richard i

A B3 now there is something I need to have a go at making.

A delight to see one modeled so well.

Lots of peoples only experience of steam locos are preserved ones, not run how the regular ones were......

Though i have tried to listen to others about how fast trains should really go and then gauge it off passing signals or buildings.

If anything Tony was always telling me to slow down. The exuberance of youth?

Richard

Speaking of manners and formality, I hope this is of amusement to some; I mentioned that letter in an old issue of Model Railway News complaining about the Grouping, here it is - presuming copyright not to be violated after 90 years? The letter is from the May 1925 issue of MRN.

 

grouping.jpg

 

Yours faithfully,

 

B Ten

 

Major, Late R.A.

Thats why we should study it.

It was our pleasure Jesse (please note your name has a capital letter, as it should have). 

 

You taught me a lot as well; things such as how my prejudices with regard to a person's appearance can be very misleading and limiting (though I still think you should have thought twice about having another tattoo). 

 

I'm glad that you made it home all right, and that your new loco made it in one piece (I assume it did).

 

Raven A2.jpg

 

Though it's been seen before, I'm glad it's gone to a young modeller. Despite some concerns that the cylinders appear a bit wide, it had no trouble going past Bytham's platforms or Grantham's. 

 

See you over in Blighty next year? You're most welcome.

 

Tony your comment about prejudice on a persons appearance being limiting. All I can say is thank god my wife can see past appearances otherwise I would be single. I think that statement is true for a lot men.

Richard

No chance!

It does look tempting as I've never built anything other than OO!!

As a precaution I have offered it to Andy for an unrefusable sum.

 

Now does anyone want some bargain telegraph poles. Or Midland 48' under frames or bogies?

Richard

No idea where mine comes from. I lived in a family who had no interest in trains really and for the most part in Germany, Norway and Holland at least 7 years after steam endded and then more. So how does that explain an interest in Steam, espespecially LNER and Pre grouping? My grandfather had a trainset, but we visited less than once a year throughout the time he was alive.

I think it was a way as a third child to get my own toys as my brothers were not interested in it. I had to have their old clothes so their old toys seemed a step too far.

Richard

I got an e mail from a company looking for my business addressed as " hey buddy" and a formal letter from a bank addressed as my wife's proper name and then mine as Rick. As can be imagined . They did not get my business.

Richard

They look pretty darned impressive do those. The milk van too. 

 

It has just occurred to me that this type of wagon would offer a rare chance to do steel wagon weathering in a pre-group setting. So I think a similar conversion in 7mm will go on my waiting list, the only problem being that that waiting list is already very long. 

 

As for what they were used for, I still don't know, but there was a lot of heavy industry in GC territory and some of it likely had use for hopper wagons. Old Silkstone Colliery had some PO hopper wagons, so there must have been a traffic. Perhaps to power stations or coke ovens, either of which were numerous.

The wagons were never clean

The inside was an experiment of thinned track rust washes of black and brown with brown pastels shaved on to them. The results were better than I expected

The outsides used oils picked up to experiment with to ultimately do a teak affect.

Lastly the milk van has gone through the paint shop and awaits its transfers.

So the conversion can be done, the handles were the hardest bit as 6mm handles don't seem to exist, we'll certainly not over here.

Richard

I think in my book of locos that never were, I read OVS first contemplated a2-8-2 before settling on the MN design?

He did, and some have tried to model it. It would have looked great. It was turned down due to fear of the stability of a front pony at speed ...I think.

I like the somewhat laconic line at the bottom "I am not aware of any models"

The Baltic A1 could be done as an un streamlined W1 post rebuilding. There was no engineering reason it had to be given a cods mouth.

It has reverted to just inner frame now...P1040101a.jpg

Spoil sport

Hi Derek

 

Yes you could be correct as I forgot all about Neasden MPD, just a point of interest was Neasden MPD still open to steam early 1963.

 

Regards

 

David

Richard

The photo I had in mind is in Tatlow's LNER wagons vol 1, p123. The wagon is in GC livery (not good nick) and the word 'LOCO' is barely visible.

I'm sure I have a better copy somewhere, but can't lay my hand on it. Though, typically of me, I immediately found two photos of diag 25 steel loco coal wagons each with slightly different versions of LOCO COAL lettering!

 

It's possible the hopper wagon is pictured in LNER days as GC livery lasted quite long in some cases. Anyway, these things were built 1904, so predate Immingham, and I think the drops there were more suited to wagons with end doors. 

 

My guess is these hoppers were built for a specific traffic, but what it was I have no idea. The GC committee minutes might elucidate, but I wouldn't bet on it.

I think you are right about immingham, now you have said it i can visulise the drops. So open to all. What traffic were these originally built for?

Richard

Like it! I wonder what these babies were built for it the first instance. As it happens, I have a rather crummy photo of one marked 'LOCO' but I can't help but think that these would be a b****** nuisance if they arrived at the average coaling stage. Presumably you would have to dump 20 ton of coal on the track, then shovel it up by hand. Or alternatively, stand in the wagon and shovel it over the side. Unless someone can think of a better technique.

 

I can't help but think they would be better going to a power station or other location with facilities to receive hoppers.

My photo from GC days makes no reference to loco so more likely for coal drops - to go to immingham? Where else on the GC had coal drops as a logical end point for the traffic?

You seem to have picked one of the double framed variants. They were not often photographed and were rarely seen outside of the north east. It will be good to see one of these finally being modeled .

Back to models, though it was fun to learn the basics of colouring in photos. I will go back to it.

All done bar the painting. I decided not to do the rivets. I can't see them until up close. I had the devil to find wheels for the side so in the end I had to make one from a washer and some wire, a la Denny, the roding from the wheels is only representational because life is only so long, they will run in rakes so it will be hard to see anyway and I have other things to build if I am ever going to finish this layout in less than 20 years. Pragmatism getting in the way of perfection, or as close as I could ever get to it.

Richard

If you really want engines far from home, look no further than the two world wars. Gw rail motors in Scotland, etc.

I ended up building one or two O gauge items for other people and really enjoyed the change after 35 years working in 4mm EM gauge. I have built pretty much every layout that I have in my head (apart from one or two that were way too ambitious and I will never have room for).

 

So in order to give me a fresh challenge, I am plotting a 7mm layout. However, my hobby is all about making things rather than buying them so there won't be any RTR in sight. It won't be a shunting plank either. I am going for a small double track terminus station, which can fit in a 16' length (plus a fiddle yard) allowing for 4-6-0 loco types and 5 bogie carriages.

 

The problem with a good supply of reasonable quality RTR is that people then start designing layouts around what is available and they all end up looking somewhat similar in terms of motive power. So you are very likely right in your prediction of shunting planks a plenty but hopefully I will avoid falling into that group!

I have something similar in 4mm and barely fit it in to 16ft, what are you using as baseboards, the TARDIS?

Richard

Success....of sorts. I have taken down the saturation and the red side lamp now shows. It looks more realistic.

still a work in progress though as a skill.

Now for something more complicated/intricate

Richard

I think you would need to start with a higher resolution photo to get the best effect.

I have been advised elsewhere that I need to desaturate the colours, so I just need to work out how to do that.

Richard

Round two, had a bit more of a play. I can not seem to get red to behave for the lamp. Sorry Bill i tried. It feels coloured in like the BBC stuff from 20years ago. I need to work out how to make that aspect improve.

It has been interesting having a go at it.

If i can improve it would be good to have a go at a full GCR train, perhaps one of the iconic photos frommy book collection.

It has put the wagons on hold for a day or two.

Richard

A few pages back you posted some photos of a horsebox. None of us can really say for sure exactly what colour brown the GCR used but I thought that vehicle looked right to my eyes. I don';t think that you would be far wrong using whatever you used on that for carriages. It would make sense if they matched up anyway, as they should be in the same livery.

 

I have seen other period paintings where the brown is much more like your horsebox. In the painting above, the colours generally don't look too convincing, especially the green of the loco.

 

I don't know of any preserved GCR carriages in a painted brown finish but there are the Barnums at Ruddington that would have been varnished wood rather than painted. It would make sense if the painted finish was near to that colour, otherwise it would have looked as if the GCR had two different liveries.

 

Of course these are well weathered and old no but they give a reasonable idea of the colour to go for.

 

https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7304/9396550796_f24d613497_b.jpg

 

Tony

The horse box is precision one pot teak rather than the base coat then top coat they do. Then it is given a wash of brown earth to give it colour variation. That has the red in it.

Richard

Not a real location but I will have a GCR station with all parts in 18feet once finished. This includes the curves at the ends. We need to remember platforms could be short for the locals to stop at, but longer expresses would breeze through.

So where do these three meet?

Just out of Euston? But then the GCR crosses over a station if I recall.