Graham T

I think it's something I will just have to live with until I start work on CR Mk II.

Clive, your painted figures look great, but I'm curious as to why you leave the square stands on them? I've found that most 3D printed figures will stand without them. Yours certainly look as if they would. Hope you don't think I'm being picky, am just curious!

Thanks Phil, that ought to be fine for propelling through. The sharpest running line at CR Mk I is the track leading off to the tunnel mouth, at 30 inches if I remember rightly, and I can propel stock over that without problems (famous last words!)

Absolutely. I'm thinking of looking at slightly larger buffer heads on the LMS van, or another alternative I've heard mentioned is to fix a thin length of wire between the buffers on the offending vehicle. I'm not an expert on anything British Finescale track; do you recall what the minimum radius point is on CR Mk II Phil?

Sorry, that's probably the key fact that I left out - yes, I use three link couplings. So when stock is being propelled it's by contact between the buffers.

Thanks Colin - for the PM, and for not opening the can of worms!

Now this is exactly what I mean about attention to detail. I have a washing line post on my layout, but it's just a (sloppily) painted scrap of plastic strip. Yours even has the - whatever they ares - arranged in right angles at the top. And the gravel underneath the line, the manure, the chopping block, the colour and texture of the earth... Simply top drawer!

Perhaps a Babycham?

A little more progress with the painting this afternoon. Not entirely convinced by the greens... Still a long way to go with this one. In other news, the ex-MR 0-4-4T still refuses to play 🙁

Hi Neal. I checked the back to backs, and the Lima wheels are long gone! A bit of experimentation shows that the Siphons are ok with being propelled into the bay, it's the LMS parcels van that is giving the problems. I think that's a combination of the short wheelbase and the medium radius point leading into the bay causing the buffers to lock. I need to look a bit deeper, but perhaps slightly larger buffer heads on the LMS van might be a solution...

Morning Colin. They are MJT items from Dart Castings.

Thanks Scott, that's what I thought.

I also tried to make up a parcels train this evening, but the results were a bit disappointing! The stock kept derailing on its way through the point leading into the bay platform. Mostly when being propelled back out onto the main running line, but also sometimes on the way into the bay. I'm too tired to do any more trouble shooting tonight (and have just about drained the profanity bank dry anyway), but I suspect the trouble might lie with the bogies; the Siphon G and the LMS van are old Lima items, and the Siphon H is from Mainline. I've already replaced the wheels on the Lima vans, and have new bogies on order for the Siphons, so we'll see if they help. I'm guessing that in the real world the pannier would have run around the train on one of the loops first, and then pushed the vans into the bay?

The benches and trolleys and so forth have been added to the station now. Although the ungrateful lot at Chuffnell R seem to be giving the new seating facilities a good ignoring! I'll shift some of the milk churns into their sun-shelter in the pagoda hut at some point. I have one more of the large luggage trolleys to build, and another two benches, which will go further down the platform, to keep these company... The luggage trolleys will all live in the space between the station building and the pagoda hut. I also have some wooden half barrels, which I'm planning to make into planters to space out along the platform. Need to finish fixing the gate at the end of the bay platform loading dock too.

Another hour or so spent on the painting this afternoon before I lost the light. Not much done, but a little bit of progress on the shed and the coal stage. Also out in some of the deepest darks on the loco. After this I had a stab at the greens for the loco, using viridian with a touch of cadmium yellow, toned down with my own black mix of ultramarine blue and burnt sienna (I don't like to use straight black from the tube for paintings). There wasn't enough daylight to get a good photo of that by the time I'd finished, so I'll post one tomorrow.

Some lovely attention to detail in this whole area of Aston-on-C!

Thanks Rob. It is starting to come together now, just a shame that I made such a hash of the track-laying... I think the standard issue trees came from MBR.

I look forward to seeing the new OED (Wolf Edn.)!

Playing with trains last night, I decided to try to assemble a few trains so that I don't have to constantly faff about with the three links. This showed up a few wagons that don't behave quite as nicely as I'd like. Apart from the three-legged D1666, which I've ordered some W-irons for, two others seem to have buffer issues. On one, the buffer heads seem too small, so I'm replacing them with metal ones. The other culprit is the GWR steel open, which bizarrely seems to have buffers that are too long... And so it doesn't like travelling around the tighter curves on the layout. Taking a closer look, the shanks are noticeably longer than on most of my other wagons (I suspect there was a choice on the Cambrian sprue and I took the wrong ones). So, the metal buffer heads will be removed - hopefully for re-use - and I'll trim a mil or so off the plastic shanks. The upside of all this is of course that I got to play trains, which I don't actually do all that much! So here we have a rather busy Chuffnell Regis, with pannier 2732 waiting to depart with a cattle train, and perhaps one of the GW classics at the platform - small prairie and B-set. I need to finish painting the platform benches so that my passengers have somewhere to sit, they're starting to grumble...

Thanks Rob, I'll take a look at some of his work before I break the brushes out again. I'm using stretched canvas this time, which isn't actually my favourite surface; I prefer to paint on panels as well but couldn't find any locally at the right size.

I like your thinking - I'll sign it now!

My apartment gets good light in the afternoons, so I binned work after lunch and took the opportunity to make some more progress with the painting. It hit a bit of a wall after the initial sketch, but I've found that often happens to me with paintings and so wasn't too concerned... This afternoon's session has brought things closer to being back on track (ahem). Next I need to figure out how to mix something like GWR green in oil paints. Maybe @Gedward or @MrWolf can help me out?

Just realised that I have confused Dart Castings with Wizard!

Good idea - thanks. I placed an order with Dart Castings last night, so will see if I can add a pair.

Thanks Jonathan. I just gave her a try, and still can't read the CV. I think a call to Bachmann is a good idea.