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Dave John

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  1. Dave John

    At the back, but is it a scene ?

    By Dave John,


    General
    Bit by bit I am getting on with with the backscene. I think I have set myself a difficult task, trying to get a feel of depth and perspective in 2d. If I was a skilled artist it might be easier just to paint it, but I am not so the only thing I can do is the collage of photos method.

    I have played around with the panorama tools in Affinity. They work well with stitching a set of nice countryside photos together but can’t really cope with the complexity of a row of slightly different tenements. Perspective is also an odd thing, getting a feeling of depth is a case of using shadow, but it tends to work best if you are looking at the picture from a narrow angle not a wide one.

    So here are a couple of snapshots of the progress to date. It is just sitting there for now, there are a few joins that need touching in. Not sure about the chimneys, they look ok front on but not at an angle. That said it is a backscene, hopefully the focus of attention should be on the foreground.
     




     
     
     


    Halfway, lets see how the other half works out.
  2. Dave John
    I could just buy a backscene. Lots of companies offer them but the thing is none of them say “west end of Glasgow”. Or for that matter any real part of Edwardian Glasgow. Anyway where is the fun in just buying stuff?

    So I have an idea in my head, long rows of traditional tenements interspersed with some industrial buildings. Maybe some older houses tucked in there too. Well, quite a few buildings, I am going to need about 18 feet of backscene in total.

    Easy then, its what I did on Kelvinbank 1. Well, yes and no. Photography and printing have moved on since then. Just go off, take a lot of photographs of tenements, spend a few weeks in a photographic program, print it out and stick it together. In theory. I live in the west end of Glasgow, I can walk about and take pictures of tenements all day long. Thing is though its much harder than it seems, particularly if you want a straight on front view. Thousands of places I can can pics from ground level at an angle but straight on ? Or even fairly straight on? It has taken a while but I’m getting to grips with it.

    The basic method is simple. Get a pic , put it into Affinity or other program, square it off. Fix the stonework, slate the roof, sort the chimneys, replace the window and doors, get rid of all the modern bits, shift the lampposts. Scale it to size, print it out. Squint at it from various angles, go back to square 1, have another go. Ad Nauseam.

    Somewhere under all those bits of paper is a railway…..


  3. Dave John
    Odd how you sometimes think you are going to tackle some part of layout building and then you end up spending a few weeks doing something totally different. I had been thinking about backscenes, but somehow I just fancied doing something a bit scenic. Generally scenery isn’t my strength but I keep seeing so may layouts on here with wonderful rural scenes which tempted me into having a play about.

    So I had a go at the harbour scene. Which by the nature of harbours requires some water. I have tried some of the the fancy scenic waters in the past but without good results, they seemed prone to cracking and expensive. So having read up about it I went for the standard layers of pva and paint followed by layers of varnish method. I’ll let you judge whether it does look like the muddy esturial waters at the confluence of the Kelvin and the Clyde, but I’m happy with it for now.












  4. Dave John
    It's ok, I haven’t suddenly decided to start a revolution, tempting though the idea is. I am of course referring to the figures for the layout. These are a mix, mostly from Andy Stadden with some from Prieser and a few older ones in places they can only be glimpsed at. The men are the problem. Most of the Edwardian ladies have wide skirts and so stand up without too much of a problem, though the ones with the hemline daringly 3 inches off the floor do tend to tip up. The men will too but the smallest disturbance and they all fall over. Hmm, fine if you are modelling a Glasgow Friday night.

    So, how to make them stand up? The obvious answer is glue but it is rather a permanent solution. Done it in the past, if you want to move a figure for variety or to add detail it tends to take a lump of the scenery out stuck to the feet.

    So I bought some “Tacky wax”. Maybe its just me but I didn’t really like it. Doesn’t seem to stay tacky enough to hold someone up unless you put a fair sized blob on the feet. Then they just look like a figure stuck in a big blob of wax. I tried a few things, such as warming it first, but to no avail. Still didn’t like it somehow.

    I did have a play with magnets, but getting ones tiny enough is not a practical proposition.

    Finally I decided to go for the wire in the foot method. I’m sure its not new, but very few good ideas are. Drill a 0.4 hole up through the foot. Superglue in a short length of 11 thou piano wire. When set grind it back to about 5 mm. Drill a 0.4 hole in the place when you want a figure and plant them.

    Advantage is that you can take them out and swap them round easily. The hole is tiny and easy to fill if you don’t want it there but from normal viewing distances it vanishes anyway.

    Some pictures to give an idea.
     


    A man thinking about some work.



    But he went off for tea, leaving just a hole.



    His mate turned up for the back shift.


     
     
     

    How many ? Well that many for a start.


  5. Dave John

    Urban Coal part 2

    By Dave John,

    It has taken a while but I now feel that the overall scene is looking a bit more like a busy urban coal yard. Details and carts are from langley or dart, most figures are Andy Staddens. Anyway, pictures speak louder than words so I’ll shut up.
     

     

     

     
    Something missing though……. Oh yes, the stock. So just for fun.
     

     

     

     

     
    Perhaps a lot of pictures, as ever helps me to see stuff this way.
  6. Dave John

    Urban coal , part 1

    By Dave John,

    I have been thinking about urban coal. Victorian cities consumed huge amounts of coal and of course Glasgow was no exception. Statistics for the quantities mined and moved are available, but staggering though they are do not actually make me think about coal. So instead I started to look at chimneys. I live in a normal west end two bedroom tenement flat which as built had three fireplaces and a kitchen range for cooking and hot water. So thats 32 fires in this block of 8. 14 closes and 2 churches in this street . Up to 450 now. An interesting aside is this link which gives a feel for the the kind of architecture I am on about, I live at the west end of Woodlands. Also has a good map showing how kelvinbridge station and yard was sandwiched in there.

    https://www.glasgow.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=16798&p=0
     

    Have a look on google earth at the west end and try and guess how many in total. I gave up, the answer is a very big number.

    So how did the railways and in particular the Caledonian deal with the need to bring in and facilitate the distribution of all the coal needed? Firstly, they had a lot of coalyards, I reckon at least a dozen to the west of the city centre, including the NB ones. Thats just yards for wagon to bag to cart deliveries, big factories and institutions such as hospitals had private sidings for direct wagonloads and the tramways were connected to the railways at various places to allow wagonloads to be delivered at night.

    Hmm, so not a couple of small coal staithes then.

    Here is a picture of Kelvinbridge yard, note the piles of coal between the six sidings. Piles that are actually the height of wagons. Bagged coal was used to form “walls” to support it all and anecdotal evidence suggests that summer stockpiles were built up to cope with the winter months. Bear in mind that the photo is from the 1950s when gas and electricity were beginning to have an impact on coal usage. As a personal aside I remember talking to the elderly lady who lived in the flat below me many years ago who had been resident in the west end long enough to remember the yard being shunted at night in the 1920s and 30s. To quote her “ I have no idea how the people that lived next to the yard ever got a wink of sleep”



    Thats the background to my thinking, sorry to blether on a bit. Therefore I have started to make some piles. To the modellers eye these may at first look excessive. But given the evidence it seems to me to be along the lines of what must have gone on. Still a lot of detailing but it does begin to look very urban.
     






     

    Just a couple of snapshots to give you the idea. As ever, comments welcome.
  7. Dave John
    There we are, the D63 in service after its 30 year refurbishment.

    I’m not sure that I’m completely happy with it but perhaps we are all getting a bit harsh on ourselves since close up photography shows up all sorts of things that are just invisible from normal viewing distances. You never know, one of the rtr manufacturers might bring out a very nice version. Probably by the time this one has been in service for another 30 years……
     

    So a close up pic;



    Aye, well. In practice these vans would have spent most of their time on coal traffic so thats the service I will be using it for.
     
     
     


  8. Dave John
    Kelvinbank has two brake vans, and really it could do with a couple more. This one has been sitting in store for a long time. It is a CR D63 20 Ton six wheeler. I built it in 1988 from a DJH kit ( no, really they used to do some wagon kits ) and it is very much a child of its time, compounded by the fact that I didn’t have access to the prototype information that I do now. ( Actually the original kit might have been meant to represent the later type outside framed D63 as preserved at Boness, but the kit wasn't outside framed. Or I only got half an etch )

    So looking at the original . Hmm, the caley put half round beading round all the planked panels, the internal ends are in the wrong place, some of the etching shouldn’t be there. The doors opened the other way. The wheels are sat in blocks of whitemetal, just a solid lump. The kit called up spoked wheels, I think I used OO ones but they were rollers with overscale flanges. Photos however show solid disc wheels. It stayed on the track, mainly because it weighed a ton. Cast whitemetal roofs are not light. Handrails were not like that at the ends and the whitemetal buffer heads are not very good. Of course it could do with decent ajs too.

    Caley coaches do a kit, I may treat myself to one in time. However this one is sitting there so stop whining Dave, put it on the bench and do something about it.


     

    Ok, so the body tidied up a bit, ready for a coat of primer to show up all the faults ….



    A simple chassis, removable if anything goes wrong.




  9. Dave John
    I was getting a bit worried. Sooner or later someone with a valid ticket and a train to catch was going to try and jump out of the station building and land with a bit of a splat on the platform.

    It has taken a bit of time but thats the stairs in a fairly completed state. Might need a bit of adjustment where it meets the station and platform buildings but I won’t be fitting magnets into the platform till I decide exactly where the canopy sits, and I would prefer to be able to see it from both sides with the layout spread out rather than fiddle about at arms length in a corner. Oh, and drilling through for the lighting feeds. I might wait until I have got to grips with the backscene and combine the jobs.

    So a few pictures to put it in context;
     






     


    Hmm, enough buildings. A brake van rebuild next I think.
  10. Dave John
    Having got the sides to a shape I am happy with progress has been reasonable. Being stuck in the house for a day waiting for a parcel to turn up has a silver lining. Anyway its about ready for some paintwork and then a roof . Fiddliest bit was the gutters, I think these would have been cast ogee section rather than half round and I’m going to have to fit some downpipes.

    Mind you its always the same , the small projects do tend to take up much more time than you ever thought they would.


     

    Glad its just the one platform......
  11. Dave John
    This is one of those things that I thought might be straightforward, but which tripped me up a bit. This is the third go at making the sides up for the stairs from the station building to the platform. The first two attempts somehow didn't have the right proportions and I wasn't happy with the angles somehow.
     
    I don't have any sort of drawing to work with so I have been taking drawings and photos from similar CR stairs and condensing the design taking into consideration features which tended to show up in buildings designed by Miller. Sounds a bit clever, in reality its a case of squinting at things and doing a best guess about how it would be.
     
    Actually this is the best photo I have of the one I'm trying to model, though its much later on timewise , certainly open to a bit of interpretation;
     

     

    Anyway, slow progress, but this is how they have turned out so far. I'm happy enough with them to push on and try building the whole structure up a bit.
     

  12. Dave John
    This is another CR Diagram 3 wagon. I made it way back in 1988 from a John Boyle etch, and although I was reasonably good at working with etched brass I didn’t have access to all the drawings and photos that are now available. The result was a decent body, but rather wrong from the solebars down. It got displaced by newer stock, but I thought I’d dig it out and have a go at bringing it up to standard.

    This particular example is one of the 1891 build converted for perishable goods traffic. It was fitted with through air and vacuum pipes, flitched frames, oil boxes and the McIntosh patent brake. I have added these from the bits box, a full repaint and there it is back in service again. I have weathered it a bit, the picture in the wagon book shows it in a rather dusty condition.
     


     


     

    Time to fire up the silhouette and have a go at the stairs from the station building to the platform.
  13. Dave John
    Ah, thats better, a bit of wagon building. Nice relaxing stuff. In this case its a pair of D59 wagons from the “true line models” kit, available from the CRA. Many thanks to Tony Brenchley for making the range available. Resin body, my usual type of chassis. As ever full history in “Caledonian Railway Wagons’ by Mike Williams. These two have the later 1905 style end door.

    Thought I would have a go at weathering them a bit, that coal dust gets everywhere.






     


    And just a bit of a panorama from the direction which isn’t usually viewed. Gives me an eye on what it all looks like.



    Still a bit of a wide open space.
  14. Dave John
    At last, a platform building with a roof on it. I’m reasonably pleased with the way it has turned out. Close up photos show the odd bit that needs a touch of paint, that always tends to be the case these days.
    The final position will depend on how the stairs from the upper building work out but thats pretty much in the right place. I have learned a lot along the way, particularly with regard to messing about with photographic textures and some of the finer points of using the silhouette. I will be interested to see how stable a delicate styrene structure is long term, only time will tell on that one. The figures could do with a spot of matt varnish too. Maybe even a bit of light weathering though at the time I’m modelling the building would be barely 10 years old.














     


    Anyway, a bit of wagon building next, will seem like a holiday I think.
  15. Dave John
    Well, been a while but I’m getting there. As promised a few shots of the platform building with the roof off. Useful, they show me where I need to tidy up and adjust the squareness of things. I can add more interior details as the bits become available ( or I make them ) The signage is on bit of copper wire, easy to adjust. Given that it will normally be viewed from a couple of feet away I think it will be ok.
     

     

     

     

     

     

  16. Dave John
    The devil is in the detail so they say. During the last two weeks I have been making various detail parts for the platform building, but it seems to be going rather slowly.
     
    If you look at period pictures of CR stations one thing stands out. Poster boards. The CR fitted a lot of them, and some of the posters have become collectors items. Really, have a look at ;
     
    https://www.1stdibs.co.uk/art/prints-works-on-paper/more-prints-works-on-paper/unknown-original-c1910-caledonian-railway-poster-golfing-girl-golf-scotland/id-a_1083043/?utm_content=control&currency=gbp&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIuOrdyYKp2gIVYbftCh3TgQvGEAQYASABEgLcQ_D_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds
     
    Right so when you have picked yourselves up off the floor I have had a go at modelling some. Micheal Dunn wrote a very useful article in TTL No. 139 in which he gives full dimensions of a poster board he has purchased and restored. I based mine on the information in that article. The silhouette was used to cut the inner frame from 10 thou, beading from 20 thou round rod added and a bit of filling and sanding. Various images were acquired and sized in affinity before being printed out on matte photo paper. Purists might argue that some of those posters would not be seen at the same time as others due to printing dates but sometimes you just have to work with the stuff that is available.
     

     
    Close up and photographed 4 times actual size they look a bit rough, a bit of detail cleaning up to do. Seen from a sensible distance they do look the part.
  17. Dave John

    A bit of lighting.

    By Dave John,


    General
    I decided to move the roof on a bit, seems like a good idea to get the lighting in at this stage.

    Very simple really , just 3 copper wires with LEDs via fine wire and suitable protection resistors. The internal and canopy lights will be separately dimmable.

    Easier to show a couple of pics than describe it all.
     




     


    Fairly fine wire, I think I’ll get away with it looking like gas pipe.
     


  18. Dave John

    Walls and magnets.

    By Dave John,


    General
    A good week, thats the basic structure put together. Simple really, just put some plasticard on a nice flat surface and make sure it all goes together square.

    I was concerned about the top edge and so decided to strengthen it with some brass strip. A thought struck me, why not use the strip to feed power to the fireplace LEDS? Now I wouldn’t want a soldering iron too close to the walls, so I soldered some sockets from a turned pin IC socket to the strip in the right places before glueing the strip in.




     


    The LEDS for the fireplaces just plug into the strip.


     

    Next question, how to hold it down. Back to magnets again, the idea is that these will hold against steel plates in the platform itself. As ever with my work I have a fear of not being able to get into things to clean or fix.


     

    So, same idea applied to the roof.

    The pic shows some 5x5x1 mm magnets on spacers glued in place. These pull onto the soft iron plates fitted into the roof itself.



    Hard to get a picture , but you can lift the whole thing up and the magnets still grab, but a slight knock and the whole roof shifts slightly. As I have written before I’m getting a bit clumsy and this way might well reduce the chance of the odd knock causing damage.
     

    A couple of pics roughly positioned on the platform.


     


     

    Anyway, with all those windows I am going to have to model the interior reasonably well since it will be rather visible. Should be fun.
  19. Dave John

    Watching paint not drying.

    By Dave John,


    General
    Things are progressing slowly. Winter tends to slow modelling down, paints and glues take ages to dry, the light is bad, there is a tendency to sneeze all over what you are trying to build. Must be a lot worse for folk who model in lofts and sheds. Really a case of watching paint not drying.

    Anyway, thats the major sections of the platform building ready to form into a structure. All still delicate, I think I am going to have to add a top internal rail to prevent it warping over time.

    A couple of pics of it coming together.
     


     


  20. Dave John

    Some Tiling.

    By Dave John,

    It has taken a while, but I am now reasonably happy with the tiling. So here is a completed bit of wall, nothing like harsh close up photos to show all the errors.

    The tiles are printed on photo paper then given a coat of a photo matte uv resistant sealing spray. I have no idea how stable these things are long term. Time will tell I suppose.
     

    I think they will look ok from normal viewing distances.
     


  21. Dave John

    Bay windows.

    By Dave John,

    So I have been making some bay windows. A few false starts but I think the ones I have ended up with have come out all right. Looking at the way the platform building was constructed; it is essentially a set of regularly spaced lateral girders holding up the roof supported by brick pillars. Th bits in between can be thought of as curtain walls , and the most symmetrical bits are the bay windows, hence the reason for starting with them is that defines the areas in between.

    Anyway , first thing some fancy windows. As ever the silhouette helps, effectively scribing all the astricals. I then ran some dilute ink into them and some paint round the edges.



    The inner and outer frames are added on the flat. helps to pre -paint them.



    So there we are just cut them out and stick them together. The dado is made up from 1mm quarter round with a strip of 1.3 mm 10 thou stuck on top.



    The walls were brick, but the L&D tiled them. In the case of Partick central brown below the dado, white above. They were laid in the same pattern as plain bond brick, but were smaller. The bit shown is experimental, not happy with it yet.
     


    Oh, and I made some chimneys based on photos of the originals. Really, simple plain ones? Heh , I wish……



    Slow but useful progress.
  22. Dave John
    I have had another go at the valence, new blade and a revised set of cutting curves. The elements still need cleaning up, but overall a bit of an improvement.



    So that let me push on a bit with the roof.



    Just some snapshots to give an idea of what it will look like in position. Still a long way to go.


     



    Having got to that stage I think its time to have a think about the building itself
  23. Dave John
    I have been looking at valences. Why ? Well, I have got on a bit with constructing the platform buildings. The roof would have ended about an inch or so over the ogee cast gutter. Between the gutter and the end of the roof supporting girders would be the valence. So in order to get the roof overhang right I need to know how thick the valences are going to be. Which more or less means I have to know how I’m going to make them.

    Well thats simple then, get on with making the valences Dave. ( harumpf ….. ) Now there are many which you can buy ready made in card, plastic or etched brass. But of course these varied by company and date. Some were nice and simple, just a point on the end of a plank of wood. Some were however insanely fancy. ( harumpf ….. again)

    Ok, so did the L&D go in for a nice simple pointy stick type valence? Nope. They went for an insanely fancy one. Which, of course, is nothing like any of the fancy ones available ready cut in card, plastic or brass. Here is a section of a photo which shows the shape rather well.
     



    (Some serious harumpfing ….. )
     

    My experiments so far consist of putting that into the silhouette software and using it to create a cutting shape. Scale it to size and then the silhouette cuts it out.

    Ok, so a picture of a cut piece.
     



    I’m not happy with it yet. For starters it creates a very complex file which takes ages to cut. Because it is many cuts it is almost nibbling the shape out rather than cutting, so much scalpel work is still required. I think I am pushing the limits of what the silhouette can do down at that size. Anyway, overcoming obstacles is the fun of modelling so I’ll persevere for a while and see whether I can get it to work.

    With of course a lot of harumpfing …..
  24. Dave John
    I have made a start on parts for the canopy and building that sits on the long island platform. Basically the original was a narrow set of waiting rooms covered by an overall roof and cantilevered canopy.

    So, how to build it? Well, styrene would be my obvious choice since I have a silhouette cutter. Might be stiffer in brass, but that would probably mean a lot of custom etching or lots of soldering of brass strip. Like a lot of things in modelling you don’t know until you have tried, here is a first attempt at some cut out parts.


     

    Since those trusses define the profile I used the silhouette to create the parts for an assembly jig as well.
     



    Happy new year to everyone.
  25. Dave John
    I have been asked why I model the CR in urban Glasgow. Simple really, its on my doorstep. Of course large amounts of it have gone, but if you walk the pathways you can still find traces of what used to be there. Its also interesting to see how nature reclaims these areas, and although perhaps not strictly about model railways it is a blog about the study of the prototype.

    Anyway, first of all, a bit of a map. Dawsholm sheds, and all the associated industrial lines in the locality. Plenty of good pictures of how it used to be , both online and in “LMS engine sheds , Vol 5” by Hawkins and Reeve. It was a substantial site, home to about 50 engines back in the day. The majority of these worked the low level lines and the freight traffic on the north bank of the Clyde. Indeed, most of the engines I model would have been shedded here.



    So here we are, looking from A at the viaduct over the road and the Kelvin. Typical CR stonework, built to last.



    From B, a view over the turntable to where the sheds stood. That part is now occupied by a religious establishment. Nature has provided many mature trees since the railways were lifted in the 1960s. The turntable would be where that circular stand of trees on the right now is.



    This is looking along the line forming the loop for the Paper works. All long gone now, the factory is now residential housing. Taken from C.
    Pups where once there were pugs.



    Looking back down the Kelvin towards the paperworks site from D. All very tranquil , with just the piers for the paperworks branch visible. Not uncommon to see herons perched on top of them.



    The most recognisable landmark is the weir, originally connected to the paperworks. I have seen salmon heading upriver leaping over it. The Kelvin was long considered to be a dead river, but after the demise of industry it has made a remarkable recovery, with a decent trout population and runs of salmon and sea trout to the headwaters. Taken from E, it would be the view from a loco footplate.



    The piers for the gasworks branch are not stone, but concrete coloured to look like stone. Very mossy, they stand like cliffs across the river. A couple of pictures here, taken from F. Now they are not terribly good pictures, but yes, those are a colony of urban cormorants. They clearly think the piers will substitute for cliffs. I have tried to count them, I think there about a dozen in total. Nature finding a use for industrial dereliction.





    Finally a view from G. The Caledonian pup, now almost in full CR freight livery on the trackbed of the line to the chemical works. In the background is the aqueduct which carries the Forth and Clyde canal over the river and what was two railway lines. Dawsholm station was to the right.


     


    Anyway, I hope that wasn’t too verbose and off topic. Just my feeling that nothing beats getting out and seeing the prototype first hand, walking it all gives a feel for the scale of things.

    My compliments of the season to everyone.
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