Leberecht, my Prussian modelling adventure.

[Horsetan]

.....It's a Roco Bavarian "Glaskasten" (glass castle/house) - a single manned 0-4-0 loco ....

 

I do like a lot of the stuff turned out by Roco these days, but the size of those wheel flanges is dreadful. There must be some way of turning them down to make them a little less offensive!

[Allegheny1600]

Thanks Ivan!

While I do agree with you I have come to realise that life is too short, I have a dozen different projects simmering in the wings and were I to do something about all my models flanges, I'd never get anywhere!

I have some P87 and some P4 stuff hidden away and when I get the desire to work with that, I'll do a few days on it, then go back to the simple life again.

Cheers,

John.

[Horsetan]

....were I to do something about all my models flanges, I'd never get anywhere!....

 

I've got 18.201 heading this way, so I can't wait to see what the flange sizes are on that. Based on Google photos of it, it looks like three different sizes!

[ChrisN]

 

Over the years, I have collected a fair few of the painted "Period" figures and some of the Stadden metal figures (gorgeous!), I wasn't aware of the Edwardian unpainted set thank you. Do you think I could get away with a few earlier figures by 1920?

Cheers,

John.

 

 John,

I think that is an interesting question.  The younger generation would have gone with the latest fashion, and the change was quite dramatic so you could not get away as a few years earlier with wearing older styles.  There are pictures of men wearing stiff collars and wing collars into the 40s but not the tall Imperial collars.  I am sure it would be difficult to notice the change in working men's clothes over quite a long period.  (Ducks to avoid missles from posts proving me wrong.)  The older ladies would have carried on wearing their older style clothes and not looked much different.( Note, older lady in Downton Abbey.  Sorry, I have seen, not watched, seen an episode).  How young this would have gone I am not sure.  Having been corseted for 20 or 30 years they may not wished to have stopped wearing them, but they may not have gone well with the new styles, but perhaps they could have.

 

So the answer is 'Yes', but not many and only the older generation, and I think, again waiting to be told I am wrong, it would be the blouse, jacket and skirt style but perhaps  a dress that shows off the ankle.

 

Also, talking of ornate liveries, have you seen this thread?

[Allegheny1600]

Hello All,

It finally occurs to me to update this thread! What with one thing and another, I haven't done an awful lot on here just covered all the baseboard top with 3mm thick closed cell foam, made the cut out for the turntable and started removing the excess exit tracks from the table.

The rails for this are Fleischmann code 100 so I may replace all the entrance/exit rails with code 75, don't know how that will tie in with the bridge rails though so I need to experiment with that.

The photos for this are not particularly interesting and I've mislaid them anyway!

 

May I wish anyoone looking in, a very merry Christmas and a happy new year.

Best,

John.

[Allegheny1600]

Hi all,

It seems I'm in a mood to show off my recent progress, not that theres much to show.

The site for the loco facilities and turntable.

 

The main station area.

 

The leads off to the quarry.

 

A largely scenic area. Must build a small corner board to save the line being balanced in thin air!

 

The start of cutting out the turntable well.

 

I had to make sure the board was well supported but the blade is clear of the support.

 

Just a bit of sanding and cleaning to do now.

 

Oops! The plywood had blown in a couple of places around the hole. No problem, just force some PVA in by 'squashing' it in with the fingers, do that until theres plenty in, then do it some more and clamp it overnight. In this case it was probably more like three or more days!

The hole is rock solid now well, the edges of the holes, anyway.

Cheers,

John.

[Vecchio]

Just fell over your thread - I like the woodworking you have showed. I know - not the right time of the year for model railways - but any further progress made?

 

Vecchio

[Allegheny1600]

Thanks Vecchio, All,

Progress has been held up because I'm an idiot! I was also in two minds about whether or not to continue posting my "progress" here but that's another story.
I had decided that I didn't want my turntable to have several spurious exit tracks unconnected to anything else so I removed on to see how easy it was to remove the rails and use filler to remove any traces of where the rails where. I then subsequently lost/misplaced this piece of the table, grrr!!!
Good news however, I found my missing turntable segment! 
The bad news was that I only found it AFTER I had ordered and received a set of additional segments from Lippe, they were reasonably priced in themselves but for such a small order, the postage was relatively expensive. Not to worry, at the time, I could not see how else to get around my missing segment! HA!
So, this is what a segment looks like;


And, with the rails and extraneous bits removed;


Filled with Squadron "White Putty" and sanded down;


As a group and with an original "blank" segment;


Now to paint, possibly fill & sand again, paint again and see what they look like!

I have also found a wonderful picture online showing a similar table in use, in Prussian days. Note that there are only handrails around the winding mechanism, health and safety was much less apparent in those days.


So, here is the original model;


And, without handrails!


A little cheating really, the handrails just unclip from the table, useful!
Hopefully, it won't be so long until my next update!
John.

[Allegheny1600]

Over the holiday period I did get some modelling done (at last!).

 

Here we have all the blank segments completed (still with masking tape) and the partially repainted track segments too.

 

The rails were painted with Howes acrylic "dark rust" and the 'concrete' section with the same firms "concrete", I had to repaint this as all the blank sections were painted this way.

 

I took the opportunity to paint the rail sides on the bridge deck, these had to be masked off. Only when I removed the masking did I realise the section between the rails is removeable, oh well, never mind.

I also thought it a good idea at this stage to paint the sides only of the circular rail the bridge rides on, with all the segments in place, this would be very difficult.

 

I had also cut down the place where the bridge was built up to support the operators hut, also the supporting "jockey" wheel was repositioned.

 

I'm quite pleased with the overall appearance here.

 

As the bridge deck and the track segments are code 100 rail, I bought some Peco transition tracks to drop the section of rail down to code 75 and painted them too.

 

At very long last, the turntable is almost complete!

All that now needs to be done is to make and fit a short section of railing around the winder and then install into that hole in my baseboard that I cut, in about October 2015! Oops, that's too long ago, I hope the next bit of real progress doesn't take so long.

Cheers,

John.

[ChrisN]

John,

Glad that you are on a roll! It is looking good. 

 

 I have done hardly anything to my actual layout for months, even though work continues on my workbench.  Hope all is going well with you.

 

That is one enormous tank engine on that turntable 

[Allegheny1600]

Hi All,

Progress on my layout has been glacially slow I'm afraid.

Mum-in-law being terminally ill, dad-in-law not much better, business steady and helping out with my club - all contribute and take their toll.

However, I'm finally making progress on rolling stock, may I introduce certain items on here?

 

I've recently completed a large amount of horse trading with an old friend that sees me acquire much of his Prussian stock in exchange for my Bavarian stock, not to mention some reading matter. Here is my 'new' Trix T3 along with some Fleischmann coaches;

 

 

 

CC my very good friend Doug and seen on his layout, Alte Rinkham.

Apparently, the T3 originated between 1881 and 1910 and on the Prussian railways, they numbered some 1345 examples in total. This particular version (431 examples) was built between 1895 and 1905, the Fleischmann version (which I also have!) only numbered 52 copies. There are only some quite minor differences between the two types, mainly around the water tank.

This loco should be capable of hauling a good 36 axles on the flat, this one may need some attention as it seemed distressed at pulling more than 10 axles and very little up Dougies 3% slopes! It squealed at trying such a grade so was hurriedly assigned to a flat route.

Despite that, I am very pleased with it although I have read that it's rigid chassis* causes hesitation, it ran smoothly enough, only baulking at occasional dirty spots which were soon rectified.

Hopefully, I can show more items as time goes on?

Cheers,

John.

 

*For which, I have a cunning plan.

[Allegheny1600]

I'm no great shakes as a cameraman but here is a little video I made recently.

 

I must add, this is on my good friends layout, Alte Rincham now sadly demolished due to moving house.

Cheers,

John.

[Allegheny1600]

Hi All,
Now that summer is finally over, I hope to start making some progress with this, along with other projects to come.
I have done very little with this layout since my last post but a couple of important things have happened.
I have managed to clear all the junk from on top of the layout that had imperceptibly built up over time. It is amazing how one just places something with the intention of sorting it later, then something else and before you know it, the layout is invisible and it has become merely a storage shelf, well no more!
A bit more messing with the track layout and I shall start glueing.
Also, I realised that "Irgendwo" (somewhere) is rather too common a name for me, I wanted something different. This fact was hammered home at the recent(ish) ERA show at Edgbaston where there were at least two other 'Irgendwo's.
So! What to call this layout?
Trawls of the internet proved inconclusive and studies of online maps became brain numbing, then it dawned on me. A colleague had suggested that I place a statue outside my station of Fieldmarshall Blucher as he was instrumental in helping to defeat the French at Waterloo. Reading up on him, what a fascinating character he was. I've still not located a suitable figure of him to be my statue but I could pay tribute in another way.
Therefore, my new name for the layout is Leberecht!
As in Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher.
I think it sounds promising, how about you guys?
Cheers,
John.

[ChrisN]

John,

I know what you mean about junk on layouts.  I had to clear lots of stuff off so I could take it down!  Now I need to clear the room to put it back up again.

 

I do like the name, it is a fitting tribute.  I am sure though he would say that we kept Napoleon busy until he was able to come and defeat him, it is all about who writes the history.

 

Hope you are well, and I look forward to more updates.

[Fluo66]

I've still not located a suitable figure of him to be my statue but I could pay tribute in another way.

Hi John,

 

What about these figurines?

 

25mm high, made of rubber:

https://www.zinnfigur.com/Zinngiessen/Giessformen/Prince-August/25-mm-1-72/1789-1815/Gebhard-Leberecht-von-Bluecher.html

 

Or 60mm high:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Figurine-MHSP-Original-Bl-cher-Prussien-Waterloo-1815-Napol-on-Empire-Figuren/272262075590

 

I would go for the first one.

Just paint it grey, sand or in a dark colour and glue it on a scratch built base like this:

http://www.modellbahn-fokus.de/product/H0/FALLER/Häuser/4-39-004017-0-7875-0-de-0-1-0-0-0-1-0-0/index.html

 

"Leberecht" could be the name of a prussian town. "Leberecht" is a compound word composed of "Lebe recht" ("live right") or "Leber echt" ("liver real/true"). The first translation sounds much better and more plausible to me ;-)

 

Cheers from Prussia

Guido

[Fluo66]

English version of the first shop link:

https://www.zinnfigur.com/en/Casting/Moulds/Prince-August/25-mm-1-72/1789-1815/Gebhard-Leberecht-von-Bluecher.html

[Allegheny1600]

Thanks, Guys!

Your interest is warmly welcomed and appreciated.

Guido, that is perfect, thank you very much indeed, he is now on his way to me. I make it that a 25mm figure is over 7 feet tall in H0 scale, that plus the horse makes a nicely imposing but not too massive statue and I could quite easily build such a base.

It's great to have someone from Prussia following too.

Cheers,

John.

[Allegheny1600]

Here are two of my all-time favourite locos;

 

Weinert T9.3

 

Weinert T13

 

Both pictured rather incongruously on my American layout, in lieu of Leberecht being very unphotogenic.

 

I must admit - these are both ready to run items, not built by me but by the factory! I dearly wish I could claim that I have built them but no, I am not that good a modeller!

The T13 I won on German ebay after I had been selling off my American 0 scale brass(!), which was how I could afford it. Now, I did do some modelling with this one as when I got hold of it, it was seized up having been presumably sat in a display case for several years. I stripped it down, cleaned and degreased it and re-lubricated it and when it was working well, I digitized it - it is still a little noisy but runs very well.

The T9.3 I won at an actual auction for a fair price, it also came with a 'free' Weinert V65! This runs well enough but still needs digitising and as a mate said, could do with its lights making working.

Funnily enough, I also have two Fleischmann T9.3's and one Trix T13 - these will be for exhibition use as no way would I take the Weinerts to a show.

So, I am a bit of a chequebook modeller but only when it suits me - the Trix T13, in particular, is a far cry from the Weinert one.

Cheers,

John.

[Allegheny1600]

Some progress, at last?

After building my baseboards, painting them and glueing on the initial underlay, modifying and fitting the turntable, I had come to a grinding halt. Family crises aside, such a delay can only be described as running out of steam!

Suddenly, my motivation and enthusiasm came back and I was able to contemplate the next job which is track laying.

I laid out some track, very loosely and pretty much according to my plans and I liked how it looked.

TRACK PICS

 

 

 

Next, I marked alongside the track for where the roadbed needs to go.

SKETCH PIC

 

Then, wouldn’t you know it? Late in the day, I discovered that my last bottle of ‘Copydex’ had dried up! So next day, off to the shops and resupplies purchased, in smaller bottles this time.

A couple of days work and the roadbed was more or less finished and I can start laying actual track.

ROADBED PIC.

 

 

I realised that it was pretty important to work out how to get power to traverser before laying any track so I set to and gave it some thought. The answer came to me in a flash of inspiration when I realised that I need two wires and I had two metal runners.

So, I soon made up some wires and connected it all together, a test run proved the concept worked although I don’t know if it will last well but I made a lot of connections to be as sure as possible.

TRAVERSER PICS

 

 

The traverser fully prepared for track.

Until next time,

[Edwardian]

Great project.

 

Might I suggest 1/72nd Art Miniaturen (http://www.schmaeling.de/napoleonischer-krieg/preussen/preussische-persoenlichkeiten/) or 18mm AB (http://abfigures.com/command/794-staff-set-2.html)

[Allegheny1600]

Hi Edwardian,

Thanks for your suggestion, I'd already ordered him from Prince August.

 

He is perhaps, a little large though?

 

I'm not too sure but he will have to do for now! I was thinking of building a plinth for him to stand on but that would be absolutely HUGE so just a small, railed off area with a separate descriptive plinth to either side. Or something.

What I should like to do is to 'green' him up rather, after many years exposure to the elements, like this;

https://flic.kr/p/Zi5znA

© Kan Gunawardena, Brandenburg Gate, Berlin.

Cheers,

John.

[Allegheny1600]

Here is the traverser with all tracks glued down and electrical connections made,

1

 

With a train on and almost ready to go,

2

 

I had to reduce the track height at the entrance to the traverser very slightly so used some thin copper-clad sleepers and while I was at it, I added a re-railer section, I have tested it and it does work. This is only needed while I have not yet built a locking mechanism to keep each traverser track in perfect alignment with the exit track.

3

 

I don’t know if you can really see from this picture but the baseboard adjacent to the traverser, had suffered a slight distortion. It was simply too much up and down movement for my little trains to cope with so I cut out the entire foam roadbed out and inserted a finely sanded down piece of curved plywood in place, then re-laid the roadbed, it’s not absolutely level but much better now.

Serves me right for not using the very best plywood available.

4

 

As you can see from here, I still had to glue some thin strips of card under the track.

5

 

I believe that it is bad practice to cross baseboard joins on a curve?

6

 

Sadly, it was unavoidable here, I have used soldered copper-clad sleepers again to reinforce the crossing, I really hope that will be sufficient. At the moment, these are not cut through but they will have to be when the time comes to split the boards.

Cheers for now,

John.

[cklammer]

Re: your Monument: see the Bismarck monument in front of Bremen cathredral

 

 

It is green like Werder Bremen and the plinth is oh so graceful

 

Maybe bit to monumental, IMO.

 

Best Regards,

Christian

 

Aunt Edith says: the plinth is six metres high and no WWII damage as the momunent was walled up from 1942 to 1952.

Edited January 8, 2018 by cklammer

[Edwardian]

Hi Edwardian,

Thanks for your suggestion, I'd already ordered him from Prince August.

 

He is perhaps, a little large though?

 

I'm not too sure but he will have to do for now! I was thinking of building a plinth for him to stand on but that would be absolutely HUGE so just a small, railed off area with a separate descriptive plinth to either side. Or something.

What I should like to do is to 'green' him up rather, after many years exposure to the elements, like this;

https://flic.kr/p/Zi5znA

© Kan Gunawardena, Brandenburg Gate, Berlin.

Cheers,

John.

 

Hi, John,

 

This is an excellent project that I have enjoyed catching up on it.  My praise was somewhat terse in my earlier post because I was struggling for bandwith and it took at least 3 attempts to get you some Bluchers.

 

I reckon that these Nineteenth Century equestrian statutes were made slightly larger than life size, so, for HO (1/87), your Prinz August figure to 25mm scale (which refers to 25mm from sole of foot to eye level)  is going to be very much larger, as it equates to 1/64 scale.

 

Traditional 15mm scale is reckoned at 1/107, so close to 3mm to 1 foot (1.100), but the newer 18mm scale might do.  I would imagine that 1/76th (4mm to 1 foot) or 1/72nd would be the best means of portraying a slightly larger than life HO scale statue.

 

Apologies to anyone still awake.

[Ian Morgan]

Your statue for Blücher would seem to follow the unwritten convention for statues, having all four hooves on the ground to signify death from old age, although having one hoof raised to signify being wounded in battle would also be appropriate. On the other hand, Bismarck's statue should really have all four hooves on the ground. (I know, these conventions are mainly only followed in the UK and the US, and even then, there are exceptions)