Andy Y

I knocked up a photo plank/bank at the weekend; part of the reason was to see if I could get Code 75 to look acceptable for forthcoming works. The sleepers had their spacing increased so that 6 sleepers filled the space previously occupied by 7 sleepers. Ballast spray fixed with Johnsons Klear. The sleeper colour was muted right down and the rails painted in Tamiya Nato Brown, a wash of Nato Black over that and Tamiya Rust weathering powder. It's up to the user of course but it'll do for what I want on the next layout. Click for full screen.

The Class 144 will be introduced in a range of current modern liveries suitable for operation during the period 2000 to 2012. Ref 144-01 Class 144 Alexander/Barclay 2 car DMU in Northern Night Blue & Purple livery. Ref 144-02 Class 144 Alexander/Barclay 2 car DMU in West Yorkshire PTE / Northern ‘Metro’ Red & Silver Grey livery. These models will be followed by a Class 143, the specification of this 2 car DMU will be identical to our Class 144 but will include a new buffer beam with early footsteps, repositioned battery boxes and electrical equipment, repositioned air brake equipment and a redesigned seating layout to suit the Class 143, which differs from the later built Class 144 DMU’s in their current day operations. The Class 143 will be introduced in a range of current modern liveries suitable for operation during the period 2005 to 2012. Ref 143-01 Class 143 Alexander/Barclay 2 car DMU in Arrive Trains Wales current Aquamarine & Cream livery. Ref 143-02 Class 143 Alexander/Barclay 2 car DMU in First Great Western ‘Local Lines’ attractive advertising livery. Time scale on the Class 144 Northern models is approx 3rd quarter 2011 followed by the Class 143 during early 2012. Further information and updates will be found in due course at http://www.realtrackmodels.co.uk/

Simple, interesting and rather attractive Al! Love it. It certainly doesn't look like code 100 in those shots either.

Can I add a polite request to try and keep the jokes a bit cleaner than some I've just 'filed'?Thank you.

Much appreciated. Thank you.

Thanks for the info but please can I ask for appropriate capitalisation and punctuation? I hate to sound like a broken record but it does make it harder to read.

Whilst grazing over a cuppa  carrying out vital research for the Keyhaven extension I came across the following Pathe clip that fills in a few gaps for me on one of the components of the extension. Ain't the 'net great?

Blimey Andrew, glad I got your login sorted. A very nice opening post! I have a liking for scenic-offs around level crossings.

Should be working OK now.

 I took the opportunity yesterday to take my last ride on these venerable and extremely comfortable machines on a route that I have a soft spot for. Years of memories of watching them trundle over the bridge at Lymington made it too hard to resist. The Lymington branch racks up another last to follow on from the last steam branch; I wonder if 2050 will be seeing the last Desiro service on the branch with as much interest? Anyway, I gather there will be a more professional video coming soon; more details in due course and for a good cause! Source: The 3-CIG 'Slammer's' last days.

Hope it goes well for you Simon, welcome to the world of early starts.

I'm certainly interested in seeing more Kier and from anyone else who has angles of Torside during happier times (can't have too much research material). Sadly all my B/W negs have long been lost from those days, not that my Zenith EM was the best tool. In the meantime here's the virtual obliteration of Torside now along with a few other snaps from a year ago. Crowden: Woodhead:

My understanding from several sources was that Kernow made a decision to change who they were commissioning to produce the Thumper.

Unlucky Steve! As the first person to get one you're now duty bound to photograph it, give feedback on dimensional accuracy, note any deviation from the prototype, full mechanical test and report, test with several decoders, install sound, write an article on detailing and inform everyone how to deal with duff locos, establish a feedback hotline to HJ and collate information on replacement parts. Boy, are you going to be busy this evening. Either that or you could just ignore me.

I can see what you mean Peter and I'd say mine was one of the early ones. Did you take the 2mm off the centre section of the tanks? The sideways slop of the body on the bogies can lead to certain things, especially the horizontal plate from the top of the steps looking too prominent on occasion. I've been badgering Brian Hanson of Shawplan for laser cut glazing, side grilles to match his other extreme etches and replacement steps/horizontal plates.

Our local independent chemist will order in 500ml bottles for around a fiver which should keep me going a few years as I prefer my clear alcohol to be from Russia or Mexico.

I did Dave, I thought it would be easier to disguise any indiscretions higher up if they happened but would feel comfortable in doing it that way after this first attempt. I happen to have another spare 33/1 that will get the front fill treatment as a comparison to become a green/white lining one for variety.

I wouldn't call it one of my quickest projects, after 18 months it's still not actually finished but I thought it would be appropriate to round up the bits that have been around before. Keyhaven won't feel right to me until there's a filthy old Crompton burbling away in early guise (probably GSYPWL - work that one out) and so a 33/1 and a 33/0 shell have been sitting for ages idly waiting for me to grab some time to attack them. I know I could probably just about live with the incorrect roof profile of a 33/0 but if I was going to go to the trouble of doing all the other bits to backdate it I thought I'd may as well make it as right as I could. Stage 1 - Hacking the body. The cabs have been cut away from the 33/0 with the cut being made just above the moulding line as shown below. It takes time and a will to cut gently and often rather than too deep in any one pass but a reasonably neat line can be taken by working freehand around the moulding. To give myself maximum room for error in doing this I cut below the moulding line on the 33/1 cabs and then filed back with a test fit process until it was near enough. There is a slight difference in the depth between the two moulding lines between the two variants, the 33/0 being around 0.5mm deeper, which is correct? I don't know but by this time it was easier to take more of the top of the 33/0 cabs than it was to take anything off the roof of the 33/1. Moving onto the roof it was relatively easy to determine the position of the old exhaust from the drawing below. What was concerning was the outer sides of the exhaust on the drawing were different from all of the images I had seen but I've followed the images rather than the drawings. Handily on the roof of the 33/1 are four little pimples (plate bolts or lifting eyes?) that appear to mark the position of the earlier exhaust so it becomes a case of joining those dots with a small saw. Once the panel is cut out the opening is tidied with a file, the removed section is filed back by around 2mm at each side and a vertical face prepared on each side. A plasticard liner will be created inside the body for the reduced exhaust panel to be glued upon. The clamps/brackets are removed from the roof by a shaving action with the knife, shaving from varying directions produces a reasonable result but any irregularities are removed by using a small file very softly over them. The newer style exhaust grille is also removed by shaving and filing prior to filling. So; that's the part done that had the potential to ruin two bodies, it was not as bad as I thought to be honest but it does represent 3-4 hours steady work and I haven't got anywhere near re-assembly - that will come when I've done some rubbing down. I shall  use the early 24 circular exhaust port (pic below) from the Brassmasters 24/25 detailing etch which is spot on for the dimensions given, the wife may also find a very small hole in one of her nylons to form the grille. The cavity around the roof horns was filled along with the later vent. The body and cab were brought back together. The following pic shows the vent and exhaust in situ. The remainder of the process was re-assembly, re-siting the speaker beneath the exhaust rather than beneath the cooling fan (why do we do that?) and taking it through the paint shop. As I said it isn't complete, it will be when I find where those Archers rivets for the roof got to though.

In finishing off the Mermaid modded here I thought I'd try the household cleaning aisle's wonder-stuff Klear for it's ballasting properties. A dry mix of ballast was placed in the weighted load area of the Mermaid, the Klear was given isopropyl alcohol and a blob of washing up liquid as additives and sprayed straight onto the dry mix. It soaked in like a dream with virtually no disturbance of the dry ballast. A few hours later it's rock hard. Any slight sheen is taken off with subsequent matt spray varnishing. I shall definitely be using that to speed up the ballasting process in future. Hoard secured.

In turning around a Parkside Pallet Van I took the usual course of referencing Paul Bartlett's site and found that the Palvan's seemed to have a fairly distinct way of weathering after lounging around in backwaters following a fairly premature absence from action - http://gallery6801.fotopic.net/p24203000.html . In all likelihood they were probably as drab and mucky as any other van whilst still in service but I fancied a go at something a different shade of brown. Starting from a base of Railmatch BR Bauxite and metal strapping picked out in a dark chocolate shade variations in tone were made via airbrush layering dark bauxite and a faint black towards the edges of panels and the strange sensation of spraying yellow/orange shades towards the centre of the larger panels. The overall finish is not as pronounced as shown in the prototype pics on the assumption that wagons aren't as old. I must overcome the temptation to treat more vans like that.

Follow up to http://www.rmweb.co....n-silo-presflo/ I'd set off on a desire to be different more than anything else in trashing a previously perfect Bachy Presflo into a twin silo variant. I set off knowing that I'd got no reference material other assumption and guesswork and even the resources to complete the model in its supposed form. Looking back Hornby Dublo produced a Presflo in a slightly bluish green with ICI logos and bulk salt and Dapol some years later in an even more garish shade. That's all I'd got to go on other than Paul Bartlett's reference material to the later life Slate Presflo which was actually more helpful than the pseudo-collectable items of yore in taking a stab at what the colour may have been before age and filth took them to the state shown in Paul's pictures. Trying to achieve a 'is that blue or is that green' shade took some trial and error with garish shades of Tamiya acrylics that would look more fitting on some yoof's Corsa and a touch of black. I was happy when I'd got a shade that seemed to change in tone dependent on the light it's in. I'd never expected to find the ICI logos and had an alternate DIY plan for them until I called Modelmaster to get the lettering. I mentioned the ICI logo and lo and behold I was advised that sheet 4651 contained just what I needed. Brilliant. However it's no exaggeration to say that applying the transfers takes longer than the conversion shown in the previous posting. Out came the Tamiya weathering powders again for pure guesswork on how such a wagon in that usage would have weathered. It's at this point when this blog entry gets posted that someone will step forth with definitive proof that I've got it wrong. Great, do it; I'm ready and waiting with another blank canvas that I can rectify these wild assumptions.

Dear Number 57, whoever you are or more probably were, today I really appreciate what you and your colleagues did all those years ago! I'd had a Dapol Prestwin in the to-do drawer for a year or two and decided a few weeks back to put into the works. What an utter disaster it was and virtually put me off buying any of Dapol's current production of these time-served moulds. The chassis was so distorted that at rest only two wheels would touch the rails, three if a digit was placed on a corner; I can't even remember where I'd bought it so it now lives in the parts bin for its other components. The kit started life under Airfix around 1964 and it's a very different story with crisp detail on decent plastic (if a little brittle with age resulting in a broken brake lever at a late stage) that can still make a decent showing placed next to the current pick of the crop. Assembly is a dream with sharp alignment, positive fit and achievable in under an hour despite the 60+ parts that make this up. The only modifications to date to the kit are the addition of a couple of Cambrian brake wheels (I owe you another thank you Brian!) to the discharge pipes on the roof and the handrails above the short ladder to the platform on one side. The original transfers are somewhat yellow and curled but handily there were appropriate lettering and numbers left over on a Modelmaster 4644r sheet after the Presflo project (I really must post some snaps of the finished article). I accept that the seams in the tanks are more prominent than you'd like to see on a wagon produced last week but in the flesh they don't look as pronounced as they do on the snaps and that some final touching up is needed before a dose of Dullcote. Show me anything as good from 1964 that you can pick up for a fiver if you can!