Wright writes.....

[Chamby]

1 hour ago, t-b-g said:

 

There has been less unsolicited criticism recently. Probably since the last major discussion on the matter. Certainly since I stopped posting any photos of what I am working on. Remember my signalbox with no closure bricks at the corners and windows and with round cornered bricks? I do!

 

That was the last straw for me as far as posting any photos of what I am building on here.  ....

 

And the thread is less rich because of it, I feel.  It has been noticeable recently, the content seems to be more dialogue and less sharing of modelling.  But maybe that’s more to do with lockdown?

 

We are a mixed community, to which I am a relative latecomer, but feel privileged to have been accepted as a participant.   There is clearly a core of people who know each other well and have friendships going back decades in some cases.  Harsh banter is acceptable in such friendships, but perhaps it invites a similar level of criticism from others where the depth of friendship hasn’t developed to the same extent, and the mutual respect hasn’t reached such a mature level.  Mutual respect is earned over time, and the deep respect developed  by some members of WW towards each other is very evident on here.

 

I thank everyone on WW for making me so welcome here, despite me being an ‘outsider’ to the inner circle, having never seen Little Bytham or Retford in the flesh, and only becoming personally acquainted with Tony through his stand at Warley each year.  In lockdown, this thread is a wonderful source of modelling interest, knowledge and banter and it has improved my own modelling subject awareness and understanding substantially.  

 

To all those who post their stuff up on here, knowing that social media can be harsh and cold at times, I am very grateful.  Please, don’t be put off by the meanie trolls, the vast majority of us are most appreciative.

 

[MarkC]

3 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

I'm not a modeller of the ECML but: what evidence have you that the whale oil was conveyed in tankers rather than in barrels? Barrels could be transported in ordinary opens and would presumably have been much easier to handle and distribute at the London end.

Hector Whaling had whale oil tankers, I think. I know that the Hector Heron ended up being operated/manned by British & Commonwealth in the conventional oil trades after commercial whaling ceased. Had it come from the Antarctic by ship, loading it into rail tankers would have been a lot easier than discharging it ashore, then having it decanted into 45 gallon drums (For youngsters, the modern equivalent is 209 litre drums...)

 

Mark

[robmcg]

5 hours ago, APOLLO said:

 

...

 

Just back from a walk over Boars Head bridge, the railway looks quite nice in the snow, pity no Super D's passed !!! 

 

Brit15

 

 

 

I could create a picture of one using a lovely RTR weathered G2a...     smoke included.

 

 

Not exactly Boars Head, more like deepest Wales.

Edited January 23, 2021 by robmcg
added comment and pic

[Headstock]

23 minutes ago, robmcg said:

 

Pre-Stanier LMS?   That's about as bad as liking the NER.  Ye shall be cast into the outer darkness, towed by a brass B16 or Q7....

 

At least for the Fowler 5XP 4-6-0  Bachmann gave them metal smoke deflectors... and they come with endless accessory parts,almost enough for me to consider actual modelling....

 

Evening Rob,

 

actual modelling! what about your digital recreation of that Fowler Pacific, or are you afraid of the outer darkness?

[robmcg]

Just now, Headstock said:

 

Evening Rob,

 

actual modelling! what about your digital recreation of that Fowler Pacific, or are you afraid of the outer darkness?

 

It is an intriguing idea , a Fowler Pacific, but no, the hens would stop laying....    look what happened to Churchward.    Only Gresley managed success in this area before 1930.

[ScRSG]

In the spirit of showing things we have done during lockdown, my latest effort is a K4 from a Dave Alexander kit.

 

 

Chas

[Tony Wright]

8 minutes ago, ScRSG said:

In the spirit of showing things we have done during lockdown, my latest effort is a K4 from a Dave Alexander kit.

 

 

Chas

Lovely stuff, Chas,

 

Thanks for showing us.

 

Is 61995 the one with the oddly-shaped outside steampipe, but only on this side?

 

I assume Dave's kits are no longer available?

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

[Chas Levin]

21 hours ago, Chamby said:

 

Tony, I think the question perhaps should be... why does it matter?   Anything other than absolute accuracy down to the point of counting individual rivets, takes you into the slippery subject of what level of accuracy is acceptable.  That, as we have discussed before, is different for different people, and can vary considerably across different aspects of modelling, from lamps to crests to shades of green, subtleties in the profile of tumblehomes or roof profiles... the list is endless! 

 

The reality is is that joe public and the majority of railway modellers for that matter, have no idea whether a tender should have an extra strip across the bottom of it, or not.  They probably haven’t even noticed that some tenders have them, and others don’t.  The fact that different styles of tenders were swapped between locomotives at different times in their lifespan makes it a very specialised and minority subject such that few would be able to criticise from retained knowledge, whilst observing a model in the exhibition hall.  Even on this forum, we have to constantly refer to photographic sources to check up on such details. 

 

So, playing devils advocate here... what are people’s thoughts on why it does matter?   I don’t think I will ever get a model 100% correct... so why do we beat ourselves up so much about these historical minutiae?

I think this has to be a purely personal question and based on one's own interests and enjoyment: if it matters to you, or to me, that a particular detail is right and it gives you or me pleasure to research that detail and replicate it accurately on a model, then for us, it does matter, but only to us and only because we care about it. As long as the process gives us enjoyment it's a Good Thing, though if it causes us stress then I would question it: a new diagnosis of 'Finescale Anxiety Syndrome' (FAS), perhaps?

Equally, if you or I run a model on our layouts that is incredibly inaccurate but which we enjoy running (perhaps for sentimental reasons - I have quite a few old RTR items that my dad used to run when I was a kid that definitely fall into this category) then I don't think it does matter at all that they are not to the same standards of fidelity.

Problems occur when one person judges another's activities according to his own criteria ('did you see the width of the splashers on that XYZ7 he was running?!'), but that's another story.

Pursuing perfection is a very widespread human activity and can be very therapeutic. Woody Allen defends the tacked-on happy ending he adds to the play-within-a-film at the end of Annie Hall, by saying that we try to get things to come out perfectly in art because it's so difficult to do so in real life...

[James Fitzjames]

37 minutes ago, ScRSG said:

In the spirit of showing things we have done during lockdown, my latest effort is a K4 from a Dave Alexander kit.

 

 

Chas

That is one bonny engine...

[ScRSG]

24 minutes ago, Tony Wright said:

Lovely stuff, Chas,

 

Thanks for showing us.

 

Is 61995 the one with the oddly-shaped outside steampipe, but only on this side?

 

I assume Dave's kits are no longer available?

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

 

Yes, the steampipe is an oddity peculiar to this loco and is only on the one side. The reason for this is unknown to me, perhaps someone knows?

 

Dave's kits are no longer available except on the likes of ebay and there is no news of anyone having taken them on. I was lucky enough to know of one owned by a friend and he kindly passed it on to me, re-imbursement by some nice French liquid!

 

Chas

[APOLLO]

The modern railway. Sat here at my computer I can hear trains whiz past on the WCML north of Wigan, just south of Boars Head. I have this site bookmarked and often click on it to see what went by - modern trainspotting without actually seeing the train ?? It's pretty accurate also. I like the double headed electric container trains heading north, screaming up the bank at a fair clip, sometimes shakes the windows a tad !!

 

https://traksy.uk/live/M+22+ECCLES+4/M+48+MSGT+-15/M+27+INCE+-27+487Q

 

I'm two blocks to the left of Wigan NW.

 

Here's one for Tony, though Little Bytham isn't marked, you need to count the blocks.

 

https://traksy.uk/live/M+22+ECCLES+4/M+48+MSGT+-15/M+27+INCE+-27+487Q/M+23+RSKNGTN+-6

 

Brit 15

 

 

 

 

 

 

[jrg1]

11 hours ago, Bucoops said:

 

That sounds like the same kit - 

 

 

Have a measure up, especially of the body height. I have found the need to trim a bit off - 

 

 

Really need to get back on building mine - I'm at the point of working out how to fix the roof on and my first attempt failed and got a bit despondent. I'm very interested in how you get on with yours.

Yes it is-I will check the height as you said.

for the roof, I have MJT cast ends and aluminium section.  The coach ends are a pair of Kings Cross (!) castings, and I spent yesterday trimming the MJT castings to fit the coach ends.  At one stage I was just going to fit a formed plastic roof, but decided to persevere with the metal components.  

I was going to build the kit as a diagram 111 with no guard's ducket, but the coach side etch location is blank-so a ducket will be fitted for diagram 154.

[St Enodoc]

8 hours ago, grahame said:

All to offen people resort to saying that a particular livery is rubbish, or modern railways are boring, or narrow gauge is pointless, or freight trains shouldn't be seen.

'Twas ever thus, I fear Grahame.

[St Enodoc]

6 hours ago, Black Marlin said:

Modellers of the ECML, a question: 

 

I've been reading Brookbanks's "Triumph & Beyond: The ECML 1939 - 1959" and he mentions that in WW2 there was a daily train of whale oil that ran in the winter of 1940-1 from Merseyside to King's Cross. Does anyone know what tankers belonging to what company would have conveyed whale oil? I have never seen such a thing modelled, and it would be an intriguing thing to send rolling round a layout...

 

Gavin 

How about these?

 

https://www.cambrianmodelrail.co.uk/store/C76-BR-WHALE-50ton-BALLAST-HOPPER-WAGON-p93692321

[St Enodoc]

4 hours ago, t-b-g said:

 

There has been less unsolicited criticism recently. Probably since the last major discussion on the matter. Certainly since I stopped posting any photos of what I am working on. Remember my signalbox with no closure bricks at the corners and windows and with round cornered bricks? I do!

 

That was the last straw for me as far as posting any photos of what I am building on here. Such comments go beyond "constructive, helpful criticism" and were more "extreme nit picking" in my opinion.

 

Somebody even suggested I would have been better building it with Stretcher Bond brick, which would be completely wrong for the building modelled. To receive constructive criticism suggesting that I make a model worse than it is was just not something that sat well with me.

 

Anyway, I will say no more on the matter. It has been talked about enough and if I am coming across as being moany, it is best that I shut up and say nothing.

 

 

 

Tony, as one who commented on the round-cornered bricks, I apologise it you took it the wrong way. It was not intended as a criticism of your specific model but a more general observation on the characteristics of 3D brick mouldings compared with printed brick papers.

 

Sorry.

[johndon]

2 hours ago, ScRSG said:

Dave's kits are no longer available except on the likes of ebay and there is no news of anyone having taken them on. I was lucky enough to know of one owned by a friend and he kindly passed it on to me, re-imbursement by some nice French liquid!

 

I was told that someone had bought Dave's stuff with a view to bringing at least some of the kits back to market but I don't know what happened after that...

Edited January 24, 2021 by johndon

[john new]

23 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

Tony, as one who commented on the round-cornered bricks, I apologise it you took it the wrong way. It was not intended as a criticism of your specific model but a more general observation on the characteristics of 3D brick mouldings compared with printed brick papers.

 

Sorry.

Non-sharp slightly curved edges seems to be a problem visible in a lot of 3D prints you see photographed on here and elsewhere. Is there a difference between the fluid light set types and the filament extrusions?

[James Fitzjames]

Having spent more hours than I care to count this week wrangling over loco renumbering/detailing, I did, at one point, find myself considering the whole accuracy issue. Was turning my mind to jelly over such minutiae as allocations, brake types, coal rail plate versions, curly sixes etc., as well as real exotica like Westinghouse removal dates and buffer beam holes, actually doing me any good? Was I deriving any pleasure from it?

I arrived at the conclusion that, though these details can be trying, I want what I model to be as 'right' as I know how to make it, it's really as simple as that. The 'line' will draw itself naturally, as it does for everybody. Pen-throwing and raw expletives are just part of the fun.

[t-b-g]

24 minutes ago, john new said:

Non-sharp slightly curved edges seems to be a problem visible in a lot of 3D prints you see photographed on here and elsewhere. Is there a difference between the fluid light set types and the filament extrusions?

 

I think the reference to 3D was about the bricks being embossed rather than any that have been 3D printed. We were talking about Slater's embossed brick sheet.

 

49 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

Tony, as one who commented on the round-cornered bricks, I apologise it you took it the wrong way. It was not intended as a criticism of your specific model but a more general observation on the characteristics of 3D brick mouldings compared with printed brick papers.

 

Sorry.

 

There have been many buildings illustrated on here over the years, often with embossed brickwork from Slaters and other sources. It just happened to be mine that you chose to comment about.

 

You are quite right. It does have rounded corners when you view it on a screen many times life sized. When seen on a layout, you can see the colour and you might just pick what sort of bonding has been used but I certainly can't see rounded corners or closer bricks.

 

The Slaters brick has been around for many years now and the tools for embossing it are clearly worn.

 

As Tony W can't recall the box in question I will put a couple of photos up along with a close up of the brickwork that has rounded corners when you view it this big.

 

 

 

Now imagine the number of hours that went into that, including scratchbuilding correct pattern furniture for the interior then putting photos of it up on here to be told by two people that I could have done better on the brickwork! Would that encourage anybody to put any more photos on here?

[St Enodoc]

5 minutes ago, t-b-g said:

I think the reference to 3D was about the bricks being embossed rather than any that have been 3D printed.

Yes, that's what I meant.

 

I do use Slater's brick and stone sheets myself, as well as kits with moulded bricks and stonework, because I try to avoid paper- and card-based products due to the risk of them being eaten by silverfish (I think it's the cellulose in the glue that they like rather than the paper itself but the end result is the same).

Edited January 24, 2021 by St Enodoc

[t-b-g]

I should have included this one, just to raise a smile. The cat is carved from plasticard and the mouse is a blob of solder on a tiny bit of very thin wire.

[Headstock]

4 hours ago, robmcg said:

 

It is an intriguing idea , a Fowler Pacific, but no, the hens would stop laying....    look what happened to Churchward.    Only Gresley managed success in this area before 1930.

 

It is an intriguing idea , a Fowler Pacific, but no, the hens would stop laying.... 

 

Bantam hens ?

 

look what happened to Churchward.

 

Retired and hit by a train I think?

 

Only Gresley managed success in this area before 1930.

 

Gresley and Henry Greenly.

[Iain.d]

On getting up today I note that WW had moved on about 4 pages since I posted my picture of a SR box van, and some very interesting discussion too, although I don’t recall any direct criticism of anything for some time now.

 

I was a lurker here for many years and felt that my model making would be of little interest or meet the quality of what was being shown. And then I thought so what if they don’t like it. I don’t ask for criticism, but if someone wants to offer constructive criticism I’m more than happy to receive it; whether I act on it is another matter. 

 

To me, it’s about putting things in perspective. I had a boarding school education (for some of it), I did 23 years in the British Army (from the bottom to a reasonable way up) and have at first hand, countless times, seen the absolute worst of man’s inhumanity to man, on foreign and not so foreign shores. I would consider my skin to be reasonably thick but can still be hurt by many things, in my self-learning, its as much, if not more, about how I react that matters.

 

I would implore people to contribute to this thread with examples of what they do. Personally I’m not a fan of pages of text nor equally one word responses. Pictures are interesting. In posts with pictures I would love it if the poster would tell us a little bit more about what they have made. I try and include a picture in as many posts as I can and as much text as I think is interesting (well it would be to me anyway if I was reading it….) but feel that I am becoming repetitive – especially when it comes to rebuilds of old Hornby Stanier coaches. Mind you only four more to go; maybe two today and two in Feb and then its onto other stuff. On the other hand, I put the information in because I have no idea where I wrote it first time in the previous however many hundred pages. I build really simple stuff and the aim of my posts is to put a basic story of what I did, how I did it and what I used, which will hopefully encourage others to think, ‘well actually, that’s not too hard, I can do that.’

 

Anyway its time to go to the beach….

 

But before I go, I’ll leave you with a picture, nothing to do with recycled Hornby’s or the ECML. It’s a Ian Kirk Maunsell Corridor Third.

 

 

So why show it? Well it’s the first model carriage I made where I ‘really tried’ to get it right. It was originally built in 1991, straight from the packet and painted maroon, it ran many miles on a 10x6 layout in our back bedroom! In 2000 I stripped it and started again. Once rebuilt I thought it looked pretty good (and I still think it does) but it is riddled with prototype errors that would offend the purist. It’s the wrong Diagram to be in SR Set 398 (it should be a low window 4 compartment vehicle), it has the wrong running number(!), the bogie centres are wrong, it rides too high, I think it should have battery boxes on both sides, the roof is a less than perfect fit…and it’s the ‘wrong’ colour green! But I don’t care – I’m happy with it. Please just enjoy what you do and be kind to each other.

 

Kind regards,

 

Iain

Edited January 24, 2021 by Iain.d
Changed a word

[Iain.d]

1 hour ago, t-b-g said:

 

I think the reference to 3D was about the bricks being embossed rather than any that have been 3D printed. We were talking about Slater's embossed brick sheet.

 

 

There have been many buildings illustrated on here over the years, often with embossed brickwork from Slaters and other sources. It just happened to be mine that you chose to comment about.

 

You are quite right. It does have rounded corners when you view it on a screen many times life sized. When seen on a layout, you can see the colour and you might just pick what sort of bonding has been used but I certainly can't see rounded corners or closer bricks.

 

The Slaters brick has been around for many years now and the tools for embossing it are clearly worn.

 

As Tony W can't recall the box in question I will put a couple of photos up along with a close up of the brickwork that has rounded corners when you view it this big.

 

 

 

Now imagine the number of hours that went into that, including scratchbuilding correct pattern furniture for the interior then putting photos of it up on here to be told by two people that I could have done better on the brickwork! Would that encourage anybody to put any more photos on here?

That is just so good!  I think it looks very convincing - especially through the windows. I copied (sorry!) the images to my computer for future reference.

 

I think I 'liked' it first time round - if I didn't, I should have.

 

Kind regards,

 

Iain

[MarkC]

6 hours ago, ScRSG said:

 

Yes, the steampipe is an oddity peculiar to this loco and is only on the one side. The reason for this is unknown to me, perhaps someone knows?

 

That looks very much like the steam pipes fitted to some (but not all) of the V1/V3 class; the others having straight pipes. I wonder if a new steam pipe had been required for running repairs, but there was only one of those to hand?

 

Mark