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Now that I have completed my research into, and constructed models of, the Mail Train that is described in the BoT Accident report of 1868, regarding the collision near Bullo Pill on the South Wales line, I am turning my attention to the Goods Train. my Mail Train models, based on accident report from Bullo Pill 1868 According to the accident report, the goods train was headed by the locomotive ‘Tantalus’ and comprised 20 cattle wagons, plus a third-class carriage at the rear in which 8 drovers and the guard were travelling. At Newport, six more trucks, loaded with general goods, had been taken on, apparently against the judgement of the engine-driver. In the collision, three of the drovers and the guard were killed and the others in the end carriage were seriously injured. About 40 cattle were also killed. Gooch's Standard Goods class ‘Tantalus’ was a member of Gooch’s ‘Standard Goods’ class, of which 102 were built at Swindon in seven lots between 1852 and 1863. Their design was a development of three earlier lots of 0-6-0 goods engines, of which ‘Premier’ had been the first engine built at Swindon in 1846. The first lot of 12 engines had 10’ 0” x 4’ 0” boilers and a wheelbase of 7’ 7 ¼ “ + 6’ 10 1/4”. For the second lot of 6 engines, these dimensions were increased to 10’ 6” x 4’ 3” for the boiler and 7’ 4” + 8’ 1” for the wheelbase. After a gap of three years, a third lot of 8 engines were built with similar dimensions, known as the ‘Caesar’ class. The first of the ‘Standard Goods’ class was built only 3 months after the last of the ‘Caesar’ class and saw a further increase in dimensions to 11’ 0” x 4’ 6” for the boilers and 7’ 4” + 8’ 10 ½“ for the wheelbase. By the standards of the time, these were very large engines, with larger boilers than the later Dean Goods engines. ‘Tantalus’ was built in November 1862, in the last lot of 12 engines. I have not managed to find any photographs of ‘Tantalus’ itself but there is a photo of ‘Xerxes’, built in January 1863, within the same lot. It is shown at Westbourne Park in later years, with a cab and Armstrong ‘roll top’ chimney. There is a similar, photo of ‘Liffey’, built in August 1857 in an earlier lot, which shows the engine with a simple weather board and copper-topped chimney. I have used these photos as references for my construction of ‘Tantalus’ Gooch Standard Goods ‘Xerxes’ Gooch Standard Goods ‘Liffey’ Modelling ‘Tantalus’ I have already made progress in building a model of a Gooch Goods, using the kit supplied by the Broad Gauge Society (kit FL02). In a previous entry, I described constructing a pair of sandwich frames, using parts from this kit. Unfortunately for me, the GWR followed a policy of ‘continuous improvement’ during the construction of successive lots of these engines and, according to the RCTS Part 2 book on GWR Locomotives, later engines (of which ‘Tantalus’ was one) had welded plate frames. Since the frames are inside, well-hidden behind the exposed driving wheels, I do not intend to undo the work I’ve already done! my model Sandwich Frame (from BGS kit) I have also constructed the boiler from the BGS kit, as also described in a previous entry. I have applied this boiler to my ‘Rob Roy’ model, since both the ‘Waverley’ class and the ‘Standard Goods’ used the same type of boiler. With my experience gained from constructing one of these boilers, I hope to avoid some of the difficulties that I encountered during my first build! my model Standard Goods Boiler (from BGS kit) Modelling Cattle Wagons information about Broad Gauge cattle wagons is rather scanty but there is a useful article in the Broad Gauge Society (BGS) magazine 'Broadsheet', number 52 (2004). From this, I learned that the GWR had 130 cattle wagons, although there are very few photographs, mostly partly obscured in the background of photos of locomotives, etc. Much of the information in the article concerns wagons originally built for the South Devon Railway and it is stated of GWR wagons that “No dimensions are known, although building dates are around the late 1850’s to mid 1860’s so are possibly a similar design [to the SDR]. Probably some were roofless, with hoops for over-sheeting.” This doesn’t give much to go on, although the article also notes that “When converted to narrow gauge, GWR cattle trucks were 16ft 6ins long by 7ft 5ins wide and 7ft 1ins high, with 9ft 9ins wheelbase and 4 x 3ft 6in wheels. Narrow gauge numbers 26273 to 26292”. It seems reasonable to assume that, except in width, these dimensions are representative of the original Broad Gauge vehicles. There are also some sketches to indicate the main features of these wagons: Sketches from BGS 'Broadsheet' no.52 In addition to these wagons, several sources indicate that ‘tilt waggons’ were frequently used as cattle trucks. Alan Prior, in his book '19th Century Railway Drawings', labels a four-wheeled tilt wagon as a ‘general goods & cattle wagon’. His drawing again indicates a 9’ 9” wheelbase. In search of more information, I next turned to the well-known photos of Broad Gauge stock, assembled in the dump at Swindon in 1892. Initially, I had assumed that all of the many white-stained wagons were from the china-clay industry but further inspection indicates that several were actually lime-washed for animal traffic. In one of the rows of wagons, there are several closed trucks, with signs of lime-wash running down the sides, together with open tilt wagons, with heavily lime-washed interiors and hoops for carrying top sheets. Some of these were quite close to the camera and provide plenty of information for modelling purposes. Lime-washed wagons at Swindon dump 1892 In the far distance, there is a side-on view of a closed wagon which, although very blurred, confirms some of the details in the sketch shown above: Cattle wagon at Swindon dump 1892 There is also an image that I have re-constructed from partial background views of what is probably an ex-SDR vehicle which, while not dimensionally accurate, illustrates some useful constructional details: Cattle Wagon, re-constructed from partial views So, after my initial feeling that there was very little information to be found, my research indicates a considerable variety of wagons that could have made up the goods train involved in the accident. It is worth remembering that these wagons were built by several different contractors and, in the modern jargon, were ‘individually hand-crafted’. I now have plenty of inspiration for devising modelling techniques to construct a variety of wagons, by making use of the various tools that I have in my armoury, including 3D printing. Of course, I have no space to accommodate 26 assorted wagons but I can make models representative of the whole train. Finally there is the thorny question of colour. The red/grey debate has become familiar but, according to the BGS 'Broadsheet' no.6 (1982), the original GWR wagon livery was all over brown, including the wheels, axles, axleboxes, side springs and every part. It also states that the date when the red livery was introduced is still to be discovered, but the evidence suggests brown from the 1840s until the middle 1860s. For my period, therefore, it appears that brown is the most appropriate colour, which is a pity, in terms of modelling variety, as the Mail-train carriages are also brown! I shall report on progress as it occurs Mike

I decided to give the 3D printer a little job and modeled up some right angle magnetic clamps. These have 4 strong magnets mounted into them and while obviously of no use for anything 'hot' for holding two pieces at right angles while they glue they could come in handy. I'll put the .STL files on the thingiverse if anyone is interested, I made too different sizes, one 50mm and the other 30mm. They proved to be very useful when assembling walls of my station building toilet block. This was cut in two layers of 1.5mm MDF. I managed to cut the quoins for the main building out of thin 160gsm (200 micron) postcard card. These did tend to come out a bit like a cake doily and were very fragile, once you have 'half cuts' for the brick joints there is a risk of them falling apart before you can stick them on. I sprayed the main 3mm MDF walls with a Halford's red oxide paint to seal them before adding another coat of Humbrol Matt 70 brick red. The centre parts were masked and then the edges sprayed with Matt 83 which was also sprayed on the quoin 'doilies'. Before assembly I rubbed some Wilko fine filler into the brick joints and brushed with Vallejo grey model wash. I am amazed by how fine the laser cutter can cut 1mm MDF, the glazing bars on the windows come out at about .45mm and I was able to paint them with the light green edging, though it is virtually invisible in the photographs. I will be painting the window sills in this colour to match the colour photograph I have from about earlier 60s'. The windows are not stuck in yet and the roof needs a little work to fit better. I used the 'engrave' operation on the cutter to take the surface of the lower pane of the window back before cutting but I think I need to cut it back a little more so that the lower pane seems to slide behind the upper pain. I've found that with care I can just shave a British Standard Gnats off the central glazing bar to improve the look but this is not for the faint hearted! I have a little fettling of the platform to do to make the hole the building fits into right. As a bit of a break from CAD and the lasercutter, (the 3mm MDF brickwork took about 90 minutes to cut, the quoin card nearly 30 minutes) I made up a facing point lock for the Cavendish end of the loop. Now I have to do a detector for the ground disc, but that probably comes when I start worrying about signal cabling. Thanks for your interest. David

For some time, I have been feeling dissatisfied with the shaping of the frames on my model of the broad gauge engine ‘Rob Roy’ but couldn’t think of any ways to improve them, with the limited tools that I have. The construction of my model is described earlier in my blog. Recently I started to think about whether my 3D-printer might be able to help. I do like engines to be made of metal, so a complete plastic print wasn’t my favourite option, although I did find it a useful exercise for testing my modelling skills. I had the idea that it might be possible to make a tool or template, to help in forming brass sheet to the correct curved shapes. I couldn’t work from published drawings because I have modified the frames to suit some slightly over-size Tri-ang wheels, which I chose because they have the correct number of spokes for the GWR ‘Waverley’ class. These wheels are a very prominent feature of the prototype. My starting point was a JPEG image of the frames that I made for my model, which has some compromises in dimensions, to accommodate the wheels. It proved quite difficult to turn this into something that I could ‘extrude’ into a ‘solid’ model by using my 'Fusion 360' software. Rob Roy Frames (modified) – JPEG image Different software packages have their strengths and weaknesses. For this application, ‘Silhouette Studio’ has an excellent ‘trace’ function but has very limited export capability. My first step was, therefore, to open the JPEG image in ‘Studio’. One pitfall is that the image had be scaled to 72px/inch, which caught me out because I usually use 300 for printing. I was initially puzzled because the image appeared 4.2 times too big! Once I had a correctly-sized background image, I use the ‘trace tool’, with the various filters turned off. The result was an outline drawing, which I saved in ‘Studio3’ format. To get this drawing into ‘Fusion 360’, it needs to be converted to SVG, which proved tricky.There is, however, a website that will do an on-line conversion of ‘Studio’ files to SVG format, so, by using this, I now had the drawing in a format that I could insert into ‘Fusion 360’. In principle, the extrude tools in ‘Fusion 360’ can be used to transform an imported drawing into a solid object. In practice, however, my drawing turned out to have tiny gaps in the lines, which did not create the closed areas that are needed for extrusion to work. There is an ‘inspect’ tool, which identified a very large number of places where such gaps occurred but I don’t know of any easy way to close gaps in ‘Fusion 360’, other than on a point-by-point basis. Since the gaps are very tiny, it is difficult to find where to apply the editing tools such as ‘extend’ and ‘join’ and, in some places, they did not seem to work on the imported drawing. Failures seemed to occur where lines met some types of curves and would not connect . I needed another piece of software, to try and resolve the problem. So, I opened my SVG drawing in ‘Inkscape’ and explored the various ‘repair’ tools in that software. The ‘edit paths by nodes’ tool revealed that there was a very large number of nodes in the traced drawing. The ‘simplify’ command on the ‘path’ menu did a good job in reducing these to a more manageable number. By zooming in on the drawing to look at the detail of the nodes, it was easy to see where some nodes did not link up and it was easy to move node points so that they ‘fused’. I re-saved the drawing and inserted the new version into ‘Fusion 360’. Overall, the situation was now much better in that the main area could now be selected as a closed object. The ‘inspect’ tool revealed just a few problem areas and it was now feasible to give these points individual attention. In some cases, it was quicker simply to delete a short section and replace it with new lines. This method was sufficient to ‘close’ all the separate areas. It was only when I came to transfer the design to my slicing software, ‘Cura’, for printing that I realised that the scale had somehow changed during the transfer from ‘Inkscape’ to ‘Fusion 360’. In my previous work, I had always used DXF files from ‘Autosketch’ and these transferred correctly to scale. As a check, I tried saving the file in DXF format from ‘Inkscape’, which solved the scale problem, but the other problems of ‘loose ends’ appeared again and, in the end, I found it easier to re-scale the printer file within my ‘Cura’ software, before finally converting the model to ‘gcode’ for my E180 printer. The printed tool is shown below. For my purpose, the most important part is the curved top surface, which provides a firm base on which to construct my curved splashers. My first step was to glue a sheet of 10 thou (0.25 mm) brass sheet to one face of the tool. I used ‘UHU’ adhesive so that, after processing, the brass could easily be removed by immersion in hot water. I then used my Dremel ‘Moto-Saw’ to make a rough cut around the main features. This wasn’t as easy as I had hoped, since the saw operates with a vibrating motion and tended to pull at the thin brass sheet. It was, however, adequate for making a rough outline, which I could then refine by means of jewellers’ snips.. I found it easy to use the snips, now that the brass sheet was firmly attached to the tool, which I could hold comfortably during cutting. For the final trimming, to match the edges of the tool, I used a selection of needle files. Although the tool is, obviously, very soft, it was sufficiently firm to provide feedback when the brass edges had matched the tool surfaces. Once the frames had been shaped to my satisfaction, I started to add the curved top surface to form the splashers. For this, I used lengths of 5 thou (0.125 mm) brass shim. I used separate lengths for each section of the splashers, as I had done in my original model, but I feel it would be possible, with care, to fold the whole top as a single sheet. I provided a series of tabs along the back of the splashers that I folded down for attachment to the frame. Because the tool is plastic that melts easily, I could not solder these tabs in situ but, once everything was correctly shaped, I could remove the components from the tool, by immersion in hot water, and solder the parts together subsequently. I treated this as a ‘practice run’ and propose to try it ‘for real’ on some future engine builds that are in the pipeline. In fact, having looked at my ‘Rob Roy’ again, it doesn’t look nearly as bad as I thought and I shall finish it in its present form, while using the new techniques to build different designs. Having got this far, I decided to see how much extra work was needed to create a complete 3D-printed frame. The answer was not a great deal and, as a training exercise, I made a complete set of frames and splashers with ‘Fusion 360’, as shown below. It was necessary to extrude selected parts of the drawing by different amounts to create the 3D structure. I took the opportunity to add sand-boxes and rudimentary springs to my original drawing. One advantage of using computer-aided design is that producing a pair of right and left handed frames is simply a matter of pressing a ‘mirror’ button! So, here’s a pair of frames, straight from the 3D-printer, with Tri-ang driving wheels in place on one side. Although the splasher tops are rather ‘thick’, to allow successful printing, they are also surprisingly robust and this would be a feasible method to use … providing you are content with plastic engines. I intend to continue with brass construction but with the assistance of 3D-printed tools, to help in forming complex shapes. Mike

I had hoped to show more progress at Swan Hill by now but in spite of hours put in, output looks a bit thin. There's been plenty of drawing (it's warmer indoors at the computer) - part of the current fabrication drawing is shown below together with a few pics of the work-in-progress viaduct and bridge abutment. The abutment face is slotted for square section rainwater DPs but the bearing shelf is incomplete until the bridge itself is made and can be fitted to get the height exact. Unusually, the bridge carries three tracks where an even number would be the norm - but there is such a bridge over Battersea Park Road which only goes to prove the old adage that there is a prototype for anything. The last photo (of the trackwork leading to the bridge abutment) is included because until I looked at it, I hadn't noticed the missing chair - it's odd how pictures can show up things that otherwise get missed. ...If you're reading this post in 2022 (or later!), the bridge abutment which forms the country end (right hand end in the photos) of the layout has been completely re-built since this post was first uploaded - I didn't like it, so I changed it,

I have a thing for GWR stable blocks. The subject isn't systematically covered in the literature, so in a previous post I tried to obtain a tentative overview of the major types and styles. Since then I’ve been searching Britain from Above, Google street view and old online maps looking for past and present traces of stable blocks. It's all a bit esoteric, but for what it's worth here is a selection of my favourite 'finds'. Westbury It's 1929 and a plane soars over Westbury, capturing the photo above. The small stable block with the distinctive roof vents can be seen at the entry to the goods yard, a common and logical location for them (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). The stable block at Westbury can be seen in this 1901 map. The station and goods area was later extensively rebuilt, as can be seen in the photos below and in this map. The stables here were built in 1899, with capacity for three horses. Many of the standard stable blocks on the GWR were built around the turn of the century, when the GWR decided to rely less on agents and do more of its own cartage (National Library of Scotland, Creative Commons). A grainy close-up, showing also the cattle dock. There must have been a lovely whiff in this part of the yard! (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). Toboldlygo of this parish has modelled Westbury stables, using the 4mm Timbertracks kit. Note the manure pit, a standard feature. Thanks to Toboldlygo for allowing use of the photos, there's more about the build in his thread. So, does anything remain of the Westbury stable block today? A look on Google maps suggests that there is in fact a building more or less in the location where the stables were situated! (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). But alas, it is only the signal box that was built later. Nothing seems to remain of the stable block (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). Basingstoke The stable block at Basingstsoke has had a happier fate. Well, sort of. Lost in a sea of cars, it is seen here on Google Maps in the guise of - appropriately - a car wash. Thanks to Western Star for the tip (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). This 1949-68 series map shows how the stables at Basingstoke were originally located at the perimeter of the goods yard, near the road. The structure does not appear in pre-1914 maps (National Library of Scotland, Creative Commons). The Basingstoke stable block in Google street view. Looks like the car park has been covered since the first photo was taken (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). Details of the roof vents on the Basingstoke block, which appear to be in original condition (though not the colour!). The vents are often a useful distinguishing feature when looking for stable blocks in aerial photos etc (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). Chipping Norton The stable block at Chipping Norton was built in in 1904. In 1929 it was converted - like a number of other stables - to a garage for GWR motor buses (National Library of Scotland, Creative Commons). Alan Lewis' excellent photo of the Chipping Norton stable block in 1983 (Copyright and courtesy Alan Lewis). The stable block at Chipping Norton lives on today, the only remaining building of that station (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). There's a Royal Mail facility next to it, so the delivery theme hasn't entirely gone (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). The stable block itself seems to be on private property now. It isn't much to look at from the road, but think of all the stories it could tell ! (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). Slough Moving on to the larger types, this is the stable block at Slough in 1928, again conveniently situated between road and yard (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). The Slough stable block was a fairly large example of what I call the "Archetype" design. The large variants of this design were simply "stretched" versions of the smaller versions. Note the horse drawn vehicles outside. I wonder if they were parked there overnight (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). Like most stable blocks of the standard designs, the one at Slough had no windows at the back, presumably to keep things quiet for the horses. Prairies on the line! (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). Today’s, er, view. The stable block was approx. where blue container/lorry is (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). Park Royal An aircraft passes over modern day London NW. The red line below shows the extent of what used to be the main GWR goods yard at Park Royal (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). Back in the heyday of the GWR, Park Royal had a 12-stall stable block (National Library of Scotland, Creative Commons). The stable block at Park Royal was almost identical to the one at Slough, but had an extra door and room for fodder. It is seen here in 1930, illustrating how substantial these buildings were (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). Here is the Park Royal stable block again in the 1950s, now a good deal shorter! Part of the building has been torn down and has been turned into a garage or similar (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). My 4mm model of the Park Royal stable block. Details here. Handsworth & Smethwick Multi-storey stable blocks were only found in the major urban areas, where space was in high demand. So far the smallest multi-storey block I have come across is the one at Handsworth & Smethwick, as seen on the Warwickshire Railways site. The two storey stable block is seen at the bottom of this map, showing one of the yards at Handsworth & Smethwick. A single storey stable block was located next to it, and can be seen to the right in the photo above (National Library of Scotland, Creative Commons). I was intrigued to find that the lower sidings of the yard can still be seen on Google maps at the time of writing, now apparently a scrap yard (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). It's hard to be certain, but I wonder if the yellow structure top center in this view is in fact the cut-down and shortened remains of the old two-storey stable block? The location and door/window relationship fits - though one window on the left side is missing (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). Paddington Mint Lastly, a look at the big one - Paddington Mint stables. (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted.) The original stables here were built in 1878, but expanded and rebuilt several time since then. I've often thought that the interior yard and ramps would make an interesting diorama. There's good info and drawings in Janet Russel's "Great Western Horsepower" (Getty Images, embedding perimitted). A modern day view of the Mint stables (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). The stables now house St Mary's Hospital (Google Maps, Map data ©2019 Google, Google Fair Use principles). I found a 1922 view of Paddington Mint on Britian from Above, and zoomed in. Two horses can be seen on the upper level, bringing life to the scene (Britain from Above. Embedding permitted). I tried to zoom in further to see the horses better. But it's a funny thing, the past: When you try to pin it down... ....it slips through your fingers. Edit: If the images re-appear following the Dediserve failure, see the following in the discussion below: * Tim V's excellent photos of the stable blocks at Witney, Shrewsbury, Westbury, Shipston and Abingdon * Methusaleh's find of the remaining stable block at Birmingham Hockley * Ian Major's views of the stable block at Littleton & Badsey

Cor, this building lark goes on a bit doesn't it? So, to bring things up to speed. The roof has had a fair few sheets of double Roman ABS tile sheets added and the glazing added. This was a little tricky as the Rowmark framing wanted to warp all over the place. The glazing is a single layer of 1mm Prespex. Despite being saturated in Spraymount and heavily weighted down, some of the glazing bars wanted to lift up. The solution was to flood each pane with Johnson's Klear and reset. In a couple of places even that didn't work so I resorted to canopy glue. I got there in the end. I've since added a few sections of framing for the very ends and the ridge tiles etc, though I've not taken any photos of that, but it's coming together nicely. The roof itself is now being subject to a bit of fettling, filling and painting. This weekend's task was to paint all of the walls and keep painting, drybrushing and more dry brushing until I'd got the colours to match those of the already completed goods shed. It took ages but I'm really pleased with the result. I keep panicking I've overdone the mortar work but from 3ft it's exactly the result I wanted. Must be the EM modeller in me! The end shed timber work has had a base coat and will have a lighter top coat and I started on the internal footbridge. These have stone stairs and a timber bridge section. All presently demountable but will be fixed in place permanently when painted. I had to carve out some of the plinths internally as I'd forgotten the steps will be flush to the wall. The rather funky balustrades are cut from Rowmark and have had a base coat to start. I've started to paint the footbridge brackets and have also painted the self adhesive quoins I had cut to tidy up the building corners. A bit more filling and fettling but I feel we're on the homeward straight now. A bit of a photo overload, but I can't be ars8d to sort them out!

Here is yet another illustrated guide through the construction methods used on Snitzl's market stalls. In all, ten similar stalls were built and modelled in styrene with bread, pies, flowers, biscuits, meat, books, dishes and vegetables made from various materials. A simple brass injection mould tool made years ago was used for wheel production and the small empty crates are modelled in 10 thou brass. Construction of the simple brass mould tool will be covered in a future blog. Inspired by photographs from the real world and a product sold as 'SS37 Market Stalls' by Will's. Snitzl.

My latest conversion is a Bachmann Patriot which has the same chassis as the Jubilee. Wheels are again Alan Gibson with Markits crankpins which have been spaced using 4 x 1mm washers per axle. Brake shoes have been removed an refixed with additional plasticard spacers. The tender has a Dave Franks Fowler sprung chassis. Below is a link to youtube. Question: - how do you upload videos from youtube these days? https://youtu.be/yib4hZZ-TbI

I recently took a visit to the Innocent Railway in Edinburgh. Opened in the 1800s it was known as the innocent railway because it was originally horse worked through out. The information board near to Duddingston explains the history better than i could but in all its a nice way to spend a few hours doing something less well known in the Edinburgh area. Here is the details of the walk Location: Edinburgh, Duddingston Old Station to Commonwealth Pool Access: Via number 30 bus from Edinburgh Waverley North Bridge stop Length: 1.6 miles Railway Highlights: 1890s vintage steel bridge Long abandoned tunnel Undefoot: Suitable for all, tarmac through out Wildlife Seen: Blue, Great & Long Tailed Tits Jackdaw Magpie Carrion Crow Buzzard Wood Pigeon Woodpeckers Grey Squirrel Good Local Pub/Food: Auld Hoose (see map) All in all a nice little walk and ill look to doing more like this in the future, information above supports the video and there is also a nice article in the Scotsman if you google it. Next will either be Penicuik-Dalkeith Route or Longniddry to Haddington with more modern railway artefacts to be found

Is it really a year on?.. Well 2524 has finally made it into the paint shop along with some other items.

So, this one is a bit detailed and has a few ramblings.... Sorry Some modellers are very clever, they come out with perfectly formed designs, work tirelessly to bring them to fruition and produce superb pieces of work first time. Some practice 'slow modelling', being superbly organized, only getting out the tools and materials needed to for the job in hand and breathing deeply while wielding their scalpels. Much respect it due to these folks, if you feel you fit into these categories then good for you. I'm afraid that I have neither the skill nor the patience. I tend to build things the best I can at the time and have no qualms about 'going back and having another go'. One of the great benefit of the automated tools I have at my disposal is that a lot of the grunt work of redoing something can be done in CAD and on the lasercutter/3D printer. Sometimes I waste a bit of raw material but if can make something better in increments then I'm happy. Perhaps I should coin this 'Agile' modelling after the current trend in software development. I guess I work on the principle that sometimes it is better to build something, even if it turns out to be wrong or could be made better, than not to make anything - 'slow modelling' can risk becoming 'no modelling' if all you ever do is sit in your armchair. Even if all I do is learn how to make a better one then I feel that is a gain. Anyway to the case in hand. I've had a few iterations now of cassette design for my fiddleyard which I thought I'd share. The original design had two low ply sides and a curved handle. The end has a tongue and a slot which aligns the cassette. I realized that these would fit nicely in the 3 larger drawers of my Ikea drawer unit but not the 3 slightly shorter drawers, the handle over the top of the cassette was unnecessarily high and could be cut down a lot without impacting the strength of the unit. I also found that if I flatten out the top of the handle it would be possible to stack one cassette on top of another and they wouldn't slip off which could aid handling and storage. Both these designs though had a common flaw, the sides of the cassette, even though they were only 25mm high, made getting stock onto the rails very difficult if not impossible. As you can see there is no way to get your fingers into the align wheels with the rail particularly with bogie stock. So we come to the third iteration. By extending the sides up to the top of the handle and cutting large holes in the side the unit keeps its strength, still stacks, if anything better than before and you can get the sides of bogies. A pile of cassettes can be made without the risk of them slipping off each other. The other change I made was on the arrangement for current collection on each cassette. On the original version I had made a sort of 'side scraper' design with a phosphor-bronze wiper mounted to engage with the side of the adjacent cassette, this worked from an electrical point of few but I found it could introduce a slight sideways force on the cassette. The original arrangement looked like this. As the cassettes are held in compression by the sliding end clamps I realized that this was unnecessarily complicated and that just a sprung upstand on end of the cassette would press against an identical upstand on the next cassette. These are very much simpler to make and easy to clean and tweak to give a good connection. So in the end I got the cassettes converted to this new arrangement and built another four long and two short cassettes. All this cassette work obviously lead to running a few trains around and it was very satisfying get some stock out of the drawers again. The Class 15 made an appearance with a very mixed bag on a parcels train. There is a Mk1 full brake, a ex-LMS full brake, a GUV, a Gresley full brake and a couple of CCTs on the rear. The station building now has the roof on, I was pleased with the way the various pieces went together, trying to draw up the hipped sections strained the brain a little! I've also had a first short at the toilet block. So I hope you liked this longer than usual entry and please enjoy you modelling, at whatever speed or style works for you. David

These past weeks I have had some pleasant early morning modelling sessions, building a GWR covered float for my early 1900s setting. The model was built using two drawings in Great Western Horse Power by Janet Russel (figs 180 and 182) and a photo in Great Western Way p.163 (original edition). I was a bit slow to discover that there are variations between the drawings and the photo. The prototype is not in the GWR diagram book for horse-drawn carriages, but is arguably a variant of the E5 diagram (see GWR Goods Cartage Vol 1 by Tony Atkins). I say 'scratchbuilt', but the wheels are from an Arch Laser kit for another wagon (see discussion here). They conveniently represent the correct 4'6" diameter 14 spoke pattern used by the GWR in earlier days. Although just a lowly float, the prototype had a certain Victorian elegance in the design. Like all floats, they had cranked axels to allow for a low floor and thereby easier loading of goods. The hoop sticks for the tilt were formed over a jig, stuck on with duct tape and dunked in boiling water. The drawings show the tilt with vertical sides and a curved top. The wagon in the reference photo suggests a rounder shape. I initially concluded that this was an optical illusion. In retrospect I am not so sure. The shafts were also nicked from the Arch Laser kit. They are flat as they come, but on my prototype they have a curve so I rolled them with a round scalpel, and modifed them to allow proper fixing to the body. The shafts had extended mounting plates/irons along the side of the wagon. Mine are a bit over scale. The springs were cut on my Silhouette. A rough outline was enough as the wheels obscure the details. The brake design seems to have varied on these vehicles. The reference photo shows a somewhat crude external design, operated by a lever from the front, so I imitated this. For the painting, I followed Tony Atkins who in GWR Goods Cartage Vol 1 states: "According to the Railway Magazine, at the turn of the 19th/20th centuries GW horse lorries for delivering goods had red wheels, shafts and framing, while horse-drawn vans used for collecting and delivering passenger train parcels were painted chocolate all over [...] In 1909 horse vans were also given the same red shafts and wheels as lorries." Although floats sometimes doubled as parcels vans at rural stations, they were first and foremost intended for goods cartage, so I opted for red wheels, springs and shafts for my early 1900s period. As an aside, I'm never entirely confident about livery references in the Railway Magazine of the 1900s, but that is another story. Then along came Charlie, new to the GWR stables. Young and hopeful, he dreamt of a career in tap dancing and an endless supply of Cheese & Cucumber sandwiches. We quickly put an end to that! Here he is being modified with extra harness. I modelled the harness so that it loosely indicates the method used to pull fixed-shaft wagons, while also allowing the wagon to rest on the back of the now disillusioned Charlie. This solved the problem of balancing a one-axle vehicle. The tilt was made from plain paper, with the lettering copied from the reference photo. Period photos show that tilts of this type were very taut, with the impression of the hoop sticks sometimes showing through. To indicate this I wetted the paper and formed it around the hoop sticks. The tarp was then varnished several times, and holes punched in the sides to emulate how it was fixed in place. I wish I had used the number of a wagon that hadn't been photographed, as that would have solved the problem of inconsistencies between the drawings and the reference photo! The reference photo shows two thin and rather unsightly boards along the sides of the tilt, presumably to pin it down further and stabilise it. I made them from masking tape. The lettering in the reference photo shows a style used during the 1890s (sometimes with, sometimes without the "Co."). I pieced it together from a couple of photos using this style. The tilt had separate protective tarps fitted on the inside of the hoops at the front and rear. Again, these were simply made from paper. Photos suggest that in daily practice the rear "flap" on horsedrawn vehicles was often secured in half-open or fully open position. Lastly the wheels hubs were fitted, made from a styrene tube and filled with putty. So that's it. I won’t be fitting reins at this point, as I have to set up my layouts every time I want to run trains, so reins are just not practical. In this view you can see that the wheels are Lasercut, but it's OK from normal viewing distance. There are photos of fixed-shaft vehicles resting like this in GWR yards. Smaller carts without a tilt were sometimes, er, tilted the other way. By and large, Charlie appears to have accepted his fate. Though sometimes, out of the corner of my eye, I can see him doing a secret little tap dance. Lastly a view of the horsedrawn GWR fleet at Farthing as it currently appears. So much for corporate identity!

The application of Europe Earth pigment is intended to represent a dusty coating of dirt picked up while operating in a relatively clean, but damp, area. The pigment was applied using a filbert brush that had taken powder from the lid of the pot. The vehicle was laid on its side and the brush held above each wheel in turn, and the brush tapped gently to dislodge the pigment so that it fell into the still wet wash from step 2.This conglomeration was then left to dry. The inevitable additional deposit on the tyres was deliberately left to discolour the rubber. The remaining pigment on the brush was then gently distributed onto areas such as the cab roof and engine cover, by simply dabbing the brush onto the relevant areas.