West End Workbench

[jwealleans]

Fifty?   You need more fingers, Tom.

[LMS29]

On 18 May 2020 at 15:45, jwealleans said:

Fifty?   You need more fingers, Tom.

 

I think RL will need to add some more sidings if south Box is expected to assemble and break up trains and accommodate more than 50 of your star wagons.

 

Tom

[jwealleans]

I think there are 108 wagons in total (I do have a spreadsheet) but that includes the fixed trains.   I don't honestly know how many are used for shunting except that it's been the same number for a couple of years at least.

[gazman424]

Hi Jonathon,

Hope all is well. I'd sent you a couple of PM's regarding the Dia. 265 Coach sides I was doing for you, but it was around the time that RMWeb was being upgraded and I think they were lost in the ether!

 I promptly forgot about them and have just found them during a tidy up, so if you would still like them, just drop me a PM with a suitable address and I'll stick them in the post.

Take care!

Gaz.

[jwealleans]

I managed some time at the bench this weekend and went back to the J6.  I've deliberately left it until i had a prolonged period at it.   Over the weekend I put together the gearbox/motor, built the tender and added more bits to the body, which is now in one piece.

 

 

The drive unit is intended to be a Mitsumi driving the rear axle through a High Level Road Runner Plus (which I happened to have) - the gearbox is on its front parallel to the rails and the motor vertical in the firebox in this configuration.  I shan't do much more to the body now until I've put all that together and tested it.   One thing which has become apparent today is that clearances in OO are tight - I've had to clear material from under the cab splashers and around the smokebox saddle and I'll take more out to be sure we have comfortable clearances there.

 

At the same time as starting this, I've been looking at the isinglass printed resin kits.  I'd been aware of this range developing for some time but wasn't overly taken with some of the early examples I saw.  More recently, though, the quality of the printing process has improved and encouraged by the Bill Bedford carriages I recently finished, I thought I'd have a dabble.   What tipped the scale was the availability of a D274 Lavatory Third, one of the 58' Gresley carriages which I think are the best looking carriages to run in this country.

You order the kits in sections, if that doesn't sound tautologous: the body is one item, floor another, bogies another.   No underframe components are offered.   I went for body and floor in this case and sorted out MJT items for the rest.

 

 

This is what turned up, within a couple of days; body sides still attached to each other, ends, roof, floor, generic instructions and a copy of the Isinglass drawing for this vehicle.   As these generally show liveries and variations and list numbers and withdrawal dates, they're invaluable and worth a fair bit of the kit cost on their own.

 

 

The floor is designed to take either RTR bogies (using the boss) or MJT ones (snap the boss out and you have guides for the brass MJT mount.  Unfortunately the floor was only 56' long, so I had to wait for a replacement.  Here the assembled bodyshell is perched on the short floor.

 

 

When the replacement came, I was greatly impressed to see that my suggestion of adding the full length footstep to the print had been acted upon.   The printed step isn't as fine as a plastic or brass one would have been, but it's much stronger.  

 

 

The printing on the sides was much better than I've seen in the past, but it's not yet a match for etched or moulded parts.   There are raised square areas on the print and in one place the side much have sagged slightly in the printer so a doorframe and droplight weren't straight.   I did some work with a burnishing pencil and left other areas to see how filler primer would help.  You can also see the characteristic pips which the Mousa vehicles also had and which have to be filed flat.  

 

 

The body went together with cyano and very little effort.  Subsequent to the above photo I added 40 thou partitions each side of the lav and at the brake end to make the whole thing more rigid.

 

 

After that there were a few days awaiting the replacement floor.

 

 

Underframe populated - the MJT components give it a bit of weight as well which is no bad thing.  

 

 

Body primed - it had two or three light coats of filler primer on the sides - and I've started detailing the roof.   The roof has a pair of parallel lines in side to help you get the vents central, but no other except, in this case, the skylight for the van end.   I haven't checked in detail, but the skylight looks a bit wide and flat to me.  I did take some sandpaper to the roof as the striations on that would be very visible on a finished model.

 

The end detail was a bit of a disappointment - there was very little other than steps.  Of course, it's much easier to add than remove, so that's what I did.   Passenger end now with alarm gear, brake piping and a cockeyed light switch; van end with revised panelling (the original beading was simply incorrect) and holes for handrails and lamp irons drilled.  I've put the lamp irons fractionally high so they don't interfere with the body/floor join.  

 

 

 

Roof now with destination board holders, vents, fillers and handrails as well as the rain deflectors.  I'm out of Evergreen rod for the rainstrip so that is having to wait for the moment.  

 

 

So this is where it is right now; I'm also out of black spray cans, so the underframe isn't beyond primer either.   I gather our local Halfords is open again so I may get there this week.  

 

 

On the whole I'm pleased with this.   The sides still show print marks when you look along them and the ends are too thick - this has been raised as a concern elsewhere.  Just to give you an idea, here are the model ends compared to prototype shots:

 

 

 

You can see that the end ought to fit between the sides to give a scale thickness beyond the end of the panelling and that isn't the case.  However in 4mm it's hardly terminal and the range is still developing, so it remains to be seen what can be done.     It's still a handsome vehicle and I can live with the compromise, to be honest.  You don't get the level of detail I found on the Mousa kits, but that allows you to do your own personalisation and detailing which, to be frank, isn't rocket science.

 

Irritatingly that passenger end photo also shows a handrail which isn't on the drawing and I hadn't noticed before.

[grob1234]

Hello Jonathan,

 

I hope you are well?

 

Just a very quick question for you regarding a D&S Pigeon Van I am building.

 

Dan recommends forming the tumblehome on the main side, then forming the inlay to fit... I was thinking of soldering the inlay to the main side, then forming the tumblehome...

 

What do you do? I'm loathed to stray from the instructions too much, the kit fits very well and I am sure Dan knows what he's talking about?!

 

 

[cctransuk]

2 minutes ago, grob1234 said:

Hello Jonathan,

 

I hope you are well?

 

Just a very quick question for you regarding a D&S Pigeon Van I am building.

 

Dan recommends forming the tumblehome on the main side, then forming the inlay to fit... I was thinking of soldering the inlay to the main side, then forming the tumblehome...

 

What do you do? I'm loathed to stray from the instructions too much, the kit fits very well and I am sure Dan knows what he's talking about?!

 

 

 

For what it's worth, I'd expect the soldered lamination to be much harder to form.

 

John Isherwood.

[grob1234]

12 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

 

For what it's worth, I'd expect the soldered lamination to be much harder to form.

 

John Isherwood.

 

Agreed. In all honesty I'm leaning back towards following the instructions. There would be 1.5 times etch and 0.5 times etch and they'd prbably bend differently.

[jwealleans]

Hi Tom,

 

Pleased to see you posting again.   I do put the two parts together then bend them - I have a bending tool like the one Sir uses and it's not a huge bend to form when you look at it.   Doing it the conventional way brings two problems;  it's not easy to manage the same degree of bend on both parts and it's very easy to overbend or distort the half-etched piece.

[grob1234]

Thank you Jonathan.

 

I'm slowly getting back into it after finally settling, having a permanent place to make models and also having a little more time than usual.

 

I have a bending tool that was made for the original Coronation, which supports the piece very well.

 

I'll give it a try, as you say the etch is pretty thin and its a small bend... what could go wrong. I'll let you know the final result - no pressure

[grob1234]

Hi Jonathan,

 

Just to prove it all worked ok:

 

 

Hardest bit was actually the bend at the top by the toplights, even though I scored through til there was a witness mark on the front. Must get a decent set of bending bars!

 

Thanks for the help

[jwealleans]

Nicely neat and tidy, Tom.  Those bends above toplights can be a .  i keep thinking about one of those Hold and Fold affairs, but I don't know anyone who has one to see it close up.

[Daddyman]

33 minutes ago, jwealleans said:

Nicely neat and tidy, Tom.  Those bends above toplights can be a .  i keep thinking about one of those Hold and Fold affairs, but I don't know anyone who has one to see it close up.

They're good, Jonathan. I wouldn't be without one. Would close-up photos help, or is it that you need to play around with one?  

 

Having  said that, they're not much use in the D&S situation, as the bit that needs to be supported by the tool - the body side, with its hinge holes or top lights - cannot be as the too would flatten the turn-under (which should already have been formed).

 

I tend not to try to bend these longitudinal strips on D&S or Connoisseur carriages, but cut them off instead and then solder them to the sides at the required angle - a lot less stressful when you're paying £60-100 for a 4-wheeler on ebay...  

Edited June 4, 2020 by Daddyman

[jwealleans]

Ooh, I've been censored.   On my own thread.   How very straightlaced of this software.  

 

I'd like a fiddle with one, to be honest, to decide whether it's better than my steel rule, bending bars and big steel set square arrangement.

 

Flat body sides wouldn't be an issue as they'll go into my turnunder forming tool with that return already bent and that would probably help the rigidity of the sides to achieve an even bend anyway.

Edited June 4, 2020 by jwealleans
Spelling.

[Barry O]

2 hours ago, jwealleans said:

Nicely neat and tidy, Tom.  Those bends above toplights can be a .  i keep thinking about one of those Hold and Fold affairs, but I don't know anyone who has one to see it close up.

yes you do now.. had one for years.. great items and easy to use . I bought the 8" one...

 

Baz

[chris p bacon]

1 hour ago, jwealleans said:

Ooh, I've been censored.   On my own thread.   How very straightlaced of this software.  

 

3 minutes ago, Barry O said:

 I bought the 8" one...

 

Some people are favoured....

[gr.king]

Chosen People? Master Race?  ?!?!

[jwealleans]

It might just be his varifocals, of course.....

[grob1234]

Hallo Jonathan, another quick question for you if I may. What is the recommended colour for the teak solebars and the teak wheel centres on LNER vans and carriages?

[jwealleans]

I use Humbrol 62 (on Mike Trice's recommendation).

[grob1234]

3 hours ago, jwealleans said:

I use Humbrol 62 (on Mike Trice's recommendation).

 

Thank you very much, sir. Looks like it comes well recommended.

[Chas Levin]

Another vote here for the Hold & Fold! You're right that top edges - especially along the tops of windows - are still problematic, but it works a treat generally and is incredibly quick and easy for all those little items, W-irons and so forth 

[Chas Levin]

On 12/06/2020 at 17:24, jwealleans said:

I use Humbrol 62 (on Mike Trice's recommendation).

 

Have you ever tried Phoenix Precision's P60 LNER Coach Teak, Jonathan? I just googled the Humbrol 62 which looks like it has more of a red tinge than the PP one. I know there's much debate on this question, so few contemporary colour photos and such a lot of variation in the ageing of their colour stock and of surviving original prototype coaches (not to mention modern restorations of those coaches).

It's a fascinating subject though; there was a little series of two or three articles in the 3mm Society Journal a while back called something like 'Interpreting colour in original photographs' that I have in a file somewhere, which tried a semi-scientific approach. The author (who's name I'm afraid I can't remember right now) took an original photo and isolated known colours such as the sky, or grass, or a well known brand logo of a particular colour. He then looked at how that known colour had been affected by the photographic process - perhaps a red that was clearly excessively vivid, or green grass that looked unnaturally bleached - and worked back from that, to try and understand how the BR maroon or LNER green might have been similarly distorted. It certainly encouraged me to look much more closely and carefully at early colour images.

There's also the very interesting series of restored photos of teak colours on Steve Banks's site...

[jwealleans]

P60 is a very dark colour which I use for the graining on a teak finish.  62 is used for the painted teak bits like steel solebars, wheel centres, duckets and so on.  Rightly or wrongly, what made my mind up was the fact that when i used it and looked at the finished vehicles, it looked just like the colour the LNERCA use up at Grosmont.  It's all over all the teak vehicles I've built on this thread, you can decide for yourself whether it works.

 

 

[Chas Levin]

No debate - it certainly works and I didn't mean to question your judgement. The 'recipe' for teaking coaches that you showed in a detailed photo sequence on your thread a few years back has formed the basis for my own teak efforts 

Edited June 14, 2020 by Chas Levin