Sarn (Montgomeryshire) and Nantcwmdu (South Wales) plus Montgomery Town in 7mm

[corneliuslundie]

Two months but very little to report and I am thwarted on several projects at the moment.

Sarn is almost complete except for finishing off the backscene and adding a dozen trees on the right hand side, plus sorting out the short circuit which has appeared. 

For the backscene photos I shall have to wait for Spring. I intended to go out this Spring but laziness intervened.

The trees are currently in the form of bare trunks/stems of twisted millinery wire, awaiting a purchase of Artex. Here the problem is that I cannot find a source in quantities less than 7.5 kg, which would be enough to produce the whole Kerry Forest.

i have made a small amount of progress on the locomotive front. I have been practising low melting point soldering and have successfully built one of Adrian Swain's cast metal Iron Minks, so the loco body is not looking quite so daunting. I intend building a couple more cast metal wagon kits and then tackling the body of 1196. And on Saturday at Manchester I acquired some strip suitable for the coupling rods.

However, also at Manchester I failed to buy several other things, both for my use and for the new club layout. This included PCB sleeper strip to enable me to continue track laying on Nantcwmdu.

I have also built a GWR Serpent, but cannot work out how to add the lettering and especially the number which needs to be squashed up at one end so transfers cannot be used. Just for luck the HMRS transfer sheet does not include Serpent.

And I am stymied over the numbering for a Slaters Ocean PO wagon. I have over a dozen, and they have had the numbers added, but I cannot work out how as the size of numbers appears on none of the transfer sheets i own, including the one which comes with the Slaters kit.

So this is a "lack of progress" report.

Hopefully I shall have made more progress by the New Year.

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

There will be a post about progress with things model railway shortly, but for now:

Jonathan

[ChrisN]

Jonathan & Clare,

A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you both and all your family.

Edited December 25, 2018 by ChrisN

[corneliuslundie]

A brief update. Until i can source the materials for layout building - Artex for Sarn and thin PCB sleeper strip for Nantcwmdu, I decided to try some more low melting point soldering, plus a few other goods vehicles which were awaiting construction.

The first LM soldering was an ABS kit for a GWR Iron Mink - not that i really need ANOTHER Iron Mink but it was an easy one to start on, with the soldering hidden inside. That completed successfully, i made two Five & Nine Models dumb buffered coal wagons. Very nice kits. Even though the solder is visible when one looks inside, it is discreet enough to get away with. They have been painted black and will be lettered for the Nantcwmdu Colliery Co, though I haven't decided yet whether the full name or just NCC. It depends partly what letters I have left on my various transfer sheets. The various wagons for this colliery are intentionally in a variety of styles, so contrast with the fleet for the Ocean colliery next door. This fleet has had its 40th example added, thanks to a purchase from an EMGS member, one of the prelettered Slaters kits. the idea is that I shall have 20 loaded and 20 empty, so there can be four rakes..

Also from a plastic kit was a Parkside GWR Mink, an easy job. Less straightforward was a GWR Serpent from a cast metal kit, though it went together OK.

So far so good, but then I got out of its packet a David Geen cast metal kit for a GWR twin tank gas tank wagon. Lots of prototype information and parts for different variants - though not the earlier axleboxes I want - but the assembly instructions are almost non-existent and it is not going to be straightforward, so it has gone back in its bag.

Also taken out of a rather battered plastic bag was a Great Western Wagons kit for an early GWR open with curved ends. What I had forgotten was that the reason it had gone back in its bag was that I had, years ago, made a complete pig's ear of assembling it and got Araldite everywhere. So I have used the smaller components and made a new chassis and body from brass angle and plastic sheet and strip. It is currently awaiting the addition of several hundred bolt heads.

Also currently on the workbench is a Mousa Models kit for a GCR open. I like his more recent klts in resin but this one is all etched except the axleboxes and buffer shanks. Making up "timber" end stanchions from three etched components is just a bit fiddly. it designed to have sprung axleboxes and buffers but it will not be built with either, the former because I do not find it necessary with nine foot wheelbase wagons and the second because Sprat & Winkle couplings make springing the buffers pointless.

I also got out a David Geen kit for a PO tank wagon but have not yet started it as it has the same problems as his gas tank wagon - lots of prototype information, several variants possible but minimal instructions.

Anyway, the next job is coupling rods for GWR ex CR 1196. Nickel silver strip has been purchased so it is now a case of getting on with a rather fiddly and exacting job. And then to assemble the loco body now that I have not ruined three cast metal kits while soldering them together.

There are still quite a few kits in the box awaiting assembly but I think I now need to finish those in the workshops and then get on with that loco, then finish Sarn and get on with track laying for Nantcwmdu.

No photos this time as I took a few but have lost them, Perhaps a catch up set next time.

Jonathan

Edited to correct typos

Edited January 5, 2019 by corneliuslundie

[corneliuslundie]

Another three months! I am trying to clear my workbench so I can make up some of the trees discussed previously. Having failed to find a source of small quantities of Artex, i am going to try a lightweight filler. Hopefully more news on that soon.

In the meantime the workbench has been occupied by wagons - surprise, surprise!

The first is a straightforward Parkside kit for a GWR Diagram V12 van in 1930s state for Sarn.  The D&C brake gear was fun, and had to be altered a little to accommodate the S&W couplings but otherwise it went together fine.

I then got down from the kit box one for an early GWR round ended three plank, originally produced by Great Western Wagons.

What I had forgotten was that some years previously I had attempted to assemble it using Araldite and got the adhesive all over the castings. So I ended up using just the component castings and making a new body and underframe from plastic and brass. This one is for Nantcwmdu. Unfortunately the ends have warped a bit.

Third is a Mousa Models kit for a Great Central open. I don't like etched brass for open wagons but it went together OK except where I made errors. The transfers are not available from the HMRS, these being waterslide type from Quainton Road Models. So what to do with the rest?

Fourth and fifth are two Furness Railway opens scratch built using drawings pubiished in Railway Modeller many years ago. The story is that they are delivering machinery to the colliery from the Lowca engineering Works.

Next, two elderly coal wagons for Nantcwmdu - both 5&9 Models. They went together fine, the big job being the lettering using individual characters from elderly PC GWR wagon transfer sheets. It is a policy that no two wagons for this colliery have the same style of lettering! One problem I had was that I used a cheap make of acrylic black paint, which then tended to come off when wetted to apply the transfers.

And finally, something completely different - O gauge. This is for the new club layout, a prototype AAC wagon having been spotted in a photo of the Bishop's Castle Railway. The lettering has taken ages, and even now needs a lot of touching up where the various protuberances on the sides of the wagon have distorted it. Also not yet finished is a similar wagon in Highley Mining Company colours, though here the main problem is lack of transfers for H, M, C and H again, as they are larger than the rest of the words. I am attempting to hand paint them.

The other activity which has been occupying some time is developing transfers for BCR iron Minks, which were lettered, rather crudely, in black on a light colour. More on this next time. The model is from Minerva, suitably repainted.

Jonathan

 

[Donw]

very nice. One suggestion though would it not be better to blacked though strange bits of brass sticking out of the ends before fitting them? ( even better use three links!)

 

Don

[corneliuslundie]

Agreed on blackening the couplings. i have usually painted them but i have been experimenting with blackening. they also still need the links added.

Also, as can be seen i have been having problems with the matt varnish turning pink for some unknown reason. i hope that can be masked by weathering. and some of the transfers have lifted, particularly on the CR wagons - i know now why.

However, all that can wait until I have some trees. And some of the  wagons also need the buffers painted a more realistic colour. i usually use gunmetal.

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

Another two moths! Most of the little progress I have made has been on four 7 mm wagons for the club's Bishop's Castle Railway layout so not relevant here - the AAC one was shown in an earlier post.

But I can report that the lightweight filler was successful. And the trees are gradually being painted with multiple layers of acrylic paint to disguise the fact that they are made of twisted wire. That is nearly finished, and in fact three of the trees now only need their final painting in a more varied grey. When I am happy with the colours i will post some photos - though not for three weeks as we shall be away.

In the meantime I also did a bit more tracklaying on Nantcwmdu but it is a slow process and nothing really to photograph.

Oh, and earlier in the spring I did get out and take some more photos of local hillsides/horizons where possible including sheep and lambs. I had intended to make some sound recordings up the lane with lambs on one side and a rookery on the other but the weather turned.

At this rate by the end of the decade Sarn might be "finished".

Of course there is still that errant point motor to fix!

Jonathan

[timbowilts]

7 hours ago, corneliuslundie said:

At this rate by the end of the decade Sarn might be "finished".

Of course there is still that errant point motor to fix!

Jonathan

Depending on when you count the years of a decade that is only six months away!

Tim T

[Darwinian]

Jonathan,

If you have not yet finished your GWR serpent, Fox transfers do a sheet of Great Western wagon names that includes “SERPENT”. I resorted to this for my David Geen  G9 Serpent. Hopefully I’ll make use of some others from the sheet eventually. Hand lettering just wasn’t working. Had to cobble the rest up from PC sheets.

[corneliuslundie]

Another small update, or rather a report on going backwards. So no photos.

Much of the time has been spent adding sleepers to one of the boards of Nantcwmdu - involving trimming the soldered joints between the rails and the lower layer of sleepers (see an earlier post) and then cutting and filing wooden sleeper strip to fit and gluing it in place. Tedious is an understatement, though it is no more tedious than adding the dummy spike heads. When the board is properly finished I will take a photo but for the moment Sarn is back on the trestles.

This is where progress has been backwards. i HAVE identified and cured the problem with the point motor, or rather as it turned out the link from the lever frame to the relevant microswitches controlling the point motor. It involved burrowing below the scenery at the rear of the layout adjacent to the lever frame, fortunately without too much disruption on the surface.

But I decided that the photographic back scenes which I had printed and fixed to the plywood layout surrounds had wrinkled too much to be acceptable. I have now got them off, but at the expense of some colateral damage to the scenery, a section of hedge which needs replacing and a couple of wall sections which need refixing - fortunately they came off fairly easily. This time I intend to use heavier paper or thin card - experiments due in the next few weeks.

I do have some better photos to choose from, including some with lambs in the fields to make up for the lack of three dimensional ones.

Another casualty is the rather prominent dead tree which has come adrift and will need reseating, while the top of the (Mike's Models) loading gauge has come adrift yet again, and is due to replaced by a different model (Smiths Components?) in due course. I have a feeling that loading gauges are so vulnerable that a bulk purchase may be wise!

On another front, I have filed up the coupling rods for the ex Cambrian tank loco and started fitting them  but one crankpin went flying and despite emptying the railway room and sweeping and mopping the floor and all likely surfaces has not been found, so that project is on hold - again - until after I can buy a replacement at Expo EM North.

I have been very firm with myself and not built any of the - now fairly small - pile of wagon kits!

But I have been investigating the etched brass kit for a 7 mm GWR outside framed brake van for the club layout. The outside frames are intended to be created by folding up etched components, and I have done a few, but only those which cannot be replaced by wooden strip. This project is fairly low priority, and will probably be overtaken by a coal wagon for Stanley Gwilt who took over most of the Bishop's Castle coal merchants and was in business for the latter part of the BCR's life. Hopefully that will be complete in time to sit on the static section of the layout which will be on show at the Mid Wales Model Railway Show in Welshpool on 26 October.

So time for a plug for the show. Trevor has made an enormous effort to get good layouts and i feel that it will be worth coming some distance to attend the show. Details are here in the exhibitions section.

And if any of you do come, please make yourself known - I am the tallest of the club members, with white hair and beard and glasses. If I am not on the desk I am likely to be either stewarding the Montgomery stand or operating Pool Road, our existing club layout.

Jonathan

I hope everyone hasn't given up waiting for this update!

[corneliuslundie]

Another two months, so overdue for an undate. What happened to my weekly schedule?

I have spent a lot of time laying the second layer of sleepers on Nantcwmdu but there is very little to show for it. There are a few small bits to insert on the end board and then that track is complete except for turnout tiebars.

Then back to board 2 to lay the pointwork at the station throat.

But I have also been working on Sarn: backscene and trees.

My first attempt at a backscene wrinkled so badly I removed it. I have done it again on thin card which has worked better. All the scenes were photographed within a mile or so of the house and p[rinted on our A3 inkjet printer. The problem then was that they didn't match in terms of the colour of the grass and sky. In the end I painted over the whole sky with acrylic paint and have hideden the worst change in colour of the field by a suitable placed tree.

The trees have also taken up a great deal of time, trying to get the trunks an acceptable colour. It is very subtle and I am still not sure ithey are quite right. The aim was to have a mix of oaks and beech. the oaks of course have bare branches while the beech keep their brown leaves until the new lot grow. So they can be used in strategic places to hide things - like the change in green of the backscene.

Anyway they are complete and planted, though in fact i have three spare oaks which may eventually find a home on Nantcwmdu.

And I have acquired some more sheep. I how feel that I have anough though I would have liked more lambs.

All that really now remains is to replant a hedge I had to uproot to add the backscene at the left hand side of Sarn.

On the club layout front, I have produced a mock-up of the station building in white card, using the nice drawings someone had produced of one of the stations as a basis, and have just started a Slaters cattle wagon.

Anyway some photos of Sarn. I hope my modelling is better than my photography.

Another update before Christmas? Hopefully.

Jonathan

 

[corneliuslundie]

I had reached my upload limit yesterday so here are two more fuzzy photos of Sarn.

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

Christmas greetings

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

Christmas greetings

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

Yes, I am still around, even though it is four months since my last progress report.

I have been modelling steadily in that time, but for about two months it was wagons for our new 7 mm club layout – sort of Welsh as it is based on a proposed BCR line to Montgomery.

Then I moved on to some wagons for Sarn and Nantcwmdu. Three have been completed and three are on the point of being lettered.

First, the first Brecon & Merthyr wagon for Nantcwmdu. It is a Taff Vale Models (ex Dragon Models) kit. I have to admit that soldering and I do not go together well, but with this etched kit it was necessary for the first stages, after which I switched to superglue. The kit is quite well designed, though I did not assemble the suspension as intended as I do not feel the need for springing or compensation of short wheelbase wagons in EM. Lettering is, as so often, cannibalised from various sheets, as there is nothing available for the B&M. I actually have a second of these kits which is still somewhere down the pile.

Next a Midland Railways 3-plank wagon, from a Mousa Models resin kit. A very nice kit, though the resin was a bit brittle and I had to do a repair job on one axlebox/W-iron assembly which I damaged. Transfers are from a Slaters sheet I had from a previous kit which had been lettered LMS. One can never have too many 3-plank Midland Railway wagons.

And thirdly, the one which has taken most of the time, partly because it is much more complex and partly because I had a few accidents and made a few mistakes. This is a GWR brake van for Sarn. On page 64 of Rick Green’s “Cambrian Railways Album – 2” there is a photo of the “Kerry Donkey” taken in June 1930, just the right period for me. It consists of a 2021 class saddle tank, a 4-wheeled carriage and a brake van. The brake van is not the usual type though, as it was originally converted to carry parcels on the Helston branch by having double doors inserted in place of one half of each side. So here is my version, scratch built. The axleboxes, wheels, buffers and vacuum pipes came from my supply of bits and pieces, as did the roof, but just about everything else is plastic or brass strip, sheet or wire.

I am not sure about the footboards. I have tried to paint them to look like very weathered wood, but they look rather light and I may just repaint them GWR grey. Does anyone know what colour they should be? For source information I used the comprehensive article by John Lewis some time ago on GWR outside framed brake vans, and the instructions for two kits I had built – a very old cast kit in 4 mm and the 7 mm kit recently built for the club. Transfers are HMRS.

But there is a bit of a problem. I finished it with a thin layer of matt acrylic varnish. I have used this perfectly successfully in the past but this time it has come out rather streaky, so I may have to repaint the van.

Anyway, further reports should be along shortly.

Jonathan

[ChrisN]

Jonathan,

When you say, 'repaint the van', I assume you just mean re-varnish it, as that is probably all it needs.  (Funny stuff, varnish.)

[Anotheran]

Jonathan, 

 

Your 2 plank and 3 plank models make me want to buy more kits to add to my unfinished (indeed mostly unstarted) pile of kits! The trouble is I want to resist but then start worrying about the longevity of these small suppliers. 

 

Your brake van is fantastic. As you know, I've drawn up plans for a scratch built early GWR outside frame brake. But it's got no further than that. Your build is very inspiring and may just be the kick I need. 

 

I hope you can salvage the finish. I'm with Chris in suggesting a varnish respray before anything more drastic. However the finish ends up though, I really like the build. 

 

Kind regards, Neil

[corneliuslundie]

The other thing the photos show up terribly is the area of film around the transfers - or some of them, as some are HMRS Pressfix. Hopefully another go with varnish should lessen that too.

If you look at the Newtown Model Railway Society Facebook page you can see the 7 mm GWR brake van I built from a kit - basically the same version but without the extra doors. But there were a lot of the etched parts I didn't use.

Anyway, two boards of Nantcwmdu are up and ready for me to start more track laying in between bouts of painting and lettering the other three wagons.

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

I warned you there would be more!

The Sarn layout has at last been more or less finished. I have been adding details for some time, such as a yard lamp, a few figures (see photos) and some ivy in the hedges and celandines on the banks. Over the last two weeks on days when we have not gone shopping my wife and I have been walking up the lane near our house. It has been very useful observing spring as it develops. So I realised that I needed some primroses on the banks, and some blackthorn in blossom in the hedges. These have now been added using a very small brush and suitably coloured paints.

One idea I had some time ago was to add ambient sound to the layout. I intended last year to make some sound recordings of lambs, as there are hundreds in the fields round us in spring. Last year the weather was too poor at the right time, but this year I have obtained several good recordings while we have been “exercising” in the prescribed manner. But I have also obtained two nice recordings of a local woodpecker, as well as good recordings of the local, extremely noisy, rookery. So I have also added two rook’s nests and two rooks to the layout - but no woodpecker as I never managed to see the real thing. The nests are made of lots of little bits of fine wire piled up at random on a piece of Blutak and then painted, while the rooks are just small pieces of Blutak painted black – no white beaks I am afraid. You may be able to spot them in one of the photos. In due course I shall edit these sound clips together with stretches of silence or bird song (especially a very voluble thrush) to make a file to play in the background.

But this means that Sarn is effectively finished. There is still just one thing to do, which is to obtain and install a loading gauge. I had one but managed to damage it and at the moment only its post graces the layout. So Sarn’s place is being taken by Nantcwmdu so I can do some track laying. I’ll try to report on this from time to time.

Jonathan

[Northroader]

A layout’s been finished! Have you applied to the Guinness Book of Records? It does look good, and bringing in Mother Nature is inspirational.

[Donw]

I presume it is the ratatatat of the Spotted Woodpecker you captured rather than the yafle of the Green one. The Spotted Wood are hard to spot I have found when you stop to look the bird stays silent as soon as I carry on ratatatat again. I have managed a few pictures not close ups though. I managed to snap a family group on the Isle of Wight. Any you can play the sound and if anyone says where's the bird just tell them it hides in the branches whenever you look.

We do see sheep in one field near us they are a real mix of breeds. The lambs are quite delightful but the ewes  tend to stamp there feet as the sight of the dog even though it is only a small terrier. Of course on the Quantocks they roam freely.

The layout has come out rather well I feel. Look forward to seeing Nantcwmdu.

 

Don

[corneliuslundie]

Yes, the ones that hammer on the trees. My wife saw it briefly but I have never managed to see it. Definitely not green. Perhaps I will post a clip later as I see thyat mp3 files can be posted here.

What Sarn still needs is locomotives. There are two on the stocks.

One is an Airfix Dean Goods which has had a new chassis and motor, and conversion to EM. But the cab needs cutting around a bit to make room for the motor. However, I managed to damage the cab moulding, and it has taken several years to find a replacement body. That now needs the backhead cut off, a layer of plastic inserted and suitably trimmed and the backhead put back to leave more room for the motor - and as it is black rather than green the whole loco will need repainting.

The other is a Gem 1196. The chassis is a replacement and is nearly complete, though I think I shall have to adjust the spacers as it is a bit wide. However, the real holdup has been that I dropped one of the crankpin washers, and cannot find it. I intended  to buy some at Scalefour North from Alan Gibson but of course it was cancelled. I have sent off an order to Gibsons but am not sure how well they are operating as there is nothing on the website. I am loth to start the body until the chassis is complete and I can make sure it fits without the body being carved about.

Of course Sarn was started as a "quicky". So don't hold your breath waiting for photos of a completed Nantcwmdu. At the moment I am track laying on board 3, As I explained some time ago that is not a quick process as it is flat bottomed track - and I don't mean Peco Code 100.

But I hope shortly to have photos of the other three wagons I am working on.

I am also looking at a David Geen 14 ton tank wagon kit but at the moment am struggling, as the instructions are a bit basic (I am having trouble working out which way up one major component goes) so that will take some time. Also I have to work out how to make the cast metal tank round rather than oval.

Jonathan

[ChrisN]

Jonathan,

I have to say that the background sound is inspired.  It is nice to anchor a layout to a particular time of year and this is just another way.  The trick is to have it loud enough for people to hear but quiet enough for it to be background noise as it would be if you were outside.

 

As we live almost in the woods with trees all around us we often hear the spotted woodpecker.  In fact the other day on one of our walks we spent quite a time trying to locate one but failed.  We saw one coming out of its hole once though.

 

I have not bought anything from Alan Gibson during lockdown but I have received things from others during this time.  I received a packet yesterday, and it is in quarantine, (24 hours for paper), waiting to be opened.  If you are desperate, you open the packet without touching the inside and tip the contents onto a clean surface.  You then throw the packet away and wash your hands while singing happy birthday twice.  

 

Are your figures Andrew Stadden's?

 

All the best.  (A finished layout, Wow!)

[corneliuslundie]

No more photos yet as I am still lettering the open wagons and awaiting delivery of suitable transfers for the Cambrian van from Camkits.

But I wanted to put "on paper" some recent observations of the countryside.

As those reading this thread will be aware Sarn is set in spring with lambs in the fields.  I have realised in the last couple of weeks, on our regular walks up the lane, that things actually change quite rapidly in Spring. A month ago the hedges were all bare. Now most are green, though with odd bare areas and the areas of beech hedge still have their old leaves. Some trees are still bare but others are in full leaf, with others between, whereas only a couple of weeks ago most were bare.

And on the banks along the roads there are many more flowers than two weeks ago and of many more species.

Other observations are that usually the banks on each side of the lane usually have a different different range of plants and that the species present varieyenormously within a few yards. Now in 4 mm scale this is not too important except for the colours of flowers present in any area - cream primroses, various little white flowers, several types of yellow flowers from the minute to dandelions (there are lots of daffodils but I think they date from the 1960s).

So what I have realised is that effectively Sarn is set in the last week of March and the first week of April. 

Now the question for anyone reading this is: do the same short term changes happen in your modelled scene at the relevant time of year? So if you want to run August Bank Holiday traffic is the scenery right for the first week of August, or just vaguely summer?

But please note that on Sarn all this will not stop me running the September Kerry Sheep Fair extras.

Jonathan

Oh, and the sheep and lambs have suddenly disappeared from the fields nearest the town. I don't think we have many sheep rustlers in the area! Have they gone "up country"?