Van Weathering

[Suffolk Dave]

No, not one of the lesser known Dutch drainage engineers but some recent work with added photo, however, DON’T LOOK TOO CLOSE! I built these two 51L NER fish vans donkey’s years ago (15+ years if memory serves me well). They were given a coat of red oxide and stored in a box. Attempts to start a layout came and went in the intervening years and so, they remained tucked away in their box. 

 

With retirement I’m building a shunting puzzle, an apprentice piece I call it, something to polish up some old skills and learn some new ones. Of course, I need rolling stock and so out these two vans came. OMG! They were crap! Roofs peeling off, glue everywhere, their only redeeming feature being that all four wheels touched the rails. And for one of them that was only achieved after a heathy twist.  

 

Should I bin them or introduce them to Nitromors? I kept pondering this for a few weeks and finally decided to give them a second chance by adding transfers and some weathering. Overall, I like the results but deep down they are rough! Thankfully, I could build them better today but I still need to learn the art of placing running numbers in a straight line. Any advice offered on that would be appreciated.   

[Zero Gravitas]

There's probably good news and bad news here...

 

The good news is that I think the weathering and the transfers are absolutely fine - I've seen vans on exhibition layouts lettered and weathered to a significantly lower standard than this. And it's good to see vac pipes and steam pipes on fish vans!  My own approach to getting the numbering level is to use a bit of low-tack masking tape to create a straight, level edge and use this as the datum for positioning the lettering.

 

However - the bad news is that I've never seen an LNER van (or any UK van for that matter) where the door slid open to the left - every other example I've seen has opened to the right. In addition, I would expect these vans to have LNER pattern 8-shoe brake gear, with the off-set v-hangers; and they appear to have something more akin to LMS brake gear arrangements.

 

Edited to add - 57xx has corrected me below, so I’ve struck out the erroneous part of this post.  These are NER wagons and should have left sliding doors. Apologies for any confusion.  So in fact, there’s just good news :-)

Edited August 11, 2021 by Zero Gravitas

[brossard]

It's funny how our perception changes over the years.  I cringe when I look at stuff I built in my early years.

 

I can't judge the condition of the wagons from the photos, whether they are acceptable is up to you I think.

 

I do like that you have gone to the trouble to add the gubbins at either end.  The underframe will benefit from brake gear detail too.

 

Parkside/Peco have a very nice range of wagon kits.  These can be improved by the addition of etched parts from the likes of Wizard (ex Mainly Trains etches).

 

Getting running numbers straight is an ordeal.  Zero's approach is a good one.

 

Some examples of Parkside LMS Fish:

 

 

Built quite a few years ago and suffering from wobbly numbers.

 

 

Underframe detailing using parts from the Mainly Trains etches.

 

John

 

Edited August 11, 2021 by brossard

[57xx]

3 hours ago, Zero Gravitas said:

However - the bad news is that I've never seen an LNER van (or any UK van for that matter) where the door slid open to the left - every other example I've seen has opened to the right. In addition, I would expect these vans to have LNER pattern 8-shoe brake gear, with the off-set v-hangers;

 

They are NER wagons, not LNER. They are exactly right as per the pics in Tatlow's LNER Wagons. There are several other pics of NER wagons in there with doors opening to the left.

 

Dave, I think you have done a good job sprucing them up (or down?). As long as they pass the normal visual range test, I wouldn't worry about them up close.

Edited August 11, 2021 by 57xx

[Zero Gravitas]

8 minutes ago, 57xx said:

 

They are NER wagons, not LNER. They are exactly right as per the pics in Tatlow's LNER Wagons. There are several other pics of NER wagons in there with doors opening to the left.

 

Dave, I think you have done a good job sprucing them up (or down?). As long as they pass the normal visual range test, I wouldn't worry about them up close.

 

Well you live and learn - thank you. I’ve just been back to Tatlow to educate myself, and then I’ll go to my room and think about what I’ve done.

 

However, I still wonder if there is a reason why opening to the left was much less common than opening to the right.

 

And I’ll add to my post above to explain my error.

[57xx]

6 minutes ago, Zero Gravitas said:

 

Well you live and learn - thank you. I’ve just been back to Tatlow to educate myself, and then I’ll go to my room and think about what I’ve done.

 

However, I still wonder if there is a reason why opening to the left was much less common than opening to the right.

 

And I’ll add to my post above to explain my error.

 

I don't recall seeing any left handers before either, just remembered his LNER book also covered pre-grouping NER wagons so went to investigate. I can't think of any reason why it was less common.

[Suffolk Dave]

18 hours ago, Zero Gravitas said:

 

Well you live and learn - thank you. I’ve just been back to Tatlow to educate myself, and then I’ll go to my room and think about what I’ve done.

 

 

No probs! We’ve all been there at some point

[phil_sutters]

LSWR & S&D had outside framed vans with left hand sliding doors.

[65179]

On 11/08/2021 at 22:35, 57xx said:

 

I don't recall seeing any left handers before either, just remembered his LNER book also covered pre-grouping NER wagons so went to investigate. I can't think of any reason why it was less common.

 

GCR sliding door vans opened to the left too.

 

Regards

 

Simon