webbcompound

But it is moving the project away from the 'average modeller' again.

 

I don't see this. Sticking a piece of brass onto an old rtr after cutting a rough hole out where the windows are is pretty basic modelmaking. You don't even have to hold everything square, which you would with a full plastic kit, and the painting is going to be identical

Of course an interesting  military variant is the "going to summer manoevers/camp" train. They can include all kinds of "foreign" stock, dependent on where the terriers come from, or the regulars are based. A typical infantry unit would have a set of old stock for ORs, a nicer first class carriage for officers, and a horsebox or two for the officer's mounts. They would be accompanied by a train of assorted flat, or low sided stock for the GS wagons, a couple of carriages for the drivers, and cattle trucks for the draft horses. Obviously cavalry, and artillery units would have different compositions. A project lurking at the back of my list would be a Garrison Artillery battery of 60pounders, only four guns needed, but lots of supporting waggons and horses so maybe a bit expensive to build. The batteries from Portsmouth went to Salisbury Plain, and the north midlands units went to Cheshire and North Wales, but I would think somebody went to North Norfolk. Something from London could have quite a wide choice of originating railways.

If this is all too military you could have a theatre train (there is a theatre for the holidaymakers nearby isn't there?) There are some nice photos of a Midland Railway stock train in action, with a couple of carriages, a scenery wagon and a couple of flats, all as far as I am aware, attainable from kits, and if you were unloading the painted flts would make for an interesting load..

If the issues with kitmaking are cost and ability surely the answer is the etched side. They can be stuck onto older carriages of the right roof profile and length. This gets rid of the "difficult" bits of carriage making, reduces the cost of the etched parts enormously (in terms of research, design, production etc) and so puts variants within the reach of the less.well endowed financially and in terms of competence.

Why?

 

Is it all about "taking back control"?!?

Oh no! Not another discussion about the merits of DC versus DCC

 

The moulded model is only part of the finished kit. Mousa Models wagon or van kits with resin cast "bodies"  also have etched sprung underframes, a moulded sprue with brake gear, etc. turned steel buffer heads and springs, 3D printed buffer bodies, suspension spring wire. Add a box and possibly instructions and it becomes clear that this is more than "simply" designing a 3D body for a pattern.

 

So you have extra parts at extra cost, plus your time in designing/producing/procuring/organising all these items. You will need to recover your outlay and pay yourself a wage for doing all this. It's not all that difficult - it's what many of our Small Suppliers do - but it is more involved than most people seem to realise.

Of course since we are proposing selling to modellers, and they have quite personal views on the other components they want to use, often replacing the ones in a kit, you could just sell the shell and leave the buyer to source the rest, cheaper and simpler.

 

 however, it was at this point I noticed I have some work to do to get the ride heights consistent and level on the brake thirds. 

The photos I have seen of this stock in use on the LNWR do not show a completely consistent ride height even before it was sold off.

I used Humbrol 100 but have come to feel it's not really red enough - red oxide rather than red lead, which should be, well, redder... There are several discussions of colour on my wagon building thread, with links to other discussions of GW red.

I agree with this. I started off thinking the colour should be brownish, but now think it is decidedly red. Here is a picture of some red lead which helped sway me

Clive,

I am not sure I agree with you that most women would have been in administrative jobs pre WW1.

 

I would have thought the vast majority would have been lowly cleaners - carriages and buildings, not locomotives. But maybe I have that wrong.

Well Chris I think you do. Cleaningcarriages was a mans job. Clerical jobs were certainly the majority. As for cleaning of stations etc this wasn't a seperate job, but was a requirement of the station staff, as was the case with engineers and engineering shops. Once they ceased to have responsibility for keeping their own workplaces clean and tidy things would start to slide.  

Probiblly true but not necessarily. The gcr work force was 2% female prior to 1914 if the numbers I have in my head are right, I will check and edit if not.

Richard

Central stores in the LNWR engineering shop was exclusively run by women, and many stations (run by families) had female clerks. Don't know what percentage this came out as but likely to be at least similar to GCR

Haydon Bridge, (Northumberland) currently has a population of 2000 or so. Around 1900 it was about 1200 or less. There was a tiny town gas works just by the station (obviously coal came in on the railway). The site of the gas works is next to the coal yard, and is barely wide enough to park two lorries next to each other, so long and thin in typical model railway fashion. It is marked on the 1895 OS map. Here is the best I can find. If you peer and squint at the point where the railway running SE to NW crosses the dashed vertical line you can just make out "Gas Works" and see its elongated shape

Just found a much better image, the 25 inch to the mile map

https://communities.northumberland.gov.uk/005035FS.htm

Top priority now though is all the loco/tail lamps in 7mm

Will the lamps be available in 4mm as well? I was about to scratchbuild some LNWR ones, but yours would be better

Although the sky (with its clouds) usually goes all the way down to the horizon. Really big clouds can be seen consequently from a long way away. I once saw the top of a massive storm in the midlands from South wales (borders), maybe more than 60 miles away. Just the tops of the thunderheads could be seen over the horizon, with flashes of lightning inside, but of course no sound.

would cars of this quality have been carried open on lowmacs where they would get covered in smuts and soot. Around this period the railway company's would have had a good selection of covered carriage trucks (CCT) for this type of traffic and the lowmacs used for things like agricultural equipment etc.

 Although plenty of flatbed carriers for carriages/automobiles still around. The LNWR one at NRM was built in 1908  http://www.nrm.org.uk/OurCollection/LocomotivesAndRollingStock/CollectionItem?objid=1988-7009

There MUST be a truly pyramidic station roof somewhere

Both a bit ultra-modern, but still working stations:

Kansas city Union Station, but this isn't the station roof.

Or this one in Tokyo. definitely the station roof, although more Central American pyramids than Egyptian.

I tell you, living in the Fens plays with one's perceptions of reality!

 

Either that or it's the medication, I suppose ....

Not far from the truth. I did some work in Wisbech and the museum has a pamphlet about the fens and Laudnum (tincture of opium). the chemist in the town during the 19th century had a 100 gallon tank to contain his weekly supply, and when it was banned in the 20s there was a temporary exemption for Norfolk. There is a suggestion that the popular image of Norfolk people as "slow" derives from the fact that most of the labourers were permanently stoned.

I'd always assumed it was a "bricklayer showing-off" job, because the building also has fancy-work patterns, made using dark, "over cooked" bricks, but this is making me wonder if there is some practical purpose in forges having rounded corners. Something about not getting the corners damaged by the hubs of the wheels on carts, maybe.

 

 

They do say that barns are built with rounded corners so the devil can't hide in them and spoil the corn. Given the dubiously supernatural nature of blacksmithing I guess there is a similar reasoning going on here.

But not petrol!

Actually, yes petrol.. Large amounts transported in wooden barrels pre WW1

Wirral Railway's loco livery was black lined with white, yellow and vermillion, coupling rods were either red or vermillion but all with black edging and vermillion lining; bufferbeams were vermillion with a black edge and the buffer casings were black.

 

 

The WR tank (L&Y 1041) seems to have stayed in L&Y livery, with the addition of the oval numberplate No6. it was bought by the WR in June 1921 so it wasn't around for very long before grouping.