TurboSnail

Brass would be better, I agree - I mentioned steel purely because I can get suitably-sized offcuts from work!

3 hours ago, Edwardian said:

1966 of 1918, so, like Sir Berkeley, the L Class, surprisingly late to be out-shopped without a cab. The enginemen have clearly expressed a view on this. Similarly, a rather Victorian lining scheme by the contemporary standards of mainline companies. This loco went to the contractors Logan & Hemingway contractors, and seen later here owned by a limestone quarry company.  

I have read a reference somewhere (can't remember where) that said Logan and Hemingway specifically ordered their locos without cabs on the grounds of visibility or safety. Presumably not on the grounds of crew morale though.

2 hours ago, AlfaZagato said:

Have you thought of casting your prints?  I know MIcroMark here in the US offers a not-lead casting kit.   For your smaller designs, making molds of a print, then casting in low-melt metals would offer a huge weight gain.

I have - I was looking at some of the kits from Prince August, but have decided against it for now. I live in a very small open-plan house with no outside or garage space, so any tools that create dirt, fumes etc. are unfortunately a no-go for me at the moment, particularly if they contain lead or other nasties. Otherwise I'd have a mill for making chassis! Spray painting gets done on the parking area outside and gains me a few odd looks from the neighbours.

(before anyone points out my obvious hypocrisy in having a 3D printer - that lives in a cupboard to contain the noise and smell, and only requires a shelf worth of space for all the ancillary bits)

28 minutes ago, Ruston said:

You can't beat products of the Boyne Engine Works. The lined one looks particularly nice.

 

I've got this beast on my work bench at the moment.

I hope you've reinforced your baseboards! One of my issues with my 3D printed locos is that they can be a bit light, especially the smaller ones where there's limited space to add weight. I'm thinking of trying out using steel plate for the footplate on a future model which might help. The lined loco has lead sheet in the tank and some steel in the bunker so it weighs more than the donor Terrier loco, but it's still a tad quick for my liking - might have to look into gearing it down somehow.

The lining was done with "print at home" transfer paper, first time I've used the laser printer paper and it seems to hold up to handling a bit better than the inkjet version.

I'd also speculate that the higher centre of gravity of a saddle tank would be a disadvantage on the narrow gauge tracks

Here are some of the Manning Wardle fleet, the plain green O Class is fresh off the shop floor

Following on from yesterday's post, the reasoning for my trip to Kempton was planning a small diorama, similar to the factory one I completed recently - I'm planning to model a small section of the pumping station coal drops circa the early 1930s. This would mean a small embankment with a wagon tippler (to feed the conveyer to the boilers), pedestrian/horse underpass and some manual coal drops (as used pre-tippler and still in use for other engines around the site). While there, I picked up a surprisingly hefty history of the railways on the site, which will help greatly with reference photos, plus I took a few photos of what is left of the embankment (including sticking a camera through the security fencing of the waterworks next door while trying not to look suspicious). The red area shows roughly the bit I want to represent, at the end of the spur from the SR main line.

I'll have to make use of modellers licence here as there's no way I can fit everything in the space I have (440x85mm), so I might have to reduce the twin track embankment to single and compress the scene a bit lengthways. I have to work out how to get the engine house in the background, as there wasn't access on site to get a square-on photo from far enough away. I also need to work out how to construct a wagon tippler, though at least I don't need to make it actually work! One of the photos I have shows LMS and SR wagons on the tippler with a Hibberd "Planet" - I've got some wagons that will work with that already, but that loco would be an interesting challenge...

Last weekend I went outside to look at some small steam engines:

This weekend I went inside to look at a big one:

More on the latter (which was in steam today!) at some point, as it does involve modelling projects...

Apologies for the commercial interlude, but a few of my locos, plus some surplus bodies, are up for sale on eBay at the mo, including these four - a Sentinel, a Ruston, a Garrett road lorry conversion and a prototype model for the Hunslet 22hp. Do take a look here if interested: https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_dkr=1&iconV2Request=true&_blrs=recall_filtering&_ssn=ts_modelengineering&_oac=1

4 hours ago, Edwardian said:

But what is this about figure painting? I love painting figures.

It's just one of my many modelling weaknesses! Painting in general isn't one of my favourite jobs, and on locos/buildings etc. I can usually either cheat by using transfers or use masking tape and spray cans. The precision needed for small organic shapes like people tends to evade me unfortunately...

Wishing you a speedy recovery

22 hours ago, AlfaZagato said:

Needs some crew, with that open cab.

I'll get round to it, at some point! People painting is one of my least favourite jobs and I'm a bit low on stock at the moment.

A Manning Wardle Class O belonging to Messrs Logan and Hemingway, doing some final test running after completing the contract to lay the track at Guilford Colliery.

The livery panels should really have incurved corners, but that's quite tricky to do neatly with this type of transfer. L&H specified open cabs on a lot of their locos (on safety grounds), so I've left off the 'diamond' canopy from this model. I also haven't modified the chassis yet (other than shortening it and repainting), but hopefully will add a flywheel to it at some point just to tame the high gearing the Hornby Terriers come with. The tank is full of lead and the bunker with that 'liquid lead' stuff so it weighs enough.

As occupied by a Peckett B1, a Sentinel and - presumably waiting to use the steam supply from the gantry - a Hawthorn Fireless

35 minutes ago, fulton said:

Just for information, it was new to me, the C class tender and most of the parts, body shells, including the limited edition, grey livery are available from Bachmann spares, I've just completed Number 689 with a new chassis.

I thought about going that route, but by the time I'd added up the cost of all the bits needed to make a running tender it was approaching £40 before postage, a whole loco secondhand wasn't too much more - and I can use the loco chassis for an S Class and hopefully get a few quid back by eBaying the loco body or just strip it for spares such as buffers, safety valves, cab fittings etc.

So much for a quick project - but my factory diorama has progressed to a point that I can call it finished and stick it in the display cabinet. I think I'll add some more details later down the line and possibly do some more weathering, but I'm happy for now and can tick something off the ever-growing "to-do" list.

More pics to follow once some things at the other end of the scene have finished drying.

I found a good excuse to start another project by picking up a cheap C Class at the Alexandra Palace show - a well-used example with glue marks, some lining missing and apparently a few running issues.

All I really wanted from it was the tender, which will get repainted at some point anyway. I'll be able to find another use for the chassis and it seems to run ok on a 9v battery, so I'm sure I'll be able to fix it up.

The tender, with a minor modification to the electrical connector, couples up nicely to another Bachmann chassis (and it runs so the wiring must be the same). I will need to add some tender pick-ups, as the loco chassis only picks up off the drivers.

This is likely to be quite a long-term project, but my hope is that this will eventually become the proposed SECR Atlantic - when the first batch of D Class locomotives were suffering from corrosion and priming issues, Wainwright drew up plans for an Atlantic in case the D Class could not be made to work satisfactorily. Water softening solved the issues so the Atlantic never advanced.

I have a basic line drawing from the RCTS "Locomotives of the South Eastern and Chatham Railway" book, but haven't tracked down anything better yet - if further drawings are unavailable I might fill in the details using D Class parts as they seem similar.

With my old Anycubic Photon having given up the ghost (screen glitches meant it wouldn't print properly) I had the choice of repair or replace - normally I'd go for repair, but I've already done this repair on this printer once before, and technology has moved on so much in the 5 years or so since it first came out, so I have now replaced it with a newer model.

The print shelf is looking a tad smarter now! I'm not planning on upgrading my tupperware though...

Some of the first things to be printed on it were some bits for the diorama, including this pipe bridge and the flanges and valves for the pipework (the pipes themselves are aluminium wire). I'm pretty happy with it so far - it's not streets ahead of the old printer in terms of overall part finish, but there are noticeably fewer errors in prints, less warp and it's much faster.

2 hours ago, TangoOscarMike said:

You didn't actually ask for suggestions, but here's one anyway. I can't detect any variation in brick colour - a bit of that (subtle or un-subtle) would be pleasing to my eye, and would probably improve the realism. 

Suggestions always welcome - bit late to add any more to it, but it is a bit more varied to the eye than to the camera. One of the issues of my modelling space is that in winter it doesn't get much natural light during the day, which makes all my photos come out a bit dingy if I don't wait for the next day!

I was reminded why I don't weather things very often - the left end wall of this building ended up with some obvious black streaks from the weathering powders. The back wall isn't great either but I can't really do much about that, the end wall is small enough for me to attempt a repair. The photos show, in order - first attempt at weathering, painted over with mortar colour, coloured back in, and second attempt at weathering. It's still not great but better than it was, at least.

I was planning for some 3D printed bits to go in while doing the ground cover, but my printer has finally given up the ghost, so this project will be on hold for a bit while I replace that.

Showing the overall layout - I've got a few more bits to print out and the buildings need weathering before doing the ground cover

I build too many locos.

Well, if such a thing is possible. But in the absence of space for a bigger layout, I'd like somewhere to put them on display rather than hiding away in boxes. I've got a display cabinet but it's a bit dull having locos against a grey background, so I'm challenging myself to build a few small dioramas this year. Hopefully this a) is easy enough to complete, being relatively small projects and b) distracts me from making so many locos!

The first one is underway, and is meant to represent a fairly generic industrial site, with an old brick building one end and a later extension at the other. I've got a few doors and windows to add before putting the track in - which will be home to my Barclay 0-6-0 and Hawthorn fireless locos... and maybe the recently announced Rapido ones too!

I'm already being distracted by thoughts of what the next display could be...

One of the more recently completed locos, a Howard petrol shunter - I've got plenty of long-term stuff on the go and wanted something I could do in a day, so this fit the bill nicely. Nice simple enjoyable modelling without having to work out why everything doesn't fit properly!

I'm not familiar with how they make those resin cast buildings but I suspect the cost is largely tied to the physical size of whatever moulds they have to use, coupled with (and this is pure speculation) probably lower expected sales numbers.

While I've 3D printed a lot of locos, I've never got fully on board with it for buildings, not sure why. I prefer to use plasticard sheet around a card shell, but do use 3D printing for some details like doors and windows. However, it's less fun when, as I did on Friday evening, you dig out your stock of plasticard for a weekend project and discover it's gone brittle and now shatters at the slightest touch of the knife! The Slaters thick stuff is fine, as is the SE Finecast sheet, but whatever this other brand is is now virtually unusable.

It's a bit of a mix up, this loco - I combined a 14" and 16" Barclay a while ago to make a Grant Ritchie 0-4-2ST, which I still haven't completed. This loco uses the leftovers from that project, so it's a 14" with some heavier-duty elements. The cab is a 3D print based on "John Howe" at the Ribble museum, the chimney is a spare from the Grant Ritchie project, the bufferbeams are extended with plasticard and the dumb buffers are offcuts of oak. I still need to add some brass cab spectacle frames, but I haven't had the etches for that done yet.

I wanted to use this loco as a test for further home-made transfer experiments, this time using clear paper instead of the white backed I had used before. That meant I needed a relatively light colour body - it's slightly less garish in person! The lining and lettering were again based on "John Howe" and came out ok - the yellow lining suffered a bit, but the stronger colours came out fine. There is some silvering in places, but not too much and hopefully will become more or less invisible if I ever get round to weathering it.

I made a few tweaks to the Ruston 44/48 kit prior to re-release, so felt I needed to test build another one. Done in a few hours over the weekend, I now have the Heinz version (green - with the bigger radiator header tank) to go with the "as-built" (blue) version I made a few years ago when I originally designed the body. A fun little quick build, as opposed to some of my projects which can go on for years... more on one of those later.