C126

Delighted to be your first 'follower', and wishing you every success with such a model.  You know Walthers do an HO model of a Blast Furnace, which might be kit-bashed to save time.

https://www.walthers.com/blast-furnace-with-sairways-and-railings-kit

Looking forward to seeing progress.  What a back-scene you can have!

1 hour ago, Alcanman said:

Thanks for your kind mention of my layouts. Much appreciated.

 

Mal

Any time; credit where it is due.  Thanks for your entertaining and inspiring layout posts, and all good wishes for the future.

@Pandora I have found this on the inter-web: https://www.facebook.com/ModelRailScotland/videos/392053014954564/

Hope of use (not watched it myself yet).

On 28/07/2022 at 07:11, Pandora said:

The Wellpark layout is interesting, do you have any more images to post?

Has   Wellpark been published in any magazines?

Sorry for the delay in replying.  I am sorry, I took photos only of the 'goods/derelict' scenes.  The coal yard/grain loader is on the left of the layout, the derelict 'shed'(?) on the right.  There was a photo of the station in the exhibition programme.  I have not had chance to check if other photos exist on the www.  If you put a 'call out' on RMWeb, I expect someone will have more pics.  There were enough people with cameras around to have something, I am sure.  Good luck.  No idea about a mag. article either.  Sorry again.

23 minutes ago, deepfat said:

can you still get that lorry...

Doing a quick web-search, this is the best I could find (and too late, alas):

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/154958822566

Strangely, this is a green livery, and in a different box.  Drop me a line if you want pics of the box/ lorry in more detail.  Thanks for the kind words.

May I thank you all for taking the time to write your comments.  It is much appreciated.  I did not expect such interest, only hoping this scribbling of mine might be chanced upon over the years by those also looking for information about the kit, and stopping them making the same mistakes.

I was surprised by the state of the first floor supplied - and disappointed as a 'swadeshi'(?) who tries to 'Buy British' - but, bar the floor and more detailed instructions, I think the mistakes on this kit were mine, used to the 'Airfix style' of one's childhood.  The fine mouldings are a delight.  I have learned one must do more research before building such kits, their demanding a little more thought and knowledge.  Thankfully, this is readily available with the internet now, so I hope the "average modeller" can achieve good results.

The two kits so far have not put me off Parkside, but perhaps their earlier releases outside my interest, as my father used to say (of K's?), "are more a set of parts".  Watching him over the years wrestling with white metal, brass, and tools to get his wagons 'square and true' put me off for decades.  But having achieved two out of two thus far that do not wobble, I am getting the 'wagonner's bug'...

13 hours ago, simon b said:

A little off topic, but would you mind sharing which colours you have painted the retaining walls with? Looks to be a good base to represent London yellow brick.

Delighted to.  Humbrol Acrylic 62 Matt, 'Leather' on the newer canister on the right:

I photographed them in the sun just now to try and get a 'real colour', but actually they need a good mix, not having been used for a few months.  As you can probably see from my previous photos, the colours vary according to light and camera, and the newer (right canister) batch is a slightly different tone to the older, as seen on my new viaduct bridge piers, compared to the first batch of brick arches.  The arch 'rubbers' orange colour were mixed by hand.

Returning to the original topic, I should plead for forbearance.  My exasperation was simply owing to what I expected to be a quick and simple task - the 'base/primer' coat of a scenic area before adding details and shading - was not a morning's work as assumed but took at least a month with four different techiques, and now needing a fifth.  But this is what the hobby is all about, and I thank you all for your kind words of advice and hope will show you progress soon.  Best wishes as ever.

[Swoon!]  North Woolwich?

Thank you also @Wheatley.  Blending the 'track brown' into the tarmac was the next task, after what I expected to be a 'simple base grey', and then some sparse greenery.  I like the idea of pot-holes filled with ballast chippings, and trying other textures as well.  Watch out any exhibitor at the next show I attend with areas of hard-standing on her/his layout I like!  Oil-stains were going to be another excuse for irregularity as well, and perhaps a spillage or two.  Thanks again for your ideas.

Thanks @simon b ;  had I known or thought of this before, I would have saved a month of irritation.  No idea why the painting ends drying unevenly, but yet another thing to put down to experience!

Many thanks for posting your picture and thoughts, @deepfat.  I must say your corners still look good to me, and I like the finishes on the white-painted pub and signal-box colours.

I have ordered the Wills kits book from the library, and will have a read.  I amended a Ratio line-side hut kit recently to try my brick skills, replacing the stone courses with brick and adding a chimney.  Sadly, I still can not cut and file the brick sheets to a 45 deg. mitre, so again am filling in with modelling clay to 'sculpt'.  I wish I could construct some sort of template or jig to ensure I am cutting and filing at 45 deg., but can not think how.

Thanks, @Mikkel  Cheaper and quicker than the fancy items to buy, I am hoping to start the passenger viaduct this Easter weekend, so wanted to start 'clearing the decks'.  What is it about railway modelling that 'manufactures' such clutter?!  🙂  Hope it encourages others.  Be warned; the interiors of box files are rarely ninety degrees, so it is worth taking time, if available, to cut the edges of the partitions at an angle to fit.

Thanks @Hibelroad for the gen.  I always wondered why, if it were necessary to protect the wood from the weather while stacked outdoors, only the ends were done.  However, this is more the 'reverse'.  I always remember it being a red colour in my childhood, but I probably missed the others used.

Thanks for the info., and so promptly.  You are quite correct: I forgot you are modelling in 'N'!  I will have a browse of the Langley Models web-site though, hoping they do a similar model for me in 'OO'.  Sorry for the mistake.  Best wishes as ever.

Good to see you are still creating things, between playing trains.  Just noticed your crane in the scrap-yard.  As they are as rare as hens' teeth now I want a few, may I ask where you got yours?  Thanks, and keep up the good work.

Thank you, @Andy WD .  Not seen this before.  Also note the motorway-style 'crash barriers' (both?) sides.  I wonder why they had two slim flaps, rather than one more substantial.  Hope this is of interest to others.

Please forgive the haste, but readers might also be interested in:

https://museum.maidstone.gov.uk/our-museums/carriage-museum/

I will try and dig out some photographs I took there years ago.  Well worth a visit and support, if rather under-lit.

Thanks to @peach james and @brossard for your suggestions.  When I did my first sample trial of brick-work painting, I got better results doing the mortar colour first, and then applying the main brick colour gently with a sponge, with three or four diagonal 'passes' (and then individual bricks and patches in slight tonal variations).  Interesting that Iain Rice does it the other way (bricks first, then, I assume, wiping off the mortar as a final coat).  My father reported better results this way round as well.  I will read the Gill Head thread with interest.  Thank you both for giving this post your consideration, and the advice/hints.  Best wishes to you.

Quite inspiring.  I hope to find time a.s.a.p. to trawl through your previous posts.  Wonderful work.

Thanks as always @Mikkel for your attention and kind remarks.  The paradox about figures struck me when first I started taking photographs.  When running trains one has restful poses, but these look less interesting than 'action' figures in one's photographs.  This was an excuse to draft a two-part list, of characters found in a goods yard and what they could be doing both 'in motion' and 'at rest'.  I would give examples, but I can not put my finger on it at the moment.  The only one I remember is two shunter poses, one leaning on a pole and the other reaching over buffers to uncouple wagons..  Composing the list also lead to ideas for tableaux and the multitude of lorries required for the different goods.

One day I might have time to play trains. 

22 hours ago, Ray Von said:

Remind me, are you working in "OO" or "N" - I find "N" scale much more forgiving of homemade joints and buttresses!  You could break up the lines with strategically placed foliage scatter, representing weeds sprouting from mortar cracks? 

Excellent idea!  I have not got as far as thinking of foliage yet, but this is good.  It is 'OO' by the way.

It was a feeling of 'exasperation', for want of a better word, at how to join two cuts in a plastic sheet of English (or any other) bond that got me.  Having smoothed it over with filler, etched in the courses again, and painted over carefully, I was (as usual, quite unrealistically!) expecting perfection to result.  I have learned though it is better to 'cut and shunt' at the side of a recessed panel than half-way between two on the outer buttress.

Anyway, I must stop moaning and put it down to experience.  I do love my brick structures though, so it rankles rather...   Were it some concrete brutalist monstrosity I would not care.

23 hours ago, Ray Von said:

It looks great, I'm not sure what part of the structure you are displeased with? 

Thanks for your kind words.  The new arches' brick-work painting just appeared worse than the first batch's - I am losing my 'dry sponge technique' - with the pointing less visible.  Also, I was hoping the joins would be hidden better.  Having done my best at smoothing over the cuts, they still show.  What more can one do?

But enough whining.  I can pick up my brickie's trowel another day, and there will be more enjoyable tasks ahead when this is completed...

8 minutes ago, Ian Morgan said:

I used some of Andrew's figures for our 'Tribute to Brunel' layout in the Great Model Railway Challenge. However, my research was based more on My Fair Lady than reality.

 

 

While Langley castings were used for the less well to do

 

 

Taking a stroll alongside Brunel's atmospheric railway representation, that was almost unseen on the TV.

 

 

 

Apologies that my modelling efforts are far inferior to @Mikkel

 

They look pretty good to me!  Well done.

Apologies for the somewhat haphazard typing here - trying to iron shirts for work to-morrow, listen to programme about Louis Armstrong, and ponder Cold War food stores on another thread - but I recommend 'Carriages at eight : horse-drawn society in Victorian and Edwardian times', Huggett, Frank E., Guildford : Lutterworth Press, 1979.  p.30:

"One of the most popular Victorian carriages was the coachman-driven brougham, a small closed vehicle of French origin, seating two people, which Lord Brougham had redesigned in 1838 as "a refined and glorified street cab that would make a convenient carriage for a gentleman".  A brougham cost about £150, though a miniature brougham, which was much favoured by young Guards officers, could be bought for £20 or £30 less.  There was also a coupe, or double, brougham, drawn by a pair of horses, and seatign four, which was a popular choice among aristocrats with a large brood of daughters."

Also an ill. p.29. "preserved in Glasgow Museum of Transport".

Thanks for the link, Mikkel.  Don't remember that web-site when I went 'carriage bagging' (e.g. https://museum.maidstone.gov.uk/our-museums/carriage-museum/ , which is recommended, if decaying slowly when I visited years ago.

Just wanted to post further proof as to how you here have led me astray:

Managed to get to a real model shop yester-day and spent too much money, including the above which was certainly not on my shopping list.  Who could resist it, though?!?

I think it will be a while till I build it - still wrestling with viaduct brick-work - but I know if I did not get it when seen, I would regret it.  Now to resign myself to beans-on-toast for dinner for the next three weeks...