Kings Cross Model Shop

[coachmann]

It was more like a Jewelry Store than a model shop. Everything in glass/perspex cases.

 

Best, Pete.

Sounds a lot like Maggie's brass butique in Sheffield, an off-shoot of Sharps but stocking all the Jap Brass American locos. A great place to browse and dream in the 1970s but one needed a second mortgage to take anything away.

 

In Manchester we had Tyldsley & Holbrook and Bassett-Lowke. There was actually a crowd around the latters shop window when I was making my way to Victiria one teatime looking at the brandnew Horby Dublo 3-rail 8F 2-8-0. A new release in those days was an event. Today we can't keep up them...

[trisonic]

Aye, Coach, not many new releases but you could always buy something without waiting years for a re-order.

 

Best, Pete.

[Brian Kirby]

Wouldn't that be Mega Models in Rathbone Place (or Street), they were also infamous for selling a less than perfect ready-to-run brass LNER P2, and maybe a V2 as well? I believe this shop had a connection with Mek's Models in Mackenzie Road, Holloway, which had opened earlier and sold secondhand. I only went to either a couple of times, i didn't like the people involved and they only lasted a couple of years.

I always liked the Mopok range, they produced some useful parts, although i wasn't so keen on the printed coach sides, they used to produce transfers as well, which covered the various CCT and GUV kits, plus the GWR Hawksworth's, including the Dynamometer Car. Tony at KX used to speak of his earlier involvement and the various associates, i seem to recall the latter address being in Glossop, which ties in with the previously mentioned North Derbyshire.

Didn't Adrian Swain use up all those spare BR castings on his own ABS BR Suburban coach kits? These were in the style of a Mopok kit, but without the wood! Again the sides were pre-coloured and printed on clear vinyl. The chassis/floor was a folded 'U' shape in tinplate, with a pre-shaped acetate body and cast ends, cast underframe and details, plus Tri-ang Mk1 bogies. Once you had made the interior, it was then sealed inside for life, fingers crossed that no seats came loose. It was a devil to get the printed sides stuck on to the acetate neatly and putting the guttering on was even trickier, you never saw many of these made up! Another odd thing was that the kits came in cardboard tubes, so they were difficult to store or display, but the contents were well protected and the the tube could be easily opened and closed to examine the contents. Because of the pre-coloured format, there must have been about twenty kit variants, covering long or short, and liveries in crimson, green, maroon, lined maroon and Rail Blue. If carefully made, they could look excellent, at least for their time.

I've been thinking about the "BR Wagons Vol.2" dilemma, the original volume was published in 1985 and covered roughly half of the fleet and their history up to the early 80s. So if a second volume was published now, should it be done in the same style and up to the same period, or should it carry on to recent times with departmental conversions, etc.? Presumably Volume One is now long out of print, so you'd have to reprint that as well to satisfy new demand. Maybe Paul's right and the whole thing needs a re-think, with a new separate book for each former chapter or group of wagons, expanded and with more detail, to accomodate the more fastidious? You could end up with a series of half a dozen books? Had Trevor already done the drawings for the vans and hoppers, etc.?

 

Cheers, Brian.

[coachmann]

The address in Glossop is perhaps better known to bus and road transport enthusiasts........Yep, some of us still wear two hats. I think it used to be Transport Publishing Co. and is now Venture Publications. I continue to purchase new books, their Super Prestige Transport history series being very useful to folk basing their layouts on the old northern cotton towns surrounding Manchester.

Edited December 22, 2012 by coachmann

[hmrspaul]

 

I always liked the Mopok range, they produced some useful parts, although i wasn't so keen on the printed coach sides, they used to produce transfers as well, which covered the various CCT and GUV kits, plus the GWR Hawksworth's, including the Dynamometer Car. Tony at KX used to speak of his earlier involvement and the various associates, i seem to recall the latter address being in Glossop, which ties in with the previously mentioned North Derbyshire.

Didn't Adrian Swain use up all those spare BR castings on his own ABS BR Suburban coach kits? These were in the style of a Mopok kit, but without the wood! Again the sides were pre-coloured and printed on clear vinyl. The chassis/floor was a folded 'U' shape in tinplate, with a pre-shaped acetate body and cast ends, cast underframe and details, plus Tri-ang Mk1 bogies. Once you had made the interior, it was then sealed inside for life, fingers crossed that no seats came loose. It was a devil to get the printed sides stuck on to the acetate neatly and putting the guttering on was even trickier, you never saw many of these made up! Another odd thing was that the kits came in cardboard tubes, so they were difficult to store or display, but the contents were well protected and the the tube could be easily opened and closed to examine the contents. Because of the pre-coloured format, there must have been about twenty kit variants, covering long or short, and liveries in crimson, green, maroon, lined maroon and Rail Blue. If carefully made, they could look excellent, at least for their time.

I've been thinking about the "BR Wagons Vol.2" dilemma, the original volume was published in 1985 and covered roughly half of the fleet and their history up to the early 80s. So if a second volume was published now, should it be done in the same style and up to the same period, or should it carry on to recent times with departmental conversions, etc.? Presumably Volume One is now long out of print, so you'd have to reprint that as well to satisfy new demand. Maybe Paul's right and the whole thing needs a re-think, with a new separate book for each former chapter or group of wagons, expanded and with more detail, to accomodate the more fastidious? You could end up with a series of half a dozen books? Had Trevor already done the drawings for the vans and hoppers, etc.?

 

Cheers, Brian.

 

I made up the Mopok CCT and have several of their kits semi made! I also have 4 of the ABS Maroon suburban coaches in their cylinders, several have probably never been opened.

I don't understand your dislike of the printed sides, They were very fine, and the thick paint used was sufficient to reproduce the difference between the glass and 1/8inch steel sheeting of the prototype.

 

As to our book, thank you for the comments. Unfortunately the Ozalids of volume 1 appear to be missing, lost either by Motor Books or in the transfer to Ian Allan. No one seems to be interested in a reprint. There are a couple of editions on Abe books at the moment for about £40. The original price of £17.95 was typical for the time, but shows how much cheaper books have now become. Of course they ended up much cheaper with the WHS Book Club. They are scarce, which surprises me as I would have expected quite a lot to be on the 2nd hand market because of the book club sales - I think a lot of their books hardly get looked at! We soon found the way to get any money out of publishing was through magazine articles!

 

Paul Bartlett

[roythebus]

John Senior of MOPOK did live in Glossop; I remember visiting him there once.

 

I also have some ABS suburban coach side and underframe and end castings kicking around if anyone wants them. Brian is correct as their construction method. I too could never get the printed sides to stick on, so never built the rest of them!

 

The only model shop I remember in Great Portland Street was the Trix showroom in the mid 1960's, when their new range of plastic models came out. that showroom later moved to Knightsbridge Green. At that time, victors model shop was in the back of Victors record shop in Chapel Market, a haven for ska music fans.

[sagaguy]

Wouldn't that be Mega Models in Rathbone Place (or Street), they were also infamous for selling a less than perfect ready-to-run brass LNER P2, and maybe a V2 as well? I believe this shop had a connection with Mek's Models in Mackenzie Road, Holloway, which had opened earlier and sold secondhand. I only went to either a couple of times, i didn't like the people involved and they only lasted a couple of years.

 

 

Thats the one in Holloway!!Iv`e been trying to remember in years.I went there once when i wanted a HD 3rail N2 for a conversion into an LNER green full lined version,they must have cornered the market in knackered N2`s,it took ages to find one that was ok.These were the days before you could obtain super magnets for them.However,the repaint worked & i still have the loco stored away in my box.Trix in Gt.Portland st brings back memories,I used to pass their premises when i walked back to Warren St station from W&H in New Cavendish st to get the bus home on my Thursday 1/2 day shop closing when i worked in Edmonton.I also used to frequent Gamages model department as well.Where did those years go?.

 

 

 

Ray.

[stewartingram]

Ah Gamages. Considering the history of this store, and its annual Xmas layout in the loft, I'm surprised there is so little about it on the web.

 

Stewart

[oggy1953]

. Others in the Greater London and surrounding area included Puffers of Kenton, the Harrow Model Shop, Braley Hobby Supplies of Northfields, Railmail of Watford.

I remember all these. There was another shop at Mill Hill, North London but i can't remember the name. Also Jennings of Enfield has now gone, I could always find hard to come by bits there even if they were RRP+

[Enterprisingwestern]

Maybe Paul's right and the whole thing needs a re-think, with a new separate book for each former chapter or group of wagons, expanded and with more detail, to accomodate the more fastidious? You could end up with a series of half a dozen books? Had Trevor already done the drawings for the vans and hoppers, etc.?

How practical/popular/cost effective would a bookazine be?, something along the lines of the MLI's and the David Larkin books, a kind of amalgam of both of them.

 

Mike.

[Oldddudders]

I remember all these. There was another shop at Mill Hill, North London but i can't remember the name.

H A Blunt? Not my part of the world, but recall their ads in RM. In them thar days, better shops advertised that they were META dealers - did that die the death in the discount era?

[Brian Kirby]

 

How practical/popular/cost effective would a bookazine be?, something along the lines of the MLI's and the David Larkin books, a kind of amalgam of both of them.

 

Mike.

I can't speak for Paul, but in my opinion, that may cheapen the product and undermine the quality. Apart from being an important historical text book, any future volume will need to be a proper spine-back book with artpaper, so it can be laid flat for closer study of pics and drawings. That's a slight problem with Dave Larkin's otherwise excellent "Working Wagons" softbacks, they just keep springing shut all the time! Perhaps Paul and Co. could follow Nick Campling and David Jenkinson's example, they published their famous joint LMS and LNER Carriage book in the late 60s/early 70s, but it was more recently re-published by spliting up the contents into three separate volumes, these too were a mixture of photos, text and drawings.

 

Cheers, Brian.

[asmay2002]

I've been thinking about the "BR Wagons Vol.2" dilemma,.... Presumably Volume One is now long out of print, so you'd have to reprint that as well to satisfy new demand.

They're still avavailable resonably cheaply so presumably there isn't much demand.

 

http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?ac=sl&st=sl&ref=bf_s2_a1_t1_1&qi=,zIthB7SpDV7k,A19niDJpaWu6Q_9670249170_1:14:711&bq=author=don%20rowland&title=british%20rail%20wagons

Edited December 23, 2012 by asmay2002

[Peter Kazmierczak]

They're still avavailable resonably cheaply so presumably there isn't much demand.

 

http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?ac=sl&st=sl&ref=bf_s2_a1_t1_1&qi=,zIthB7SpDV7k,A19niDJpaWu6Q_9670249170_1:14:711&bq=author=don%20rowland&title=british%20rail%20wagons

Methinks that's a completely different book.

[hmrspaul]

Methinks that's a completely different book.

 

That's correct. This is the one we are discussing, rather more expensive (but some are still cheaper than the cost new when calculators that take inflation into account are used). Books have gone down a lot in relative price!

Bartlett, P., Larkin, D., Mann, T., Silsbury, R., and Ward, A. (1985) An illustrated history of BR wagons, Volume 1 published by Oxford Publishing Company, 192 pages.

 

http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?ac=sl&st=sl&ref=bf_s2_a4_t1_4&qi=EYXOBJUCZ2LSWy0KjPmH7MamIsg_3865398188_1:88:818&bq=author%3Dp%2E%2520bartlett%26title%3Dillustrated%2520history%2520of%2520british%2520rail%2520wagons

 

What 'ours' had was drawings (not weight diagrams) almost all of which were prepared from our own field measuring. Also, there are descriptions of the type of brake rigging/bogie used for each lot and photographs of the main brake riggings, buffers, axleboxes, bogies. There are  mistakes (the 16ton minerals are messy and the first three lots of china clay wagons were unfitted when new (guess were Ratio got their info from without acknowledgement  )).

Drawings -

Lowfit 1/001; Lowfit 1/002;  Medfit 1/017; Medfit 1/019;  Highfit 1/032; Highfit 1/039;  Highfit 1/044; Highfit 1/037; Highfit 1/049; Soda Ash 1/046; Dropside open 1/033; OAA 1/191; OCA OCO0lA; Shock open 1/031; Shock open 1/056; Shock hood B 1/058; China clay open 1/051; Sand tippler 1/072; Palbrick 1/026; Ferry open 1/055; Timber 1/420; Scrap open MFO0lA; Expt. car -; Carflat 1/130; Beer tank 1/302; Class A Ferry tank 1/305; Demountable beer 1/334; LNER/BR Pipe 1/461; BR pipe 1/462; BR Tube 1/448; Ferry Tube 1/449; Single bolster 1/402; Double bolster 1/416; Bogie bolster C 1/473; Bogie bolster D BDA BDO06D; Bogie bolster E 1/479; Bogie bolster BBA BBO0lB; Borail EB 1/482 & 483; LNER/BR Plate 1/432; Boplate E 1/490; Trestrol EO/MO 2/682; Strip coil 1/407; Slab coil 1/411; Strip coil A 1/412; Pig Iron l/007; slope-sided mineral ex WD 1/100; Mineral weld ex WD 1/102; ex SNCF Mineral 1/112; Weld Mineral 1/108; Weld Mineral rebody 1/108; Double door Mineral 1/110;  Double door VB Mineral 1/119 & 1/120; Double door Mineral rebody; Double door Mineral 24.5t 1/115; Ironstone tippler 1/181.

 

The book we were promised was an Ian Allan "Datafile" one based on the series we did in Model Railway Constructor & the last 5 albums - but that went belly up. There are a lot of good drawings in those, as there were in a few of the Model Railways before that also went down the tubes (was it something we did?). Now decent drawings are rare in the model press.

 

Paul Bartlett

PS wasn't post 86 longer originally?

[asmay2002]

Methinks that's a completely different book.

Apologies for the confusion.

[Brian Kirby]

Just to catch up on a couple of earlier points:

 

Horsetan Said:

"I think his was one of the few premises in "Fitzrovia" which still had an outside bog. And I remember you expended a lot of effort in repainting the interior to get rid of the cigarette stains (Nigel smoked a fair few every day, as well as being a diabetic)".

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

 

BK replies:

Yes, the facilities out the back at "The Booking Hall" were rather primitive, especially for the West End. You wouldn't want to sit out there and read the paper, well there was no light anyway or loo paper. Perhaps we could have used the surplus Bottomley prints? :-) ! He never had a proper cleaner and the old hippy never bothered to keep the loo clean, it was all pretty disgusting. The same went for his shop, a bit of a flea-pit, dusty shelves, dusty carpets, dusty stock. As you say, there were various items of damaged stock chaotically dumped downstairs, amongst all the mess were things like a "solid-state" and totally seized DJH WD 2-10-0, which i managed to take apart and rebuild for him.

 

Add to this, the fact that Nigel was a chronic chain-smoker, so after awhile all the stock stank of nicotine and went yellow. Two of us volunteered to repaint the shop in it's twilight years, we had to use special anti-nicotine etching paint to get through the grease to the wall proper.

 

Before Nigel had his own shop, he used to be receptionist/shop manager for the Crownline/MTK/Jidenco triad in Maidenhead, although he was the only member of shop staff, all the others were bashing away out the back. I first knew him when he came to KX every week for trade supplies. Before this he had also worked at MRM KX for about one week, before being sacked by Ted Morris for poor time-keeping, a tradition he carried on at The Booking Hall. The shop went bust around 1998/9 and he ended up being locked out by the landlord. Sadly, Nigel passed away about 6 or 7 years ago, he was only in his fifties.

 

BTW Ivan, your last Booking Hall topic happened on several occasions, frequently on saturday afternoons !

 

Cheers, Brian.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

...There was another shop at Mill Hill, North London but i can't remember the name...

 

 

H A Blunt...

 Indeedy. Their satellite shop in WGC supplied my youthful modelling wants, staff in brown dust coats and all. Between them and Pond Tool round the corner no practical task in modelling was impossible. Sigh...

 

Strange to relate these two  premises roughly marked the course which a Blower Bentley reputedly ran in 17 minutes one night. (Birkin's workshop was right under where WGC bus station now stands, near enough. In 1930 England the Barnet Bypass was the one piece of road in the UK which remotely emulated the Mulsanne straight. So when a test run was required, wait for the wee small hours and take her out boys.

Edited December 23, 2012 by 34theletterbetweenB&D

[Brian Kirby]

Regarding the Mopok sides, yes they were very high quality with excellent artwork, but i went off ALL printed coach sides as a whole. Quite right, you would achieve excellent flush glazing with a printed side, plus the tricky main livery was ready applied, but they seriously lacked relief in the door department. Some other kits used to supply etched hinges and door handles to glue on, but it was all rather fiddly, another improvement would be to score on the door lines. The door droplights should have been recessed as well, this was most apparent on the ABS BR suburban kits, of similar origin. Apart from the delicate construction required, what to do if damaged in service? Any paint touch-ups on the printing would show up a mile away, plus every vehicle would have the same finish, but at least the windows couldn't fall out.

 

The Mopok and PC printed kits were good for their time, later followed by Southern Pride, but they've been mostly superseded now. I remember the day at MRM KX, when either the Lima CCT or GUV first appeared (whichever came first?), and Tony Dyer (ex Mopok) said "well that's the end of the kits, now it's all ready-made" (in so many words). 

 

                                                                   Cheers, Brian.

[slilley]

Whilst on the subject of shops, who remembers The Smokebox in Kingston? Oh the hours I used to spend in there. I spent a fair bit of time at KX and at the Booking Hall as well. The Booking Hall was a bit like a social club,people wandering in for a natter and a browse and on their way again.

[Brian Kirby]

Back on the King's Cross thread, most people won't know that there was a strong connection between the KX shop and Lima Trains. In the late 1970s, the importer/distributor for Lima in the U.K., was Messrs Eisenmann & Co. in nearby Clerkenwell. Their first British models were the HO LMS 4F and Class 33 diesel, plus Mk1 coaches and a small range of wagons. These met with a mixed reception, although they sold moderately well. Lima/Eisenmann learnt the scale lesson quickly and re-used their research to produce a 'OO' version of the Class 33 as their first 'OO' model.

Now Eisenmann, acting as agents for Lima, needed ideas for new British models, so we were the nearest place to seek advice. We told them that the modelling public were crying out for a 'OO' gauge Deltic loco, perhaps we were swayed by the fact that the real locos were still running across the road. The 33s and the Deltics were initially released in a rather pale rendition of Rail Blue, but this was corrected in later years. When the Deltics were first delivered, they sold literally like hot cakes, we just couldn't stop selling them by the crate load. Then a lot of customers started to slag off the estabilished Hornby diesel range by comparison, convieniently overlooking the fact that the new Lima Deltic was half an inch too short, with seriously under-length bogies, so as to fit a standard Lima mechanism, but nobody cared about that then.

Following this, the Eisenmann boss (DW) said they wanted to produce a DMU, so Tony who commuted every day from West Drayton via Paddington, suggested a Class 117, then i suggested that they could later produce the 119 Cross-Country sets using the same chassis, but this latter idea never happened. What did appear were two types of DMU vehicles, one powered, one dummy, but sharing a common DMBS body to reduce costs. The centre trailer was added a couple of years later, after encouraging sales of the originals. Also around this time came the suggestion for the Lima Western and Mk2B coaches, along with the 08 shunter.

For steam we got the dreaded J50 and GW 94xx, both of which came with appalling mechanisms, very cheap and nasty, but the bodies were quite good. The GW King appeared at the same time as the Hornby version, so they went head-to-head, as did the two Western diesel models. KX colleague Bert Collins suggested they do a LNER V2 (he was an ex-ER fireman) and Tony Dyer suggested the LMS Crab, alas the V2 was never produced. From memory, the Warship and Classes 50 and 87 came later. I used to dread the big blue Eisenmann van turning up to deliver, it always involved 40 to 50 huge boxes, which would swamp out the shop, and the driver was a right misery guts. The 'O' gauge range was the worst to handle, because it was heavy and bulky, but it all sold very well with cheap prices.

 

Another loco type planned was a 'OO' Class 25/3 and KX staff member Mike W was sent off to take profile shots at Euston and other places. This model was cancelled when Hornby beat them to it with their early 25, although i think both would have sold well. I've still got the pics that Mike took of 25 313. The KX shop closed in 1988 and Eisenmann handed over the Lima ditribution to RiKo in Hemel Hempstead, so the connection was broken. Happy Days.

 

Cheers, Brian.

[coachmann]

I had a tidy up when I reached 65 and thought i would probably retire for good. The boxes of accounts from 1972 onwards were burned but I'm pretty sure kept the original file of 1972-3 invoices for old times sake. It must contain invoices from many of the major model railway retailers of the time including of course Kings Cross. Must have a dig in the attic sometime.

 

I painted buses for John Senior some years before going self-employed as he was a friend of two guys I knew in the Manchester area. I still have some elderly cast bus radiators from those days produced by Alan Bracks for his printed sided bus kits. Alan gave me some of his artwork to assist when I was doing artwork for a range of bus parts in 4mm and 6mm scale.

[BernardTPM]

Their first British models were the HO LMS 4F and Class 33 diesel, plus Mk1 coaches and a small range of wagons.

Lima did the Mk.2b coaches first in H0, the Mk.1s added to the range later, still with B4 bogies and continental 'loop' couplings. I bought some of the sets cheap in Petticoat Lane market as the 10 ft wheelbase bogie on the H0 Class 33 worked out just right for MUs in 4mm scale.

[Brian Kirby]

Ooh, that's right Bernie, i'd forgotten about the HO Mk2Bs, so they did those twice too. I had been racking my brains on the particular order of releases, but this was 30 years ago or more, now it's ancient history ! Two other significant watersheds, were when Lima went from shiny wheels to blackened wheels, then the motor bogies changed from single to double reduction gears for slower speed control. I still use a lot of the double reduction version for my DMUs.

    Larry has just mentioned the various radiator castings, then available as spares, we used to sell them of course and we had a card display to help us non-bus train enthusiasts work out which was which. In a similar vein, i clearly remember a small Anbrico display case, showing all the various DMU engine castings, etc. that were available for scratchbuilding. Now they would be really useful today, i wonder if the patterns and moulds still exist?

    Even though i wasn't a bus fan, i remember being very impressed by the quality of the TPC books, very good reproduction and the book covers were always very smart. My favourite cover was the all-black one, would that have been the Blue Triangle book ? It seemed to be inspired by Pink Floyd !

 

                                                        Cheers, Brian. 

[sagaguy]

In my HD 3rail collection,i have a Lima Cl.117 which was converted to 3rail by the model shop in Lincoln Rd,Peterborough before i believe it changed hands.The conversion used a Marklin skate & successful it was too.

 

Ray.