Train spotting at Finsbury Square

[Mallard60022]

Just a thought Steve, having looked at this again and how good it is. How about strapping that Tarp in case it blows away in transit? I don't normally notice things like that and I am deffo not being a finger pointer; for some reason I just looked and thought that it might need strapping around.

Phil

[31A]

27 minutes ago, Mallard60022 said:

Just a thought Steve, having looked at this again and how good it is. How about strapping that Tarp in case it blows away in transit? I don't normally notice things like that and I am deffo not being a finger pointer; for some reason I just looked and thought that it might need strapping around.

Phil

 

I might do Phil; I must admit it does look a bit odd; but I had in mind a thin tarp tied to the tractor with string by the tractor merchant rather than a heavy Railway Company 'wagon sheet'.  And couldn't work out how, or whether, to do thin string in 4mm scale!  Although I agree, it does look a bit odd without anything o keep it on.

 

[PhilJ W]

The tractors a Ferguson not a Ford.

[31A]

4 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

The tractors a Ferguson not a Ford.

 

Ah well; I couldn't remember so I looked on the Oxford web site; I must have looked at the wrong one.

 

[31A]

2 hours ago, Mallard60022 said:

Just a thought Steve, having looked at this again and how good it is. How about strapping that Tarp in case it blows away in transit? I don't normally notice things like that and I am deffo not being a finger pointer; for some reason I just looked and thought that it might need strapping around.

Phil

 

How about this then, Phil?

 

Probably going to be the best I can do!

 

 

 

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, 31A said:

 

How about this then, Phil?

 

Probably going to be the best I can do!

 

 

 

I jokingly said when Steve showed our little covid support gang his latest wonderful model, that on some RMweb threads someone would question the knots.

 

I will let you guess who said this "Not wrong knots but wrong weave of Rope." ? He needs his beak tying up.

[jwealleans]

Morning Steve,

 

Juts in case you've not run out of enthusiasm for that one - it helps the appearance greatly if you paint the seat grey (64 is about right) and replace the steering wheel with an etched brake wheel (a tip I picked up from Adam).   They make an interesting load and the kids love them at shows.

[Oldddudders]

14 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

on some RMweb threads someone would question the knots.

RMweb has its fair share of knotted threads.....

[31A]

1 hour ago, jwealleans said:

Morning Steve,

 

Juts in case you've not run out of enthusiasm for that one - it helps the appearance greatly if you paint the seat grey (64 is about right) and replace the steering wheel with an etched brake wheel (a tip I picked up from Adam).   They make an interesting load and the kids love them at shows.

 

Thanks Jonathan, I did wonder whether anything else could be done.  Painting the seat would be easy enough and I'll do that.  I might have a rummage through the brake wheel etches as well, and see whether I come up with anything suitable.

 

[jwealleans]

I think the ones I used were Bill Bedford, but 51L do an etch as well.    Soldered to a lace pin which then serves to attach to the steering column.

 

[PhilJ W]

On the subject of tractors. Does any one know where you can get model draw gear for tractors in 1/76 scale?

[Tankerman]

20 hours ago, 31A said:

 

How about this then, Phil?

 

Probably going to be the best I can do!

 

 

 

 

Just like the one I started driving at 14.

 

Only just found your postings, really like the layout.

[jwealleans]

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

Does any one know where you can get model draw gear for tractors in 1/76 scale?

 

I'd have thought Langley would be your best bet, but it's not something I ever recall seeing tbh.

[PhilJ W]

I couldn't see anything suitable in the Langley catalogue. I'll have to check out some of the continental makers such as Faller.

[Mallard60022]

8 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

RMweb has its fair share of knotted threads.....

Many are the get knotted type too.......

Gone already.

Ar$£

[31A]

Here's a thing you don't often see modelled.  The latest Great Eastern Society Journal had a picture of a BR CCT, that was converted from an ex Great Eastern Railway suburban coach.  It's quite an elegant vehicle, as parcels vans go.  There were two types, bogie CCTs and PMVs.  They were quite short lived, the CCTs were converted in 1956-7 and withdrawn in 1962-3.  Originally they were used on the Anglo Scottish Car Carrier service and some had big lettering on the sides to that effect.

 

I unearthed this, which had been lying in a drawer for too many years:

 

 

It's a few millimetres longer than the vans in question (2mm at each end - does that sound better than saying 4mm?), but the profile is just about spot on to the drawings of GE coaches in "Historic Railway Carriages".  I decided to have a go at using it to make the CCT version, which naturally has end doors.  The PMV version might have been less work, but I suspect they retained the curved under ends which the Grafar coach doesn't have.  I didn't have any drawings to work from, but by re-scaling the BR outline drawing in Longworth I was able to get the sizes and positions of the doors.

 

So I cut sides from 10 thou plasticard; normally I would have used thicker but I didn't want to make the coach much fatter than it already was.  Droplight frames were also made form 10 thou., and holes drilled for handles etc.

 

I then cut away bits of the donor's sides that coincided with the new windows.  The seats are part of the body moulding, and had to be nibbled away in a couple of places so as not to be too obvious from the outside.

 

 

Bearing in mind that they were made from thin plasticard, I stuck the sides to the body with Dl Limonene solvent which I hoped wouldn't melt and distort the outsides.  I'd scribed the outlines of the doors on the ends, and then built up the end door detail from Evergreen strip, rod etc.  I copied a Lima CCT for this (the doors seem to have been very similar); in fact I did consider cutting the ends out of the Lima van and inserting them into the Grafar body, but that seemed too much like extreme surgery!  Door handles were made from wire and brass pins with the heads squashed, and with the body temporarily back on the underframe, it looked like this:

 

 

The underframe is a modular construction in four parts, which made things easier in some ways.

 

 

The bogies have the correct wheelbase and are pretty much spot on in other details, so didn't need much doing to them.  They have a particularly nasty tension lock coupling moulded on one end, but the other end has mountings for a 'standard' T/L coupling, so I sawed off the integral ones and attached Bachmann short couplings at the other end (the holes needed enlarging slightly.  The wheels that came with it were pretty nasty too, but a rummage uncovered enough suitably - retro Romford Jackson wheelsets (new enough to have pinpoints) which fitted nicely into the bogies and have produced a very steadily running vehicle.

 

 

Underframe details were mainly guesswork based on the aforesaid drawings of different GE coaches, and photos.  Some of these vans seem to have kept more of the lower stepboards than others; I decided to model them inn full as they are quite a distinctive feature.  So step boards were made from etch scrap; truss rod posts from split pins and wire insulation; hand brake wheels from a 51L Models fret.  On the end sections, some nice turned brass buffers (from a packet labelled Cav'ndish Models), and drawhooks.  I looked in the usual places for some proper GE buffers, but the GE seems to be poorly served for coach bits.  The brass ones I've used are reasonably similar, the bases should be square - if I ever find some better ones, they could be replaced.

 

 

From there, it was all downhill really.  Other underframe details (Battery boxes, brake gear, dynamo) were arranged as best I could guess from the photos, using various castings soldered to a metal sub base which was then glued beneath the body.  The roof had all the moulded ventilators removed.  Rain strips on these vans also seem to have differed; some retained the original long ones whereas others had them replaced with short ones above each doorway; I retained the long ones.

 

The modular construction meant the different elements could be sprayed separately, which was a bonus.  Transfers were HMRS Methfix, but I had to compromise a bit.  The real vans were labelled CCT(E) but I had to be satisfied with CCT.  The tare weight markings on the sheet are for BR standard vans so the TARE 25T is a bit of a fudge, hopefully doesn't look too bad, and the dimensions in the tiny insignia also apply to BR standard vans but are only legible under a very good magnifying glass!

 

So there we are, something a bit different!  In the lower picture the outlines of some of the original windows are visible but in reality  this isn't normally obvious; some pictures of the real vans show that the new panelling wasn't always too smooth, anyway,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[TrevorP1]

It's good to see old timers 're-purposed'.  I vaguely remember having one of those Graham Farish coaches in days long gone.

[St Enodoc]

12 hours ago, TrevorP1 said:

It's good to see old timers 're-purposed'.  I vaguely remember having one of those Graham Farish coaches in days long gone.

I had a set of four in the 60s/70s. They were good "generic" coaches, as we would say nowadays.

Edited February 26, 2021 by St Enodoc

[Mallard60022]

21 hours ago, 31A said:

Here's a thing you don't often see modelled.  The latest Great Eastern Society Journal had a picture of a BR CCT, that was converted from an ex Great Eastern Railway suburban coach.  It's quite an elegant vehicle, as parcels vans go.  There were two types, bogie CCTs and PMVs.  They were quite short lived, the CCTs were converted in 1956-7 and withdrawn in 1962-3.  Originally they were used on the Anglo Scottish Car Carrier service and some had big lettering on the sides to that effect.

 

I unearthed this, which had been lying in a drawer for too many years:

 

 

It's a few millimetres longer than the vans in question (2mm at each end - does that sound better than saying 4mm?), but the profile is just about spot on to the drawings of GE coaches in "Historic Railway Carriages".  I decided to have a go at using it to make the CCT version, which naturally has end doors.  The PMV version might have been less work, but I suspect they retained the curved under ends which the Grafar coach doesn't have.  I didn't have any drawings to work from, but by re-scaling the BR outline drawing in Longworth I was able to get the sizes and positions of the doors.

 

So I cut sides from 10 thou plasticard; normally I would have used thicker but I didn't want to make the coach much fatter than it already was.  Droplight frames were also made form 10 thou., and holes drilled for handles etc.

 

I then cut away bits of the donor's sides that coincided with the new windows.  The seats are part of the body moulding, and had to be nibbled away in a couple of places so as not to be too obvious from the outside.

 

 

Bearing in mind that they were made from thin plasticard, I stuck the sides to the body with Dl Limonene solvent which I hoped wouldn't melt and distort the outsides.  I'd scribed the outlines of the doors on the ends, and then built up the end door detail from Evergreen strip, rod etc.  I copied a Lima CCT for this (the doors seem to have been very similar); in fact I did consider cutting the ends out of the Lima van and inserting them into the Grafar body, but that seemed too much like extreme surgery!  Door handles were made from wire and brass pins with the heads squashed, and with the body temporarily back on the underframe, it looked like this:

 

 

The underframe is a modular construction in four parts, which made things easier in some ways.

 

 

The bogies have the correct wheelbase and are pretty much spot on in other details, so didn't need much doing to them.  They have a particularly nasty tension lock coupling moulded on one end, but the other end has mountings for a 'standard' T/L coupling, so I sawed off the integral ones and attached Bachmann short couplings at the other end (the holes needed enlarging slightly.  The wheels that came with it were pretty nasty too, but a rummage uncovered enough suitably - retro Romford Jackson wheelsets (new enough to have pinpoints) which fitted nicely into the bogies and have produced a very steadily running vehicle.

 

 

Underframe details were mainly guesswork based on the aforesaid drawings of different GE coaches, and photos.  Some of these vans seem to have kept more of the lower stepboards than others; I decided to model them inn full as they are quite a distinctive feature.  So step boards were made from etch scrap; truss rod posts from split pins and wire insulation; hand brake wheels from a 51L Models fret.  On the end sections, some nice turned brass buffers (from a packet labelled Cav'ndish Models), and drawhooks.  I looked in the usual places for some proper GE buffers, but the GE seems to be poorly served for coach bits.  The brass ones I've used are reasonably similar, the bases should be square - if I ever find some better ones, they could be replaced.

 

 

From there, it was all downhill really.  Other underframe details (Battery boxes, brake gear, dynamo) were arranged as best I could guess from the photos, using various castings soldered to a metal sub base which was then glued beneath the body.  The roof had all the moulded ventilators removed.  Rain strips on these vans also seem to have differed; some retained the original long ones whereas others had them replaced with short ones above each doorway; I retained the long ones.

 

The modular construction meant the different elements could be sprayed separately, which was a bonus.  Transfers were HMRS Methfix, but I had to compromise a bit.  The real vans were labelled CCT(E) but I had to be satisfied with CCT.  The tare weight markings on the sheet are for BR standard vans so the TARE 25T is a bit of a fudge, hopefully doesn't look too bad, and the dimensions in the tiny insignia also apply to BR standard vans but are only legible under a very good magnifying glass!

 

So there we are, something a bit different!  In the lower picture the outlines of some of the original windows are visible but in reality  this isn't normally obvious; some pictures of the real vans show that the new panelling wasn't always too smooth, anyway,

 

 

 

The UF gubbins looks particularly good Steve including the Vac Pipe; beautifully excecuted.

[thegreenhowards]

I love the CCT Steve. These have been on my to do list for a while but I had no idea on how to tackle them. Trouble is that I’d need six (for the Car Sleeper Limited) and that would be quite a lot of work!

 

Andy

[Clive Mortimore]

8 minutes ago, thegreenhowards said:

I love the CCT Steve. These have been on my to do list for a while but I had no idea on how to tackle them. Trouble is that I’d need six (for the Car Sleeper Limited) and that would be quite a lot of work!

 

Andy

 

Hi Andy

 

If you do make six can you order a 7th set of custom transfers?

 

My LNER Illford stock conversion. Both ex GER and LNER Illford coaches were used to make these CCTs. 

[thegreenhowards]

26 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

 

Hi Andy

 

If you do make six can you order a 7th set of custom transfers?

 

My LNER Illford stock conversion. Both ex GER and LNER Illford coaches were used to make these CCTs. 

That's not likely any time soon but I'll bear it in mind! The transfers are another reason for lethargy as the original Anglo Scottish Car Carrier decals will need a specialist to produce.

 

I see you've gone for the normal 'Sheffield Exchange Railway' white livery!

Edited February 26, 2021 by thegreenhowards

[Wheatley]

Very nice indeed Steve, not many others around either ;-)  The GUV did have the curved-under ends, there's a very clear photo in one of the Chenoa "Railways in Profile" volumes. 

[31A]

38 minutes ago, Wheatley said:

Very nice indeed Steve, not many others around either ;-)  The GUV did have the curved-under ends, there's a very clear photo in one of the Chenoa "Railways in Profile" volumes. 

 

Thank you!  That confirms what I thought re. the GUV version then; I haven't got that book.  If I was to do another one I might try that - there should be enough 'meat' in the ends to file the curve in; the underframe would need shortening a bit too, but that could be done.  They had a different arrangement of doors and windows, which would be interesting.  I might be inclined to try using thin brass for the sides to avoid the 'sinking' of the plasticard; there wouldn't be too many windows to cut out ....

 

[31A]

2 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

Trouble is that I’d need six (for the Car Sleeper Limited) and that would be quite a lot of work!

 

Glad you like it, Andy!  I have seen one or two pictures of that train with these vans (and the type Clive is making) mixed with BR Standard GUVs which might make it a bit easier.  Also, the large lettering doesn't always seem to have been applied, although it would be nice to be able to reproduce it.  Might be worth asking someone like Railtec, or in fact they might already do it - I haven't looked.

 

For example, p51 of "Keith Pirt's Colour Portfolio - Eastern & North Eastern Region Vol 2" shows 60078 on the Up "Anglo Scottish Car Carrier", carrying the headboard (looks like black lettering painted onto a white background).  Of the first 6 vans 4 are like Clive's or mine and 2 are BR Standard GUVs; none are carrying the large lettering.  June 1960.