Eastwood Town - A tribute to Gordon's modelling.

[hayfield]

The method in this thread is slightly different to the earlier one, no black paint stage and using satin varnish.

 

Colron I thought is now acrylic rather than spirit which may explain the slight difference in methods

 

 

As for joining sheets, what I have done rightly or wrongly (using paving for platforms)  is to cut/sand back the 2 protruding tabs so that the rebates on the long sides but join better using plenty of solvent on the ends, fusing them together. Once dry I make up a runny batch of Green Squadron filler using Humbrol Liquid Poly, shape it and let it dry over night then sand.

 

Should work for brick, watched on of the Blunt brothers making a kit when they first came out and they also used a craft knife to make the brick joints on window and door apertures. Milliput is another good filler which can be worked over time then left to dry. I used the Green Squadron method on a Ratio station which I heavily kit bashed, once painted and weathered joins are invisable

 

Some make their own filler with plasticard dust/filings and solvent, easier to use plastic filler

[Brassey]

2 hours ago, gordon s said:

Thanks for that, Brassey. I had a quick look through the buildings thread, but there are 265 pages and it will be difficult to find. I did a secondary Google search and found this. Was this the piece you were referring to?

 

Starts near the bottom of this page:

 

He does refer to previously giving his advice on joining the sheets but where that is I do not know 

[martin_wynne]

 

Allan Downes also wrote extensively on the YMRC forum, starting 87 topics and making 2025 posts.

 

You can see a slide-show of his 1732 pictures here: http://yourmodelrailway.net/gallery_view_slides.php?user=1427

 

A couple of his topics:

 

A lifetime's work: http://yourmodelrailway.net/view_topic.php?id=15113&forum_id=15

 

Unfinished project: http://yourmodelrailway.net/view_topic.php?id=11497&forum_id=21

 

If you are a member of YMRC you can see a full list of his topics here: http://yourmodelrailway.net/view_user.php?id=1427&topics_started=1

 

Martin.

[St Enodoc]

12 hours ago, hayfield said:

Blunt brothers

As in H A Blunt & Sons?

[aardvark]

20 hours ago, gordon s said:

Apologies, I meant to ask, did Alan give any clues how he joined the sheets together or what his build process was?

 

I'm assuming he cut out the shapes of windows etc before painting and then had a complete front/end/side wall which was then laid flat and painted as above?

 

Allan made a few posts on this thread: Joining Wills Slate Sheets.  The first is typical Allan Downes gold, while the second and third might be useful.

[gordon s]

Thanks AA. Very useful.

 

Bit of a surprise this morning to see Alan's first post and realising the pic was taken by me in our front room.....

[hayfield]

9 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

As in H A Blunt & Sons?

 

 

Sorry yes, a wonderful old style model shop

 

 

[St Enodoc]

41 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

 

Sorry yes, a wonderful old style model shop

 

 

Well, well, well. I grew up in Mill Hill and Blunt's was my local shop. Every Saturday morning we'd go shopping in the Broadway after which Dad would take me up to look in Blunt's window and, if I was really lucky, inside the shop to buy something. As you say, a wonderful shop run by two wonderful men, Peter and Alan, who encouraged my interest gently but persuasively (with an eye, I suppose, to getting hold of most of my pocket money, which of course they did!).

[hayfield]

I grew up just south of Watford, in my early years there were 2 decent model shops with quite a few others selling new and second hand models, once I had a car Blunts was on the radar, a truly wonderful shop.

 

My favorite was Puffers at Kenton, owned by the late Chris Parish and of course John Redrup downstairs in the basement with all the finescale items

 

Harrow Model shop was another interesting place with Norman running the model train side

 

Happy days, I am now very lucky with John Dutfield's close in Chelmsford and thankfully seemingly very busy

[St Enodoc]

2 minutes ago, hayfield said:

I grew up just south of Watford, in my early years there were 2 decent model shops with quite a few others selling new and second hand models, once I had a car Blunts was on the radar, a truly wonderful shop.

 

My favorite was Puffers at Kenton, owned by the late Chris Parish and of course John Redrup downstairs in the basement with all the finescale items

 

Harrow Model shop was another interesting place with Norman running the model train side

 

Happy days, I am now very lucky with John Dutfield's close in Chelmsford and thankfully seemingly very busy

Puffers became a regular haunt later on, when I lived in the Midlands. If I had a meeting in London I'd try to finish early, get the DC to Kenton, half an hour at Puffers then on to Watford Junction to pick up an express for Tamworth.

[bigwordsmith]

1 hour ago, St Enodoc said:

Puffers became a regular haunt later on, when I lived in the Midlands. If I had a meeting in London I'd try to finish early, get the DC to Kenton, half an hour at Puffers then on to Watford Junction to pick up an express for Tamworth.

many years ago, when building my first ‘proper’ railway with a good friend in my parents’ loft, we heard that Puffers was having a massive sale of smoke damaged stock.

 

we duly jumped on the train from East Grinstead to VIC thence cross town and on to Watford Junction, before ending up at their front door.

 

we came home laden with stuff at discounts of up to 75%!

 

the only time I’ve bought as much in a single spree was at the NEC a decade ago!

 

Nowadays, although I’m 20 minutes from guagemaster who have a huge range, but all at mrrp, I find my new BFFs are called Hatton and Rails, with occasional wanders in the direction of Kernow!

[gordon s]

Hi Guys....As always, hope you are all keeping well and dealing with self isolation.

 

There's still many jobs to do, but with no ply in the garage, the new shed board will have to wait. Trying to prioritise things to do, but find myself easily distracted once things are running......

 

I may try and pick up weathering again. Haven't done any for years, but all this pristine stock of vans and 16T wagons is not helping create an illusion of a well worn railway back in the 60's.

 

Next up on the decoder front is a late Britannia, 70048 celebrating The Territorial Army fiftieth anniversary in 1958. Whilst searching this morning, I learned from Richard Derry's book on Britannias, it could have been called 'Furness'. Whether that was true or not, i don't know, but that big name plate certainly looks the part.

 

Another DJH kit where I can just make out a 26A shed plate which is Newton Heath. Having Googled, I find that the shed is somewhere in the Manchester area, so very much LMR territory.

 

I do love these later 1D tenders that were also fitted to 9F's. There's something about those high sides that make them look quite streamlined compared to the various bumps and vents of the earlier versions.

 

Edited April 3, 2020 by gordon s

[cb900f]

Gordon,

 

Newton Heath shed c&w football team went on to eventually become Manchester United.

pete

[gordon s]

I had no idea that was the case, so looked up more info on Google. Says they were Newton Heath LYR which stood for Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway and were from the carriage and wagon department.

 

There was a second Newton Heath team from the Motive Power Depot called Newton Heath LOCO. Fascinating stuff.

 

They’ve come a long way since 1878.

 

Thanks...

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Manchester_United_F.C._(1878–1945)

[Chimer]

Bunked round Newton Heath shed many a time back in the day - it was on the 6(?)-Manchester-sheds-in-a-day itinerary published in one of Ian Allen's Locoshed Guides (I think), complete with details on which buses you needed to take to get around …… now I'm beating myself up trying to remember the others - Longsight, Trafford Park maybe?  Someone will know …..

[A Murphy]

Gorton, Patricroft, Agecroft?

[BoD]

16 hours ago, gordon s said:

I had no idea that was the case, so looked up more info on Google. Says they were Newton Heath LYR which stood for Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway and were from the carriage and wagon department.

 

There was a second Newton Heath team from the Motive Power Depot called Newton Heath LOCO. Fascinating stuff.

 

They’ve come a long way since 1878.

 

Thanks...

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Manchester_United_F.C._(1878–1945)

 

Didn't Newton Heath play in yellow and green, the colours that a lot of Man. U. fans, including some of their ex-players (usual suspects) wear as a protest against the Glazers.

It may not have been Newton Heath  but the green and yellow definitely comes from a source such as that - and NH does ring a bell.

 

 

[gordon s]

They did indeed....I wondered where that came from.

 

 

Funny old day. Thought I'd add decoders to my Bachmann DMU's. No problem with the power car as an 8 pin Zimo plugged straight in. The trailer car was a real pain. It has a 6 pin DC/DCC plug and I've faffed around for a couple of hours to see if I could use an 8 pin decoder. I probably could, but all of mine were too large to fit in the little space they leave in the lavatory. Height and width are restricted, so in the end I had to order some DCC 6 pin decoders at £20 each. That's £55 for the two decoders......

 

.....and here's the rub. Turns out the interior lights are permanently on. I only found that out after testing by reading the data sheet. Whilst the front decoder is controlling the motor and the directional lights, the rear decoder is only doing the directional lights and nothing else. I had no idea you couldn't turn off the interior lights via a function, so a pretty expensive solution.

 

Next up will be a beer and the virtual Grand National....about the nearest I'll get to sport for some time.

 

To make matters worse, I just looked out the bedroom window and noticed a family walking across the 7th fairway with a push chair, football and frisbee.....

 

Saints alive, that's hallowed turf.....

 

Difficult really, as if you are stuck indoors with children and no garden, acres of nice cut grass must look really attractive.

 

[hayfield]

4 minutes ago, gordon s said:

To make matters worse, I just looked out the bedroom window and noticed a family walking across the 7th fairway with a push chair, football and frisbee.....

 

Saints alive, that's hallowed turf.....

 

Difficult really, as if you are stuck indoors with children and no garden, acres of nice cut grass must look really attractive.

 

 

The trouble is for quite a number of years many people have no respect of others property. I was a member of Bushey Hall Golf Club for many years, quite often especially in the early evening in the summer members of the public trespass on to the course with no respect to either theirs or others safety, one evening after driving off on the 3rd down hill (its a blind drive with a call up bell) I got to the brow of the hill to find a middle age woman on the fairway playing with her dogs.

 

Fortunately or perhaps unfortunately, she was not hit by my ball, however it is not safe having dogs on the course where they could easily foul leaving a biohazard for golfers.

 

Another time whilst on the 7th tee a scout leader and his troupe started to cross the fairway via a right of way, however they stopped in the middle of the fairway and started to set up a cricket pitch. Had I not seen it myself I would not have believed it.

 

As I said many have little respect of others property

[BoD]

47 minutes ago, gordon s said:

To make matters worse, I just looked out the bedroom window and noticed a family walking across the 7th fairway with a push chair, football and frisbee.....

 

 

Could have been worse...

 

…… it could have been the 7th green

[cb900f]

3 hours ago, Chimer said:

Bunked round Newton Heath shed many a time back in the day - it was on the 6(?)-Manchester-sheds-in-a-day itinerary published in one of Ian Allen's Locoshed Guides (I think), complete with details on which buses you needed to take to get around …… now I'm beating myself up trying to remember the others - Longsight, Trafford Park maybe?  Someone will know …..

 

At a guess Patricroft, Heaton Mersey , Belle vue, Gorton and maybe Stockport Edgeley ?

 

Pete

[St Enodoc]

9 hours ago, hayfield said:

 

The trouble is for quite a number of years many people have no respect of others property. I was a member of Bushey Hall Golf Club for many years, quite often especially in the early evening in the summer members of the public trespass on to the course with no respect to either theirs or others safety, one evening after driving off on the 3rd down hill (its a blind drive with a call up bell) I got to the brow of the hill to find a middle age woman on the fairway playing with her dogs.

 

Fortunately or perhaps unfortunately, she was not hit by my ball, however it is not safe having dogs on the course where they could easily foul leaving a biohazard for golfers.

 

Another time whilst on the 7th tee a scout leader and his troupe started to cross the fairway via a right of way, however they stopped in the middle of the fairway and started to set up a cricket pitch. Had I not seen it myself I would not have believed it.

 

As I said many have little respect of others property

All the courses round here are fully-fenced.

[gordon s]

Here it’s not unusual for courses to have several old public footpaths either cross the course or run around the perimeter. We have several adjacent to fairways and there are fences to prevent access, but of course there have to be gaps to move from one hole to the next and whilst there are the usual warning signs about it being a golf course, no public right of way and danger from flying golf balls, there is still open access.  Normally it’s not an issue and we enjoy walking our dogs around the course footpaths on a summer evening. Naturally that includes sitting on the clubhouse patio for a beer or two halfway round.....

 

I really have to think carefully these days what day it is. All the pointers such as golf games, sport on TV etc have gone and our home has become a desert island. At least we’re heading into warmer days and can get out into the garden.

 

Today will probably see the Derby Lightweight pulled apart and it will be a case of tracing back the connections to the interior lights and hooking up a pair of function wires from the decoder. Never done this before, so the meter will be out to check connections, output voltages and polarity. As the interior lighting is all in the separate body, I’m hoping it will be straightforward, but jobs that appear easy, rarely are.

 

On the plus side, the model looks the part and runs really smoothly. The front headlights are bright enough to dazzle the whole of France, but that may be a CV adjustment. 
 

If anyone has done something similar, I’m all ears....

[hayfield]

5 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

All the courses round here are fully-fenced.

 

At Bushey Hall there is one public right of way L shaped crossing 2 fairways an through a wooded area, but many see this just as an access area to exercise their dogs and neither dogs or owners keep to the footpath. There are also two other large areas which are public accessible and local kids continually damage the fences, there is also one other area where dog walkers trespass on to a industrial area and again have broken fencing

 

Children will always push the boundaries, but what gives adults the right to trespass on private land !  They would go mad if I exercised my dog (if I had one) in their back garden and let it foul on the ground.   

[hayfield]

1 hour ago, gordon s said:

I really have to think carefully these days what day it is. All the pointers such as golf games, sport on TV etc have gone and our home has become a desert island. At least we’re heading into warmer days and can get out into the garden.

 

 

 

Snap

 

Went to bed last night thinking hard what day it is, not worked for 3 weeks, retiring in 4 weeks with no sign of returning, lack of sport and other activities to indicate what day it is. Still if I start a job I don't have to worry about finishing it within a certain time. Trying to fit in DIY/gardening in the morning and modelmaking in the afternoon, just need a plan and perhaps a few time based goals