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

[NCB]

7 hours ago, Simond said:

 

as part of the beef cattle herd, perchance said bulls are short of 2/3 of their dangly bits, and thus rather less aggressive?

 

not much call for bulls or geldings in a milk herd...

 

atb

Simon

 

Pretty sure this bull is used for breeding. Judging by the number of calves which keep on appearing!

 

Nigel

[Simond]

Can’t argue with that observation!

 

many moons ago, on a business trip, I got into a lift in a hotel in Detroit.  Another chap got in just as the doors closed.  I couldn’t help but notice that the prominently-displayed clip of his pen read “PURESPERM” in bold white capitals on a vivid purple background.  
 

Obviously, I had to ask.  “AI” he happily replied, and gave me the pen!

 

atb

Simon

[corneliuslundie]

Yes, both the herds with bulls have numerous calves.

Too hot to do much today except sit about and read MRJ, though we did go out for a walk this morning, hence knowing about the Dutch sheep as we spoke to the farmer. And a terrific thunder storm and very heavy rain this evening, to make up for what we missed on Monday..

Jonathan

[Donw]

On 12/08/2020 at 13:08, Simond said:

 

as part of the beef cattle herd, perchance said bulls are short of 2/3 of their dangly bits, and thus rather less aggressive?

 

not much call for bulls or geldings in a milk herd...

 

atb

Simon

 

Not if he is the breeding bull and is there to service the cows. Hopefully he will be more interested in the cows than you.

 

Don

[NCB]

This one was taking a keen interest in me when I was taking his pic. A sort of "make my day" interest.

 

[mike morley]

It's not generally known that there are more people killed every year by bullocks than by bulls.  I suspect one reason is because people tend to be wary of bulls but dismissive of bullocks when they quite definitely shouldn't be.  Having said that, putting bulls in fields with cows is commonplace nationwide, the theory being that female company keeps them comparatively docile.

 

A few years ago my then-partner and I spent Easter weekend in the Severn Valley, using the train to walk from Bridgnorth to Bewdley, section by section.  Near Arley is a long, curving, fairly narrow field with the Severn along one side and the railway on a low-ish embankment on the other.  The field contained a sizeable heard of cows that we were slaloming our way through when one of the heifers stepped aside to reveal that immediately beyond her was a large bull!  He was as surprised to see us as we were to see him but while he was clearly unhappy with our close proximity (we were about ten feet away) he made no move but just stood and eyed us grimly as we hastily backed off then detoured as far around him as the narrow confines of the field would allow us, doing our best to keep as many members of his harem as possible between us and him.

Then, the following year, an exact re-run happened to me in a field beside the Wye near Brockweir!

[corneliuslundie]

Some progress. More work done on the walls and parapets on the layouts, and the bridge girders in the process of being painted. I calculated that they each have 11 pieces of plastic card or strip and 32 pieces of etched strip with boltheads, so rather a long task.

Of the six vehicles on the workbench three are now complete:

MR goods van from a Slaters kit – the only issue being that the transfer sheet did not include the tare weight for the number I chose. But as usual with Slaters kits a delight to put together.

 

Rhymney Railway 18 ft goods van from a very early Derek Mundy etch. A few bits of etch got lost and have been replaced by plastic. The roof is not a perfect fit but it looks OK from most angles. The only thing I am not certain about is the large RR, using transfers obtained from Chris Basten. I know the style of script lettering is not correct but until someone produced Rhumney transfers (apparently possibly in the not too distant future) the GWR style is the nearest available. I always use GWR grey for RR wagons but I notice that Precision mentions a Rhymney grey. I must investigate.

 

GWR Cordon gas tank. I eventually got it together and have now added the vacuum brake cylinder – though I think there is one link which fell off and needs replacing. So not quite as many bits left over as I suggested a few posts ago.

 

Still in the works are the 14T tank wagon, being painted in Homelight livery; the GWR diagram K4 parcels van, partly lettered (one side) but I discovered that the paint on the other side seems to have attracted a lot of dist so it is being removed and that side will be repainted. I am not sure how it happened as I always put models under a protective cover while paint is drying. I have also made a very tentative start to the lining, but am not sure how to do the curved corners as there are none on the transfer sheet; and the freelance colliery carriage which is slowly but steadily being painted.

Then back to that recalcitrant loco chassis!

I’ll post again when these three vehicles are complete and ready for the photographer.

Jonathan

Edited August 20, 2020 by corneliuslundie
Getting the photos in order

[NCB]

Re Rhymney wagon colours, I use Precision GWR grey for my GWR wagons, but Railmatch GWR for Rhymney. It's just a tad lighter. Haven't the faintest if either is correct.

 

[corneliuslundie]

The latest vehicle to be completed is this coach owned by the Nantcwmdu Colliery Co, used to transport miners between the station and the colliery.

As mentioned earlier, it has been made from an incomplete etch for a GER carriage which I obtained second hand many years ago. Nothing posh. The livery is one of the dirt colours available from Precision and the transfers are from an HMRS LMS passenger vehicle sheet.(not sure why I bought it). The oil lamps are left over from the Dan Pinnock GWR parcels van I am still struggling with, and the buffers are from the oddments box.

I have intentionally left the footboards rather wonky on the basis that it is a very old vehicle which has hard a hard life.

Still on the workbench before I get back to the ex-Cambrian tank loco and a Slaters GWR bogie carriage, both partly built, are said parcels van and the David Geen tank wagon. I have stripped and repainted one side the the parcels van but once again there are bits in the paint (not from the pot), and in one or two places paint has not "taken" even though the asides were first painted with acid etch primer. It also seems to take several days to dry. The black HOMELIGHT transfers for the tank wagon are now made and will shortly be applied, which will be tricky with holding straps and cables across the tank. I am afraid that the painting of the white panels on the tank sides has been a real pain. I chose Homelight because in 1912 they had a depot in Cardiff. It will definitely be a "layout" model, ie to be looked at from a distance of at least 6 ft.

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

I have not been idle for the past two months or so but there has been very little to show for it.

One the layout, I have continued with the parapet walls and the bridge girders which are now in place. I have also started on a terrace of houses, but have not touched them for a couple of weeks.

I have completed and am slowly putting lining on the Dan Pinnock GWR parcels van mentioned previously, but I don’t know what to do about the rounded ends of the panels. I thought of using a 0.2 mm yellow paint pen but they are currently unavailable from any supplier. So that may have to wait.

And I have just about given up trying to get the hand painted lettering on the Homelight tank wagon looking decent. It will havw to be heavily weathered.

Much of the time has been on GWR No. 1196, ex Cambrian 58, for Sarn. This is the old Gem white metal kit which I bought a couple of years ago. I bought a Mainly Trains chassis fret but discovered that it is not designed to provide a compensated chassis. Fortunately, I was given a more suitable chassis fret. I have been working on this for several weeks. I am using a High Level gearbox, which is very nice. I am building the model split frame, so have used EMGS “spiders” soldered to the wheel rims to link the rims and axles electrically. This threw up the first problem, as the wheels were then too tight against the axleboxes. So I measured twice and cut once but still managed to shorten the frame spacers too much. That was solved by inserting washers between the frame and the spacers on one side of the chassis.

Next came the brake gear. The new fret made no provision for such luxuries, so I thought I would use the parts from the Mainly Trains fret – pull rods, brake shoes etc. Unfortunately, the brake hangers turned out to be far too short, so I filed up new ones from brass strip, suitable tapered. I duly drilled holes in the frame and threaded through 0.31 mm diameter NS wire on which to hang the hangers, only to find that the front wire fouled the compensation beans I had inserted. So this wire has been moved up and now sits in a nick in the top of the frame instead of in a hole. But of course then these two “hangers” (not sure what to call them as they do not have brake shoes) were too short and had to be remade.

It has been a real fiddle assembling the brake gear but it is now done with the help of BluTack, though I have a feeling that the pull rods from the Mainly Trains fret are a tad short, meaning that the rear brake blocks are too close to the wheels. I think I can fudge that.

Meanwhile the body has been going together fairly well though I had to open the hole in the footplate piece to clear the motor. The castings are not very clean but hopefully I can deal with the pitting in due course. One disappointment is that even though I am using the “bendy” High Level gearbox the motor and fixed part of the gearbox sit so far back that I will not be able to use the backhead and shall have to cut a large chunk of the floor away. So I shall need a crew in due course.

So I have now got to the stage of adding the brake shoes and balance weights, as well as the guard irons, all from the Mainly Trains fret.

I have managed to identify all the white metal fittings, though I do not feel that the reversing lever looks much like what one sees in photos of the loco, and neither do the smoke box door darts, so some more scratch building may be needed.

Perhaps I should have waited for NCB to finalise the design of his kit and twisted his arm to produce it in 4mm, though I bought mine before he had even started designg his..

Oh, and I have also been having trouble with the tyres of some of the wheels coming loose, so a bit of superglue will be needed. And one of the leading wheels is quite loose on its axle. To be fair, these wheels have been on and off the chassis far more often than the good folk at Alan Gibson ever dreamed was likely.

Anyway, I seem at last to be getting beyond the frustrating stage and seeing some progress. I just hope the loco runs nicely when I try it on Sarn. It has seemed OK as a chassis on my test track, though showing the lack of weight.

So to finish a couple of rather poor photos.

Please don’t hold your breath waiting for the next report.

Jonathan

[Donw]

On 17/08/2020 at 22:16, mike morley said:

It's not generally known that there are more people killed every year by bullocks than by bulls.  I suspect one reason is because people tend to be wary of bulls but dismissive of bullocks when they quite definitely shouldn't be.  Having said that, putting bulls in fields with cows is commonplace nationwide, the theory being that female company keeps them comparatively docile.

 

A few years ago my then-partner and I spent Easter weekend in the Severn Valley, using the train to walk from Bridgnorth to Bewdley, section by section.  Near Arley is a long, curving, fairly narrow field with the Severn along one side and the railway on a low-ish embankment on the other.  The field contained a sizeable heard of cows that we were slaloming our way through when one of the heifers stepped aside to reveal that immediately beyond her was a large bull!  He was as surprised to see us as we were to see him but while he was clearly unhappy with our close proximity (we were about ten feet away) he made no move but just stood and eyed us grimly as we hastily backed off then detoured as far around him as the narrow confines of the field would allow us, doing our best to keep as many members of his harem as possible between us and him.

Then, the following year, an exact re-run happened to me in a field beside the Wye near Brockweir!

 

My experience of Bullocks is that they are rather curious and will come to investigate but with the pushing and shoving of a group of them it can be rather hazardous.  When working as a rural postman there was a number of isolated cottages than involved walking through a herd. I found that if I sang loudly they wouldn't come too close (shows how awful my singing must be!)

Don 

[mike morley]

Throughout the years I was an urban postman I used to work on the theory that you can never walk far enough so also used to go walking most weekends.  It was a very rare walk when we didnt encounter at least one herd of bullocks and it was very noticeable that the herds, but not the individual bullocks within each herd, varied a great deal in terms of size, physique and levels of aggression.  In the era when James Herriot books made regular appearances in the Best Seller lists there were a fair few other vet memoirs riding on the bandwagon and a  regular complaint in most of them was that some farmers were prone to leaving it far too late to call for the vet, who as a result found themselves struggling to castrate almost full-grown bulls. Knowing that meant it wasnt hard to work out how the variations we saw on our walks came about.

[NCB]

Growing up near Ruthin, Denbighshire, the field next door often had cattle in it. We had a Corgi; the name derives from Cor Ci, which translates as cattle dog, because that's what they were used for, and very good at it. The Corgi liked nothing better than to get in amongst the cows and round them up into a tight circle; they were nervous of this little thing zooming around and yapping at their heels. Didn't work for bullocks. They weren't at all phased by the dog, just curious. The dog used to go frantic barking at them, while they grew closer and closer. Think they broke the dog's spirit.

Edited October 15, 2020 by NCB

[Simond]

We had corgis from when I was six. I had a Welsh pal who told me that the name was derived from “Gurra” (hurry up) & “ci” or “gi” (dog) which would make some sense for a herding dog.  
 

Regrettably, my command of Welsh is negligible!

 

atb

Simon

[corneliuslundie]

My Welsh is not good but good enough to know that cor is nothing to do with cows, bulls etc. But Google Translate suggests it is from corrach meaning dwarf. I'll have to ask our Welsh teacher next week (ar-lein wrth gwrs).

Jonathan

PS I thought this website was about modelling! Not that I mind.

Edited October 16, 2020 by corneliuslundie

[NCB]

On 10/10/2020 at 19:28, corneliuslundie said:

I have not been idle for the past two months or so but there has been very little to show for it.

One the layout, I have continued with the parapet walls and the bridge girders which are now in place. I have also started on a terrace of houses, but have not touched them for a couple of weeks.

I have completed and am slowly putting lining on the Dan Pinnock GWR parcels van mentioned previously, but I don’t know what to do about the rounded ends of the panels. I thought of using a 0.2 mm yellow paint pen but they are currently unavailable from any supplier. So that may have to wait.

And I have just about given up trying to get the hand painted lettering on the Homelight tank wagon looking decent. It will havw to be heavily weathered.

Much of the time has been on GWR No. 1196, ex Cambrian 58, for Sarn. This is the old Gem white metal kit which I bought a couple of years ago. I bought a Mainly Trains chassis fret but discovered that it is not designed to provide a compensated chassis. Fortunately, I was given a more suitable chassis fret. I have been working on this for several weeks. I am using a High Level gearbox, which is very nice. I am building the model split frame, so have used EMGS “spiders” soldered to the wheel rims to link the rims and axles electrically. This threw up the first problem, as the wheels were then too tight against the axleboxes. So I measured twice and cut once but still managed to shorten the frame spacers too much. That was solved by inserting washers between the frame and the spacers on one side of the chassis.

Next came the brake gear. The new fret made no provision for such luxuries, so I thought I would use the parts from the Mainly Trains fret – pull rods, brake shoes etc. Unfortunately, the brake hangers turned out to be far too short, so I filed up new ones from brass strip, suitable tapered. I duly drilled holes in the frame and threaded through 0.31 mm diameter NS wire on which to hang the hangers, only to find that the front wire fouled the compensation beans I had inserted. So this wire has been moved up and now sits in a nick in the top of the frame instead of in a hole. But of course then these two “hangers” (not sure what to call them as they do not have brake shoes) were too short and had to be remade.

It has been a real fiddle assembling the brake gear but it is now done with the help of BluTack, though I have a feeling that the pull rods from the Mainly Trains fret are a tad short, meaning that the rear brake blocks are too close to the wheels. I think I can fudge that.

Meanwhile the body has been going together fairly well though I had to open the hole in the footplate piece to clear the motor. The castings are not very clean but hopefully I can deal with the pitting in due course. One disappointment is that even though I am using the “bendy” High Level gearbox the motor and fixed part of the gearbox sit so far back that I will not be able to use the backhead and shall have to cut a large chunk of the floor away. So I shall need a crew in due course.

So I have now got to the stage of adding the brake shoes and balance weights, as well as the guard irons, all from the Mainly Trains fret.

I have managed to identify all the white metal fittings, though I do not feel that the reversing lever looks much like what one sees in photos of the loco, and neither do the smoke box door darts, so some more scratch building may be needed.

Perhaps I should have waited for NCB to finalise the design of his kit and twisted his arm to produce it in 4mm, though I bought mine before he had even started designg his..

Oh, and I have also been having trouble with the tyres of some of the wheels coming loose, so a bit of superglue will be needed. And one of the leading wheels is quite loose on its axle. To be fair, these wheels have been on and off the chassis far more often than the good folk at Alan Gibson ever dreamed was likely.

Anyway, I seem at last to be getting beyond the frustrating stage and seeing some progress. I just hope the loco runs nicely when I try it on Sarn. It has seemed OK as a chassis on my test track, though showing the lack of weight.

So to finish a couple of rather poor photos.

Please don’t hold your breath waiting for the next report.

Jonathan

 

Jonathan

Think you've got the brake pull rod on upside down. The staggered bit in front of the rear wheel should be lower, not higher, than the main rod.

 

I did wonder why on earth Sharps had that bit in the rod anyway. Tonight I had a flash of inspiration, and took a straight edge to the Mike Lloyd drawing. The pull rod isn't flat; the rear half slopes upwards. In fact it may even be jointed on the rear brake hangers. The reason for the staggered bit is to make sure it clears the rear coupling rod boss and crank pins.

 

Nigel

Edited October 20, 2020 by NCB

[corneliuslundie]

Pull rod noticed and already corrected. I have at last got all the brake gear together, a bit of a tight fit. And yes, I didn't measure but it seemed to me that the pull rod sloped up towards the rear so I bent it just a little.

The body is now primed ready for application of filler to all the holes and dents. The roof is the worst, though hopefully fairly easy to clean up. I shall have to paint the chassis assembled unfortunately. I have spent so much time making alterations and fudges that any painting I had done beforehand would have been severely damaged anyway. The body has been on and off dozens of times to ensure clearance between the body and the motor and to avoid any shorting between the body and the chassis. (I had to cut away the bottom of the backhead unfortunately. And because two of the wheels started to come loose on their axles (not intended for regular removal) I have had to Loctite them on.

You can tell I have not built many loco kits. I think the last was a Ks outside frame GWR 0-6-0 sometime the last century (not quite the first half!) 

Jonathan

[corneliuslundie]

I mentioned a Slaters GWR bogie third. Following a question I posed on another part of RMWeb I decided that I needed maps and pictures in the compartments. Now done. A genuine GWR map, and photos, admittedly modern, of places served b y the GWR. You can of course identify them all from the photo. The partitions are now fixed in the carriage body and I am adding the many bits to the bogies.

 

Now my wife says I need to add luggage racks in the carriage. And I thought I was the crazy one.

Jonathan

Edited November 3, 2020 by corneliuslundie
Add comment

[Joseph_Pestell]

3 minutes ago, corneliuslundie said:

I mentioned a Slaters GWR bogie third. Following a question I posed on another part of RMWeb I decided that I needed maps and pictures in the compartments. Now done. A genuine GWR map, and photos, admittedly modern, of places served b y the GWR. You can of course identify them all from the photo. The partitions are now fixed in the carriage body and I am adding the many bits to the bogies.

 

Now my wife says I need to add luggage racks in the carriage. And I thought I was the crazy one.

Jonathan

 

The luggage racks in Darstaed O gauge coaches do look rather good. Shouldn't the pics be black & white?

[corneliuslundie]

I pondered on that but could not find any examples. However, posters were normally in colour from much earlier than 1912, so I took the view that the pictures would probably be prints of colour paintings. If anyone has proof that they should be black and white please let me know before I fix the roof.

Jonathan

[richbrummitt]

16 minutes ago, corneliuslundie said:

I pondered on that but could not find any examples. However, posters were normally in colour from much earlier than 1912, so I took the view that the pictures would probably be prints of colour paintings. If anyone has proof that they should be black and white please let me know before I fix the roof.

Jonathan

The ones in the toplight I rode in at Didcot on the weekend were B&W photographs. The notice over the droplight about availability of teas was dated 1920. 
 

No mirrors though (might have been a different thread that). 

Edited November 3, 2020 by richbrummitt
auto******

[Simond]

I can’t offer evidence, but my belief is that colour prints would be normal.

 

atb

Simon

[ChrisN]

2 hours ago, corneliuslundie said:

I mentioned a Slaters GWR bogie third. Following a question I posed on another part of RMWeb I decided that I needed maps and pictures in the compartments. Now done. A genuine GWR map, and photos, admittedly modern, of places served b y the GWR. You can of course identify them all from the photo. The partitions are now fixed in the carriage body and I am adding the many bits to the bogies.

 

Now my wife says I need to add luggage racks in the carriage. And I thought I was the crazy one.

Jonathan

 

Jonathan,

Brilliant!  Were these images culled from the Web?  As you know I have a number of GWR coaches to produce, eventually, and if you have put pictures in yours I suppose, (*sigh*), I will have to do it in mine.  

 

Are the seats Slater's seats from the kit?  If they are I also have this kit and it would be interesting to see how their height compares to the Ratio seats.  I have started to cut off the top part of the Ratio seats as they are too high and leave no room for (you to imagine that there are) luggage racks. 

[corneliuslundie]

The seats came with the kit. The backs are (if I remember correctly from so long ago) part of the partition moulding.

For the images I just found some suitable photos on the net. The map was I think from the EBay site, tweaked a bit to straighten it up. The version I used is attached in case anyone else is stupid enough to want a 4 mm GWR map. I just dropped it into Word (as I did with the photos) and then reduced in size to the right size, and copied and pasted lots of copies.

BTW I am not sure all the photos in the carriage are the right way up as at that size it is hard to tell the sky from the sea!

Jonathan

PS I suppose I had better add the bars for the luggage racks now the glazing is in place.

[NCB]

Took this photograph of a Dean clerestory coach at Didcot in 2003:

 

Pic is definitely black and white. Can't ever remember seeing colour pics in coaches in steam days.

 

Nigel