PatB

Some time back in the 1970s there was a kids drama series screened in the early evening on, IIRC, ITV, about a preserved railway. It was, if memory serves, shot on a just about to open or possibly newly opened West Somerset Railway. I can't, however, remember the name of the series. Even my ~9 year old self thought it was pretty dire and I don't think it made it to either a second series or even repeats of the first one.

Pat - give Jim a call, I'm sure that for a few shekels he'll spin you a new set of castings for your Lowmac when he runs off his next batch.

I certainly intend to. I'm just waiting to see what else I can knacker before ordering so as to save two lots of postage. An ag implement wagon has gone without hitch (although it did need a bit of Milliput around the axleboxes) and the Y7 is still a while off needing most of its whitemetal fitted, although the backhead, brake standard and sandboxes are in place.

SNAP, Pat! But isn't this van a nice vehicle (I do like brake vans). A good kit too - I talked to Jim McGowan about it - I seem to recall him saying that he originally designed the kit for a different range and bought it back to include it in his Connoisseur stable, hence the fact that the model includes a compensated (rocking cradle) axle.

 

Now these little interludes are all very well but they do hold up progress on the cobbles - they are going to take longer than I thought so MUST GET ON!

 

Chaz

Agreed. A very nice kit indeed and has the distinction of being my first successful completion in etched brass. My first attempt, a Connoisseur LNER Lowmac, languishes in a box and will remain there until the day when I can face its blobbily melted whitemetal castings and broken buffers.

Graffiti on one of the vending machines found commonly in Gentleman's lavatories

(wish I photographed it but was in the 1970s, at Bristol Parkway station incidentally!)

 

"That was the worst chewing gum I've ever tasted"

 

Neil

Bet the bubbles were pretty good though.

If you'll forgive the temporary pedant's hat, both the Slater's and Connoisseur kit follow the mistake made by the early (and current!) Hornby 00 models in providing impossibly curved horseshoe-shaped rainstrips over the four corners of the roof. Looking at photos of these vans in the 50s through to more recent ones the wooden battens are sometimes gently curved, and sometimes straight battens are fixed on in a diagonal position.

 

You'll find a couple of photos here and here illustrating the above.

The Connoisseur Toad E is also an offender but I only found out after mine was built and the roof painted. I've decided that I can live with it, at least for the time being, as long as I don't number it as any van which I've seen in a photograph to have straight, angled rainstrips. It does, after all, still look like an ex-LNER brake van and will be just as much fun to shuffle around on a shunting plank.

I guess whether you sweat small details depends on the intended purpose of your modelling. If the object of the exercise is to produce a perfect representation of a real place and time, with all vehicles representing a prototype which actually existed, it matters. If, like me, the aim is more towards creating an impression of a railway, much of which is fictional anyway, if your variant of a vehicle is, at least, plausible, and is not actually in direct contradiction with available historical records, it probably doesn't. Or, at least, the extent to which it matters is up to the individual. Considering how long was the working life of most railway equipment and how many different repair shops were involved in its maintenance, what is plausible in any given wagon type can be pretty broad.

Mind you, given that my original efforts in 0 gauge were heavily reliant on the products of Triang, Lima and even some repainted Hornby tinplate, maybe I'm not as discriminating as I should be . That said, I am going to try and make my Y7 a reasonable representation of members of the class which ran on the North Sunderland Railway so it won't be going together quite as supplied.

shrewsbury-1980-2 by nobleman10582000, on Flickr

Aren't those Pola platform canopies and seats? And those brick arches haven't been sufficiently anglicised either.

I agree with what you say Pat, particularly the bit about it being tremendously satisfying. However there is one warning worth giving. There are a few bad etched brass kits around. Either they don't fit, or are difficult to build because the design is faulty (and often bad kits have worse instructions). I have struggled to finish a few dodgy ones and it was tremendously satisfying to eventually complete them.

 

How is a beginner to know which ones to avoid? I would suggest before buying post a request on the forum - "Anybody built a....". If the purchase is at a show I would also ask the vendor how easy it is to build. The answer may be revealing. If you ask Jim McGowan (Connoisseur Models) how easy a kit of his is to build you will get an honest answer. He will tell you about any tricky bits and offer advice when you need it. A beginner could do a lot worse than start with one of his kits.

 

Chaz

I've certainly no doubt that there are a few turkeys out there that would put me off etched kits for life if I tried one at my current stage of competence. I went with Connoisseur for my first efforts because of a couple of good write ups on the net and in magazines (Phil Parker's build of the Y7 in the December 08 Railway Modeller springs to mind) and also because I was able to get a good look at the instructions before buying. I'm sure that other manufacturers are equally good but I'm less than certain about which ones. However, having had a couple of qualified successes, I'm less worried about solving the odd problem as it arises.

A minor point about the Y7 is that, being an early kit, the instructions supplied are a bit basic for the beginner (ie me). No problem, though, because the much more comprehensive instructions for the very similar "Nellie" starter loco are available for download and provide most of the necessary supplementary information.

Soldering is definitely worth having a go at, because it's a hugely useful skill to have in your repertoire and also because, when you do get it right and the solder flashes neatly along that seam in an almost magical fashion, it's tremendously satisfying.

My manual skills are somewhat......er......basic. However, having read Jim McGeown's various booklets which can be downloaded from Connoisseur's website, I decided that etched brass looked pretty doable and bought a couple of Jim's wagon kits, a cheap 80W soldering iron (probably overkill, but the general consensus seems to be that more heat than you need is better than less), a roll of 145 solder and a jar of suitable flux. Following Jim's comprehensive instructions everything went together fine. Whilst I wouldn't make any claims to perfection for my first efforts, they are far from scrap and it's amazing what a coat of etch primer will hide . I was sufficiently encouraged that I'm now building one of Jim's LNER Y7s and looking with great interest at Agenoria's new Manning Wardle 0-4-2T as another suitable power unit for a freelance northern light railway.

For me, the great thing about etched brass is that it is practically impossible to destroy most of the kit components. I'm a messy git and, when working with plastic and solvents, tend to apply obvious and permanent fingerprints to every finely detailed surface. Great for providing future owners with a means of identifying the model's builder but less good for realism. With brass, that's just not going to happen.

I do still have difficulty soldering on whitemetal parts without melting bits of them (no, I wasn't using the 80W at full heat) so Araldite still plays a role. However, I am improving in this regard, especially having become sufficiently enthusiastic about this construction method that I've sprung for a basic Hakko soldering station from DCC Concepts. Not essential at all, but awfully nice to use.

Hi, I'm in Perth's eastern hills, nominally working in 7 mm with an interest in British light railway and industrial prototypes. No layout yet though, and no real prospect for the forseeable future.