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Over the years I’ve gathered a small collection of anecdotes and photos that document quirky situations and customs on the real-life railway. The idea is to re-enact them in model form while the glue dries on other projects. The Slipper Boy story was one attempt at this, although admittedly that one got a bit out of hand! Here’s another, simpler one. First, the props: ***** Clear as mud, I suspect! Here’s what it’s all about: Railway Magazine, January 1906: Just another incident on the everyday railway, but we can’t allow this stuff to be forgotten! Below is an attempt to re-enact it in my Farthing setting. I’ll see if it works without words: ***** That was the event as reported. But I wonder what happened afterwards? All those tasty eels, and no ice left to keep them fresh... A quick discussion among the staff, perhaps, to find a solution? 🙂 ***** PS: I couldn’t find a period description of exactly how live eel were transported in Edwardian days, so the container seen here is loosely based on a 1970 FAO publication which documents a method that does not seem out of place in earlier days: "Live eels can be transported in small quantities in tray-boxes […]. A typical wooden tray-box contains four lift-out trays about 50mm deep, each designed to hold about 10kg of eels graded according to size. The top tray is usually filled with crushed ice so that cold melt water trickles down through the eels during the journey to keep them cool and lively. […] Each tray has drain holes and is divided across the middle to make a total of eight compartments holding about 5kg each, that is about 40kg for the whole box. The lid of the box is nailed on, and the whole is steel-banded both to prevent pilferage and to prevent the eels escaping through the joints. Boxes of this type are used successfully for live transport not only within the UK but also for 24-hour journeys from the Continent with little or no loss." Source: http://www.fao.org/3/x5915e/x5915e01.htm#Live storage and transport

Being inspired by what id seen at Warley.. I set to work building my first layout (Tunnel Lane ) using tips from all the mags ,Facebook groups etc.. The goal was to get it in a mag and do a few exhibitions.. So 4 months in to the build to be appoarched by Model Rail for a feature I was totally blown away, Then with Tunnel lane finished, I really wanted to build another but this time and due to lack of space I wanted to build a micro layout. Armed with a Scale Model scenery baseboard Little Quarry was born ,and the start of Tunnel Lane Model Railways . I was also approached by Railway Modeller for a feature with Little Quarry which got me my first commission, Oldbury (as featured in the current BRM magazine)! I've also built 3 dioramas Portmadog, Barton Road and Barmouth for Alan at Modelu , I've built numerous layouts and commissions which In due course will gracing the pages of BRM. I do have a very active Facebook page which you are all very much welcome to come and take a look at https://www.facebook.com/groups/tunnellanemodelrailways/ YouTube channel https://youtube.com/channel/UCjf0qzVOWI1FsI3ouS7eaEA I also have an Instagram page of the same name to This is Little Burford my first dabble at 0 gauge.. Thanks for taking a look Regards Dan

Ok, so where were we? Ah, yes the victim had been reduced to pieces (or at least stripped of its means of movement( and was ready for reconstructive surgery. So now it is time to address the thorny subject of wheels. As I mentioned before, you have basically three choices: Aland Gibson, Markits and Ultrascale. So lets compare what you can get for how much using a Bachmann 2251 Collett goods as our exemplar. Ultrascale offer a conversion pack that includes all wheels (inc tender) and crankpins - in fact as they state - everything you will need. They also have notes offering advice on how to do the conversion. What you get from Ultrascale. See: https://www.ultrascale.uk/eshop/products/view/CAT007/30 This will set you back £96.58 for wheels with Nickel Silver tyres or £70.57 for brass tyres (some Ultrascale packs offer steel tyres too which seem a couple of £ cheaper - the 3F tender engine for example). Ultrascale also state that the product is supplied as per the image. I take this to mean that the wheels arrive in the case of the the 2251 ready assembled - so quartered, correct back to back gauge, pins fitted and and with a (brass) gearwheels fitted in place. All you have to do is drop them in and add the coupling rods, reassemble, test admire followed by a bragging session at your local club of choice (although if you don't do the bragging at a model railway club you might get some odd looks or comments). So all in all quite a good deal. You can get the wheels unassembled with separate pins included and without a gear wheel for about £10 cheaper (in the 2251 example) - just make sure you select the correct diameter axle for the driving wheels. The biggest problem is that the range or ready assembled wheels is quite small - The range of Bachmann steam engines covered is just 5, but both the standard DIY wheel range and the diesel conversion range is much more comprehensive. Which brings me to a useful digression … whatever your interest period if you are moving to EM or P4, buy a cheapo 2nd hand Bachmann or Hornby diesel, convert it (much quicker and simpler than a steam loco - I did one using an Ultrascale drop in set in under 30 mins) and you'll have something to test your track with (aka playing trains) while you build and convert your way to finescale nirvana. Markits also offer complete conversion packs, the GWR 2251 is £72.15 (I emailed them to check) and for this you get all wheels (all with nickel silver tyres), 'super deluxe' crankpins and axle nut covers. The Markits wheels will need assembly (and the gear wheel(s) salvaging from the victim), but they are self quartering so that is a considerable amount of heartache and pain done away with. It is unclear whether these packs use their 'standard' profile or the finer flanged RP25 profile. If you know please let me know. It is also unclear from the website/catalogue whether P4 profile wheels can be supplied (I'm not hopeful) so these are probably an EM only option. Again, remember to state gauge (OO is their default) and axle diameter when ordering. Sometimes the Markits axle nut covers etch included in the conversion packs have balance weights too (for example the LNER V2) - a bonus that will save you fabricating them later. Finally, there is Alan Gibson. AG also offer a conversion pack for the Bachmann 2251 Collet Goods at £20.00 with steel tyred wheels. However, this pack is for the driving wheels only. So when tender wheels, crankpins and coupling rod bushes are included that takes the price up to £37.70 (prices from the most recent catalogue (2018) on the Alan Gibson website). So buy Ultrascale and get a drop in set, spend £24.43 less and you get everything you need for Markits but with some assembly required, spend £34.45 less than that and you get Alan Gibson with quite a lot of assembly required. But what Alan Gibson has in its favour (apart from being cheap) is that because its not an all in one deal you can spread the cost. Being a perennially poor thanks to a multitude of children much as I would love to buy Ultrascale drop in products (and if you ask me to do a conversion for you I'm afraid I'll insist you do) I usually end up using AG products. So having laid out your choices in wheels, I'm going to ignore choice and concentrate on the ones that are cheapest and also probably need the most work. (It has struck me that these two things may be related). The first thing to note is that Alan Gibson doesn't have an e-commerce portal (unlike Ultrascale), but then again Markits don't either (or do lots of others) relying instead on human determination and the innate stubbornness of the finescale modeller in trying to press money on businesses that often give an impression of not wanting to take it off us. For AG products there is a short cut - the EM Gauge Society stock his conversion packs and a limited range of other AG products - but unfortunately not the whole range. Happily they stock both EM and P4 versions, so another reason to be an EMGS member (even if you do P4). So in preparing and assembling our AG wheels there are 4 different tasks: Fit crankpins Fit balance weights Assemble on the axle Quarter them Fitting crankpins. This is the job I do first for a number of reason, mostly centred on its much easy to do them now than when the wheels are on the axle (or even on the loco). Some points to note: Some Alan Gibson wheels (the very earliest ones made for the range, like if my memory is correct, the J15) don't actually have any crankpin holes. Instead there is a blind drill mark at the location where you have to drill the hole. How big a hole? Ideally 0.75mm (see https://www.trfastenings.com/Products/knowledgebase/Tables-Standards-Terminology/Tapping-Sizes-and-Clearance-Holes ) as this will mean that the M1 machine screws AG supplies as crankpins will then cut their own thread in the plastic wheel centre. However, I have used 0.7mm drill bits quite successfully. The difficult bit is making sure that your hole is at right angles to the face of the wheel. Take your time, look at it from many angles as you slowly drill the hole.... If it isn't it might be enough to cause binding as it will, as it rotates, slightly increase and decease the distance between the wheels (or actually the pins) and we all know thanks to the great Iain Rice the importance of wheelbase and coupling rods matching.... don't we? I have in the past done this by hand, but now that I'm the slightly smug owner of a drill press and machine vice, hand shake is now a thing of the past. Here we have a set of AG wheels destined for a Bachmann Stainer mogul (or it might be a Jubilee, but I think a Mogul). Left is as it comes out of the packet with no crankpin hole. Centre, with the crankpin hole drilled - and you can see its right on the edge of the indie of the boss. Right, countersunk ready for the crankpin to be fitted. Although I'll talk about coupling and connecting rods separately, it is also worth considering the combined thickness of the coupling and connecting rods, especially as with some that aim for a more prototypical profile (and why not?) through using multiple etched layers they can end up thicker than the bit of the AG crankpin that is left sticking out of the wheel. (It is also worth checking this even if you intend reusing the RTR rods - better safe than sorry.) If they are too short it can be solved by getting longer ones (yes I know - duh!!) (still M1 though) from any one of a multitude of sellers, many of whom inhabit ebay which at least makes buying them easy. However, longer ones can make using the GW quartering jig hard as they will be too long to fit in the receiver (answer only use long ones when you have to, shorten them as much as possible (but still giving you 2mm proud of the rods, screw them half in way, quarter the axle, and then screw pins fully home - but more on this later). The M1 machine screws have countersunk heads but the wheels do not have countersunk holes to receive them. So grab a 1.5mm or better a 2mm twist drill, centre it in the hole and give it a quick couple of twists (but no more) to provide a counter sink but not one so deep as to go through the wheel...I normally don't even put it in a pin vice, instead just holding it in my fingers. It is possible for the screws to unscrew themselves if the crankpin nut or eccentric crank is a bit tight on the thread. As this happens when the wheel is mounted on the loco, it is very difficult (but not impossible) to get it back in without undoing a lot of work. So when, happy with all other aspects of the budding relationship between wheel, rods and crankpin, you decide to fully screw the pin home, stop just before the head goes into the countersink. Using a pin introduce a bead of superglue between crankpin head and countersink and quickly screw home. This is especially important if you have overtightened the screw at any point and therefore stripped the soft plastic thread the screw cuts for itself. On some of the wheels the rear of the boss intrudes into the spot where the countersink will need to go. So grab a scalpel (or better yet a chisel ended scalpel blade and carve away the area so you have nice flat space to countersink. Fit the balance weights. Take it from me (because I have forgotten to do this at this stage enough times), it is a lot easy to fit the balance weights now. The can use etched or pre cut plasticard ones from Markits or Ultrascale (or indeed anyone that makes such things) or you can make your own out of 5 thou plasticard and a set of dividers. Once the balance weights are fitted you can also, should the urge take you, paint/blacken tyre rims and paint balance weights - again its a lot easier now than once coupling rods are in place and you are staring at your new pride and joy wondering what isn't quite right (and its starting to annoy you....). If you are one of the sensible people doing an ornate pregroup livery that has wheels other than black, definitely paint them now, and you may as well line them too if needed. For the Claude Hamilton I found that an egg cup was the perfect radius for finishing off the balance weights. Just to show that I don't do what I say I should do. I forgot the balance weights on the Claude Hamilton until I had reassembled everything... Assemble the wheels on the axle. First things first. Make sure the axle is the right length (because it won't be if you are EM'ing your loco - AG supplies P4 length axles that you have to reduce to length for EM). Finding out what the correct length is easy. Take a pair of wheels and your back to back gauge. Using hands (if you're like me you'll need two) hold the wheels on either side on the back to back gauge. Then (possibly using the third hand that you get issued with on joining the finescale fraternity) place a digital vernier /caliper/gauge across the two wheel bosses, note the distance, and then, because you are squeezing the wheels too hard to try to keep a grip on everything, catapult them into the air. The next bit may sound bad, but it really isn't. Reduce the axle to length. First use a black Sharpie (or similar) pen to paint a nice thick band around the axle roughly where you'll be cutting. Then with your vernier calipers put one end at the end that isn't black, and gently lay the other vernier prong aginst the other, spin the axle with your fingers and lo, a thin line shall appear around the axle. And there was much rejoicing. Which was rapidly stopped by the thought of how to cut the axle accurately. You have effectively two choices: Put axle in Dremmel (or similar) shove in a vice, set Dremmel in motion, attack with bastard file until either the axle is the right length or you say goodbye to your fingers. I DO NOT USE OR ADVOCATE THIS METHOD. I know exactly how hard it is cleaning blood of walls and the ceiling (admittedly this was after a minor table saw accident but my darling wife still doesn't let me forget about it and the club I was with at the time were a bit off with me too as it was their walls and ceiling). The safer way is to use a lathe with a parting off tool. Preferably someone elses - another reason to join a club, access to machine tools and gadgets you use too infrequently (or are too expensive) to justify having yourself. The next important job is to offer up one of your newly trimmed axles into the slots for the driven axle. Make sure you have an equal amount of axle sticking out of each side and part with your Sharpie (or similar) where the gear wheel needs to go. Marking the position of the gear wheel on the axle. Then using the bastard file knurl the axle where you have marked. This means, on a resilient surface (not a hard one) like a cutting mat, using the short edge (mines about 4mm across), place it on the axle where you have marked roll the axle while pushing down hard with the file - don't allow the file to wander - and bingo a knurled axle that will probably grip your final drive gear wheel. Knurling the axle for the gear wheel. Work out how many spacing washers for each axle. A tip - if you have outside cylinders etc go for no sideplay if there will be a wheel lurking behind the cylinders or slide bars - its just too infuriating to assemble everything and then find that on a curve the crankpin fouls the outside gubbings. For the other non gear wheel axles, probably not more than 1mm in total (unless you have a huge wheelbase and tiny curves to get it round). On the axle with the gear wheel, as much as you can without causing the gear wheel to lose contact with the intermediate gears - probably less the 0.5mm in total. So take the chassis, measure its width where the axle slots are, take this away from your back to back measurement and divide by 2 gives you the sideplay possible on each side. Then just add 1/8 inch brass washers of suitable thicknesses until you have the sideplay that you want. Take a 6mm (or there abouts drill bit) and using your fingers give it a quick twist where the axle fits into the rear of the wheel, just to take the sharp edge off and help the axle locate itself hopefully perpendicularly to the wheel when its is assembled. Now its time to assemble the wheels ready to quarter them. As I use a GW wheel press and quartering jig I'm assuming you will too...So: Take an axle, add the gear wheel by pressing it on carefully and without twisting it until it is in the correct position. Add any brass bearing that might have been included on the victim by the manufacturer, add the required spacing washers each side and grab a pair of wheels. And move to the quartering section. Repeat with the other axles. Quartering. Using a wheel press and quartering jig like the GW models one to fit AG wheels (or Ultrascale self assembly ones) should reduce your troubles here, but there is wheel wobble to think about. (I'm not going to worry about Markits ones as they are self quartering.) Simply put, even using the jig might not stop a wheel going on not quite square leading to a wobble. My view is that this is caused by the wheel boss sticking out beyond the wheel tyre, allowing it to twist on the mounting stud as the wheels are squeezed in the press. To stop this I have superglued 30thou of plasticard about 6mm above and below the mounting stud on each side of the wheel press. My modified GW wheels press. So you now should have the jig, with a wheel in each half, an axle with all the bits (bearings, spacing washers, gear wheel etc) and you are wondering how to get it all together. Well, it can be a bit of a juggle but three hands probably won't be needed - (but doing the chamfer of the inside of the axle socket mentioned above will help), and gently close the jig until the axle just starts to engage with the wheel. At this point stop, reach for your back to back gauge and insert it so that as you close the jig with finger pressure the B2B gauge will ensure that you set the correct gauge. Squeezing everything together with the B2B gauge in place. The jig is designed for axles that are the correct length, but this might not be the case, and it is easier to set the B2B now, rather than later. When you feel the jig press the axle home, release it and you have a wheel that is probably square and probably quartered. But until we get the coupling rods on, we can't be sure that each axle has exactly the same quartering...

Good morning all, So today is the day I thought I would finally say hello to you all over here on RMweb, I must admit I've been a bit slow joining the party , but anyway im here now!! About me.. Well I live on the Shropshire/ Herefordshire boarder not far from Ludlow , Im 39, married, 2 little girls (2/5) and as it stands at the moment a full-time job working in a garage. My modeling Story Well my modelling interest start off with me following the love of watching my father build his 1/35th military vehicles, I would attempt the basic Airfix aircraft kits and in my eyes at the time they were pretty dam good , but in reality they were shocking!! So Trains where did they come in? Well My friend at school had a railway and I use to go over to his to play ,I think I fell in love with the modelling and movement aspect.. Fast forward a little and my father build me a layout , a good old round and round 8x4 jobbie which I loved.. But as I grew up sadly girls and cars over took my life and wallet.The railway was all sold off and that was that.! Then about 12 years ago I had ago at a model tank and built a little dio , really enjoying the build progress I built another and another , and another. Soon it was getting out of hand and I had a whole room to myself just for this stuff.. We moved house and alot of my model stuff was boxed and put up in the roof, We had the birth of our first child which I found very hard to adjust to being a dad but with doing the DIY I found that took my mind of things.With the house done and second child on the way the worries and anxiety kicked in again.But something in the back of my ignited that railway memory from year's back, So 2018 I found myself at the N.E.C and Warley.. Totally overwhelmed by the shear size of the event to the point I nearly turned around and left, but I forced myself to stay and buy something and with a length of flexi a loco and a little house from Petite Properties my railway journey began.

I finished a model cab office yester-day to use for my aggregate merchant. It has not endeared me to white-metal kits - the brick-work is decidedly 'un-matching' and I glued one side out of true - but I am ridiculously pleased at how the colours have turned out. The mortar was painted in acrylic first, all over, and then a sponge dipped in brick-coloured brown no more than caressed over the walls, so as not to paint over the mortar. This needed to be done a few times, to get a darker and darker shade. Then one starts the never-ending cycle of painting doors, windows, and sills, re-painting walls that have been dabbed with fittings paint, then re-painting the fittings, then touching up the walls again, until one goes quite doolally and has had enough! The interior needs to be done, and eventually, I fool myself, I will be able to scratch-build my own from brick-sheet and with a chimney for a coal fire, but overall I am content. Owing to the lack of a local aggregate merchant's name to steal in the 1972 'Brighton Area' telephone directory, I used the one of a much-loved toy-shop from my childhood instead. I thought it sounded right, and must decorate the tipper when I find the lettering. That vehicle's livery is chosen quite at random, of course...

GWR No 15 was a bar framed 0-4-0 by Bury. Note the domed firebox which it retained for its whole life in spite of other changes. Built in 1847 for the Shrewsbury and Chester Railway, it was withdrawn in 1903. This first sketch shows her around 1866. And this second one about 1887, when it had been cut down in height.

The 1813 Class is intriguing. They started off as side tanks, and ended up as pannier tanks with saddle tanks fitted in between. The side tanks didn't last very long, and this was a period where there were any number of experiments with boilers. Consequently there is extraordinary variety, and it seems as if not only were there no two the same, but none of them stayed the same for very long either. These sketches are the fruits of a small joint research exercise with @Mikkel. Beware of thinking either of these sketches is representative of any locomotive at any date! They are all features that existed (along with quite a few others) but I haven't attempted to align these versions of the sketches to any particular one of the photographs and drawings we found. There is a sketch of this class in the published volume, but it was rather basic. I wasn't satisfied with it (are we ever completely satisfied with any model, whether in electrons or in brass?), but I felt it was a vital one to include, since these side tanks were the direct ancestors of the 57xx and 94xx classes.

Outside the Box at Watford. A southbound Freight passes a northbound Express. A Bakerloo Tube completes its journey from Elephant & Castle as it arrives in platform 5. Looking north towards Harrow, plenty of activity taking place. Thumping south at Linslade, 1005 heading for home territory. Looking north along the Harrow section of the layout, with the Watford section along the other side of the loft. Looking north along the Watford section of the layout near the Loft Access hatch. Another fairly recent clip of video from the layout. West Coast Main Line N Gauge Layout (Part 18) - YouTube

I’ve been making my own crates and tea chests from printable veneer. Today I installed them in the goods depot at Farthing. The mezzanine floor at Farthing was used as a storage facility. Traders could have their wares stored while awaiting dispatch and distribution. Space was literally at a premium, and this floor was always tidier and more well organised than the busy decks below. Farthing wasn’t far from Britain’s first Nestlé factory, built at Chippenham in 1873 for the manufacture of condensed milk. This part of the goods depot was inspired by the balcony floor at Hockley Goods, which seems to have been used for similar purposes. The following is a description of how the crates were made, summarized from the workbench thread: I like the smallish wooden crates that could be seen in goods depots before cardbox boxes became common. So I began by designing a few of these. The top one above is photoshopped from a pic of an original Nestlé crate. The rest are tongue in cheek I wanted to capture that light wooden look of a new crate, and wasn’t quite happy with the texture of ordinary paper. After searching the web I came across these veneer sheets intended for creative photo printing. I bought mine from Crafty Computer Paper (no connection). It’s important to note that these sheets only work with top loaded ink-jet printers. They will jam if you use a printer where the paper bends over on itself. I have a cheap top loaded Canon IP2850 printer, which cost about 30£ a year ago (colour cartridge included). It does take the sheets, although each sheet needs to be pressed down gently when the rollers try to “grab” it. I would be weary to do this on a high-end printer! Test prints suggest that the wood effect is pretty much as I had hoped. The lettering comes out OK I think, although I’m sure a more expensive printer could give an even better result. The veneer sheets can be cut fairly easily with a normal scalpel. I've experimented with two different ways of building the crates. The first and most laborious method is to cut out each side separately, and glue them on a block of laminated plastic rod as seen above. This method gives a fairly neat final appearance, as seen above. This pic also shows the texture of the veneer, and how the different shades of the sheets can be used to add subtle variety: The ones on the left are from one sheet, the ones on the right from another. A quicker method is to cut each crate out in one piece, and lightly scribe the rear of the veneer at the corners with the back of a thick scalpel blade (a sharp scalpel or deep cut will break the veneer). The crate can then be folded and glued with a good quality card glue or similar. You inevitably get a light tear at the corners though - so this method is best for crates that aren't seen close up. I've made rows of stacked crates by glueing individual sides to the front of a long block of laminated styrene strips, as seen above. Saves time, and can't be seen once completed. The fake rows can then be stacked and glued or just blu-tacked together. The tea chests are based on real ones but photoshopped to fit my setting and period. The metal edges on the "East India" one didn't really come across as I hoped in the printing... ... so thanks to Dave and other RMwebbers I tried using the dull side of foil for the metal edges. I cut the foil in strips and then fixed it with card glue to one side first. It can then be bent around the edge and stuck to the other side. It’s worth the effort to spend some time cleaning up the edges afterwards. With a ruler and sharp scalpel, edges can be trimmed straighter and narrower as required. The superfluous foil can be scraped off leaving no visible mark. Small problem areas can be fixed with a quick lick of metallic paint. The veneer is very forgiving, so paint can also be scraped off if necessary. The crates are strenghtened inside like this. The tea chests represent different types and sizes, some with metal sides and some without. Judging by photos I have seen, the metal edges don't seem to have been common until the 1920s or so. As mentioned earlier, the sheet itself is quite forgiving and glue and paint can be scraped off without leaving much trace. The lettering is another matter. The print on the right has been treated to a light coat of Vallejo matt varnish! Finally a comparison between a veneer crate, an earlier paper-printed effort (right) and a parcel made from Manilla envelope paper. The crate has that nice and square look. Thanks to all who have helped and contributed to this little project, see the discussion in the workbench thread for more ideas and suggestions.

A new O Gauge commission build by TheLocoWorks for a private industrial tank locomotive, based from the Connoisseur Models 0-4-0 tank kit. My requirement for this model is broken down as follows: Highly Detailed Cab Interior, using various components Extra detailed chassis Slaters sprung horn blocks DCC control with Lights, Sound & Smoke The first part to tackle on this kit is cutting the frames to accept the slaters sprung horn blocks. Progress has started with the assembly of the horn guides into the etch chassis ensuring that both sides are aligned. The chassis has then been folded up and put to one side to concentrate on the body, whilst we await the motor and gearbox. The body is simple to solder together starting with the cab beading detail, and moving on to the tank sides, all of these elements are then soldered to the footplate, tack soldered first and then check with an engineers square. I’ve then moved on to the cab details, there are a number of parts here from a scrap bin to replace the basic cast parts from Connoisseur, i also wanted to ensure that the whole cast firebox could be removed for detail painting (it becomes to difficult when fitted). The next step is looking at what DCC components i will use in this little locomotive knowing how tight for space we are more to follow........