Traeth Mawr -Building Mr Price's house , (mostly)

[Sasquatch]

On 24/01/2021 at 12:32, ChrisN said:

Having been on the Abertaw Flickr sight again I must show the photo below.  First an explanation.  @Mikkel in one of his blog entries, I think, not his thread, fell to discussing where horseboxes were placed in a train.  @Nearholmer stated in another place that when they had horses in they were put next to the engine as they had a smoother ride.  So that is the explanation of this photo.  

Hi Chris. wonderful content on here as always

I'd like to suggest that the coaches in this photograph are not on the same rails as the loco and horsebox.

The coach wheels look like they have all been derailed! Had the photographer captured the image a second off the proximity of loco to brake third might look quite different!

 

regards Shaun

[Donw]

On 21/01/2021 at 20:15, Northroader said:

That’s a terribly short list of unfinished work, you really must start a lot more than that and leave it lying around.

On the matter of coach liveries, just going by memory, around the turn of the century, coach ends were brown with the mouldings picked out in black. However there wasn’t the yellow edging around the mouldings like the sides had. Some lines had the brake ends painted red, but the GWR wasn’t one of them.

 

edit: I must say gold, not yellow, looking at Jonathan’s post again.

 

Oddly enough I am sure Alan Brackenborough the painter told me he uses a straw colour not gold as it looks more correct on a model. Probably as gold catches the light full size.

 

Don

[NCB]

Chris

 Here's 3 GWR 16' vans, a V4, V12 and V14, with differing grey roofs. A close look reveals you get a slightly mottled effect, which looks OK at a distance and stops the texture being too even:

 

 

As I said, a light thin acrylic wash can produce a slightly more weathered look whilst avoiding a streaky effect.

 

Rolling bars are those available for rolling boilers etc; here's an example:

http://www.metalsmith.co.uk/rolling-bars.htm

 

Not sure what's available at the moment. I bought mine 20 years or more ago and it's proved very useful. The roof on my Cambrian brake van was done using them:

 

 

Nigel

[ChrisN]

14 hours ago, Sasquatch said:

Hi Chris. wonderful content on here as always

I'd like to suggest that the coaches in this photograph are not on the same rails as the loco and horsebox.

The coach wheels look like they have all been derailed! Had the photographer captured the image a second off the proximity of loco to brake third might look quite different!

 

regards Shaun

 

Shaun,

I am not sure about that.  The image is of such poor quality that enlarging it does not help.  I think though that the train is obscured by a three railing fence, as seen here.  (It is about the same place and the church is just off to the right I think.)  The only other picture of the area from this web site is from 1931 and the fence has been replaced by a stone wall and the siding appears to have been removed, and everywhere is overgrown.  I need to get my time machine out and go back and take a few photos myself.  (That might take a while though.)

[ChrisN]

12 hours ago, NCB said:

Chris

 Here's 3 GWR 16' vans, a V4, V12 and V14, with differing grey roofs. A close look reveals you get a slightly mottled effect, which looks OK at a distance and stops the texture being too even:

 

 

As I said, a light thin acrylic wash can produce a slightly more weathered look whilst avoiding a streaky effect.

 

Rolling bars are those available for rolling boilers etc; here's an example:

http://www.metalsmith.co.uk/rolling-bars.htm

 

Not sure what's available at the moment. I bought mine 20 years or more ago and it's proved very useful. The roof on my Cambrian brake van was done using them:

 

 

Nigel

 

Nigel,

Thank you for the information.  Do you spray the next coat of a different colour while the first is still damp, or wait until it has dried completely?

[MikeOxon]

3 hours ago, ChrisN said:

 

Shaun,

I am not sure about that. .................................

It is tricky but I made the following enlargement and the engine does appear to be nearer to the camera than the coach.  On the other hand, the vac pipes of the coach are connected to something and it's hard to say that there's anything hiding behind the engine, so the apparent separation may just be a trick of the light. Not at all clear!

[NCB]

9 hours ago, ChrisN said:

 

Nigel,

Thank you for the information.  Do you spray the next coat of a different colour while the first is still damp, or wait until it has dried completely?

 

Try to do them while still damp. That way the droplets tend to merge. When dry I take another look and if necessary do a bit more. Very easy to play around with it until you get the effect you want. I tend to do the roofs before I attach them to the models. If you have some Halfords cans you can try it out on a bit of scrap.

Edited February 5, 2021 by NCB

[ChrisN]

On 05/02/2021 at 22:12, NCB said:

 

Try to do them while still damp. That way the droplets tend to merge. When dry I take another look and if necessary do a bit more. Very easy to play around with it until you get the effect you want. I tend to do the roofs before I attach them to the models. If you have some Halfords cans you can try it out on a bit of scrap.

 

Nigel,

Checked in the shed yesterday and I have both grey and white plastic primer.  I checked in my railway room and I have 3 6t vans.  They are all in resin and the roof is already attached, but as they are to be grey I could remove the wheels, spray metal with metal primer and the sides with plastic grey.  I could then spray the roofs, masking the sides if necessary.  I checked the garden, and it is freezing, so it will be a couple of months before I can try.  However, once sprayed, iron work painted black all I need to do is couplings and we are done.  Oh yes, and transfers, and one will need a vacuum pipe as it is piped for passenger work.

[ChrisN]

As the Cambrian station building has not been built yet Mr Lewis has kindly let Mr Price use his building, at least to collect fares.  He seems to have got some passengers.

 

 

I think some of their friends have already gone in as when I looked in the carriages:-

 

 

There were twice as many!

 

They are of course Andrew Stadden's latest 1860s people.  It is slightly disappointing that the standing figures are new and the seated ones are the new ones sitting down.  The reason it is disappointing, to me, is that most of these are posh, and only one male, it is difficult to tell with the ladies, could pass as working class, whereas his previous 1860s figures and one set of working class and one set of posh people.  Maybe it was the level of inflation though as they all appear to have third class tickets.

 

Most of the men and one of the ladies, have taken their hat off, which as for out of five wear toppers is not surprising.  If a lady would have taken her hat off is debateable but I am not going to worry, as long as she does not make a fuss if her husband/mother tells her off in public.  Although the male dress is obviously earlier than 1895 I could probably use them when I , (eventually), build the narrow gauge line which will have the market on market day in it.  (Just a reminder that I have peopled these carriages with 1860s folk as they were built in 1860, and it is a bit of fun.  It was the LCDR, not the Cambrian that had a reputation for late running.)

 

I have a few ladies from the previous set that I will use too, despite the crinoline, ones that are not too fancy.  We have had some discussion earlier that the second hand, (third, fourth and fifth hand), clothing market was quite strong.  In those days they made things to last.  This is true.  However, in the book, 'Grandfather's London', which are pictures, mainly from Greenwich, of ordinary people in 1875, there is at the side of one, and I think half off it, a lady in an 1860s dress.  It is layered as per 1860s, but she is not wearing a crinoline.  I assume she has shortened it or she would be treading on the excess material.  So my ladies, will be wearing crinolines, so perhaps they fancied dressing up for the parade of soldiers that had gone by and is now round the corner on Station Road.

 

If you have been, thanks for looking.

[MikeOxon]

It looks as though all your passengers are out in the snow

[NCB]

4 hours ago, ChrisN said:

 

Nigel,

Checked in the shed yesterday and I have both grey and white plastic primer.  I checked in my railway room and I have 3 6t vans.  They are all in resin and the roof is already attached, but as they are to be grey I could remove the wheels, spray metal with metal primer and the sides with plastic grey.  I could then spray the roofs, masking the sides if necessary.  I checked the garden, and it is freezing, so it will be a couple of months before I can try.  However, once sprayed, iron work painted black all I need to do is couplings and we are done.  Oh yes, and transfers, and one will need a vacuum pipe as it is piped for passenger work.

 

Chris

 

I have 3 of Coast Line Models 6T vans to do. I plan to spray the roofs first. But I brush paint wagon sides, so for those would slosh on Precision general purpose primer, then whatever grey I've decided on, then the outer faces of the body framework and the chassis in black. probably Humbrol matt black acrylic. My "spraying shed" fell down about 3 years ago, there is a replacement but as with you it's cold. Might resort to a quick indoor job, as it's just the roofs.

 

Nigel

[ChrisN]

I have a feeling that I might witter on in this post, so if I do, just shout and I will stop.

 

I am going to have to apologise that the quality of phot is less even than usual.  Last night I was trying to download my photos from my DSLR when it fell on the floor.  Unfortunately it had the cable attached and not only bent the plug, it pulled the socket half out of the camera.  The result is that the computer and camera are no longer talking to each other.  All the photos are on a memory card, and when a card reader arrives I will see if I can use that to transfer.  (Yes, I know it should work..........)  So here goes

 

 

All the fittings, except for the reversing handle have been attached, and the loco has been put on the chassis.  The handrail knobs on the side are 2mm, as I was advised to have longer rather than shorter, and the one on the front is 1.6mm.  The photos of the prototype showed, among others, four handrail knobs on each side.  I measured length of the boiler. At the cab end there was already an indentation that was for the handrail knob to go in.  I measured the distance it was from the cab, then measured the same distance from the front.  I then divided the length left into three and marked this length with a notch on a piece of card, using the notch to measure from the back mark, and from the front mark.  In theory the length between the two marks was the same as the length on the card.  I am a physicist so it was the same, given experimental errors.  

 

The holes were then drilled.  One was particularly hard to do, it must have been how it had been printed.  The first four down one side were superglued in and left to dry overnight.  (You remember the adverts when it first came out?  Man sticking a handle to something on the ceiling, and hey presto he could hang from it immediately.  Umm, yes, artistic licence at least.)  I used 0.4mm brass wire, mainly as that was the largest size to go through the holes.  The end of the wire at one end had already been bent for grab handles so I threaded the other handrail knobs onto the wire.  I had intended not to glue the wire in at all as once bent round the tank it would not come out anyway, but it would not stay still to be bent so I glued the wire to the Handrail knob nearest the cab, and left it overnight.

 

Using plasticard struts as spacers and a pair of long nosed pliers I bent the wire round to the front and then gave it an upward bend.  Then using my fingers gave it the front curve, pushed the front handrail knob in, superglued it and left it.  The next day I worked on the curve at the front, then the two bends so that it went round the corner.  The handrail knobs were superglued in as I worked down the side, and I had intended to cut the wire so that it was slightly too long and then file it to the correct length.  I made a mistake, and cut it to the correct length.  The last one was glued in.

 

The whistles were, I think, Markits, and the holes were drilled for them.  I had expected the holes to go inside the cab but the cab must be thicker than I though and they never appeared.  The thin one on the left had a long wire insert and that was cut short.

 

You will notice the whistle cover is there. You may remember that I had lost it.  Einstein said, that to keep doing the same thing and expect a different result is madness.  Einstein never looked for things in my house.  I was looking for the bag of fittings in a box of Plastrut packets and although I did not find the fittings, I found the whistle cover at the bottom.  I have looked in that box dozens of times in the last few months and it was not there then although I admit that I probably had not looked right to the bottom.  More concerning was I decided to look in that box again just before I went to bed, and the bag of fittings was at the top.  I am convinced that there are worm holes in my house down which things disappear and pop up at a latter date.  Either that or I drift between alternate universes.  (I told my youngest this and he said if it continued I should see a doctor.)

 

The vacuum pipes were as specified and bent to the right length and superglued in.

 

The buffers are Slaters Dean/Churchward.  They have a spring, a thread and a nut to fix the buffer to the stock.  The buffer does not go inside the stock so it does not spring, and the stock is to well made to open out.  The issue is that the buffers are longer than the tension lock so I get buffer lock, which is not what I want, so I shall probably look for some different ones.

 

My other picture on my other camera shows the Indian Red wheels, which I forgot to show on this one, you will have to believe me.  I now need to wait until the end of lockdown and hopefully go to Expo EM South and get some blackening fluid, and once that is applied I will give it another coat of green.  Not quite off the 'Current' list, but nearly.

 

If you have made it this far, well done, and if you have been, thanks for looking.

[Nick Gough]

I also seem to have a number of objects that are equipped with a Romulan cloaking device. This usually stops working when I no longer want the object and have used something else instead.

[Mikkel]

That looks excellent Chris! Well, what we can see of it 

 

11 hours ago, ChrisN said:

My other picture on my other camera shows the Indian Red wheels

 

I was on a guided tour boat on a lake in the Alps once. It was supposedly a very beautiful trip but it was completely overcast and pouring down, so there was nothing at all to see of the mountains and views. The guide persevered though: Speaking constantly as we sailed along, she minutely described every detail of what we would have been able to see if the weather had been better. In the end it became a wonderfully surreal experience and a lesson in human persistence.

[Simond]

Are you sure she wasn’t just part of the matrix?

[richbrummitt]

10 hours ago, Nick Gough said:

I also seem to have a number of objects that are equipped with a Romulan cloaking device. This usually stops working when I no longer want the object and have used something else instead.

Everything that falls out of the tweezers magically spawns this device and activates it in the act of landing. Even if I see where it lands I cannot find it when it has landed.

[ChrisN]

4 hours ago, Mikkel said:

That looks excellent Chris! Well, what we can see of it 

 

 

I was on a guided tour boat on a lake in the Alps once. It was supposedly a very beautiful trip but it was completely overcast and pouring down, so there was nothing at all to see of the mountains and views. The guide persevered though: Speaking constantly as we sailed along, she minutely described every detail of what we would have been able to see if the weather had been better. In the end it became a wonderfully surreal experience and a lesson in human persistence.

 

Mikkel,

How do you know any of what she said was true?  Did she slip in things that were not there, just as a private joke?

 

Edited February 11, 2021 by ChrisN

[ChrisN]

11 hours ago, Nick Gough said:

I also seem to have a number of objects that are equipped with a Romulan cloaking device. This usually stops working when I no longer want the object and have used something else instead.

 

30 minutes ago, richbrummitt said:

Everything that falls out of the tweezers magically spawns this device and activates it in the act of landing. Even if I see where it lands I cannot find it when it has landed.

 

Yes, the Romulans have a lot to answer for.  I am at present working in the extension that has a wooden floor, and still I drop things and they disappear.

 

However, on the other side, certain packages come through the door and go into isolation for the required three days before opening and they are completely invisible to my wife.  

[MikeOxon]

No need to invoke Star Trek fantasies. Surely, every railway modeller has a house full of poltergeists.

[ChrisN]

Just to keep us on topic of physics that you thought did not exist, although today is Thursday it is apparently Monday, as my memory card reader arrived.  Maybe the postman went through a wormhole or it was delivered by time machine or................ (Boring reasons like, it just did not take as long as they said it would are not allowed!   )

 

So here is the photo I was going to post yesterday but was not able to.

 

 

Not that wonderful, but it i in focus over the whole loco and yo can see the wheels, and the damage from attaching things.  Coal will be added, but not much as it will have come from Ruabon, when I find my real coal.  The box I found the other day had foam chips in it.  

 

Must do something about those buffers.

Edited February 11, 2021 by ChrisN

[Northroader]

I hope you don’t mind me putting up two images of GWR saddle tanks, one in Wolverhampton livery, one in Swindon. You’ll note the green is much bluer in the one, lower surfaces are brown or Indian red. Also the wheels and splashers front faces differ in how they’re treated.

[ChrisN]

16 minutes ago, Northroader said:

I hope you don’t mind me putting up two images of GWR saddle tanks, one in Wolverhampton livery, one in Swindon. You’ll note the green is much bluer in the one, lower surfaces are brown or Indian red. Also the wheels and splashers front faces differ in how they’re treated.

 

Thank you.  I believe for my period the splashers were green and not red.  (Why do I think that?  Cannot remember.)  The green I have used is supposed to be a close match to the new GWR livery, which claims that it is close to the original GWR livery which was continued by Wolverhampton.

 

They are both lovely locos.

[Northroader]

Just looking in “Great Western Style” the last loco  was done in the Wolverhampton livery in 1902, and the Swindon livery depicted lasted until 1906 (with variations in the way lining out was done) then it was charged to green splashers and black undercart, and so say, the green was changed from this to that, and a fight breaks out over what it really was, and wasn’t it terrible of manufacturer A to paint it like?

[Compound2632]

I rather like the theory that the colour of the paint never changed, just the number of coats of varnish...

[ChrisN]

43 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

I rather like the theory that the colour of the paint never changed, just the number of coats of varnish...

 

We had a long discussion on @MikeOxon's blog about the old green.  At the time we were allowed to go out and travel on the train, (do you remember those times?).  The new green is very interesting as in full light it is a bluey green, and under the canopy it is black, well nearly.  

 

I know my colour is correct as no one has come to me and said, 'When I saw a 645 passing through Ruabon, it certainly was not that colour.'