Edwardian locos pre grouping L&Y

[Simon Moore]

It's been some time since i posted anything on the forum regarding my own personal works so i thought it time i started a thread. My collection of models is far & wide & i've had a bit of a period of thinking trying things etc & then i came back to my ever growing number of etched kits. My collection which keeps growing is mainly Lancashire & Yorkshire railways items mainly the london road models collection.

 

When i decided to comeback to the workbench i was pondering on what to start with so i decided to tackle a few cambrian kits firstly & i knocked together about 5 wagons mainly Midland which can go in to the mix of pre grouping stock. Everything i have done has been in P4 it's been one of those things that has been on my mind since i decided to convert. The question looming in my mind was " is this dooable " . Well happily to say yes it is dooable & i've managed to get a compound chassis running sweet as a nut & now i am working on a Barton Wright "Ironclad". The Ironclad i started sometime ago on a hobby holiday weekend the only problem was i rushed the chassis & made a real balls up so i managed to get a replacement chassis from John at LRM. I've used high level hornblocks which is my preference always now, they are so simple to use & i spent a full saturday making £50's worth of them Anyway first up a view of the mess i call a workbench. Organised of course

 

 

 

Next up i have a photo of a brakeblock set for the Ironclad i made one on sunday evening & i can honestly say this is the first part of modeling i found to tax my patience i found a few new combo swears as well. There are 6 in total for the loco which i have finished producing today. I followed the instructions to make a jig which you can see although i added a central hole so that i could make a temporary keeper to hold the brake shoe in place whilst i set everything up for alignment.

 

 

 

The chassis was very easy to build i use a avonside chassis pro jig which is simply one of the best modeling tools out there. I constructed my compensation beam in situ using the chassis pro as a guide for bending the beam. I guess everyone has there own way of building kits i follow the instructions a little but i tend to put my own spin on things to suit my style of modeling. It's taken a long lnog time & cost a bit in mistakes to get to this point but when i placed the chassis on the test track with the wheels fitted & it glided along it was a pleasing sight.

 

 

 

I've got the tender underway too which is in its very basic form but that took a weekend to get correct & make sure everything was bob on. Im very pleased so far with this kit i have enjoyed more or less every minute of the build although i really have taken my time but a little every now & again gets me one step closer. In the pipeline i have plans for a few kits of my own mainly the L&Y highflyer atlantic & the dreadnought because they are 2 of my favorite locos & not offered for sale anywhere on the market.

 

I'll keep you all posted on my progress because the ironclad is being worked on daily now.

 

Cheers

 

Simon