Deliberately Old-Fashioned 0 Scale - Chapter 1

[Marly51]

Beautiful old models!! Love the Bayko house... I inherited an incomplete set with bent metal supports, which was a bit frustrating... then Lego appeared on the scene and we were converted!

[Annie]

I had a Bayko set and it was great fun.  I did exactly the same thing and built buildings for my trainsets with it.  I don't know what happened to it.  I think it basically got played with into a state of destruction and one of my brothers broke some the pieces (the rotter) and then parts got lost.... and so on and so on.  I recognise the Chad Valley set as I have the remains of a very down on its luck locomotive from that same set as well as one of the odd oval section coaches lacking its bogies.  When I was still working before I retired due to illness I tried to buy one of those sets on ebay, but even with being employed in a 'good job' the bidding swiftly went beyond what I was willing to spend.  The clockwork mech from one of those 4-4-0 locomotives looks very Hornby like and I think it would be very easy to mistake it for a Hornby product.  The wheels while looking very similar to M1 clockwork ones are a slightly different diameter though.

 

The LCDR R1 Class, and SECR coaches are beautiful.  I really love to see vintage scratchbuilds and especially in 'O' gauge.  They have quite a different quality about them that's absent in modern finescale scratchbuilding.

[Nearholmer]

The guy who owns the CV was telling me that the mechanisms were churned-out at a rate of thousands each day by a firm in the West Midlands, and used by both CV and in the Hornby M series, which explains things.

 

When I was small, we used to get given already tatty secondhand ones, then treat them just the way children now treat cheap battery-powered toys from China, which is to say badly.

 

Odd fact that, because they were real toys, mint versions of these CV, Mettoy, Brimtoy etc are probably rarer than BL, and certainly rarer than Hornby. They don’t “do it” for me, but some collectors love ‘em.

[Annie]

Yes exactly Kevin they were toys and were generally played with until they turned to scrap and fell it bits.  I have a largish collection of CV, Mettoy and Brimtoy trains including some nice almost pristine items of rolling stock.  Mettoy made some nice open wagons and vans that are a less toy like in appearance and I've wondered more than once about narrowing their gauge and using them as narrow gauge rolling stock alongside my larger 'O' gauge stuff.  Some CV rolling stock had 3 link couplings and I have a couple of nicely made brake vans that are so fitted.

Anyway I had a lot of fun with collecting them and enjoyed their cheerful simplicity, but I'm now going sell them all off to help with funding my layout ambitions.

 

Interesting to have it confirmed that CV clockwork mechs and Hornby clockwork mechs did indeed come from the same factory.  Looking at them side by side the differences are superficial and very slight.

[Nearholmer]

My layout is still being affected by the pull of other threads, so remains in a pre-grouping mood.

 

Since I don’t have a suitable brakevan, I’ve had to resort to shunting to allow the goods wagons a moment in the limelight.

 

The trouble with tinplate is that most of the wagons are a bit too exciting, but I picked-up some nice ‘boring’ wagons yesterday, made by a chap who lives nearby, using Leeds lithos on wooden bodies. The Leeds Model Company had a giant print run of wagon litho papers the year before the grouping, which then didn’t sell at all well, so originals can be found very easily, and I particularly like the GW van.

 

The LNWR open raises again the thorny question of black ironwork. The S&C wagon is a modern tinplate job and may, in fact, be in a late version of the livery, but I’m not sure.

 

The Terrier, incidentally, copped happily with 24 axles, some of which are decidedly not free-running.

Edited February 28, 2018 by Nearholmer

[Northroader]

Admiring that scene and just thinking couplings, I’m supposing the type on the Fry’s conflat will couple with the rest? Also all are worked manually? Does the Fry’s conflat type auto-latch? Should there be a link on the back of the Terrier, or is that another type?

Edited February 27, 2018 by Northroader

[Nearholmer]

The one on the Fry’s wagon is a Hornby auto (if you are very lucky) coupler, the Terrier has hooks only, most of the wagons have droplinks, but of about three different designs, and a couple have three-links.

 

Miraculously, it all couples together, and even more miraculously can be propelled through reverse curves without buffer-locking.

 

Actually, not a miracle really, it’s partly down to LMC’s design of buffers, which are wide ovals.

 

I was trying to show more pictures, but my phone is doing strange things again, so unless you want them upside down .......

 

And, since there appears to be A Rule, which says that a pre-grouping layout has to be infested with MR 5-plankers, here is one. Not in pristine condition, it came ‘ready weathered’, by a century of playing trains, and it has been subject to cruel and unusual behaviour in the coupling department. I don’t know what this coupling is (Bing?), or why somebody has mangled the headstock to fit it, and probably never will! [Well, you’ll have to imagine that, ‘cos it won’t upload!]

Edited February 28, 2018 by Nearholmer

[Northroader]

I don’t mind standing on me ‘ed, in the cause of tinplate enlightenment. It always strikes me as how marvellously “bombproof” it is. I suppose the missing links on the loco are to prevent double heading?

Disregard that rule, he’s got shares in them.

Edited February 27, 2018 by Northroader

[Nearholmer]

I’m not sure ...... that one has a very small motor, but it self-protects by wheelslip if overloaded. There are some locos I definitely wouldn’t double-head, very strong ones that have very different responses to the controller, which I suspect might give one another hernias.

[Annie]

I've got my eye on some of those Leeds wagon lithos, though I do have some Milsbro ones as well which I want to do something with.  I'm not terribly fond of the Hornby 'auto' coupler which can and does scratch the tinprinted surface of the wagons and coaches it's fitted to.  My eventual aim is to change all my rolling stock over to link couplings.  I used to buy a very nice link coupling from Walsalls, but they don't seem to have them anymore so I'm now trying to find another source.

[Donw]

I use Premier Components couplings for my 0F stuff but they may not suit standard scale.

 

Don

[Annie]

The couplings I'm looking for are ones like these Don.......

 

Hornby link type.

 

ACE link type

 

The ones I was using were (I think) were NOS ones by Bonds, but Walsalls must've finally run out of them.

 

The ACE type is nice, but largely mythical as it's impossible to find any to buy, - and the Hornby link coupler is now made by Progress Products.  Nobody seems to be making the Bonds ones which I would prefer to have.

 

 

Please forgive the thread hi-jack Kevin.  

[Nearholmer]

No worries. I think The Station Masters Rooms stocks Ace couplers, but buying ‘bits’ from him is a tad uneconomic, in contrast to the value he offers on ‘big things’, because he sends everything out on premium, fully insured, postal services. I bought four buffers recently, one having mysteriously disappeared in traffic, and the postage doubled the cost.

 

I too detest the spikey Hornby auto couplers. They look horrible and, as you say, scratch things. I’ve got most of the No.50 wagons now, and they are all in very good condition, probably never used, apart from where the couplers have scratched the ends while they are in the boxes ...... an irritating design fault.

Edited February 28, 2018 by Nearholmer

[Northroader]

With locos needing to use the train couplers, I wasn’t thinking of tractive effort so much as if any of them were using “American” style pickups, with only one side wheels insulated, so there would be a need to prevent accidental shorts.

[Nearholmer]

The only one that’s caught me out like that is a Corgi BL, but I don’t have a big layout, so double-heading isn’t really part of the game.

[Northroader]

Me, neither, but I occasionally stick a couple of tank engines together to create some “bustle”.

[GRASinBothell]

The Terrier has a lower buffer beam than other locos (note how the shank protrudes above the beam), so I've rather assumed the reason for the lack of a drop-link is to prevent it shorting on the centre rail...

I've obtained ETS couplers from Raylo (Colin Toten), but those are designed to avoid having to cut a slot in the bufferbeam (which was what I wanted, to convert a Jep STEF refrigerated van).

Gordon

[Nearholmer]

Just turned the thermostat up a notch, and it occurred to me: this gas I’m merrily burning, and this freezing weather that is causing me to burn it, they both come from the same place don’t they? There’s not some devious connection is there?

[brianusa]

For those snowed in.

 

 

Relief is at hand.

 

Brian.

 

[Mark Carne]

I've fitted Ace trains type droplinks to the couplings of my 5 ETS Terriers, from spare Ace couplings obtained from Kevin Finch. I was told the reason the Terriers were not fitted with droplinks was because they would touch the centre rail, which they certainly don't. They would touch the centre rail if you were using the archaic raised centre rail system, but that's not a concern with an ETS Terrier, as the clearance underneath does not permit operation on raised centre rail.

 

Cheers, Mark.

[Nearholmer]

A Terrier frolicking in the snow.

[Metropolitan H]

I might almost have believed you if it wasn't for the reflection of the door handle! - Hope you had the heating turned up.

 

Regards

Chris H

[Guest Isambarduk]

 

I had one of these when I was a teenager.  The rotary was driven by a belt to the leading axle so it was a cosmetic model, really.  I fitted a copper boiler and a Mamod oscillating cylinder to drive it properly :-)  Yes, I know now, but it was an improvement at the time.    David

 

[Metropolitan H]

What you really want is one of these!

 

Regards

Chris H

[Nearholmer]

What I really want is the summer.