Leaderboard

Years ago I picked up a load of Airfix Mk2D coaches on the cheap. Being cheap, most of them were Brake Second Opens, and most of the rest were First Opens. Many of them were also in poor condition. One turned out to have broken/missing bogies and gangways. There's a distinct lack of stepboards, buffers, and so on. There are also shortcomings in the original Airfix representation -- such as the FO having 2+2 seating, but at the correct 7-bay pitch. It should be 2+1 for a proper FO... This makes them ideal conversion material. This one is my first attempt. It's an early Mk2E TSO, created from the non-brake end of two BSOs. The exterior, the glazing, and the interior have all received the cut'n'shut treatment, creating a proper 8-bay 2+2 seating layout. The roof and the bodysides have been cut at two different locations. Glazing is only in temporarily installed -- it'll need to come out again when this finds it's way to a paint shop. This is my second attempt. It's a Mk2D FK. It's interior has been created by cutting and shutting two Hornby Mk2 BFK interiors. The paint isn't great on this example, so I may elect to repaint it too. It'll certainly need a new number. Two further coaches are on the workbench. I have an FO shell in a particularly poor state of disrepair, which has been put down next to one of the brake ends of the BSO. This should be the correct pieces to make a BFK, although I've lost the cut diagram I used to have bookmarked many years ago. I also have two spare FO interiors, and I'm cutting out and repositioning individual seats. If I can separate enough to form an airline section in the centre, it should make a convincing 58 seat Ex-FO declassified TSO.

I was posting some pictures of Sherton Abbas on the "O gauge Guild" forum https://www.gauge0guild.com/, where it was pointed out that my poor signalman had no means of communicating with the rest of the world. This situation obviously had to be rectified by the addition of some telegraph paraphernalia! I spent some time researching the subject, but as is so often the case in this hobby, the more I read the more questions I needed answering:-) During my search I came across a number of interesting sites including this one http://www.telegraphpoleappreciationsociety.org/ For what its worth, I feel that any site with a "Pole of the Month" has to be worth a read! One of the O gauge guild members "Jim Snowdon" is a font of information about the subject and has given permission for an article he wrote to be posted on the forum. Railways and Overhead Pole Routes - with pictures.pdf The article goes a long way in helping to demystify the world of Telegraph poles, with an emphasis from a modelling point of view and I thoroughly recommend anyone interested in the subject giving it a read! I decided to use the Peco poles https://peco-uk.com/products/telegraph-poles-pack-of-4 as a starting point, hoping to customise them into something more appropriate for an early 20th century Great Western branch line:-) Photographs of prototype poles around the turn of the last Century appear to only have had two insulators per arm and the arms are also of two different lengths and staggered. This was something I was keen to represent on my layout, so some surgery of the Peco arms was required! Peco Arms as supplied in the kit The arms were cut to the appropriate length and then drilled with 0.5mm holes before insulator supports at he correct spacing could be fitted using Slater's Plastikard micro rod. Arms after modification on right side of image The Peco poles have provision for fitting 3 arms into rebates cut into the poles, so depending on the number of arms that need fitting to the modelled poles, either some filler or additional rebates will be needed. Example of modified pole The next thing to be considered were the insulators, which appear to come in two main types. The majority of insulators enable the supported wire to pass through it and then run on to the next post down the line, however where wires are terminating at a post, or building a different type of insulator was used. These are known as Pothead insulators and have a distinctive flat top rather than the conical shape of conventional insulators. Pot head insulators are also mounted on "J hangers" below the post arm which help to minimise any twisting of the arms. I was keen to model these features, on my model poles. The Peco kit contains quite nice representations of conventional conical topped insulators, so these were fitted onto poles where the wires were not terminating. Poles with conventional insulators. The pole adjacent to the signal box would have been fitted Pothead insulators mounted on "J hangers" for any wires that would terminate at the signal box, insulated cables would then have been used to carry current from these insulators, down the pole and into the signal box. Telephone wires would have continued from this pole to the Goods Shed and Station building, so on these arms conventional insulators would have been employed. To represent the "J hangers" I used some 0.5mm brass wire, bent into shape using some round nosed pliers and fitted into pre-drilled holes of the correct spacing into the arms. J hangers mounted into arms I simulated the flat top appearance of the pothead insulators by heating a screw driver blade in a flame and then pressing onto the top of a standard Peco insulator. The thermoplastic distorts quite easily and can be pressed into a more convincing shape, most of the time :-) Signal box pole fitted with pothead insulators on three of the arms and conventional insulators on one arm. The poles were painted with enamel paint, first with a dark brown and then dry brushed with gun metal to simulate weathered wood. Once the poles had dried they were fitted onto the layout by drilling holes and then held in position using 5 minute epoxy resin. Example pole Once all the poles had been installed in their positions on the layout, the "fun" could begin adding the telegraph wires. I used E Z elastic thread https://www.modelscenerysupplies.co.uk/brands/EZ-Line/EZ-Line-Rope to simulate the wires, attached to the insulators with a drop of cyanoacrylate glue applied with a cock tail stick. Fortunately I only need 3 poles on Sherton Abbas and with the addition of some insulators mounted on J hanger brackets where the wires terminate on buildings, the telegraph/telephone system is now complete. Images of the completed poles on the layout The signalman at Sherton Abbas is delighted with this new addition, he's no longer startled by the arrival of the 8.17 am and spilling his tea is a thing of the past!:-) The 8.17 am train arriving at Sherton Abbas Thanks again to Jim Snowdon for his excellent article and for allowing me to publish it on the forum. Its a subject that I knew very little about before starting this project, but I've enjoyed finding out what was used and why so much that I might even join the Telegraph Pole Appreciation Society:-) Sherton Abbas will be appearing at Railex later this month http://www.railex.org.uk/ hopefully I'll see some of you there. Best wishes Dave

In July 2015 I posted a picture of my cut-short garden railway. It showed the original cutting devoid of track, but left like so may closed railways, to the passing of time and the advance of nature! The post received a comment that the space for the line curving away had a certain attraction. The relaid track in the 'station' looked in good order, although ballasting was not complete. Today the scene shows signs of both neglect and new works. The neglect (and relatively poor design of plastic points) has caused the lead point to go out of gauge, needing to be removed and replaced with some plain track to allow testing of visiting steam engines. The stud of the siding has been ballasted over to prevent derailed stock from falling onto the exposed rail ends and damaging paint work. When the track was rationalised, all the spare points were scrapped so I will have to make a new point sometime. The rockery has been neglected and allowed to become overgrown with weeds.... yes, in this garden wild strawberries are weeds. The Juniper Compresses has suffered very badly this winter due to extremely cold east winds. (All part of the climate change.) The new works are non-railway, it having been decided to improve accessibility to the highly productive soft fruit patch that replaced the circular line. (We are still eating last years blackcurrants and the new crop is already showing signs of setting, with trusses of bright green fruit evident.) This means the old right of way looks more like a road building site with bare earth awaiting some recycled paving slabs. The buffer stops will be cut short, dare I say to increase the size of the concourse, so feet on the way to get fruit are away from train waiting for a run! The surrounding vegetation has grown into well sharped bushes, but there needs to be some trimming back ... but it is too late to do this this spring!

One of the more iconic features of Romford station are the overbridges. Bridge 102A (footbridge) was built in 1893 to link the Great Eastern Station to the London Tilbury & Southend Station. Bridge(s) 102 (Main and Electric lines) were built in 1931 as part of the four tracking and replaced the original brick arch structure, albeit some of the abutments were reused. I managed to ascertain the span length from scale drawings that I had acquired. The depth of the main girders was calculated from counting bricks on the adjacent abutments. The main web plates were constructed from 0.5mm thick Plasticard. The flanges were built up with 1mm plastic angle sections and a 0.5mm thick flange plate. The web stiffeners were made from 1.2mm plastic T” sections. I sprayed each complete girder with Halfords grey primer. The south span carried a number of cable troughs. These were constructed from 3mm square tube sections and were supported on brackets cut from chrome staples. When complete, the girder and associated cable runs were weathered. Archer rivet transfers were added to the top and side plates. The notable feature of the bridge was the large fluorescent lettering which featured on the north and south sides of the main girders. The wording read, “British Railways, Romford Station, Frequent Electric Trains to London”. I recreated the wording with 3mm and 5mm Slaters lettering, which was stuck to 0.5mm brass wires. The south span (Electric Lines) also incorporated a dual track overhead line (OLE) gantry (12/22) and integral signal gantry (R64). This was a highly unusual arrangement and one that has now been phased out, probably due to Electricity at Work regulations. The OLE gantry was constructed using brass sections and Weismann insulators (see my previous blog: The Only Way is….Romford – Part 3). The signal gantry (Electric Lines) was built from 1mm brass angle and 0.5mm brass wire to form the railings. I modified a Berko 4-aspect signal head to match to curved back plate that was prevalent on this stretch of line. The signal wires were threaded through 1.5mm brass tube, which was bent to recreate the dog-leg profile. The signal gantry deck was constructed from scored card and was suitably weathered. The OLE/signal gantry was sprayed with grey primer and fixed to the main girders on pre-assembled Plasticard supports. The whole structure was weathered and glued in to position on the baseboard. The footbridge was constructed using the same methodology as the main girders and incorporated a corrugated roof. Supporting arches for the roof were formed from laser cut Romark and included a channel for a longitudinal stiffening beam and lighting conduit. Three LEDs were wired along the length of the bridge and additional one for the height restriction sign. I used Ambis corrugated sheets for the roof which was formed over the supporting arches and glued into position.

I found recently that we still had an old Christmas engine in our attic that had been up there for many years as we didn't have the room to set it up around the tree anymore. So I came up with the idea of "Hey if we aren't going to use it anymore I wonder if I can cut it up and make something of it". The engine itself is a battery operated G scale engine based on a american 4-4-0. I have decided to cut everything off and shorten the chassis alongside making my own boiler and cab (including everything else like funnels, domes and cab interior). This means that I pretty much have full control on how it looks and to get rid of any pressure of accuracy I am going to make it to my own design while still taking parts from other engines. The finished result will hopefully look like a cross of the Furness railway K2 and the Adams T3. It will have inside pistons and will be made to Gauge 1. As you can see if I am going to make a British style 4-4-0 the distance between the leading axle and the drive wheels is strangely large. Because of that I will have to cut the chassis in half and cut a lot of the length of then stick it back together.

I've now been able to add the gas pipes to the roof to complete the model. Those who have read my blog will know that I'm quite obsessive about roof detail. It always surprises me that people spend so much time detailing the underframe which is hardly seen whilst ignoring the roof which is always visible. We don't look at models like you look at the prototype. Having said that I'm not sure of the exact layout of the piping. I recollect a photo of what may be a Siphon C on the Highworth branch taken from above but can I find it? As the model represents the later 1920's period, I've added the thinner acetylene pipes. For bedtime reading I've been re-discovering my old BRJ magazines and an article in one of them about gas lighting showed that remarkably few Siphons actually had any form of lighting. The Siphon C certainly did though. The plastic rod came from a model shop discovered whilst visiting my mother in a home in Axminster, Devon. Buffers is in the middle of fields but is an excellent shop with a far wider range of goods than I expected. I'm sure those in the area already know of it but if you are in the vicinity it's worth looking in. Back to the Siphon. as so often with me, things go well until I pick up a paintbrush. I wanted to do some weathering using Humbrol washes but, stupidly, picked up the dark brown which for me dries to a high gloss finish. I consequently had to use "dust"wash to cover the gloss finish which means the model is rather dirtier than I wanted. Photographic evidence shows that like all wagons they were not cleaned and therefore the level of dirt is typical. I like the dust colour as I know when washing the car the "dirt" is light but whether that holds good for a steam railway is questionable. I do like the way that weathering picks out the fine detail. Incidentally, when it comes to weathering in the aforementioned BRJ there was an advert for a book by John Hayes, "The 4mm Coal Wagon." Look at the photos and weep. The Siphon C was one part completed project that I wanted to finish. Another was a kit for a GWR 64xx pannier tank. Those of you of a certain vintage may remember a range of kits by a manufacturer, Stephen Poole. The 64Xxx was one of those and had, as all kits did in those days, a crude brass chassis. I rebuilt this to EM gauge using Romford wheels but it still looked crude. I probably wouldn't have bothered with it but it had been painted by Larry Goddard (brass safety valve cover?) so I thought it deserved a little attention. Below is a photo taken in 2015 before I tried improving it. I wanted a better chassis but the only one I could trace was the one from the Westward Models (I think) kit. This unfortunately was etched in one piece as an inverted "U" for OO gauge of course. In a fit of enthusiasm I split the chassis down the middle and using brass spacers set the sides wider for EM gauge. There was no provision for compensation so it was fixed bearings aligned using lengths of 1/8th inch OD brass tube. I didn't want to spend much (any?) money on this so raided my spares drawers for a Mashima motor, Comet 38:1 gears and a motor mount of indeterminate origin. I had a number of Alan Gibson wheel sets and this was where the problem arose. The wheels I found were a tightish fit on the axles but not tight enough. Trying to quarter the wheels I found they slipped on the axles and even cyano would not cure the problem. If I wanted to make a proper job of this I would get a High Level gearbox and a new set of wheels. The moral of this story is if ever using wheels that are a push fit on the axle don't expect them to be a tight fit if taken on and off more than a couple of times. I had some old Romford wheels of the right size but the oversized flange and fixed balance weights were too much even for me. Incidentally these defects have been cured in the "Romford" wheels marketed by Markits. As any layout I do is likely to be in the "uncoloured" category the 64xx won't find any use which is why I'm reluctant to spend too much cash on it. A Bachmann body too would would be better detailed. As ever though this is the modellers quandry, what to do with those efforts from earlier days when the products; look at those handrail knobs; and your personal skill level were of a lower standard than now. I think though it is worth updating, maybe a job for the next modelling season. The other kit I mentioned in a previous blog was a GWR 2021 kit. This is being re-introduced by SE Finecast (the same range as the 517) so will wait for that to appear as it seems they are doing the chassis separately.

The holes in the underframe strengthening plates presented a small problem. How do you get an even coverage of paint on the solebars that will be seen behind the plates? I put the nozzle of the airbrush right up against the holes and sprayed through them onto the solebar. The consistency of the paint allowed it to spread far enough inside the gap to cover the whole area. The Railmatch frame dirt was applied first, to give an overall tint to the whole area. Wheels were done by using the airflow from the airbrush to turn the wheels and then applying the paint and watching the excess fly all over the inside of the spraybooth. Railmatch weathered black was mixed in with the frame dirt and then randomly airbrushed over the top to introduce a change in tone to the accumulated grime. The photographs show this much better than (my) words can explain:

Evening all, Following on from my last entry, I wanted to undertake some tests on the inset track and ballasting for the layout. The only ballasted section will essentially be the track along the front whilst most of the area depicted had a concrete type apron. As mentioned before I have had a few disasters on my 2mmFS layouts with both of these so thought a few tests would be a good start rather than wade in. I assembled a 60ft length of C+L plain track on a 5mm foam board base and this was first sprayed with track colour weathered sleeps as a base. I then built up two different options for the concrete hard stand using 5mm foamboard and a card top layer. The first option runs the card tight to the rail, whilst the second option stops it short to create the gap as described by Scott in a reply on my last blog entry. I then filled this gap with a proprietary ready mix filler which was sanded when dry so slightly lower then the rail - this is twofold, firstly to create the infill gap and secondly to have something slightly lower for when cleaning the rails. I then applied two coats of some acrylic paint although I am not so keen on the brush strokes. Ballasting was then applied using two types of ballast obtained from Green Scenes at a show. Looking at the prototype pictures I wanted to create the very dark (almost black) ballast seen at the dries rather than my usual light grey ballast. PVA and water with some detergent was applied using an old syringe and left to dry over night. Incidentally, my son and I prefer the slightly larger ballast than the smaller and I purposely did not buy ‘7mm ballast’ as people tend to say it’s overscale. This morning, I first picked out the chairs in acrylic rust colour and then toned them down later with weathering powders. The same mix of black and brown powers was applied to the ‘concrete’ running the black powder into the small groove next to the outer rails. Joints in the concrete were scored with a scalpel then gone over with a 0.7mm lead pencil, adding a few cracks too. Finally I applied some static grass to the track and also in the cracks as well as the groove alongside the rails as I am modelling the scene circa 1983 just before it closed, so would like a little evidence of neglect. Overall I am very happy with the results. To get rid of the brush lines to the concrete I might spray the top layer of card before applying it in place. I might do this in sections too creating some thin joints rather than scoring them. This now allows me to start to prepare the base for the inset track on the layout and then get the ballasting on the go. Once these two large elements are done it will allow me to turn my attention to the dries buildings...and I have started to have some thoughts on those too. As always, comments welcome, Pete

At the end of the last blog I said I was going to try and 3D print a lever frame. I knew that this was probably going to be at the extreme end of what the printer could handle. The results were promising with a few issues. There seem to be a couple of issue, firstly the levers appear to have been attracted to each other by the surface tension of the resin. In most cases the bulk of the lever was actually printed correctly but as they came out of the printer the levers were stuck together. Secondly the very tops of the lever appear to have lost the plot slightly, on several of the levers there was a distinct step where half way up the handle of the lever. I can see a couple of options, I could try and add some support between the levers but I think this would be a pain remove, possibly almost impossible. The other option would be to print the levers separately and make the base with some holes to glue them into. I tried to break and re-seat the handles on the worst offending, the result wasn't too bad. I tried the frame in the box, this photograph is greatly magnified. I did a couple of other prints at the same time, the platform face includes a number of tie-bars to stop it falling down. I was able to draw these up, they are about 5mm in diameter. Finally I also printed a sack of potatoes off the Thingiverse, While all this was going on I went into the arboriculture business and finished off some trees and bushes. I have quite a thicket to plant now. David