Brassey

Thanks Mikkel I would agree and the difference in colour is apparent in the flesh. I have different versions of PP loco green, pre 1906 both dull and gloss and the later pre 1928 both dull and gloss. I always plan to use the gloss on locos that are to be lined as it makes lining easier. However for me the best shade comes from a couple of very old tins of pre 1928 dull that I have. The paint looks almost black in the tin and goes on darkest and almost matt. For me this looks the best shade and looks "right" to me. Whether it is historically authentic is another matter. The paint in these old tins is like jelly and needs careful stirring and mixing before applying via an airbrush. Here is an example on 2524: PS: At one point in the past I briefly worked on the marketing for Barbour waxed jackets and spent the whole day once in a meeting discussing the shade of green on a shoe polish tin! Those were the days...

My first kit was a K's Dean Goods. That rapidly got converted to EM at which point I abruptly moved to P4. During the period when career, marriage and family took over, I seem to have acquired 4 Dean Goods chassis and a load of Mallard etches. I now have 3 completed Dean Goods and a Martin Finney kit still to build. Bits of the original K's Dean Goods have been incorporated in most of them. I have recently replaced a 1024 with a High Level coreless 1219 in a Wills Saddle tank mainly because I needed a shorter motor to make room for the DCC decoder. I am quite happy with it.

Good to hear you sorted it. Which motor did you have. As a naive newby when I returned to the hobby, the guy from Comet, alas no longer with us, sold me a Mashima 1015 with the DG chassis! That's despite me telling him I modelled in P4 and so I had much more room for a bigger motor between the frames. Mine has a 1224 underslung which was my motor of choice. I'm yet to build 30 wagons and the current fiddleyard wouldn't' hold that many anyway. We'll see what it can do when I get that far.

Despite using a GW wheel press and a B2B gauge, I find that the Gibson wheels can go on a bit tight if you are a bit over zealous with squeezing the wheelset together. Apart from being undergauge, the wheels are tight against the bearings. The first set wouldn't move and I broke the spokes trying to get them off with a wheel puller. The key to Gibson wheels, according to Colin Seymour, is to twist them off apparently. However, the Comet chassis is curved behind the wheels so the are a bu66er to get hold of, particularly in P4 with razor sharp flanges. I resorted to knocking the axle out with a centre punch. The next set went on almost as tight but would just about move. Still undergauge, it does run and I guess with a bit more running in it might improve. There are benefits in making all the wheelsets removable but I built this with a fixed driven axle. 2478 above has a High Level Dean Goods chassis whereby all the wheelsets can drop out. (It also has Ultrascale wheels which is another bonus and runs fine.)

Which one; the loco or tender? Both are from the same tin of PP pre-1928 great western loco dull but the tender has come out gloss and lighter. When all else fails, read the instructions. I read on the Phoenix website that Precision Paints should be diluted 80:20 and sprayed with 20 psi. I had always used a weaker 50:50 solution with less pressure but got runs and sags. So I tried the new spec with a different, less fine airbrush on something else and it worked! Have now changed the needle in my Iawata. I also think the pre-1906 PP comes out even lighter but should be darker:

The subject of my first blog is now nearing completion after only 8 years! It has been a problem build right from the start. I also painted it when I was really struggling with my airbrush so the paint is far from perfect. 2306 was an early Dean Goods which numbers started at 2301. In 1912 it was at Pontypool Road by which time it had acquired a B4 Belpaire firebox the Autumn before. This is mainly an old Mallard kit, narrowed footplate with additional spare parts from a Martin Finney Dean Goods including the more pronounced sweep of the cab sides. It has a Comet chassis, Gibson wheels, High Level gearbox and Mashima motor but is still not too good a runner. As a working layout loco it will do for the time being.

Why not abandon weathering powders and just weather with enamel paint?

I have considered hacking a hole through the wall to get the other fiddleyard in but I'm not sure that will enhance the value of the property. So it will just have to wait for the time to come when I can get a loft conversion/shed etc.

I have one of those gas blow torches now but in the past have resorted to the gas ring to unsolder entire jobs. It does not take much heat to loosen the solder. I would be concerned about getting the metal too hot as that might have some effect on it.

You could be right, according to RCTS, auto apparatus was fitted to this class from 1904. It states that under Churchward many auto fitted engines were painted to match the contemporary carriage livery but gives no date. No date is given either for closed cabs apart from "Under Churchward". I have to declare an interest in that I am just finishing my second 4mm 517, this one in brown, but my layout is dated 1912 by which time 1425 might have still been in that livery. RCTS states that the locos that were disguised with dummy coachwork had it removed by 1911 so the matching livery might have been obsolete by then too. In which case rule 1 applies.

I hope the move has gone well. I had to let my daughter have a larger bedroom when the shoe collection was encroaching the landing! I've managed to shoehorn the layout into the new railway room (along with everything else) but there is only space now for a small fiddleyard at one end only. Currently that isn't such a problem as I don't have that much finished stock to run having focused on loco building. The challenge now I face with panelled coaches is the painting and lining which I am now only just coming to terms with.

Why not ring the changes with a closed cab 517 in brown?

There are the Morgan Design underframes sold through the S4 Society which cover all variants of the DC brakes. They are complete underframes not components.

No Mikkel. Due to the day job, the lining pen will have to be confined to barracks until the weekend. This will help let the base coat dry hard as I foresee there will be a lot of errors that will have to be removed with white spirit leaving the base colour intact. I have owned a ruling pen for decades though never got round to using one in anger; until now. As can be seen from the pic above, there has been some training on painted card. It has also taken an age for me to get an acceptable finish out of an airbrush and I still have issues there. I changed the needle to a less fine example (0.5mm from 0.35mm) and using a stronger paint dilution (80:20), I think I have cracked it. Thus some locos are in the lining queue too but I thought I might start with coaches as that would cause less angst if all went pear shaped. Watch this space. Peter

Some kits have a resin roof which I have acquired as a separate item for various projects. IIRC Jol’s LNWR diner and ex-Modellers World kits had a shaped wooden roof.

So it's time that I finally got round to mastering the black art of lining and some candidates have been prepared in the paint shop. First up is the subject from the start of this thread, (just 7 years ago!) the 6 wheel parcel van. The second, LNWR 50ft bogie break third, eagle-eyed readers would recognise from my layout thread where it has been testing the track in grey primer for about the same amount of time. These now have the appropriate coats of paint sprayed on ready for the ruling pen. Let battle commence.

I made my own mitre block out of wood cutting the slot with a razor saw as it is vital to get the cut square in both plains and without the saw wandering from side to side. It took quite a few attempts as cutting things straight is not one of my strengths. Currently residing in the cabinet of shame, 2 of my cut and shut jobs awaiting lining. Having cut up a few GWR 4 wheel break thirds to make parcel vans, I ended up with a lot of 3rd class compartments. So I put these together to make a 3rd class carriage. It was quite a Frankenstein until painted with panels of dark brown, grey and buff plastic. This made me aware that panels, even from the same model but from different eras, do not necessarily line up. As a result the cantrail just below the roof is not perfectly straight though should be hidden under lining and the roof line. The cut lines are where the doors are so this it not so much of a problem.

Interesting. A similar cut and shut approach was featured in S4News using Ratio sides to produce GWR bogie carriages which resulted in some fine examples that I saw at a Scaleforum. However, apparently it took two years to produce a rake at which point I decided it would be quicker to build complete kits. Either way, it amounts to a lot of carriage lining for pre-grouping liveries. Something not for the faint-hearted. Mike Trice put some tutorials on YouTube for carriage lining over lockdown if anyone is interested. (I am currently at that stage).

I got mine new in the 70's/80's at which point I soldered the saddle tank together but did nothing else to it. Boiler fittings are AGW. It has a Martin Finney 1854 chassis, the original Ultrascale wheels I got for it when the EM gauge Society supplied them, High Level Road Runner plus with drive stretcher and one of the High Level coreless 1219 motors and a Zimo decoder. Runs OK.

Not K's but an old Wills saddle tank:

Hi Mikkel . Thanks. The ground covering is a mixture of Chinchilla dustIng powder and ash with a bit of coal dust near the track all dusted onto gloss grey paint whilst wet. This technique gleaned from Gordon Gravett’s book from Wild Swan. The photo is deceptive in that the fence on the far platform is not yet complete. Along with some other bits, this might get progressed over the bank holiday weekend.

Having arrived with the 14:10 local goods from Shrewsbury, 1505 collects the empties from the yard to take them back to Hereford.

I’m still using solder I bought in Tandy in the 80’s. still going strong. I also have some Eames “40” flux unopened of the same vintage. 44p in Hamblings

I use an 18w iron, 145 solder and Carrs Green Label or similar for etched kits brass and nickel solver. The heat from a higher powered iron can cause heat distortion in the parts. I occasionally use 188 solder for something that could easily drop off or would be under stress such as on a chassis. 70 degree lowmelt for attaching whitemetal and filling gaps with Yellow label or similar flux. Everything is burnished with a fibre pencil before soldering

IIRC when I worked on TV advertising production back in the day, the standard was Sony U-matic. I think I still might have some up in the loft. I do not recall ever seeing Betamax around but that could just be me.