David_Belcher

Ages ago somebody had an eBay listing for a LMR 'London District' motor coach using a later GF suburban coach with a Triang EMU power bogie. Ingenious and quite nicely done. One of these days I might have a go at converting some GF suburbans to a MSJ&A unit just for something different to do... David

I bought a bundle of early 70s MRCs years ago with GF ads on the back cover featuring said never-were wagons. David

The newest arrival - a boxed 3rd gen (all plastic, Dorset factory) "Iolanthe". Tempted to leave the bodyside factory finish alone on this one (although the crest printing is a tad crude)? Metal wheels already done, roof detail, couplers, Keen buffer beams and gangway ends still to sort, also the upper recessed panels on the coach ends which need blocking up & painting. Glazing units temporarily removed, double sided tape had expired. David

Did they do a cellulose acetate brake car or did that come later with the change to styrene? For parlour cars, I've seen a Golden Arrow example or two recently, but not a faux-Wagons Lits one.

Early Farish is also prone, Kings and Bulleid Pacifics often pop up on eBay with diecast bits missing/detached...the 5MT and the Prairie on the other hand seem to fare better? David

It's a little bit of a shame that GF didn't keep 00 going, but with a lot of competition (I think they pulled out around the time that Mainline and Airfix were launching RTR) in 4mm compared to far less in British-outline N it was a canny move. David

The non-corridor stock isn't a bad representation of LMS designs. Pity they didn't capture the Maunsell roof profile for the corridor coaches though. The Pullmans could have done with a bit more roof detail, but the matchboard sides wouldn't be done again in 00 RTR until the current century so noteworthy from that point of view. The brake car should really be a 12 wheeler; which mine will be, one of these days... David

Always good to see some 00 gauge GF stuff, I'm a big fan of the coaches and the suburban ones in particular are neat. Currently have some of the 2nd & 3rd generation styrene-bodied Pullmans on the workbench awaiting roof details, a new coat of paint and for the brake car some major underframe details as it should be a 12-wheeler. I recently acquired a second parlour car so I now have a 3-coach set to work on; one of them will be a 2nd class car (169 or 171) with 'Iolanthe'* as the 1st class one - the bodies are almost identical on the real thing. They've also got decent Keen buffer beams and buffers now plus gangways bodged from old Hornby Gresleys. Already in service - one SR green main line brake compo (original bogies but Ratio corridor connections, MJT vents & turned metal buffers) as a loose through coach, a two-coach suburban set (1 compo, 1 brake 3rd) in unlined LMR maroon with MJT buffers, bogies and vents. David *I'm not a Gilbert & Sullivan fan, but it was Reggie Perrin's middle name** and I do like a classic sitcom, so... **I didn't get where I am today by buying the earlier GF Pullmans with bodies that warped.

Shades of the HR 0-4-4Ts that worked the Dornoch branch?

Ditching the moulded nameplate or just popping an etched one over the top? When I used a Hall footplate/splashers to build my '57 varieties' 44743 the plate mouldings were a bit of a challenge to remove! David

Any rewheeling? Drivers look in better proportion to the running plate than on my Scotsman-powered effort.

Ah, that'll be the difference. Britannia drivers should be the correct size for an A2. A1/3/4 ones are too big. David

Chassis looks better proportioned than my old Trix-based effort. Did you rewheel it with the correct size (25mm) drivers? UPDATE: Just realised I got this pic mixed up with 33C's post!

Arrived yesterday, taken it partly to bits...footplate is solid (boiler moulding appears to have a gap underneath) so a lot of cutting is called for! Tender looks a fairly easy proposition with just a new chassis of U-shaped section needed plus coupling & disc wheels. Motorised Rovex chassis turns out to have solid-backed wheels (despite having the later style of front coupler) so those now need to replacing. Curses!

Thanks, I was unaware of that. I owned a Dublo Deltic years ago and couldn't remember any such lines, although it was a repaint of a repaint so may have started life plain green... David

It was yours (and Simon Martin's) Trix A2 reworkings that sent me down this rabbit hole in the first place! I was very impressed with what had been done to update a bodyshell made back in the 60s and give it a modern, more accurate chassis. David

Being a diecast model, I don't think it would have had a boundary line added - Meccano never bothered with a panel boundary on the two-tone Deltics...did they? David

Palitoy and Jouef solved the problem in a similar way at around the same time. But look at how compact the motors in their Peak and EE Type 4 bogies are compared to HD motors. David

With hindsight, should've done that with my last effort - the wheel diameter/wheelbase are much better suited. Nice model (I see you have the proper tender, too - the use of the corridor type let the Trix original down a bit). David

The HD Bo-Bo 2-rail chassis had failings that weren't ironed out until the MU and the AL1 appeared, so I guess a diesel model that used the more successful 3-axle power bogie was an obvious choice, without directly competing with a Lines Brothers product (the 0-6-0 DE shunter was the only diesel or steam outline model where they properly overlapped with Rovex IIRC), otherwise I suspect they'd have plumped for a 31 or 37. Had the Bo-Bo chassis been flawless a Derby Type 2 might have been a better choice in that power category than the Metro-Vick; during the 60s all regions except the Western had one (and by the end of it even former WR territory like the Cambrian had some) at some point, even if their axle loading didn't make the ones with heating boilers popular on the ex-Chatham lines of the Southern. I'm surprised they didn't put the 3-axle Ringfield power bogie into a Brush 4, but maybe they'd already got wind that Trix had one planned? In the Michael Foster book this seems to have been the very reason why a Ringfield-driven Western was binned. Safe to say that a Derby or EE Type 4 would have been an unlikely choice given the need to be compatible with tight "train set" curved track back in the day. David

Some had flush-panel rather than the usual recessed-type doors fitted, and/or ended up being used for explosives traffic (the actual GPVs owed a lot to Mink design). I used to have a couple in BR grey running as such on a North Wales layout (large scale slate/granite quarrying plus the ICI works at Penrhyndeudraeth meant they were a common sight on the Cambrian, etc.). David

Ages ago I built an A2 Pacific in 00 using a Trix body, a Hornby non-corridor tender top and a modified Tri-ang 'Scotsman' chassis. Fun to build but it always looked like it was on the wrong chassis as the pic shows. Fast forward a few years and I currently have a cheap GBL 'Blue Peter' on its way from eBay plus a Tri-ang Princess chassis and some other bits. Hoping it will be a fairly straightforward job. The loco will be 60536 'Trimbush' in BR green with later emblem, which was apparently allocated (on paper at least) to York for the very end of its career, fitting nicely with the location I model. Suspect I can improve on my previous effort... David

I'd only do this with a partly intact bike if there were particularly desirable bits on it that a someone wouldn't be willing to buy a whole frameset for (e.g. my last cyclo-cross bike had Mafac brakes which I sold separately; the less interesting headset and chainset stayed on the frame). In the model train world, the dearth of cheap-ish wrecks that the likes of me might see as a rebuild, repaint & detailing project is indeed a shame. My 'City of Sheffield' started off that way. David

For a moment I thought the palm trees were there to give a Torbay vibe!! David

Later 5MTs had a tweaked version of the same casting, I think, with the rear body fixing screw going vertically rather than horizontally. Certainly, when I built 44743 I had to do a bit of thinking and improvisation to get the body to stay on the chassis at the cab end... David