South Wales Valleys in the 50s

[The Johnster]

 

With the light failing as evening sets in on an already dull day, the NCB Hunslet 18” positions an empty 21-tonner on the weighbridge as Mynydd Maendy broods in the background.  W4 Forest No.1 is wagon-bothering over on no.6 road, picking up the load of building stone delivered earlier with the pickup and moving it to the platform for unloading.  It is for the baths/canteen building under construction and shrouded in scaffolding.  Then it’ll berth the wagon and retire to the loco shed to drop fire.  
 

The Hunslet still has another hour or so of work, as the last of the afternoon shift’s production is lifted, processed, and loaded; the loaded wagons need to be removed and replaced with empties, then weighed and berthed on no.1 road, the start of assembling tomorrow’s first clearance. 
 

A quarter mile or so to the north, the throbbing commercial heart of the seething metropolis of Cwmdimbath is starting to form.  Ordered more buildings off the Bay earlier, a row of four stone terraced cottages, 3D plastic, another two brick, finished resin RTP, and a terraced shop to be Idwal Bracchi’s espresso bar and gelateria, lasercut scratch aid.  This and the 3D cottages will need a good bit of finishing work, and final positions are not decided, but the post office and pub have returned to their original positions, except that the road now rises fairly steeply here so the pub is ‘stepped up’ from the post office, though it is not as tall so the roof ridges are almost level with each other.  The road narrows to a single track too narrow for the bus in the squeeze between the rock outcrop  and the end of the station, then widens back out a bit and curves around behind the station into Lechyd Terrace.  
 

The outcrop is in place, or a place, possibly not its final place; bit of sorting out and scenicking to do to the road before I photograph it.  To the left of the post office is the garage/workshop, and Idwal Bracchi’s might well go the other side of that. 
 

But the big news is that there’s a new loco, another 56xx.  Some of you may have seen it on the Bay, described as kit built and going for 45 beer vouchers BIN.  Looks like a Mainline bodyshell on a a brass kit chassis with a live chassis return, and has been given proper buffers and screw couplings.  Seller shows a video of it running back and forth, but at far too high a speed to determine what I really want to know; how slow and smooth can it go!   BR unlined black unicycling lion. 
 

Now to check out BRDatabase for a suitable Tondu candidate…

[The Johnster]

Two engines in two days!  Wallet cowering in terror! 

 

See, what happen is sometiimes there's a discount offer that I think it the cheapest a loco will ever be, and if I can scrape the beer vouchers together I'll bite.  This time it's a Rapido 16" Hunslet, Thorne No.1, unlined apple green livery, knocked down to £101.50 (the normal discount is £109.50).  I've seen these engines operating at shows and they are superb runners, so I have high hopes of this one.  It will be the first all-diecast RTR loco I've bought since HD were still in business!

[The Johnster]

From RoS, btw. 

[The Johnster]

I'm a bit miffed at Royal Mail today.  I mean, I understand, used to work in the Cardiff sorting office, it's mad this time of year and getting madder, stuff gets delayed, sh*t happens, the pressure's on.  But I've got two locos on the way that they are dealing with at the moment, one they themselves estimated would be delivered Friday 1st and the other Saturday the 2nd.  Present sitrep is that the 56xx, Friday 1st estimate, is 'in transit' (well don't leave it in a bloody van, deliver it you bast....) and the Hunlet 16", which should be accompanied by a BR grey liveried SR 8-plank open, was sheduled Sunday evening to be delivered today (yesterday now, it's past midnight), Monday, between 07.30 and 19.30.  Then, at 13.25, it was 'due to be delivered today'.  It never arrived, according to their website it is still 'due to be delivered today', 'today' being yesterday, Monday, or is this a new Tuesday notice, who knows?

 

Ok, I've had my moan and feel better for having got that off my chest, and all will be forgiven when the Hunslet arrives.  Presumably it was loaded on a van but the driver ran out of time to deliver it yesterday Monday, must stop posting at this time of night, it's confusing...  There is a plan of action, though,   This is based on the idea that the parcels delivery runs go out at 13.25, and I am going to ring them in the morning with some questions; the next course of action will depend on answers.  I am not expecting to get any new news about the 56xx, but it might have turned up.  If the driver with my Hunslet hasn't gone out yet, I'll ask to have it left for me to collect at the local Post Office, and if there's any news of the 56xx, they can leave that there for me as well.  There's some scenic stuff and a 3D row of terraced cottages, as well as a lasercut shop and a plaster rock face in the offing as well, but the locos are the main thing now just.  All part of xmas I 'spose.

 

My resin painted and finished pair of brick terraces were delivered Thursday, and they're going back.  Not happy at all with them; one window missing, another frame fallen out in the packing, and the roof ridged warped, looks melted, at one end.  Shame because the thing is fairly well finished with nice detail and good relief. 

 

Ok, time for some positivity,  A neighbour has chucked out some wooden floor covering, you know, the stuff that slots together, which I spotted on the way back from the shops Saturday.  Pieces about 4'x6", thought they're prolly some metric size really; anyway, a little light came on in my head, and there was nothing to lose by trying out the idea...  So, with a bit of cantilevering and block-of-wood support, there is now new baseboard real estate to the west of the branch along the station boards. By happy accident this slopes upward to the foreground, and I've already started putting trial bits of cardboard to form the lower slopes of Mynydd y Gwair.  The loop of roadway that I made for the bus stop will now be extended at the foot of the new mountain slope in both directions, to link up with the village square where the post office and the pub are, before looping around the end of the station to finish in Lechyd Terrace.   There will a fence or wall, we'll see, at the edge of the goods sidings, and a proper road entrance, with gates an' a weighbridge an' all, we duz fings proppa up Cwmdim, see, bwtti bach.  No room for any large structures and the site is not suitable for low relief, but possibly a few sort of clapboard or corrugated single story shops or garages, all a bit rough and ramshackle. 

 

Unlike the other mountain, Mynydd Maendy, only the lower part of Gwair's slopes will be modelled, and they don't have to be as precicipitous as perspective demands of Maendy, though the real slope is proper steep!  I like the idea of it as a veiwpoint, looking down on to the railway below in a fairly natural Valley situation.  The missing link at the moment is Nant Lechyd, the stream, and I'm using the excuse that it's culverted under the road... 

 

The road will be a fairly narrow lane, an extension of the real Cwmdimbath Lane further down the valley.  Wide enough for the bus, but not for two buses to pass.  This is the 50s, so not much needed in the way of markings, maybe some signs for the bends and 'road narrows'.  M4 it isn't, and the centre, straddled by vehicles' wheels, will be rough and gravelly with weeds evident.  A few potholes wouldn't hurt...

[Nevermakeit]

11 hours ago, The Johnster said:

A few potholes wouldn't hurt...

If they are anything like the potholes round here, they will hurt quite a lot!  You get a nasty jolt driving over them, and then you have to pay for the suspension on the car to be fixed (again!)! (And there are too many to avoid).

[The Johnster]

Don't get me started; our local roads are pretty bad and constant heavy traffic in the bus lanes collapses the drains.  Our lovely council patches the holes up, but won't pay to have the job done properly, so all that happens is that the holes form again almost immedieately, only this time with pedestrians and cyclists peppered with shrapnel as the passing buses' wheels gouge bits out and fling them into the air at high velocity.  The buses springs are shot after a few weeks' service, and it's spine-jarring if you are sitting over an axle.  What fun!

 

There are some proper cycle lanes now in the city centre, which keeps the buses off the top of the drains, but not many of them and none yet on my inner-city mean streets...

[The Johnster]

I am on a bus having my spine shortened as I write…  

 

Phoning Royal Mail was a non-starter; gave up after 25 minutes having been told the waiting time was 15.  But as I was cositing Lord & Butler’s this avo and the desk re-opens 4-6pm, I called.  They did deliver a parcel yesterday evening and ascribed the Hunslet’s tracking number to it, but agreed they’d got that wrong and the Hunslet is now out for delivery again.  Might be there when I home, if not tomoz the counter guy reckons.  We’ll see.  
 

Bought a circle of 2h Hornby R2 to make a test/running in track out of; It’s first task may be the Hunslet’s running in session, but I want to make interlocking bases for it first; my nam isn’t Sam!  Possibly with electrical connections as well so I don’t have to rely on fishplates which will get inevitably damaged with handling!!

[The Johnster]

Ok, Hunslet's here!  More on Hunslet 16" topic!

[The Johnster]

Royal Mail have caught up with themselves a bit, with three packages arriving together today from my spending spree week before last!  Main item being the 2h 56xx from 'Bigboystoys', which was due last Friday and which I was a bit worried about; it's been 'in transit' (well, get it out of the van and deliver it you 'stards) 'estimated Friday 1st' for nearly 2 weeks!  It's a Mainline with a Comet chassis, and a quick burst up the branch shows a good smooth slow running, which was what I was hoping.for, so I am hapy with it, but it needs ballasting; even the original ML underboiler ballast is missing.  It has been made as a common return mech, with pickups on only one side, a type of construction not often seen deze daze but it works well enough.  The motor is mounted rearward facing driving the rear coupled axle through a fold-up gearbox, which means it may be possible to work up some cab detail.  It's previous owner has given it etched brass numberplates and some rather nice turned brass sprung buffers as well as screw couplings, but I am going to have to take things a little further with lamp irons and cab glazing, and for some odd reason the front sandboxes are missing, no biggie.  Happy with it, the basis of a nice little engine for £45 beer vouchers...

 

In other news... a resin rock face, not all that happy with the cork bark (curse my 6th form failed A level Geology education, I want Pennant Sandstone, statified, with the correct dip and strike, thank you), which will not be wasted but broken up and carved into smaller more feasibly Pennant outcrops, and a Base Models Albion 4-wheeler dropside lorry, from 'Sarjem' in Lewes, Sussex, who kindly enclosed a Lledo delivery van, Ford model T based I think, not an expert in cars or commercial vehicles, painted up for 'Lincolnshire Echo'.  Kudos to Sarjem, recommended!  Nice little van for Lledo, who often let themselves down with unsuitable goldie shiny bits and modern advertising on pre-war vehicles; this is capable of being worked up into something cromulent for the 50s.  Nice cross-spoked wheels. 

 

 

 

Here's 16" Hunslet Thorne No.1 spotting a couple of minerals under the washery loader, flash of colour in this rather grim industrial scene.  Sum fule have lost the cab roof down the back of  the layout and there is a temporary replacement until it is retrieved; has this loco been through Caerphilly Works, it's got a red reversng rod.  Very nice runner, ideal for it's duties, and a good looker as well; thank you Rapido and Rails.

 

 

 

5658, probably going to be renumbered, on the goods loop posing for it's rear 3/4.  Looks really empty at the front without the sandboxes.

 

 

The Albion and the freebie van hanging around the goods shed.  I suspect a repaint, heavy weathering, and 'under repair' or even 'derelict out the back' status around the motor workshop for the van!  'Britain At War' is of course suitable for more or less any date since the last Ice Age...

 

Scenic  work is progressing at a fair old lick, and a better new appearance for the layout is in the offing.  I treated myself to a big Gaugemaster grass mat while I was down at Lord & Butler's t'other day, offcuts of which will be turning up all over the place and some of the bare cardboard scenery formers will undergo their long overdue disappearance beneath it!  The road is beginning to look a bit like a narrow side-road not very well looked after, but a lot more scenic and fencing/walling is going to be needed!  This will go on for months, and there's 3D buildings to work up and the old K's A31 to repaint and try to pass off as an A10 to run with the Dapol N as well, so plenty to do!

[Darwinian]

It's.a.pity Bachmann have never reworked the cab roof/cabside on the 56xx. It spoils an otherwise good model. I still have one on Cwmhir, although I modified the bunker to get rid of the dent where it's hit a telegraph pole, as they are a good value, smooth loco. I nearly asked Santa for a PDK kit one. Might revive that thought around my birthday!

[The Johnster]

What is your objection, Darwinian, plastic a bit thick?  I think the Bachmann 56xx is a great little model, one of the best of it's era, underrated and a decent bit of kit for the money, and can hold it's own well enough on a modern layout, but it isn't perfect; my main criticism is the floating rear radial axle, which was I thought a crude peice of modelling in RTR days.  My new loco's kit chassis has this in a proper pivoted box, which is much better!  It's prolly going to be the other side of xmas before I do anything to it, as Cwmdimbath is not desperately short of 56xx and there's plenty other stuff going on.  I will have to fabricate the unique (I think) middle front lamp bracket which is cranked forward over the drawhook on these engines so that the smokebox door doesn't foul on a lamp (or target) in that position if it's opened, but I've done this before on my old Mainline model, so no problem.

 

BR Database has 5658 'on' Cathays in 1947, but the loco seems to have spend most if not all of it's BR career in the West Midlands, so I can't get away with it at Tondu even as a loco 'borrowed' or working through from Llantrisant, Barry, or Dyffryn Yard.  A renumber will be needed, and I will seek out a TDU 56xx, as I've already got a Rule 1 non-Swindon 66xx...  Problem is that TDU seemed to specialise in non-Swindon 66xx during my 1948-58 timeframe, and the best I can do at the moment is 5624, which didn't turn up until 1955, but there's plenty time do dig out other candidates...

[The Johnster]

I decided that this weekend's task to complete would be sorting out the town end of the station, which is also the rock outcrop pinch point.  One of the items that arrived yesterday was a pair of resin rock faces, which is what prompted this idea.  Progress today has not been too bad, but I think that access to Lechyd Terrace by 4-wheeled motor vehicles is turning out to be unlikely, which will mean a little group of parked cars at the village end of the pinch point, and maybe a moped or Lambretta or two in the Terrace itself.  The rock outcrop has been painted, some plant life attached to it, and installed, and the general look of it all is coming together, but the road/pathway through the pinch point has been ripped out and a new one laid, to be surfaced later.  A delivery this morning turned up a small size Hornby Rowan tree, with berries, we call them Mountain Ash in this part of the world, and it has taken up residence behind a chicken coop in between the town end of the cottages and the outcrop (the coop started life as a detonator lever rodding housing, you put a cap on a striker triggered by the passage of a loco and 'bang'...).  Included in the stuff Colin-up-the-pub's missis gave me along with the HD 2-6-4T now on one my living room shelves...

 

I've temporarily abandoned the new slopes on the Mynydd Y Gwair/Bryn Y Cae side, as my first attempt was a bit too high and spoiled the train viewing from the operating position; I will have to keep this down to about three inches tops.  Ripped it all out, no harm done, but I'm concentrating on the pinch point until that job's finished, which it should be some time later today.  Town on Monday, Antics for some paints and I might treat myself to some new brushes so that the current ones can be 'cascaded' to the rougher life of scenery application.  I'm enjoying myself, photos this evening!

[The Johnster]

Wrote that yesterday evening, and there are still no photos...

 

I think I can see the finishing line now, but work is suspended while paint and glue goes off.  The pinch point area has proved surprisingly recalcitrant and reluctant to adopt a form with which I am happy.  Outcrops of rock have moved, changed places, and moved again, and again, as have terraced cottages, a henhouse, and the Mountain Ash tree.   Things I thought were stuck down securely have proven not to have been, and I've had to redo some jobs several times.  The core of the problem is an awkwardly shaped site with changing levels and perspectives and a hole underneath it, which has had to be packed with old boxes and similar detriitis to securely support the narrow roadway and the rocks in position in an under-table postition which is challenging at my age... This pinchpoint arrangement is key to the village making sense from a road or even pathway access pov, and is if I'm honest my own fault for endig the branch too close to the wall, which is at a 45degree angle here.  It is not based on any actual location that I know of, but has some similarities with Abergwynfi; no colliery branch but a narrow road on a rising gradient around the buffers end of the station and a sloping pathway to access the platform. though Abergwyfi's is the other way around.  The Mountain Ash has moved (didn't know they were ents, did you, but in the book Treebeard's girlfriend is a Rowan and he wrote a song about her) and now sprouts from behind a rock.

 

Around the rugged rock the ragged rascal ran...

[Barclay]

I have one of those Albions - they definitely benefit from a repaint as the colours they come in all seem pretty gaudy. Looking at this it desperately needs flush glazing too!

 

Edited December 11, 2023 by Barclay

[The Johnster]

Perfidious Albions...  Yes, mine will be repainted and the gloss taken off.  It would be pretty new in the 50s and needs to look smart, only light weathering and a bit of wear on the floor planks, but the silver-painted chassis can go as well.  Prolly won't bother with flush glazing, too faffy!  I like it, though, nice truck with a lot of 50s character to it.  I'll also put a bit of a twist on the front axle ends; road vehicles look much more natural with a bit of steering on when they are parked up...

 

My first item from Base, and I'm impressed.  Would still like to see 4mm diecast road vehicles with proper headlights, though...

[The Johnster]

 

Squeeze point and station approach sitrep.  I think I've cracked it!  The road begins it's rise towards the rock outcrop as it passes The Forge, middle left, and is at it's narrowest halfway up the hill, just past the big rock, positon marked by the Corporation Dustcart heading for Lechyd Terrace.  The 3D terraced cottages, painted this evening and awaiting glazing and detail, are centre-left midground, with the sloping pathway leading on to the platform Abergwynfi-style opposite.  The retaining wall has timber bars on it for mounting advertisment hoardings.  On past the Standard Vanguard, waiting for the dustcart to clear the narrows before leaving it's parking place, pan right to more rock outcrop (I may put the chicken coop back here) and Lechyd Terrace, pan down/forward to this end of the station building and the goods siding and platform in the foreground.  The new timber fence I made yesterday evening sits behind the station building roof.

 

Cracks. gaps, and holes everywhere, to be filled next time I mix some plaster.  All this faff because of my bad planning; I now wish I had left a foot, or at least six inches, more between the platform buffers and the wall, but of course I wanted to squeeze as much run as I could in the space available and was unwiiling to give up a coach length, or any of my loco release headshunt!  But I haven't done badly; the outcrop and The Forge, named for the small foundry that originally occupied the site and shown on the OS map, are in the right place, the branch following the trackbed of the tramway that once connected the forge to the rest of the world.  It must have been sited there in order to use water power for the bellows.

[The Johnster]

The last of the deliveries from my retail therapy session turned up at lunchtime yesterday, and has been made up; lasercut kit for a terraced shop from Fairprice which will be finished as Idwal Bracchi's Espresso and Gelateria.  Idwal and his family were interned on the Isle of Man during the war as Italian civilians, much to the disgust of the local community who considered this a great injustice, but returned in early 1945.  The premises were in poor shape after being abandoned for so long, but it is now the early 50s and Idwal is rebuilding the business slowly but surely.  He has not yet, however, repainted or even varnished the wooden frontage, which is a bit faded, having sunk what little cash he could raise into an espresso machine, but this is paying for itself and he is thinking of installing a pinball machine and one of those new-fangled juke boxes his cousin in the States has told him about, much  to the delight of the local teenagers, and staying open until 7 o'clock!  This is of course an excuse to leave the building in a mostly unpainted state, as a rendered building with a wooden shop front. 

 

There's a big window, and this is going to be an opportunity for a bit of interior detail.  I need to make a sign, and if I can find suitable inside-window transfers I'll do somthing there as well.  It was a simple but very pleasurable kit to build, and needs a proper thin-card slate roof and some chimney detail.  It's been put next to the post office, other side of it from the pub, and being not quite as tall adds to the valleys 'buildings up the hill in steps' look.  

 

 

The village square, with Idwal's, the Post Office, and The Forge, Craig y Gelli in the background; it's swapped place with the 3D terrace.  Not sure what the nissan is yet.  Traffic is quiet enough for Tommy (Horizontal) Rees' Ford Pop to be temporarily abandoned while Tommy is buying some stamps.

 

[The Johnster]

The nissan is a Japanese car that won't be seen for another twenty years, but I don't know what the nissen is...

[lmsforever]

Are you thinking of a Nissen hut?

[The Johnster]

Yes, a Nissen hut.  A war surplus Nissen hut; they got everywhere in the late 40s and the 50s, used for all sorts of things.  This cut-off low relief is placeholding and unlikely to be a permanent fixture, but what it’s placeholding for is anyone’s guess!  Another Fairprice terrace, possibly house, to go the left of Idwal’s would usefully fill a gap, but at this end of town the mountains are closing in and I need to suggest this; it all looks far too open at the moment.  The reality is a steep-sided and narrow ravine up towards Pant y Wal, there’s a wind farm there now, civilisation never penetrated that far up. 
 

All in time, Padawan…

[The Johnster]

Yes, a Nissen hut.  A war surplus Nissen hut; they got everywhere in the late 40s and the 50s, used for all sorts of things.  This cut-off low relief is placeholding and unlikely to be a permanent fixture, but what it’s placeholding for is anyone’s guess!  Another Fairprice terrace, possibly house, to go the left of Idwal’s would usefully fill a gap, but at this end of town the mountains are closing in and I need to suggest this; it all looks far too open at the moment.  The reality is a steep-sided and narrow ravine up towards Pant y Wal, there’s a wind farm there now, civilisation never penetrated that far up. 
 

All in time, Padawan…

 

In the meantime, it’s lunchtime and the colliery’s 18” Hunslet backs into the exchange loop spur, known locally as ‘the quarry’.  The long-abandoned quarry behind has filled with water and eventually become a marshy area, and some young Alder trees have made their home in it.  
 

 

The NCB’s Hunslets are certified to run through the loop and on to the spur, and the 18” (NCB never called them Austerities, not in South Wales anyway), is positioned to propel the load of empties that are plodding their way towards Glynogwr Jc as we speak behind 6642.  

[The Johnster]

 

As promised, 6624 has arrived with the empties, uncoupled, and is drawing forward on to the quarry spur as part of the process of running around the train to collect the van, which it will then take out of the way so that the Hunslet can propel the badly-needed empties down to the colliery yard for tare weighing.  In the meantime, 6642 will run around the van ready for attaching it to the rear of the loaded clearance, but there is a passenger working first which leave 6642, crew and their guard good time for a beer over the Forge.  
 

It’s better than working for a living…

[1466]

10 hours ago, The Johnster said:

 

As promised, 6624 has arrived with the empties, uncoupled, and is drawing forward on to the quarry spur as part of the process of running around the train to collect the van, which it will then take out of the way so that the Hunslet can propel the badly-needed empties down to the colliery yard for tare weighing.  In the meantime, 6642 will run around the van ready for attaching it to the rear of the loaded clearance, but there is a passenger working first which leave 6642, crew and their guard good time for a beer over the Forge.  
 

It’s better than working for a living…

Didn’t Robert Mitchum call his autobiography “ Sure beats working “ ?

[The Johnster]

I believe he did.

[Darwinian]

On 08/12/2023 at 21:27, The Johnster said:

What is your objection, Darwinian, plastic a bit thick?  I think the Bachmann 56xx is a great little model, one of the best of it's era, underrated and a decent bit of kit for the money, and can hold it's own well enough on a modern layout, but it isn't perfect; my main criticism is the floating rear radial axle, which was I thought a crude peice of modelling in RTR days. 

 

Whilst that floating rear axle is a bit of a "toy" feature it does work and my 56xx is one of my best loco's for road holding and haulage. However the cab cutout and roofline area is poorly represented in my view. I did raise this with the Bachmann stand at an exhibition many years ago and they said it was something they were considering addressing, but obviously never did. 

 

The area cabside above the cutout below the roof is too deep. The side shutter runner should be tucked up under the roof overhang. Bachmann have put it below the roof and this results in a too low cabside cutout that ends up looking squashed compared to the larger opening on the prototype.  It's not helped by the rather heavy beading around the cutout and coarse roof rainstrip that would make rectifying this a fairly significant bit of surgery.

 

Compare my pictures here of my Bachmann model and a preserved loco at Holt on the North Norfolk Railway in 2017.