Graham T

Thanks, I’ll have to get some of those.

Thanks Rob. It's not gone together quite so well as I'd hoped, but with luck some paint will hide the worst of the bodgery (several coats, perhaps!) What are the magnets that you got?

Now that's an interesting idea. Sounds tricky to do in practice, but I'm tempted to give it a go!

Sounds like a very successful and enjoyable visit Bill. I would have spent a fortune I'm sure! I hope the Channel crossing wasn't too lumpy 🙂

The wagon-building binge continues. Here we have an ex-LSWR van, Diagram 1410. This was a bit more of a challenge to put together, even with the all in one floor and solebars. It still needs a bit of firtling where the vent meets the roof. I'm thinking about leaving it in LSWR livery, but very faded and worn, just for a bit of variety. Any thoughts one way or the other?

That was exactly what I liked about it!

Strangely enough, it's now stopped. But still not especially pleasant. I think an evening at home sniffing glue is called for!

I seem to be on a bit of a roll as far as wagon kits are concerned. This is another Cambrian kit, again with the all-in-one floor and solebars, which makes the build a lot quicker. It's an LMS one-plank wagon, diagram 1986. Still needs buffers and the wire rod between the vee hangers, and I'll have to think up some sort of load for it that I can hide some lead in, as it's light as a feather of course. No chance of getting outside to prime these at the moment, as it's persisting down with rain 🙁

I was based at Culdrose air station for a long time, and we had a few particularly troublesome local residents, who lived at the end of the main runway, that constantly complained about the noise. I don't think they were especially mollified by the Vulcan display crew standing their aircraft on its tail directly above their houses one year after Air Day ...

I like the weathering.

Have seen something very similar myself; jumping with a young soldier who couldn't grasp the concept of turning into wind before landing. Ouch...

Thanks Bill. I quite like the Monty's Models white metal figures, and will probably get some more of them - they'll get the rattle can treatment for sure. I use Vallejo acrylics and am a big fan.

Yes, that's the one.

The steel open has been finished this evening, and I've also given the pagoda hut some light weathering. A thin wash of back all over, and some green on the roof, nearly all of it then wiped off with cotton buds. A few small bits of rust were added, but not too much. A couple of small spots of pure rust coloured paint, and then some thin washes of the same colour to show stains underneath running down the ironwork. Or that's the idea anyway!

I have their 6-ton crane in my stock of kits to build, but am leaving well alone for now as I've heard that it's a bit of a so-and-so to put together.

That's very positive news on the health front - very good to hear!

I've now added the bodywork to the Cambrian steel open. I'm no expert on these things, but it looks to me as if the kit has been created out of some old and not very crisp mouldings (brake gear and so on), with the addition of some new - and very crisp - sprues containing the body panels. Anyway, it also contains those tiny little collars to fit over the buffer shanks (!), and the buffers themselves are a bit meh, so they'll also be replaced with turned metal items. The one piece chassis is great - makes for a beautifully free-running wagon (that shows up how far from level Chuffnell Regis is, when it happily goes wandering off on its own...)

Lovely. CR Mk II may feature a garage; if so then I'll be shamelessly plagiarising your ideas von W!

Sorry to hear about the difficulties Paul. And wishing you the best of luck with the printer - personally I think they are the devil's work!

You're going to have to nuke it from orbit - it's the only way to be sure!

I still have some left from 51L, but will definitely take a look at H&A when I need more. I seem to remember they have all sorts of useful little bits and pieces on their site...

I'm back in the thick of it with work today, but took a minute to plonk the pagoda hut and fencing in place. I think this will look more or less right (I'll try to get things actually straight!) You can see that I made a slight, ahem, faux pas, when I drilled the holes for the gate to the end loading bay. They were drilled about a million years ago, when I had some other gate in mind. A dab of filler should sort that out.

Now there’s one that I am fluent in!

I say!!!

Well that's turned out to be a rather productive day. The LNER cattle wagon is now complete, save for couplings and gluing the roof on, which I'll do after painting the interior and priming. I fitted a lead weight inside with superglue, then tackled the buffers. The shafts of the metal buffer heads need a 0.5mm hole drilling in the buffer shanks, which was beyond me, partly due to the plastic ones in the Parkside kit being tres spindly. Fortunately the spares box came to my rescue once again. I'm sure the shanks I've used are wrong in all sorts of ways, but they look ok to me! So here's the wagon next to its GW brother. Next thing to be given the coup de grace was the pagoda hut. With the light and dark stone finished, I painted the roof with a mix of Vallejo black/brown and white. I was hoping to have something just a shade warmer than bog standard grey, but I'm not sure if I like the result or not. I deliberately left the colours poorly mixed so that there would be some variation on the roof. The paint isnt fully dry yet, so I'll see how it looks in the morning. The hut will get a touch of light weathering too, of course. Wanting to make a bit more of a dent in the kit stash, I then started on a Cambrian GW steel open wagon. These kits have a feature that is an absolute boon for someone like me, who has a complete inability to build anything at right angles ... What a lovely idea isn't it? So, construction continued "at pace" (I hate that phrase - typical governmental weasel-ness; pace doesn't necessarily mean fast!) Anyway, I was able to get a fair bit of this done tonight before deciding that enough was enough for one weekend. Time for a wee dram 🍻