Spitfire2865

Shapeways manages to give you the option to group ordered items with previous yet to ship orders. And they must deal with a similar level of outgoing orders per day.

Though they do tend to always ship in the same sized boxes regardless of size or number of items. And with much more unfriendly packaging material to boot.

I wonder what the project was? It looks as though it might be on a preserved line.

With those trees cleared, Id think the would need to strengthen that embankment.

As ever excelent modeling. I am suprised you had not resorted to casting earlier.

Richard

I still dont intend to move to casting for major works.  Much prefer the fiddling around with wood and styrene.

But for the rare instance it may prove to be useful.  

Wow, another update in less than a month? Must be early Christmas!

So recently Ive been splitting my main modelling time between the G3 boxcar and the rc tugboat.

On the railroad front, Ive framed, sheathed, and hung doors on the car.

And what will become a functional brake has been added.

Ive also dipped my toes in the black art of recasting.

From some 2.5" gauge trucks I bought, I needed a new journal cover as one was missing.

So I bought some polymer clay and made a simple 2 part mould.

And I then had the chance to try making some whitemetal castings with VERY rudementary tools. A tincan on the stove for a meltpot and a stick as a skimmer.

But I managed some decent results and a few castings before the mould broke apart.

Im pleased to say the least.

And on the tugboat.

I received the RC parts, decided to swap out the esc and motor, decide to change the esc again, and install the lot in a relatively tight hull.

But then the cabin was planked.

And details fitted.

And me being me, Ive decided to fit functional navigation lights on the limited areas available. All controlled individually via switches in the cabin.

All thats needed now is a tow light and possibly an anchor light if I feel like it for display purposes.

I could also control a headlamp via ch5 on my transmitter.

The boat was also given its first water test last week, at which point I discovered the esc wasnt powerful enough at full throttle.

The struggles of a joggled driveshafe and slightly tight stuffing box.

At least the rudder works well and it actually floats relatively level. For something I put together from mostly scraps of wood, Im pleasantly surprised.

Excuse the intrusion, but I asked this question in a couple of places and didn't get a full answer. I thought I knew my way around what wagon kits were or had been available, but these have passed me by. The first has been identified by Jol Wilkinson as an LNWR D33. Almost all the others in the collection (there were about 15) were pregrouping, so I'm guessing these are too.:

 

 

Request for help this morning. I acquired a box of part completed wagons a few months ago and dug them out last night with a view to finding out what they are. I managed most of them but there are a few which still elude me. I'd be grateful if anyone else could pin them down:

 

I know I've seen these before. LNWR? By ABS?

 

 

This is part of a twin but I only have one half. The axleboxes are quite distinctive:

 

 

Again, part of a twin (I have both of these)with offset axles. These have a cast WM floor as well, not the usual plastic insert:

 

 

Finally one of two single bolsters which came as a pair.

 

That first one looks like a David Geen kit to my eyes.

The third looks like the L&Y twin from 51L?

Did you check the tips are clear?

Is the paint thinned properly?

What pressure are you spraying at?

Ive had several instances at this point of someone offering a best offer lower than my auction start, i counteroffer and they let it expire. Is it not going through?

How I see it working, if its BIN and best offer, you go low. If its Auction and best offer, youre fighting to end it early, thus slightly higher. No?

There’s a lot of posts on ebay which make me wonder.

 

There is a whole industry in taking items on Amazon, and relisting them at a higher price on ebay, if you win, it’s delivered from Amazon, in an Amazon box, it could just be one of those items scraped off Amazon on stuck on ebay, model railways are not immune to it.

But at least there they arent ADVERTISING exactly where they are getting it and what they are doing with it.  

There is no convention, least none that Ive ever heard about in either Britain or America.  

Do what is convenient to you. Though if your transformer has a horizontal direction switch, I would wire it with respect to what side youre on.  Helps the brain not get confused.  

Anthracite would not be used for loco coal so the wagons that had contained loco coal would have had the soft, bituminous Welsh steam coal, reputedly the best steam coal in the world. The only locos I know of that did burn anthracite were in Pennsylvania. They were odd looking things with the driver in a cab perched up above the middle of the boiler and the poor fireman on a rather spartan platform at the rear. The firebox was huge and  the full width of the loco. I think they were only to be found on the Reading and Lehigh Valley; if I'm wrong I will soon be corrected!

Only took a few minutes.

What youre referring to is called a "Camelback" on account of the hump caused by the cab.

Quite popular actually around these parts.  Many railroads used them for quite a range of services, freights and local passenger services.  But of course they werent as popular as conventional locomotives.  Although I could see it working rather well with an auto-stoker, but I dont know if it was ever tried.  

It seems no one at SHAPEways knows how to properly implement change.  

I do wonder with that previous question answered, how much of a pain would it be to clean up if someone were to open the drop doors of a D299 with a load of small general goods, such as baskets or the like.  At least on one side you could get under the wagon "easily" to pick up whatever fell out.  

Another e...e bidder has now got me. And its not even a railway item. Except this one has 15000 feedback on the US site.

But I suspect bidding to rediculous values which I dare not find out.

Shapeways are still continuing to tweak all the pricing algorithms for the detailed plastics and some of my products having recently gone down are now higher than ever, one to watch out for. I've decided to take a step back for a while and see where they end up, giving how many times they've changed their mind it seems fairly clear that they haven't got a strategy on this one so it's not worth planning until the dust has settled...

IF the dust settles.

Ive used plaster cloth over foam before. Makes quite a strong surface, but hard to blend edges without noticable ridges. So perhaps a normal plaster mix slapped on and worked to the finished surface to easily blend together and make it strong.

Have you had a look at the worm gear? Possibly its slipped from its place and is binding when forward running?

One of the 'Usual Suspects' with a "kit built" item:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LIMA-FLEISCHMANN-KIT-BUILT-RAKE-of-3-WAETHERED-BR-CCT-PARCELS-VAN-WAGON-nq/372416385905?hash=item56b5bf1371:g:BFEAAOSwplBbg8Zw:rk:18:pf:0

 

So someone has taken three Lima CCT van's, ditched the chassis, taken three too short wagon chassis from somewhere, sawn them in half and then bunged the results badly onto the underside of the van bodies.

 

WHY?!?

Its clearly to represent those very rare, only 3 built, prototype wagons where the designer decided the body should be strong enough to not need a chassis.  Its as if youre not even a real railway modeller!

Im finding people putting a starting bid on an item with no traffic mere seconds before the auction ends.  Only reason I know is I dont get the "your item has been relisted" email immediately, but get a "congratulations" email a bit later. 

90% of the time for anything high value I send out it gets tracked delivery with appropriate insurance costs x2, one to pay the customer back and one to pay myself back.  Job done.

 

Id be weary of that.  It might be considered fraud to claim an item is worth double.  While your logic is sound, I see it backfiring if someone filing a theoretical insurance claim catches onto the stated values.  

I know for ebay if you choose to insure it through their online payment portal, you cant claim it more than the final list price. How fees and shipping costs are calculated in that Im not sure.  

I would think any suitable hardwood they had access to.  As its exposed, one of the more resilient breeds.

Perhaps whatever theyd be using for rolling stock? Oak?

Naah, doing it at home takes a bit of effort but it isn't as bad as you make out. I don't think anyway. Gloving and masking up for 15 minutes or so isn't the end of the world.

 

My Class 28 loco bodies in FUD were hovering around £75-78 for months. Recient price issues made some of them go to £83, now I check and some have gone to £94.

 

They really know have to drive sales....away.

It's a great motivator for doing things yourself isn't it? In progress.

See post #43.

All par for the course at this point. Best of luck doing it yourself.  

Ive honestly never liked the traditional American style of pickups.  But for tenders where you may have several axles dragging on the pickup wires, I can see its appeal.  

My Guard seems to quite like his Lima O Scale Toad, which has had a bit of TLC applied...

 

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Re American Cabooses (or 'Cabeese'?!) here's one on display at the Railroad Museum in Plant City, FL. I think the "Wide Vision" copula would easily break the UK loading gauge, & the whole thing would make any UK brake van look very small, but of course they were partly built for much longer distance travel.

 

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Here's the interior view through one of the end doors. Includes a kitchen sink!! and a big stove (not sure if this one would be oil or propane gas-fired). Ladders to the seats in the copula are next, then more benches and seats to look out of the end windows beyond. Quite a contrast to a UK Van!

 

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Surprising lack of handrails inside.  

Though I suppose this does date from postwar where they had such luxuries as limited slop drawgear and controlled airbrakes.  American cabooses earlier werent a far cry from the humble brake van.  You best hold on when the train gets going.

I have £5 on this new "less than +10% from historical pricing" adjustment being significantly worse than they claim.  

I still havent forgotten his previous "+/-5%" claim that was proven to be such a brazen lie. 

But to actually answer the title question: I would guess that at  some time pre WWII, most TOADs were double ended. If the builds of double ended TOADs by the constituents of what became the LMS and LNER were not sufficient to have achieved this by 1923, then those two group's builds - which between them had near 80% of the UK freight mileage - will have quickly produced this result. (Explanation. 'TOAD' is a telegraphic code for a goods brake van and not an exclusive term restricted to any one UK railway.)

But the OP wasnt talking about the telegraph code "TOAD" but the typical GWR brake van "TOAD".

So its less a question on who had more vans in traffic and more to why the GWR designers didnt modernize sooner and shift their design strategy to more modern concepts.

Maybe they were just bitter the rest of the country didnt like the Churchward brakes?

Or maybe, being the only company of the grouping to not have undergone a major philosophy shift with the merging companies, they kept to their own tried and trusted methods.