Bluemonkey presents....

Thank you Bundeena2230 for your posts. I find your 'real life' experiences with this kit very informative and reassuring that we can all have a go regardless of experience and/or skill level.

I am not the teenager you talk about but I am relatively new to the hobby after an exile of 20+years. It is always interesting to read other people's views and see demonstration of skills, there is always something to learn or an idea of a different way to try. 

I have a couple of build threads on RMWeb and try to encourage others to input on my builds to help others reading and myself. Feel free to have a look and comment if you like, the more the merrier.

The kit does look particularly tricky in places. I have a few brass wagon and loco kits to build but have been going mad on plastic kits recently hoping that the 'lessons learnt' there will benefit me later when building etched kits.

Thank you for your posts, keep them coming.

Loving this, as with your other two!

I found a stranded van body and seeing your idea being totally inspired. I then realised it was the exact same van! I have put a ratio chassis underneath and wow that door takes some serious cutting to remove cleanly, my poor scalpel!

Your layout Little Muddle is a beautiful model.

Thank you for sharing your layout and projects.

This is truly a very special day out for anyone with any sort of interest in railways and especially the Great Western Railway, (is there any other?! ). 

Castle makes the tour a very interesting, making time for everyone's questions and specific interests whilst giving the opportunity for some special requests to photograph stock that normally you would not be able to either see or get close enough to.

I went along last year and seriously the entire day is awesome. Thank you again Mr Castle.

A couple of observations: firstly on exhibitions -

 

Why disquieting? Observing, and experiencing for myself, the incredible arrogance of so many of the visitors - pushing in front of, blocking the view, gathering in exits and entrances were the very people you might least expect to show such bad manners. Men of advancing years. A wide range of visitors were at the show, young, old, couples, families, children - lots of families with children. 

 

Ok, I admit to being a little sociophobic, I don't do crowds too well but when you've been barged, bumped, almost dry-humped... a dozen times in an hour. It wasn't even that crowded.

 

In the end I just picked up a couple of bits from the various trade stands and gave up. So I didn't get to see any of the demonstrators this year, or get back to see the exhibits that warranted (for me) a second visit.

 

I am in my sixties, I think I have manners, I would always defer my needs so that someone else could also share a worthwhile experience. Why is it that most offenders are my age or older?

 

I just wondered if others have experienced this at other exhibitions. If you have, how does it make you feel about visiting an exhibition where you have to drive for two hours or more, each way just to feel uncomfortable.

 

Regards

 

(a possibly paranoid) Billj

 

Billj, I couldn't agree more this is exactly why I do not attend more shows and exhibitions. I am only in my forties and it disgusts me the absolute utter rudeness that a lot of people demonstrate at these shows, especially from those that are old enough to know better. My wife completely refuses to join me at any event for these reasons alone.

I only go to my local exhibitions and I experience this so most certainly will not travel any distance to be physically and socially abused. This does mean that I miss the fantastic demonstrations and probably have missed, and will never, learn valuable modelling skills and build friendships with likeminded people thus expanding the wealth of knowledge, experience and skills that can be shared.

 

Additionally where I live does not have a local model shop and the nearest one (about half an hour drive on a good day) has recently closed thus ensuring that any liquid type products i.e.paints and glues either incur a heavy courier costs for a pot of paint. So such shows and exhibitions are being more important for me from a consumer aspect as well. Of course I could delay each project or kit build until I have a long enough list to ensure value for money on courier costs but this I fear will make starting anything a military planned manoeuvre, eliminating any modelling enjoyment or satisfaction.

 

I think it clearly reflects today's society and how an ever increasing majority of self centred, obnoxious people are destroying community spirit and social inclusion. That said there are still many amount of people of all ages that will and do happily help and include others, (although they are now the minority it seems) as proven by Tony's thread.

 

Apologises if a little negative but I hate to see a beautiful hobby that offers so much in a way of variety of interests, skills and friendships be destroyed by modern society's lack of reasonable social interaction and single minded self centred rudeness.

 

Tony I hope MO is on the mend and you are well.

Thank you for your superb; DVDs, photographs, books and articles. They are a tremendous source of knowledge and inspiration, as are so many other contributors to RMweb.

Achy Breaky Heart - Billy Ray Cyrus

Hi Jeff,

Sorry I can not help but I have a similar issue with my 0-6-0 chassis. It was perfectly fine under testing but once fitted binds slightly. I look on with interest. Hopefully someone will be able to 'kill two birds with one stone' here.

Matt

Nice job Stu. Looks like you are very handy with the base boards and the shed lining as well as a cracking build on the viaduct, very impressive. I watch with interest.

Thanks again for posting. got my set Saturday lovely job.

Ordered my set to. Hi Phil, thanks again for pointing me in the direction of Narrow Planet for my GWR Hercules build.

 Only yesterday, a cheery Balkans-type chappie in his Yodel van delivered a small package containing the ten empty plastic bottles I'd ordered off Ebay for £2.60 post paid only three working days ago. 

Spikey please can you tell me the item number for those bottles. I have been looking for some for a while but can not find anything suitable. Thanks in advance..

Dave,

Sorry to hear about your troubles. Your shop had been a project saver many a time for me and of course you have a good supply of (then) Parkside Dundas kits.

Hadn't realised you were closed and popped over Friday to find your closure notice.

Hope the new show went well, most likely see you in Calne for some bits and bobs.

All the best,

Matt.

Castle, sorry I don't know the answer to your question but I do know those are two lovely built wagons you have. You have made an excellent job on them both. Always a pleasure to view your work Sir.

Happy Christmas to everyone watching and looking in on this thread. All the advice and encouragement has been greatly

appreciated, thank you.

Castle, what a fantastic finish build to a great years modelling. Thank you for all your posts and model supplies help throughout the year, as well as organising and conducting a superb Didcot RM day. Personally I can not thank you enough for your help and assistance. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year Sir.

Hi, I am looking for a decent empty 14T tank wagon box with the plastic inner, please.

Thank you for any responses.

Stunning matey what's your next project. 

Thank you. I am very please with the outcome although I have to sort the slight stutter on the chassis. I am thinking of removing the coupling rods and replacing them with the fluted ones but reversed to give the flat appearance as seen.

Next project, well I have an O gauge pannier kit I am really tempted to start, (no layout just a yard of track and a display case, lol) or a 4mm Simplex loco kit I have found stashed in a box.

Still struggling to complete those transfers though and I seem to have built a few more sleeper wagon kits, now have three fully loaded without transfers!

Edit: Oh and of course I have a planned layout to start!

Dear All,

I am having some really difficulty finding a thread I am sure I read on RMweb. Please can someone help me.

I am looking for the Great Western text type and sizing scale equivalent for MS word. The text I am most interested in is the 'return to ....' on ventilated wagons and locations names on brake vans, please.

I am sure I once read a thread on here about a particular site that can be used to create the exact text style and apprropriate scale sizing for 'OO'/4mm and thought I had bookmarked it but as Sod would have it does appear I did.

Thank you for any help and guidance in advance. (I am unable to log in daily at the moment but do as much as possible so please excuse any delayed gratitude.

Morning,

Well it truly has been a struggle to get motivated to get those transfers on noted wagons! I have managed a couple. The mink G had a disaster as the 'G' and 'W' transfers started to break up on the wagon and I just could not salvage them at all. It could be that my transfers are old as I have experienced some cracking before but they are HMRS so should be alright. In the meantime I diverted my attention with some pre-printed open wagons that I found in one of my collected 'to do' boxes.

One each of Cambrian (Sully, Bridgwater), Mike's Models (Marlborough College, Wiltshire) and Slaters in association with Pendon (Woodley, Oxford). All plastic kits and had very little flash to remove. There are some significant size difference between the finished kits (shown my ignorance again) but this does allow for interesting changes throughout a rake. 

Each kit went together well. All three had differences regarding the initial construction of the solebar. I preferred the Slaters kit for this and found the Mike's Models kit required a certain amount of refining to allow the wheels to actually move in the bearings as the axle boxes seems too close and pinched, this is more apparent in the Slaters wagon. The Cambrian kit had the best fit of the planked sides with the Slaters a very close second but the Mike's Models kit had one side fixed with doubles-sided tape to a piece of paper as part of the packaging/advertising and this remained on  the wagon side due to age of kit most likely. Rather unfortunate as I was hoping to have these as empties. I expect there is a lot of weathering and dirtying that can be applied to hide once I set to it rather than a load. I would have tried 'sticky stuff remover' but had concerns that I may end up destroying the pre-printed side. 

I used a pin flow type device to make invisible liquid cement joins for the interior of the open wagons. With a short practice this worked really well and genuinely the joins made are near invisible unless you get real close. A little tricky to load and use but well worth the investment and practice time to create good strong cement joints especially for empty open wagons.

Edit for pictures; First shows the slow progress with transfers. Second of those wagons, as mentioned showing the 'sticky stuff' on the inside of the Marlborough College wagon.

Further edit; I should have put pictures of the inside of the wagons to help show what I was trying to explain i.e. the sticky stuff. The Slaters one has the best fit regarding planked sides to base the other two both have slightly wider bodies than the flooring. The pictures also demonstrate how effective the pin flow application has been as each wagon has been glued from the visible interior side. I started with the Marlborough College wagon which shows a little but I figured I would be grubbing or loading it up anyway.

I would say definitely Slaters. I have been working on a wagon kit by this manufacturer and the associated transfers look exactly the same style as what I have been using. My transfers also seem to have lost the 'stickiness' I continued with the pressfix method and plenty of Micro-sol after application. Everything seemed to work OK although the transfers actual did seem quite delicate when having to re-position them.

Allan,

I have followed your previous thread "Anything you can do....". Fantastic work. I have been completely inspired by your incredible model and wish one day to be able to create such beautiful buildings half as well.

Thank you Sir for sharing such a wonderful skill with us. I look forward to seeing more.

Wishing you all the best.

Matt

Well sat down to make a start on a transfer session and fell at the first hurdle! My starting point was the two steam banana wagons from the Parkside range and using HMRS transfers but the set does not include the 'Avonmouth' lettering of  "Return Empty to Avonmouth" which would be representative for my planned layout i.e. http://ukrailways1970tilltoday.me.uk/severn_valley_wagons.htm (third picture down).

I have trawled the internet this morning but currently I have no results. Even 'craftypapers' websire is a dead duck although I think it would be somewhat overkill going down the route of creating my own for now. Any ideas? (Other than leaving the destination out).

So I used my demotivated time wisely to finish of a little treat I purchased whilst ordering my wooden sleepers;

Edit: 

81C and bgman, thank you appreciate your comments.

Well, the next thing will to tidy the workbench (so I'm told!) but more seriously I now have a large number of kit built wagons that I put together during this project as 'distractions'. They are all painted but a serious transfer and coupling session(s) will be required to complete them.

I have a layout in the planning stages (about 6 years now) in desperate need of building as well. I intend to try and capture Chippenham Station (Wiltshire) in the late 20's, early 30's, including the Calne branchline. I will be running a wide variety of stock* and motive power as I am not as disciplined as Castle is with his. Although, where I can, I will have locomotive and stock numbers accurate to those either used or passing through the station/branchline. 

I'll post the 'distractions' when I get them picture and as they get finished. 

Not sure about blogging the layout build as that could run decades if this project is anything to measure it by    but I may.

Edit: * I also have a thing 6 wheeled tankers. This will become obvious if the blog takes off!

Update: Here are the distractions I mention;

OK this is it. Finally I have Hercules completed, well I say that...........................

........................After all the testing and re-testing the chassis now soldered has a slight stick! Of course the rods are now soldered etc etc so some time in the future I am going to try and fix this. Any suggestions please?!

I have added a few details to the complete the over all finish and glazed the cab windows. Currently in a 'just out of the workshop' livery and over time as I develop my weathering skills I will add a very slight weathering to the locomotive. This is something that can come in time as it would on the prototype. Happy with the overall finish and appearance though.

I have put one of my reference pictures in the background to make a direct comparison. I have really enjoyed this little project along with the 'happy accidents' and new modelling skills developed. I have also very much enjoyed the comments from everyone along the way. Thank you to all for your patience in watching this build, it has been a little time in coming. Now all I need to do is build my planned layout for it to run on, (after the chassis tweak). Hope you enjoyed the journey. Here are the pictures;

Thank you to everyone for their comments and continued support. Everything is always appreciated.

I would like to join in with the thanks you's. It was a fabulous day held by Castle and team. I learnt so much and enjoyed everyone's company a perfect way to spend a Sunday. 

Anyone umming and arring about going, if you can do so. You will not regret spending the day at Didcot and whats more if you are able to join the next RMweb tour you will see and learn a lot more than if just visiting.

Thank you again for a great day.

Thank you 81C that conifrms it, I will use the flat coupling rods. Thank you for the link as well. I think for layout purposes I will depict the single lamp option as it would be working/moving to a job for my planned layout rather than moving from shed to shed.

Thanks bgman, thought as much but just checking.

I think I have the head lamp answer. Found a picture in Steam Picture Library.com, seemingly in service although posed with a single lamp on the left hand side (looking forward (Fireman's side?));

Edit: although I have also found a description of a single lamp positioned in the bottom centre and the one describing a 36T crane has a lamp on top of the smoke box and one left looking forward.