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


ChrisN
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I like the recent work you've been doing a lot Chris.

 

I have to admit that I don't remember suggesting the beard, though it is the sort of silly suggestion I make! I'm not about to flick back through 150 pages to find it though. Having said that I think you've nailed it, hopefully not literally for the farmer's sake. Also for his sake you need to find out his real name as I can hear the small boys shouting out "Barf llwyd" as he's driving his sheep past them. A bit rude, but boys will be... well, rude! 

 

As for loco colour I'm all ears, or rather eyes. Not that I'm any closer to having a layout for my 1896 era than I was a year ago, but I can still watch others and dream on! 

 

It's always good to see the progress and hear the comments of the inhabitants on Traeth Mawr. Especially at the moment as I'm laid up in bed with a bad dose of 'flu awaiting the result of a C19 test! 

 

Kind regards, Neil 

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4 hours ago, Anotheran said:

I like the recent work you've been doing a lot Chris.

 

I have to admit that I don't remember suggesting the beard, though it is the sort of silly suggestion I make! I'm not about to flick back through 150 pages to find it though. Having said that I think you've nailed it, hopefully not literally for the farmer's sake. Also for his sake you need to find out his real name as I can hear the small boys shouting out "Barf llwyd" as he's driving his sheep past them. A bit rude, but boys will be... well, rude! 

 

As for loco colour I'm all ears, or rather eyes. Not that I'm any closer to having a layout for my 1896 era than I was a year ago, but I can still watch others and dream on! 

 

It's always good to see the progress and hear the comments of the inhabitants on Traeth Mawr. Especially at the moment as I'm laid up in bed with a bad dose of 'flu awaiting the result of a C19 test! 

 

Kind regards, Neil 

 

Neil,

Thank you for your comments.  There are two or three other styles in that photo that I would like to try.  I have a Shire Scenes G20 saloon which I had intended to fill with farmers in one compartment and their wives and daughters in the other.  They were to go to the Thursday market.  In the group I was going to attempt the other styles of beards.  Last night I double checked how soon this coach would arrive.  I knew the first train of the day from Dolgelley had no connection with the GWR trains from Ruabon but it turns out that they would not arrive until 11:30, by which time the market would more or less be over.  The next train back is either 2:20pm or 7:05pm.  The first seems too early so I need to think of a good reason why they would want an afternoon out.

 

'Grey Beard' is what I believe they called Gandalf, but I do not believe he ever went to Wales.  I will have to ask Mr Price if he has his name.

 

As for the loco, it is nearly next to be painted, so hopefully the wait will not be too long.  I first started thinking about Traeth Mawr about 25 years ago when it was the terminus of Twll Du narrow gauge railway.  The Cambrian was going to be off stage as its 'feeder'.  I am still trying to build the second layout and the first is not even on the horizon.

 

I hope and pray you feel better soon and that your Covid Test is negative.

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The idea of a compartment of wives and daughters separate from that of the farmer's amuses me somewhat, but I'm sure it would have been the case. And the scope for beards is significant from great long Dickensian ones to the wispy ones of would be farmers' sons. 

 

If the Traeth Mawr Thursday market was big enough to warrant a whole group of farmers and their families booking a saloon couldn't it also have justified a ThO service, maybe even as a mixed train, in addition to the standard weekday timetable to get other people there early enough as well? Or does that take TM too far towards the realm of fiction? 

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12 hours ago, ChrisN said:

'Grey Beard' is what I believe they called Gandalf, but I do not believe he ever went to Wales. 

 

I have it on good authority that the Undying Lands are just west of Barmouth and south of Pwllheli and that if the conditions are right you can still see the forests and hear the singing of the inhabitants... So Traeth Mawr isn't too much of a trek... But of course by then he'd have been Barf wen, so it can't be him, can it? 

 

I think this flu is getting to my brain! 

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1 hour ago, Anotheran said:

The idea of a compartment of wives and daughters separate from that of the farmer's amuses me somewhat, but I'm sure it would have been the case. And the scope for beards is significant from great long Dickensian ones to the wispy ones of would be farmers' sons. 

 

If the Traeth Mawr Thursday market was big enough to warrant a whole group of farmers and their families booking a saloon couldn't it also have justified a ThO service, maybe even as a mixed train, in addition to the standard weekday timetable to get other people there early enough as well? Or does that take TM too far towards the realm of fiction? 

 

Neil,

Does the size of the market justify the farmers coach or do the farmers justify having a G20 on the back of the Dolgelley train?

 

You may have seen this photo:-

 

465180787_HiringFair.jpg.0fe5aca410d6e3c8c1cf73ff935cee65.jpg

 

This is an impression of a hiring fair picture in Carlisle.  The market on the day modelled is the Spring Market being 21st March, so as I have already done this one there will be others as well.  I understand that farm hands also were hired at Hiring Fairs.  This  would be a special market, hence the farmers in their coach and John Edwards, (See Mr Price told me,) (How do you spell John in Welsh?  I know it is pronounced Yi-yan.), with his sheep.)  

 

The first train from Ruabon arrives at 10:08am so nothing is happening on the line as far as I know before that, so a special from Bala could have been arranged with this stuck on the back of it.  I will need to get permission from someone high enough up in the GWR to agree to the special train.  Perhaps @Mikkel could do that for us.

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1 hour ago, Northroader said:

Hiring fairs traditionally happened at Michaelmas, we still have “Marlborough Mop” near us.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiring_and_mop_fairs

 

I find that interesting as the Carlisle Hiring Fair where this young lady has just been hired, apparently happened four times a year, so perhaps it was different in different parts of the country.

 

My grand dad probably would have known as he was a farm worker who worked in several counties around England and may have gone to fairs like this.   

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Depends on whether the market is just a livestock market or a more general farmers' market. If the latter then the wives would be responsible for getting farm produce such as eggs, vegetables and so on to market whereas husbands would concentrate on livestock. They might actually travel by separate trains; market day specials were not unknown, the wives might travel by regular service and the farmers by a special. Whether the 19th century practice was same as 20th century practice wouldn't know.

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Chris I have said it before, but the figure painting in that 'market' scene is superb.

 

On 29/09/2020 at 12:19, ChrisN said:

  I will need to get permission from someone high enough up in the GWR to agree to the special train.  Perhaps @Mikkel could do that for us.

 

I'm afraid the best I can do is Station Master A. Woodcourt of Farthing -  which is rather a long way from Traeth Mawr! And I don't suppose Station Masters had any particular authority in terms of special trains anyway?

 

gallery_738_870_13310.jpg.40b8d8b9848ffb80c9548bb212076784.jpg

 

PS: I see that the new right hand column informs us that Chris is the top poster in this thread. I never would have guessed. The wonders of technology.:D

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15 minutes ago, Mikkel said:

I don't suppose Station Masters had any particular authority in terms of special trains anyway?

 

I wish I could remember where I got this story from - a book on the Midland, or the Bulletin of the Alpine Garden Society. Anyway, sometime in the Edwardian era, Reginald Farrer, the pioneer of rock gardening in Britain, was on his way back from a plant-hunting expedition in some remote oriental mountain range to his home in Ingleton. He'd got as far as, I think, Skipton, only to find that he had missed the last train to Ingleton. The stationmaster ordered him a special - presumably at the family carriage price of four full first class fares, though I suspect what would have been to hand would have been a goods engine, an old 6-wheel first, and a brake van.

 

It probably helped that Reginald's uncle was a Director of the company.

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13 hours ago, NCB said:

Depends on whether the market is just a livestock market or a more general farmers' market. If the latter then the wives would be responsible for getting farm produce such as eggs, vegetables and so on to market whereas husbands would concentrate on livestock. They might actually travel by separate trains; market day specials were not unknown, the wives might travel by regular service and the farmers by a special. Whether the 19th century practice was same as 20th century practice wouldn't know.

 

Nigel,

Thank you.  The market as originally intended was an ordinary market with stalls but also for the sale of sheep.  Sheep were to be brought down from the hills by the narrow gauge railway.  I have not considered cattle.  The particular group I would not have necessarily considered regulars, although I suppose they could be, and had not considered them bringing livestock.  There would have to have been a special train for that as there are no direct goods workings from Dolgelley to Traeth Mawr.  All goods went to Barmouth Junction and then were worked by trains from there.  

 

This is the problem of making things up piecemeal, and then having to fit it all together later.  I shall think further at times when I cannot model.

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2 hours ago, Mikkel said:

 

Chris I have said it before, but the figure painting in that 'market' scene is superb.

 

 

I'm afraid the best I can do is Station Master A. Woodcourt of Farthing -  which is rather a long way from Traeth Mawr! And I don't suppose Station Masters had any particular authority in terms of special trains anyway?

 

gallery_738_870_13310.jpg.40b8d8b9848ffb80c9548bb212076784.jpg

 

PS: I see that the new right hand column informs us that Chris is the top poster in this thread. I never would have guessed. The wonders of technology.:D

 

Mikkel,

Thank you for your kind comments on the painting.  Your image of Mr Woodcourt is rather special though.

 

I am sure he could have organised something but maybe not as far away as mid-Wales.  

 

Yes technology, information that you did not know you did not know,, or knew you needed, and probably do not.!  :D

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4 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

I wish I could remember where I got this story from - a book on the Midland, or the Bulletin of the Alpine Garden Society. Anyway, sometime in the Edwardian era, Reginald Farrer, the pioneer of rock gardening in Britain, was on his way back from a plant-hunting expedition in some remote oriental mountain range to his home in Ingleton. He'd got as far as, I think, Skipton, only to find that he had missed the last train to Ingleton. The stationmaster ordered him a special - presumably at the family carriage price of four full first class fares, though I suspect what would have been to hand would have been a goods engine, an old 6-wheel first, and a brake van.

 

It probably helped that Reginald's uncle was a Director of the company.

 

I think hiring trains was something that was not that unusual.  There was a story in the WRRC newsletter, about a man in, I think, the 1880s, whose train to Bristol, (?), was late and he missed the last connection.  He needed to go somewhere on the Plymouth line and so he asked for a train.  It was supplied, and he was charged £30.00, which was not an inconsiderable amount of money.  When he got the bill, he refused to pay and was taken to court and he lost.    The company was the GWR, which is why I think it was in the WRRC.  

 

I am not sure about the price of hiring a Sloon but apparently you could hire an Invalid carriage for the price of four First Class  tickets.  I think that was the same for other saloons but of course four was the minimum and over that the numbers had to be paid for.  

 

*Citations needed but cannot remember where to look.

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Most interesting. But wouldn't there have been all sorts of complications and permissions needed and messages sent for specials of such short notice as in these examples? Easily managed on a branch, but beyond that?

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1 minute ago, Mikkel said:

Most interesting. But wouldn't there have been all sorts of complications and permissions needed and messages sent for specials of such short notice as in these examples? Easily managed on a branch, but beyond that?

 

Mikkel,

Probably, but this was quite late at night, so may have been easier.  I think if he had just missed the 10:00am from Paddington they would have told him to wait for the next train.  This seems like a good PhD thesis, "The Running of Extra-Timetable Private Trains in the 19th Century."

 

(Someone will now post a link to it as it has already been done.  :D)

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3 hours ago, Simond said:

sadly, they probably won’t let you drive it!

 

 

That was never on the cards, unless you were the King of Bulgaria. (Or was it Romania?) The officials of his state railway and of the CIWL were brought to the brink of nervous breakdown by his penchant for speed and lack of understanding of signalling. 

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Well, I don't know about the hemlines but was it Tsar Boris or some other European royalty that married a peasant girl he saw disporting herself on a cutting bank, from the Orient Express? After which, the CIWL conductors were instructed to pull down the carriage blinds when passing the spot, as the idea had caught on with the local girls.

 

Not that I'm suggesting this would make an appropriate cameo for Traeth Mawr; Mr Price would find it all very embarrassing, I'm sure.

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The trouble with going away is that everything gets packed up, and then you have to unpack it when you get home.  The last holiday was completely unfruitful where modelling was concerned.  On top of that I took it into my head to try and finish off two projects that have been waiting for years as they have no place on the present layout.  However, as they are the only buildings that I have made, you have seen them in their unmade state behind people.  (Oh yes, I have built the Down Shelter.)

 

The first is the Honeymoon Cottage, which having thought about it, and found that bits that I thought I had cut out have gone walkies, will still have to wait.  The second is the station building for the Twll Du, which basically needs its roof.  There are other things to do inside, but I am more interested in making it so that when I take photos I do not keep on having to crop the non existent roof off.  Mr Lewis, the other Station Master is overjoyed, although concerned that he will have a station building but no railway, whereas Mr Price has a railway but no building.

 

The building is the Ratio model of Castle Coombe.  It has some roof supports and some formers.  I decided to read the instructions.  Bad move?)  They said glue the roof parts together and then to the building.  The first I had done years ago, and the second I did not want to do as I want it removeable to finish the inside.  Umm, what about the formers?  It said, 'When the roof is glued in place, fit them from underneath.'  The building already has a floor so that is impossible.  What I wanted to do was use the formers to make the roof.  

 

Here is an image of the station:-

 

Inside.jpg.fdaa82c00a0c38b252f3d66165df445e.jpg

 

Here is the roof:-

 

 

1781775241_Roof2.jpg.97378f4c22c688fb40de50377e9dcd30.jpg

 

The former on the right has the extra supports attached that re designed to fix it to the extension.  As they will interfere with the triangular wall supports it had to be placed so as to miss them.  I used polystyrene cement on one side of the support to fix it to one side of the roof, then the same on the other support but on the opposite side.  This meant I could stick it to the roof and bring both sides together, and have some possible movement and alignment, then I glued the other side of the supports and the apex together with Plastic Weld.

 

The support under the extension roof was 1mm below where the roof would sit so I cut some 1 x 2mm strips of Plastruc of different lengths.  This means that when the roof is sat on the building there is very little side play.  The extension roof was then glued with Plastic Weld.

 

Chimneys next.  There are two, one for two pots, and the other for one.  In the kit the pot for the single appeared to be more for a stove rather than a fire, so I decided to make my own pot.

 

Chimney.jpg.7134c95b3ac60fbcb915321287fd4c91.jpg

 

It is the one in the middle.  :D   It is two 1 x 2mm strips glued together, then around it is wrapped some 10 thou plasticard.  To make the band at the top I used 30 x 10 thou strip.  I would have preferred 30 x 20 but I did not have any, and I thought wrapping two strips, one on top of the other was too much of a challenge.  The marks that look like dips are in fact my pencil markings for positioning.  They were then fixed to the stacks.

 

2121772508_Chimney2.jpg.f4b37876f940ff41a69ed6256cb552b7.jpg

 

No, your eyes are wonky, not the chimney.  :D  Then onto the roof.

 

301607015_Roof3.jpg.c6622304b64a806589bdba37f7ccbc65.jpg

 

Finally I painted it.  The instructions say, a grey/green.  Now Humbrol Dark Slate Grey is grey/green which is a shame as I would like slate grey to be blue or purple grey so for other roofs I will have to find something else, but I thought I would stick with it for this one.

 

1868281531_Roof4.jpg.ea83a5e34a1e823375d1a80cd905800e.jpg

 

I was not very happy with it as it took lots of coats to cover.  Then I realised that unlike other paint I have used, if you spread a thin layer on top of a drying thick layer it does not match, it just shows up lighter.  Most annoying.  Still not sure about the roof colour.

 

The chimney pots are Humbrol Brick Red and the stacks are a mid grey.  The instructions say it is concrete and to use a white or cream, but when we were in Wales the pebble dashing, or its equivalent was this grey, so I thought that would be better.  I think they use the same colour in Scotland as well, and certainly on an estate as you leave Manchester heading for Glossop and the Peak District.  It gives the estates a dreary look, but it looks fine on these two stacks.

 

The instructions said to then dry brush the roof with increasing paler shades of the green/grey, for five or six times.  Now I am not sure about that.  (They also talked about adding other signs of wear and decay.)  This building is only 13 years old, in 1895, (and probably 2020 as well), so I am not sure how much more I should do to it.  Any thoughts would be welcome.

 

I will continue with the gutters and downpipes, but not do much to the inside unless I have nothing else easy to do.

 

Next time, it could be the coach, any coach, or perhaps the 650.

 

If you have been, thanks for looking.

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Wot I do for slate roofs is paint them grey (think I used Tamyia dark sea grey acrylic), then sloshed the odd wash of dilute acrylic over them, think a mixture of earth and green. Much prefer to use washes rather than dry-brushing. It's fairly easy to vary the texture according to the amount of wash used, but being a wash it also smoothly blends in rather than giving abrupt changes of colour. Use the same technique for stone walls on building, think I used Tamyia light sea grey (which is darker then dark sea grey ...).  The earth tones down the base colour and also helps things blend.

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