Jack P

Absolutely not! I'm about to ruin them by EM converting and weathering them.

My order arrived yesterday, and what I absolutely can't get over is the quality of the box. It makes the whole experience feel pretty darn special. This is my first Accurascale product, so perhaps previous boxes have been just as good. Obviously it goes without saying that the product inside is phenomenal - No photos though, as they're currently out of the lovely boxes and on the bench for EM conversion.

I'll no doubt have mine to bits, and after seeing what @The Fatadder has done with the M34. I'm tempted to order another. Ah I see. Was just clarifying the question, you know what it's like trying to interpret tone through the internet!

Are you asking why someone might weather, or otherwise alter their factory fresh Siphon?

Thanks all for your advice & info so far. If they're good enough for Pendon, then they're absolutely good enough for me. Is express models still trading? There doesn't seem to be any suggestion that they aren't, but there haven't been any updates on their web-page since 2020. Both insulator types are currently out of stock, but I suppose that's understandable if they've run 3000 of them off for Pendon! (I suspect that was probably some time ago though)

I'll amend my post to be more clear. I'm asking what people who make their own poles do, as I am after a specific type of pole, for which I can find no currently available ready made product. My google searching turned up posts that (to my eye) are over/under scale or don't have the correct number of bars for my application. Thanks anyway, I guess.

Hi all! I've got a few questions about the items listed off in the title. - SR fence posts: are there good references available somewhere (or does someone know) that show the posts in detail, as well as cover the spacing between posts? - Point rodding: I've found a really great diagram of FPL's and their working, but it's a GWR one, does anyone have/know of a Southern diagram? Or would the GWR one be close enough? - Raised cable trunking: the type you'd see running along side the track. Are there diagrams for this? In addition to the specific above questions, does anyone know if there are bits available for fence posts/cable trunking? Thanks in advance

Hi all, Looking for options/suggestions for telegraph poles. I'm not adverse to producing them myself, either from bits or from scratch if need be, but I need a fair few and they have an average of 5 bars each. Below is an image that shows the type of pole that I'm trying to replicate. My knowledge in this area is slim to none. Ready made/off the shelf examples look to be vastly incorrect for what I'm (specifically) after. Happy to be corrected if there's some I've missed though! Thanks in advance!

Thanks Tony, I messaged Steve & I think he'll be able to help me out! A quick diversion from signals/baseboards. I converted my second SECR D class to EM. I didn't take very good photos of the process though! Here's the body after I spent an age cutting/filing for crankpin clearances. This is the version with 4 cab windows. I tried to re-use the Dapol wheels, but to no avail. New Gibson wheels fitted. After painting the base layer of black, I repainted the cab interior and glued it back in place. Here's the chassis in the midst of being fettled. I used bits that Mr Ultrascale made, for the conversion, and I think they had might finer tolerances than the chassis. Wheels are chemically blackened and painted. Here she is in current state with the Z, the other D and some wagons that are going through the conversion/detailing/painting/weathering process. Finally the WD has completed running trials and now needs the final balance weights fitted and wheels/motion blackened/painted. More anon.

Thank you kindly Tony. I’ll message Steve directly and see if he has any images saved of the specific stuff I’m after. The image loss is felt even more in threads like his, where the most recent 3ish pages are the only ones with content. Thank you Michael, he really loves the layout at present, perhaps I should make him something next. Ive not had any bad luck with the levers (touch wood!), but it seems Tony’s been through a fair few!

Thanks Nick - for those reading along at home, Nick's provided me with a signaling diagram from 1947 (the junction was re-laid in 1946), so this is perfect. I had incorrectly assumed that the crossover would require two levers (one per turnout), but this is incorrect and in practice would need just the one. No matter, I may stretch reality even further, and bring another signal on scene, or just have a spare. I have spent some time this weekend doing something for the first time - building signals. A quick tangent, I think this is the first actual model work to commence specifically for this layout. Which is very exciting. Here's a poor attempt at AI image sharpening. This shows the signal in question. My notes so far are below: - A heavy duty rail built post (actually x2 twin rail posts) this specific post doesn't appear to have the rungs joining the two sets of posts. -Then we've got the landing platform, supported with bent angle iron offering personnel protection in the form of a thin railing running around the perimeter. -Two dolls, which appear to be of the LSWR 'Lattice' type, certainly the finials look to be of the LSWR cruciform type (my understanding is that the southern adopted these as 'standard' along with the LSWR's style of point rodding). - Two pressed 'corrugated' home arms adorn the tops of the posts. - There are two ladders, a straight one against the back of the gantry, and another leading to the top of the higher doll. - Balance weights are attached to the dolls and have wires running to a central roller, which then feed down. If anyone has any other observations that may help with the construction, please let me know. These are the bits i've knocked up so far from ex-MSE, now Wizard models etches. The top two arms were my first go using the simple fret, I quite quickly decided these weren't quite detailed enough, so I scribed the corrugation lines and used the arms from a different fret. The corrugations aren't as prominent, but I think overall the arms look better. Balance weights and brackets assembled, however i'll need to flip one around before it's all fixed in position. Shorter ladder assembled too. Here are the rail built posts. I've used drawings from the Pryor book on Southern Signals, and scaled them to 1:76, coupled with measurements from the photo. I used the signal arm as a sort of datum for those measurements. Probably wildly inaccurate, but at least all the bits will look vaguely correct in relation to each other. Jon Fitness was very helpful in pointing out that the angled supports are actually iron, and not rail. I've decided to use some more rail for the base of the gantry platform, it should be U channel, but the stuff i've got is far too big and the rail is much closer in size terms. The angle brackets are 1mm square rod bent up, they should be 0.8/0.75mm, but again this is all i've got to hand, so it'll have to do. The plate sections will be cut from brass offcuts and rivets pressed. I'm still not 100% in how it all goes together, but we'll get there! I'm now figuring out the best way to make it 'work', Working point rodding might be a step too far, but the signal will need to work as it's supposed to. If anyone has any hints or tips for Signal construction, please let me know. A final request, can anyone identify the trees in the background of the above shot? TIA. That's all for now!

Wonderful. Thanks again Tony. I've ordered one of these: https://kslaserdesigns.com/ks-laser-other-items/cab-holder?product_id=284 Which is designed to house the levers and the Solder-less tags. I'll report back on it's construction when it arrives. I decided that I wasn't the biggest fan of the mottled look on the handles of the Cobalt levers - so after sanding off the coating of clear, I used blackening fluid to make them look more metal-y. Admittedly they look very black here, and not so metal-y. But in real life they look like polished, blackened metal. I then painted the levers. 3 for turnouts, 2 for signals, 1 for the Gates. I ended up taking the levers out of the frames and masking the connections at the bottom. It was a lot of faff, but it meant that I could get them painted all over. I considered painting the catch lever black (as some had) but decided that they look enough like Saxby & Farmer levers as is. They were given a coat of satin Lacquer and left to cure before reassembly. I finished off the final board - pictured here with 1 piece left to go. I am looking into options for the tops. I have found some 4mm ply that I think would be perfect. There is a firm local to me that do laser cutting too, so that might be the best way of ensuring they're nice and square and even. Here's a very loose mock up of how the board leading into the crossing/junction will look. https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52888597524_8fa55931d7_h.jpg[/img] I'm yet to cut the trackplan out for the Junction as it diverts, but that'll be tonight's job, followed by a full mock up over the weekend. More anon

I'm hoping that's a good thing! The goal was to make them as accurate and strong as possible without making them too heavy. They're heavier than the other boards, but not significantly, they're also 1/3 as big again, so a good trade imo. Hey Tony, Otto will no doubt appreciate the compliment! I appreciate your insight into your experience with the levers. I don't expect them to be perfect - they needed some gentle tweaking out of the box already. I'll keep an eye on the soldered parts of the joiners, I assume you've also used the 'no-solder' components that plug into the front of the lever? They seem like a good solution in practice.. but we will see. Did you find a specific method for painting the levers that seemed to work best for you?

Another update from Otto & I. Board construction has begun & is progressing well The first two boards are now complete. The above boards will have thin ply tops added to them, which will then have the scenery built up upon them. The third board will have the falling cut-away as the curve sweeps around (in the Pulborough direction). Next step will be to measure the printout of the track plan and make sure I have my spacing correct for the turnout motors & make sure no part of the turnout will sit on a gap, i'll also then use this as a base to make my cuts before assembling the third board. The logic of applying my eyes and counting on my fingers did not occur to me until now. In my previous post you can see the tie-bars for the turnouts at the crossing & the junction. I had previously thought there was a significantly longer gap between the two. I can count approximately 21 chairs between the two, so to be safe, i'll go with 22/23. But this should mean I won't have to introduce much/any compression, and may be able to fit the entire lot on a single board. The only issues I can see arising is that i've chosen to use B7's and not the more likely C9 crossing turnouts. You can see my primitive scratchings to show the approx. distance. The control system will be DCC, and while the wiring for the actual running lines should be relatively straightforward, I am still scratching my head when it comes to powering the Turnout motors/switches. I opted for the Cobalt S Levers (which are amazingly tactile, and heaps of fun to play with), and the Cobalt iP Digital motors. Next step will be figuring out how/what/why it all works. if the turnouts all fit on the same board, then it will only be the two signals on the third board that will need the ability to be disconnected. That's all for now!

Fantastic work as always Dave, what's the final livery going to be?

Oh I'm not bothered, I'd like to think I have a fairly good grasp on how to communicate. Some of the intricacies will have no doubt gone over my head. You mentioned the A2/3 Ocean Swell, I have this to pass on from the owner; "[Tony] would not like what he saw, because bits have fallen off (they are in the box) and at some stage someone has picked it up by the valve gear. This is the one where I have spent some hours unpicking the squashed Walschaerts. I have substituted a photo of A2/2 Wolf of Badenoch : this promises to be a Really Useful Engine and runs very smoothly now that more than a dozen shorts have been dealt with. It is temporarily running with the wrong leading bogie axle. (Long boring story.) Still a work in progress but nearly there." Here are a few more photos for now, Including a HR 4-4-0 tank.

The neighbours don't hate me, despite having to listen to the scream of the holesaw when I finished work last night. The end panels haven't been holed, and are waiting for the locating dowels to arrive before more work is done - I'm probably going to double them up to get the thickness I need, possibly triple, and IF I do go that route then i'll likely put some holes in the thickening boards. That's for next time on 'Woodworking with Jack'. I've been working on the trap point for the branch, which is just a Peco B6+ modified to curve. A friend of mine is planning to go to the Amberly Museum to take some photos/measuements of the box there, so that we can decide on the best course of action for the production of mine. Laser cutting probably has the most appeal. That's all for now!

Both the LNER and HR are far removed from my primary interest, but I can appreciate a fantastic model when I see one. The fit and finish on the A2 is really really high quality, while the finish of the HR wasn't quite there, the quality of the builds were still excellent. There was also a HR tank engine which I didn't photograph. Next time I go over I will take better photos of everything and hopefully have the full compliment of 80 there.

Tony, Apparently the person handling the estate had contacted multiple parties (here in New Zealand), to no avail, came across my friend by complete chance, and let him know that if he was uninterested, a run to the tip was occurring the next week. It does make me very sad to think that this is probably one instance of many, how many fantastic models have been consigned to the bin, solely because (through no fault of their own) the people dealing with the estate don’t know what they’re looking at! Jack

On the subject of models from deceased estates, I was privileged to see part of a nearly 80 locomotive collection that was (get ready to wince) saved from being thrown in the bin. The absolute star of the show was this Raven A2. Which of course, is the one I took the worst photos of. It's an etched kit, and there was a Proscale marking on the chassis. There was also both a large and small boiler C1, all finished to similar standards.

A quick update After some careful work, the baseboards look like this: What, I hear you asking, are you up to? Well this was my first go at something like this, and there were a few shortcomings. Most glaring of which was that I had cut the scenic parts of the baseboard horizontals without really paying attention to the topography of the area. At Hardham Junction the only places the landscape falls away is looking towards Pulborough, after the signal, the rest of the area is on fairly level ground, with some small embankments on either side. I also didn't really leave enough space between the horizontals to get a drill in there, nor did I use the hole saw in advance to cut lightening holes/cable runs. I also need to fix the alignment dowels in place before attaching the ends. to the rest of the board, to make sure the cuts are nice and straight. Final thing was I felt that 550mm (the width i'd chosen) was just too narrow. So... I spent most of the day in the sun cutting some new boards. It always seems to take me a few cuts to get my act together - as can be seen by the shame pile on the right. Here they are at the end of play tonight - I'm trying to minimise cutting inside the shed as (with no extraction) dust just gets everywhere. Next steps are sorting out the alignment dowels and hole saw-ing the horizontal boards. These new boards are fractionally shorter (1190mm vs 1200mm) but 200mm wider, with all 3 being rectangular. This should allow more of the surrounding scenery, while still incorporating the compression I had employed on the other boards. The end goal is to try and make the end result as close to 'prototypical' as possible. Anyways, that's all for now! Hardham Junction (V2 boards) will continue.

What's your go to for lining please Mick?

They'll be well worth the wait, no doubt!

I'd echo Iain, the Ratio coaches look excellent Tony, and you made them. How'd the Bulleid light pacific end up on the road - some sort of Titfield Thunderbolt recreation?

Not to overstep, but I'd suggest gloss varnishing the whole body. The matt varnish makes the colour look a bit washed out and dull. As you know, the southern would often revarnish instead of repaint! You'll also run into the same issue if you varnish just the bottom half. They do make for a fantastic rake though. I'm still so on the fence about picking up a set (solely based on their primary running location), but it's getting harder and harder to resist!