Clem

Ha ha - so true! Given that modelling reflects life, I suppose we can't complain too much. We're all pretty lucky to have something so creative and absorbing to fall back on in times of stress. - Thanks also, for the kind comment!

A little bit of progress to report here. I've added the full length solebar step-boards on each side. Very tricky to get them straight an to line them up with the twin coach. I used evergreen plastic strip no. 8210 which is a HO scale dimension - By trail and error and in comparison with the photos that I have, it was the size that looked correct to my eye. (0.56 x 2.84mm). The guards grab-handles now need to be fitted and the ends need finishing and then some airbrushing required. The dreaded glazing approaches!

I'm hoping to go on Saturday. If I do, I'll photocopy the trains illustrated article for you if you like. Yes I have got a copy of Bob Cryer and Alan Whitaker. I've just dug it out of the bookcase and refamiliarised myself with it. Great cover photo! Clayton had a strange looking signal box didn't it? Anyway, I'll let you know for definite later in the week about Saturday. Regards Clem

Top of my London road list is a J6 (I've got a stockpile of 3 built up over the years!), although I'll probably not get to it for a while. I have already built three and a half Nucast J6s and you can get a good model from them but whitemetal is never as fine as etched brass. But being a one-man band I'll be concentrating on the layout over the winter and it'll probably be next spring before I can get to it. I'm just finishing a twin articulated set at the moment. I'm afraid I haven't your speed or standard of modelling it seems to be taking me an age to finish off. What period are you modelling - From what you have said so far I would guess 1930s. My layout will be based around 1955 plus or minus a year. The Q1 sounds interesting. I think I have an old Cotswold kit for one buried somewhere in the loft. I like your 29' parcels van - the GN flat roofed 6-wheel and articulated stock are very attractive and if I ever tire of 1955, it may be nice to vary the period to be able to include some teak and GN stock. Are you going to the EMGS Manchester show next week?

Hi Chris, Just wanted to say how impressed I am with your modelling on this thread! When I was little, my brother who is ten years older than me, used to buy the odd Trains Illustrated which I used to filch and read. One of these was the June 1956 issue which contained an article on 'The Queensbury Triangle'. So from the age of about 7 onwards I was aware of this fascinating system of lines linking Bradford Keighley and Halifax. You're probably very familiar with the extremely well written article by J F Oxley and D R Smith which showed a number of pictures of N1s on 2-coach passenger services, a J50 on a goods and a Bridlington excurion being double headed by a J6 and an ex GC B6. It struck a chord with me then as it had a similar GN feel to my local line sadly now gone almost 50 years. So I've been following your thread with great interest. I did once visit the site of Queensbury (about 1980) and there was quite a bit remaining then including a footbridge but I understand little now remains. You're producing some wonderful stuff and I look forward to seeing how Clayton develops. The N5 is first class and your J4 is coming on great - it reminds me that I have several London Road kits to tackle myself. Any up and coming plans for an N1 or a J6? Regards Clem

I start this topic with a certain amount of guilt that it's taken me so long to be approaching finishing this project. It was 1992 (or was it 1993) that I first started this particular project. But I'll come on to that later. First of all, I should give a bit of a background about the Diagram 210 twin articulated sets. By the mid-thirties, the need for new coaching stock for the LNER in Lincolnshire and the East Midlands was pressing and in order to at least part fill this need Gresley designed 39 55'6" articulated twins in the years 1936 and 1937. Similar, but differently laid out sets of Diagram 213 and 214 were produced for the GC Marylebone suburban services. As I'm intending modelling the ex-GN line from Nottingham to Derby, several of the Diagram 210 sets would be desirable. I can vaguely remember them as a boy but they had all been withdrawn by the time I was ten. When the DMUs started taking over from 1957/8 onwards it was the class 114s that seemed to be almost a direct replacement in terms of their geographical footprint. In terms of suitability, here was a non-vestibuled design which had access from 4 of the 13 compartments to a WC (2 from first and 2 from third class) thus being ideal for the cross-country and rural services they were designed for. In terms of formations, on the Grantham-Nottingham-Derby line they were often used in pairs, back to back with the two brake ends facing outwards and with an extra lavatory composite (diagram 50) tagged on at the start or end. But they were used singularly on other lines most notably the Leicester (Belgrave Road)-Grantham service which mostly consisted of a J6 and a twinset only - some of the services running under express headlights. Many of the sets were based at Lincoln for the rural services and certainly early on in LNER days they were used on outer suburban services eminating from Kings Cross. I've always found them to be a very attractive subject but with none presevered and the number of photos of them at a premium it has been a bit of an uphill struggle to accurately model one of these twinsets as what photographic evidence I have obtained, shows that in many details they differed from the Isinglass drawings available, although the general layout of windows and panelling is correct. On to the model: In the early 1990s I was living in Ipswich and had started building a P4 model of a represention of Awsworth Junction in Nottinghamshire and it was at this time the model was conceived. I should say here that I already had had one attempt in the early 1980s when modelling in OO to build one of these sets from two Grafar LMS coaches, and the idea of building a much more accurate version possibly with the use of Ian Kirk kits came to me. Sure enough, I discovered that using a full third, a full first and a brake third - all non-vestibule kits - the sides could be pretty accurately made up. This was succesfully achieved and using the coach compensation units from the scalefour society the twin set in a very bare-bones condition (unpainted, no compartments or seats inside no roof vents etc. etc.) was running in P4 on the layout. A move to Nottingham spelt the end of the P4 layout and a lack of time and speed of modelling on my part lead to a decision to change to EM for any new layout. This decision was made as for me, it was the perfect compromise - I could convert stock much faster as not everything need to be sprung or compensated and I've always aspired to having a large-ish layout. (I still spring or compensate my locos though). Work and family pretty well kept me clear of modelling in earnest until the early 2000s. Just when things were looking rosy for the twinset I got hit by marital problems and it wasn't until 2010 that I could start modelling in earnest again. Over the last 3 years I've been working on a new EM layout (still based on the ex-GN line between Nottingham and Derby) and earlier on this year the part-finished twinset was converted from P4 to EM and from July I have been working again on the twinset towards completion. I don't know about anyone else, but I don't find modelling coaching stock easy - there seems to be endless tasks - most of them very tedious - involved in producing a detailed model ..... and then there's the glazing!! Anyway, I've rambled on enough now so I'll post two or three pictures to illustrate where I'm now up to. Tasks remaining include: 1. Finishing off end detail and painting 2. Fitting guards grab-handles and roof grab-handles 3. Fitting the full-length wooden running boards and painting 4. The small task of fitting 96 windows (sigh!) 5. Weathering The two whitened out lavatory windows that show on each side of the composite coach which to a large degree gives these sets their most obvious feature won't, of course, be evident until the glazing is completed. If anyone out there has any good detail pictures of these sets, I would love to see them. Unfortunately all the photos I have of them show them behind an engine in three-quarter pose. If anyone is interested, I can probably dig out the method of building the set - I remember logging it down when I first did it and I have got photos that show the method fairly clearly. Well - I hope to follow this up with a bit more progress over the next few days. I would be very interested in any comments, advice etc. Best wishes Clem

Hi Andrew, I'm interested in modelling 69481 - an interesting example as it was a saturated engine with part of its condensing apparatus removed. (see attached photo). So, I think I would be interested in the condensing apparatus on a separate sprue as suggested. How would I go about ordering this. Also, if, instead of a Hornby chassis, one of the direct replacement chassis for the Hornby one was used (a la Bradwell or Comet for example) would this still fit? This is because I model in EM. To your knowledge, has anyone tried this? Regards Clem