Aston On Clun. A forgotten Great Western outpost.

[Rowsley17D]

2 hours ago, BroadLeaves said:

Is that a blackened metal etch?

It looks exactly the same as the set that come with the KMRC 1361 class (ex DJM) locos, and those are just black plastic.

 

Quite correct, in the description it says they are from their Beattie Well Tanks, Adams O2 and SWR 1361 Models

[Mike 84C]

Why not make your own fireirons? Whitemetal look a  bit fat and chunky, etched ones look flat and ; just etched!  Wire about a scale 2 1/4" dia would look ok the chisel bar a bit thicker 'cos they were b---- heavy! after they have been in a fire a few times they will not be so straight!  WR fireirons were much better quality than those from the  Ell of a Mess which seemed to be made of toffee or spaghetti.

 The tunnel on he L/H side of WR engines usually held the long bar and long pricker. Much easier and safer than waving it about over the side of the engine when its red hot!

 My avtar shows a 9f I think one of the best things about all BR standards was the rocking grate, why the WR never fitted them is a mystery to me . Fire cleaning was such a b----- awful, awful job and men did it day in day out for years. One of ours at Banbury,  Jack Rakestrawe had biceps bigger than my thighs! And such a nice man.

[John Besley]

6 hours ago, Mike 84C said:

Why not make your own fireirons? Whitemetal look a  bit fat and chunky, etched ones look flat and ; just etched!  Wire about a scale 2 1/4" dia would look ok the chisel bar a bit thicker 'cos they were b---- heavy! after they have been in a fire a few times they will not be so straight!  WR fireirons were much better quality than those from the  Ell of a Mess which seemed to be made of toffee or spaghetti.

 The tunnel on he L/H side of WR engines usually held the long bar and long pricker. Much easier and safer than waving it about over the side of the engine when its red hot!

 My avtar shows a 9f I think one of the best things about all BR standards was the rocking grate, why the WR never fitted them is a mystery to me . Fire cleaning was such a b----- awful, awful job and men did it day in day out for years. One of ours at Banbury,  Jack Rakestrawe had biceps bigger than my thighs! And such a nice man.

 

Mike you can't keep all your footplate stories to yourself... 

 

Spin us a yarn or two...

[Tortuga]

@MrWolf just wanted to say the grain on that plank is excellently rendered: I could feel the splinters in my palms just looking at it!

 

Good job well done sir.

[MrWolf]

Thank you, it's scratches made with a no.11 scalpel on 20 thou card before I cut it from the sheet.

I try to keep it simple!

[Mike 84C]

I all honesty I only did 3 1/2 yrs firing so my little pot of yarns is not so deep!   But I could tell you of trips on Austerities from Tysley back to Banbury Ironstone sidings where the only time we had more than 80psi was when it was stood still! Lumps of brickarch in the fire, holes in what was left of the arch so most of the tubes were visible and a lubricator that was not very adjustable so the valves moaned and groaned for 42 miles! But those Monitor type injectors kept on working!  Tried firing light and bright after pulling the lumps of arch back under the door, that method did'nt work. So "boxed her up", that method made little more steam but at least I was not stood in front of the firedoor all the time.

  Put  the loco on Banbury ashpit and my driver failed the engine on the repair cards and off home we went. Blow me we book on to work OIC to Brymbo as far as Tysley and that same Austerity was our booked engine. No repairs done to the arch so it got failed again! and I think we took an 8f instead.  Austerities were not very popular at Western depots, get rid of it quick was the plan . They seemed to be wandering nomads that little was done too keep them in fair nick.

  On the LMR and ER the fires were cleaned by taking out some firebars then pushing the fire out through the ashpan. All good till the cleaner of fires could not get all the bars back in place so they got spread a bit. But those engines were so rough riding the fire could get shaken into the ashpan and make it glow dull red! I have arrived at Woodford like that several times. The crew had a little padded seat to sit on, quite comfy, well they were fixed to the cab side with a hinge pin and on the other a metal support arm that fitted into a bracket on the cab side. We have just passed Bletchington Cement sidings big crash and bang from my mates side of the cab and he is flat on his back on the cab floor! this engine was so rough it had sheared the seat pin and the bits bounced over the side! he was not happy! This was the same engine that the boiler water looked like  mushroom soup and any more than a 1/4 glass when running it just bobbed up and down from top to bottom of the glass. Night mare!

  I suppose I know lots of silly tales but I didnt keep a diary in those days, now I wish I had, hindsight eh!

My regular driver was a lot of a drinker so I worked harder than some others. One job in our link was get two engines ready for other crews, then prep your own for the York- Bournemouth which we worked to Oxford, relief by SR men then walk across Oxford sta; relief the Oxford men on our train, which was all stations back to Banbury. Carriages to sidings, engine to shed not one minutes overtime allowed and as it was passenger work no bonus! I think that was a 6 day week with no rest day. Very tiring week for bare time!

 My only real claim to fame is I fired the last steam hauled TRPS special with Clun Castle back from Salop to Banbury. Last Castle I ever fired! Pat Whitehouse gave me and Dick Powell the driver a bottle of beer each and 10/- each! When I see Clun now I get severe footplate envy! But I did it when it was "real"! Time for bed.

  Sorry Mr Wolf  I seem to have hijacked your thread blame John Besley. Psssst where is Banjo country?

[MrWolf]

Not a hijack at all, much appreciated and if these anecdotes aren't passed down, we lose our history, social culture and ultimately our identity, which would probably suit some people...

 

Plus it makes such a nice change to be talking about railways on here! 😆

 

I have managed to do a few, fiddly, sweary but ultimately pleasing little jobs.

 

The underframes have had a coat of mixed Matt black, leather and gunmetal, to give a greasy but well cared for look. The uppers I left out the leather 62 paint. We do have the broken off cab upper handrails replaced by drilling a centre where each end used to be and springing in a slightly over length piece of.0045" wire and securing with superglue. 

I made a couple of uprights with a hole at the top to secure the rain sheet then filled up the tender using glue n glaze and real coal. I realise that synthetic alternatives are available, but I'm assured that fossil fuels are plant based and therefore 100% vegan 🤪

It tastes horrible though.

 

 

There has of course, been fun and games. The centre axle was missing from the small Bachmann tender, so I robbed one from the Mainline tender, same size wheels.....

But it's too tight, the Bachmann axles are shorter. I machined down the Mainline axle to match the other two, which it does, dead on.

 

And it falls out.....

 

There's got to be some things in life that are straightforward, surely?

 

None spring to mind......

 

 

[Winslow Boy]

I always find pulling up weeds straightforward but then again I'm weird.

[John Besley]

Thanks Mike ... Now some 9F stories or should we start a footplate topic...

[MrWolf]

54 minutes ago, Winslow Boy said:

I always find pulling up weeds straightforward but then again I'm weird.

 

Until you get those annoying ones where the root snaps off and you know that it will be back...

Time to water the 'plants' with a couple of gallons of heavily salted water.

[MrWolf]

20 minutes ago, John Besley said:

Thanks Mike ... Now some 9F stories or should we start a footplate topic...

 

My father's older cousin was a driver instructor on the old Great Central London extension, he'd been trained by the army in Germany in the fifties on steam diesel and electric locos and managed to get ahead when he went back to working for BR. 

He regularly worked on the 9Fs and apparently there's some truth to the stories of freight trains racing against cars down towards Northampton where the M1 runs parallel.

[MrWolf]

Taken at Worcester Shrub Hill in 1964 by Derek Parsons, this is an interesting shot of 2291 showing how the storm sheet has been lashed onto the roof.

I was wondering if it would have been done like that in GWR days?

 

[Northroader]

They would more likely be rolled up and slung under the curve of the roof near the back edge, though I cba to find a photo.

[Donw]

Alan Brackenborough lent me a scratch built 633 class which had a neatly rolled sheet tied to the cab edge roof. I needed an extra loco for an exhibition. Superb bit of work in 0 gauge. Might be worth trying in 00 some sort of tissue perhaps?

 

Don

 

 

[MrWolf]

42 minutes ago, Northroader said:

They would more likely be rolled up and slung under the curve of the roof near the back edge, though I cba to find a photo.

 

I know what you mean, as in properly furled. The leather straps would still have been intact prewar. 

I also CBA this morning, it must be something in the air.

[Graham T]

The air seems to have drifted across to Austria as well...

[longchap]

Fortunately the air is clear this morning in the Loire Valley, so take a good look throiugh http://www.gwr.org.uk/nopanniers.html to see several weather tarps, but note that some are just resting on top of the cab while drying out!

 

There's a superb shot of 645 class, No 652, some third of the way dowmn showing the small hooks just under the cab roof. Now there's a neat thing to model, sans tarp!

 

 

Edited August 31, 2022 by longchap

[Mike 84C]

Re; storm sheets. I can only remember a row of hooks on the rib that supported the roof extension that the eyelets in the sheet hooked onto. The tender end of the sheet had stiffeners in it  and two coil springs each side that hooked onto the tender uprights. And those springs could really bite ones hands. I seem to remember it being a real PITA to roll it over the cab roof and secure  it  but my experience of sheeting HGV loads says trying to furl the storm sheet would have been an even bigger PITA. 'Cos they were not light! Often they lived in the tender toolbox behind the drivers position with the tin tube of detonators. Feeders , oil bottles and spanners lived in the other tool box.

  When you come to paint the cab inside, see if you can find some pictures of the drivers side 'cos you may notice an odd shaped piece of dirty side window. That is where the ATC and its mounting bracket was, and you could'nt get a hand in there to clean the inside of the glass!

  Now I would guess your fathers older cousin worked at either Annesley or Woodford but probably the former? There are some guys on another RM web  thread who cannot get their heads around 60mph loose coupled coal trains, but this due in my opinion to todays risk averse hse culture. Not that its all a bad thing buuuttt and I am of a certain age /generation! There is total truth in the speeds of the Annesley runners, Mr Dick Hardy, whom I knew was very proud of those trains!

  Worth looking at the Annesley shed website your relative may be on there in the personalities page.

[Tortuga]

I’d like to second the appreciation of the railway related anecdotes. 
 

(A book of collected anecdotes would be fantastic, but I’ll settle for random memories on here)

[Nick C]

14 hours ago, MrWolf said:

Not a hijack at all, much appreciated and if these anecdotes aren't passed down, we lose our history, social culture and ultimately our identity, which would probably suit some people...

 

Plus it makes such a nice change to be talking about railways on here! 😆

 

I have managed to do a few, fiddly, sweary but ultimately pleasing little jobs.

 

The underframes have had a coat of mixed Matt black, leather and gunmetal, to give a greasy but well cared for look. The uppers I left out the leather 62 paint. We do have the broken off cab upper handrails replaced by drilling a centre where each end used to be and springing in a slightly over length piece of.0045" wire and securing with superglue. 

I made a couple of uprights with a hole at the top to secure the rain sheet then filled up the tender using glue n glaze and real coal. I realise that synthetic alternatives are available, but I'm assured that fossil fuels are plant based and therefore 100% vegan 🤪

It tastes horrible though.

 

 

There has of course, been fun and games. The centre axle was missing from the small Bachmann tender, so I robbed one from the Mainline tender, same size wheels.....

But it's too tight, the Bachmann axles are shorter. I machined down the Mainline axle to match the other two, which it does, dead on.

 

And it falls out.....

 

There's got to be some things in life that are straightforward, surely?

 

None spring to mind......

 

 

Try using one of These gizmos to drill out the axle boxes, then add brass bearings?

[MrWolf]

For reasons best known to the manufacturers, the axles on both tenders have plain rather than pinpoint ends, running directly in the plastic.

But that gadget will be very useful for wagons and particularly RTR coaches, so I'll be having one. Thanks for the link Nick.

[Rowsley17D]

38 minutes ago, MrWolf said:

For reasons best known to the manufacturers, the axles on both tenders have plain rather than pinpoint ends, running directly in the plastic.

But that gadget will be very useful for wagons and particularly RTR coaches, so I'll be having one. Thanks for the link Nick.

 

Cheaper at DCC Concepts and gauged to OO. I have one and even stock which I thought ran well is even freer after using it.

 

https://www.dccconcepts.com/product/bearing-reamers-set-of-two/

 

A nice run to Settle for you as well or I can pick one up and post it to you no doubt cheaper than DCC C will charge for p&p.

[longchap]

1 minute ago, Rowsley17D said:

 

Cheaper at DCC Concepts and gauged to OO. I have one and even stock which I thought ran well is even freer after using it.

 

https://www.dccconcepts.com/product/bearing-reamers-set-of-two/

 

A nice run to Settle for you as well or I can pick one up and post it to you no doubt cheaper than DCC C will charge for p&p.

 

Yep, I also have the DCCC ones, which does the job.

[Nick Gough]

1 hour ago, Rowsley17D said:

 

Cheaper at DCC Concepts and gauged to OO. I have one and even stock which I thought ran well is even freer after using it.

 

https://www.dccconcepts.com/product/bearing-reamers-set-of-two/

 

A nice run to Settle for you as well or I can pick one up and post it to you no doubt cheaper than DCC C will charge for p&p.

 

Another vote for the DCC version.

[MrWolf]

I see that we actually have two very different devices here, hence the price difference.

The gadget that @Nick Csuggested is made with a brass body for starters and it's designed for machining out the axle bearing housing in plastic or white metal to take a 2mm brass bearing, which is what I do with all of my kits. 

 

https://www.hamodels.net/axlebox-bearing-cutting-tool-for-4mm-wagons-coaches.html

 

The DCC Concepts device is designed to clean up the existing moulded pinpoint bearings and slightly deepen them to ensure free running.

 

Back here, I've salvaged the tender wheels situation by trial and error, just taking a few thou off the axle ends at a time and trial fitting.

The alternative would be sourcing appropriate wheels axles and bearings as well as the cutter from hamodels.