.   Small spots of stray paint should come off with a scalpel once it dries, but getting a neat edge is best done while it's wet.

 

 

[crompton 33]

Or you can use a Permanent black marker pen.  Around the window  frames.

[C126]

On 17/03/2021 at 20:35, BernardTPM said:

If you can pick out the headlght surrounds in chrome silver that would much improve the frontal appearance of the A60. Real one in the same colour here.

 

Just wanted to thank you again for this (although the link appears to have vanished now), and show my recent attempt when I had the tin of silver paint open to do the tea-chests and a steady hand:

 

 

Hope people agree this is an improvement.  I will have a go at window surrounds mentioned further down the thread later.

[Barclay]

On 29/08/2021 at 12:23, C126 said:

 

Just wanted to thank you again for this (although the link appears to have vanished now), and show my recent attempt when I had the tin of silver paint open to do the tea-chests and a steady hand:

 

 

Hope people agree this is an improvement.  I will have a go at window surrounds mentioned further down the thread later.

If you have a really steady hand there's the chrome trim down the side too!

 

 

 

Edited December 20, 2022 by Barclay

[PhilJ W]

I have a Minix Ford Corsair which someone had repainted dark blue and painted on the thin chrome strip that runs along the top of the body sides. It was very well done but over the years a lot of it has rubbed off due I suspect to being handled.