Martin S-C

A tribble truck?

*Scratches head, wondering where the west coast of Norfolk might be*

In what way?

Wowsa. Old dog. New trick. Awesome. Muchee thankee.

Fascinating discussion. So "goods" was a cargo that completely filled a wagon or railway truck? A goods train was a train in which every wagon carried a full load of a certain goods? The freight was then carried in the brake van, road van or maybe in one van within the goods train? Is that about right? So all pre-1928 trains would be referred to as goods trains?

Looks good. Excellent plan. It has a hint of C J Freezer about it but seems to add much more operating potential than his roundy-roundy or dumb-bell schemes did. Might I suggest that a trap point is needed where the fiddle yard line joins the main line on the lifting section? So you'd have 4 turnouts on there, and a few inches of dead siding.

Gentlemen, zombies being an especial interest of mine (for medical and anthropological reasons), what might be the quickest way to navigate to page 219?

The Martians have landed! Kevin - what do you use for reeds along the riverbank? They look especially effective.

Not going to bag many ducks with that, unless the plan is to overtake them and run them down with sheer speed.

Ah, that's a pain. I had a digital sound set fitted in mine from a Collett Goods. Mind you it still sounds gorgeous. My other one, an Oxford Rails model, came with factory fitted sound which still sounds lovely, though I have no idea where they sourced the sound files from.

Mysteriously the child appears to be wearing... a pyramid. The plot thickens.

All this talk of cockchafers is making me feel uncomfortable. Can we move on?

Pressing on... Now ready for a lick of paint.

...and a pair of mooring bollards? Does the tide rise that much?

I love the architecture of that last building. Screaming out to be modelled. A kind of Cley-Next-the-Sea meets Cardington airship sheds. What is its knobbly exterior made of? Is that more flints?

Oh dear Lordy, no. We don't want to start exploring those websites. Then again... The sound of cans of worms being opened is deafening. Still, the locals appear to have grand time at these events... I'm sure a wicker man incendiary special train can be run each summer equinox dawn.

Hi Dave. Please note the first two after the "red lines - I'm going to make an incision here" pictures are digital mock ups - so give your thanks to trusty old Paint Shop Pro, not me. My first attempt at shortening a coach are the last two pics before the Cambrian and S&DJR models. The gaps at present are huge; I need to pop down the local model shop and grab some plastic putty. Might have a better looking picture by tomorrow evening.

I see you are a past master at this. For my 4-wheelers I'm going to muck about with some Ratio kits just as everybody else has done! I have some brass Shirescenes sides to convert one of them to a different diagram so this will be my very first foray into brass etch work. Wish me luck! The older Tri-Ang/Hornby non-corridor bodies are much easier to chop about because the roof is a separate moulding. With the more recent coaches Hornby made it integral with the sides so its harder to get a smooth curve. At least my coaches only have to look English, they don't have to conform accurately to any specific diagram. I don't think I could ever be a true-scale historical modeller in the mould of Bob Essery or David Jenkinson, my attention span falls off far too soon.

Next project! After the brake vans - some passenger coaches. I've several Ratio GWR 4-wheeler kits to build (and hack about) but first, I shall indulge myself in that age-old and well practised past time of chopping up and detailing some Hornby clerestories. I feel I am on safe ground here as many intrepid souls have trod this well worn path before me... First off, inaccurate bogies. Guh. Away with you, hellspawn! Replaced by 3D prints from Stafford Road Models on Shapeways. These are the first 3D printed products I've modelled with and they are superb, very robust, yet flexible. The axle boxes just needed a little reaming out with a pin drill to accept brass 'top hat' bearings and then 12mm plain disc wheelsets just popped easily in. They are extremely free running and even come with an NEM pocket for a Bachmann coupler to slide right in. I used the Dean 7-foot bogies with footboards on the short non-corridor coaches and the Dean 8-foot 6-inch bogies with footboards on the larger corridor brake third. I need 2 more 7-foot bogies for a third non-corridor coach I have. The plan is just to add details to the two non-corridor vehicles and repaint them. The corridor brake third is going to get some cut-and-shut surgery with about 65mm being removed from the central luggage storage area to reduce the coach from a 56-footer down to a cute stumpy little 38-footer; much more suited to my railway. The third non-corridor coach will have one whole compartment cut out reducing it to six compartments and shortening it from a 46-footer to a 40-footer. The resulting coaches will not be historically accurate but then the originals weren't either. And since my railway is fictional I can do as I like The two non-corridor coaches at top right. The corridor brake third is in bits in the foreground. Stafford Road Works 3D printed 7-foot Dean bogie. Its a little raw but as this will get a good coat of track dirt colour and then more grime and weathering on top, I won't bother with smoothing it. I am not sure I'd want to buy something as detailed and needing to be clean and smooth like a loco body in this material. Proposed cut lines on the 56 foot corridor brake. So we get a cute little 38ft brake. I may be able to cobble together a small 4-wheel luggage van out of the discarded section. I have a terrible weakness for small NPCS vehicles. Chop lines on the 46 foot non-corridor. To give us a 6-compartment 40-footer. I expect a thousand sawn up Tri-Ang and Hornby clerestories have laid like this on a thousand modellers workbenches over the decades; and every person was thinking just as I was ... "Oh plop(*), what have I done?" ...however nothing that a smear of plastic putty and a bit of wet and dry can't fix. One pair will wear the NMR green-and-cream livery (think Cambrian Railway), the other the GSR's Prussian blue-and-cream, thusly: (*) or another expletive applicable to the level of angst.

Ah yes, I see what you mean! I selected three of the smallest ones because you're probably going to get fed up with gluing rows of bricks onto things pretty soon.

Tom Thank you so much. This is incredible! So very useful. I shall enjoy poring over these for hours. I can see another AVR wagon coming out of the Nether Madder workshops based on one of these.

Now that idea I do like. Ten points to Gryffindor.

I am more than a little alarmed to realise that this describes my layout building ambitions perfectly!

By golly, you have got it bad up there. The Mechanical Engineer magazine was well established by 1905 so there certainly were well-informed gentleman abroad who had the bent of a mechanical and railway engineering persuasion. I feel sure a local body of them would meet to discuss matters of interest to them as well as covering the goings-on at the local railway company. The CAMES (Castle Aching Mechanical Engineering Society). Might there be a walking or cycling club? I might suggest the Aching Feet or the Aching Legs but I think its probably best not to.

After a few days of weathering wagons for a friend and other non-modelling goings-on that distracted me, I have picked up a couple of projects. First, I realised I had no period brake vans that were usable. I had bought three Bachmann brakes at the beginning of the year but these were all too late for my chosen period - like so many others I began buying rolling stock I liked before my focus on what I really wanted and needed had narrowed. Those three vans have gone into my "for resale" box. Some months ago I bought a set of S&DJR and MR wagons on e-Bay with about 6 or 7 wagons in each set. The S&DJR 3-planks, the S&DJR cattle wagon and the MR cattle wagon and box vans that I've shown before on this thread were in these sets. The wagons are mainly Ratio or Slaters kits pre-built. Kit construction is sound but the paint jobs were a little wanting. There were three brake vans. A Midland 10 tonner, an S&DJR 10 tonner and the very nice D&S brass and white metal S&DJR 6-wheel 20 tonner. I dug these out of their boxes the other day and took a look. The Midland Railway 10 tonner came with moulded-on plastic handrails so all these had to come off. I've been adding brass wire handrails and have also added metal wheels, some under-body weight and Bachmann couplings. I plan to add some wire linkages under the chassis to represent the rather complex and visible brake gear. For the Nether Madder railway version I have added a full width handrail at the verandah end (the Midland vans had only a short rail in front of the door which I always thought looked strange). As bought Current state of progress The Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway 4-wheel 10-ton van came with some rather grim and over-scale handrail knobs holding the hand rails on so all this had to be removed. New brass wire handrails have been added, as well as wheels, weight and couplings same as the Midland van. The handbrake rod and hand wheel were very over scale so I cut these down and moved them a little. I also moved the stove chimney more to one side because I can! As bought Current state of progress Both these vans are absolutely tiny at just under 70mm over buffers which makes them very useful on the NM&GSR where sidings and passing loops are short. Finally a really nice model, the D&S brass kit with its white metal framing overlay, the S&DJR 20-ton 6-wheel brake. This van will be allocated exclusively to coal trains running between Deep Shafting Colliery and Nether Madder terminus, and between the colliery and the Madder Valley Railway exchange sidings, both these runs involving heavy gradients. The model had been well built and painted but no detail work had been done on it. Fortunately the builder made a good job of the delicate and complex brake gubbins under the floor. Once again metal wheels and tension hook couplings were added as well as all the necessary handrails and door handles from brass wire. As bought Current state of progress I need to source some lamp iron castings or brass etches to fit to all three vans as each carried no less than ten of these fairly large lumps of iron. I've had a recommendation to use cut-up 'bambi' small staples so will go in search of a box in the week. After the lamp irons its painting time. The two S&D vans will be painted in the GSR (Great Shafting Railway) freight livery of a bauxite shade with white lettering. The Midland van will carry the slate grey livery of the NMR (Nether Madder Railway) again with white lettering. I have two Slaters North Eastern Dia.V1 brake van kits to build; the nice ones with the birdcage roof lookouts which will also be GSR vans. I then have three more Midland van kits to build which will be NM&GSR. Along with my single WELR van (a brass kit of a diminutive Pontnewynedd GWR van) this will complete the fleet - for now at least... there's plenty more in the box of kits that need building.