Pierview

.For my final winter loco build before I have to turn my efforts to decorating and gardening I decided to tackle the Nu Cast Partners 15xx 0-6-0PT kit which was a Christmas present from my wife in 2020. I remember building the chassis of the original K's kit for a friend years ago and always quite liked the idea of getting one for myself. It was never a high priority however, and whilst I failed to make a move the K's range passed to Autocom before that manufacturer also disappeared from the market. Thanks to the heroic rescue act by Dave Ellis and Brian Osborne in recent years there is new life for many of these old kits, including the 15xx, so I wasn't going to miss the opportunity this time. Inevitably the announcement from Rapido trains about a RTR version then followed so I thought that I should get mine finished first! First impressions are that this is one of the better products from the former K's range although I am not sure whether Autocom upgraded the kit during their ownership. So far I am working on the chassis and progress is shown in the attached photos. The frames are very much as I remember the K's originals although made of somewhat thinner brass. Assembly is by the old fashioned screw in spacers and as this method did not afford enough width to fit my High Level gear box I widened the frames by the expedient of introducing washers between the spacers and frame on one side. Once all was square I followed the instructions in soldering the spacers into position on the inside of the frames before removing the screws and filling the external holes with solder, which was subsequently dressed back to a smooth surface. Unfortunately there is no provision for brake gear so before assembly so I marked and drilled holes for the cross wires. The Mainly Trains etched pack of GWR brake gear provides suitable hangers and these will be fitted in due course. The gearbox is a HL Loadhauler with 90:1 reduction and a 1020FE motor. Barry

I will be interested to hear how you get on Jon. I might even be tempted to make an improved version myself! If I recall correctly I didn't build the card kit as a fold up model but cut it into individual parts before treating them with model aircraft dope (or whatever it is called these days) to stiffen before assembly. This gave a sharper outline and was a tip picked up in a 1970's MRC. Barry

Some superb modelling there Phil. Did you use the Lledo Foden as the basis of your conversion? Also, I am very impressed by your 1 1/2 ton steam crane, which I assume is scratchbuilt. Did you have any plans to work from? Barry

Ah the minefield of GWR tender variations! However it looks OK to me so I think I will live with it.

Hi Jon A thought that occurs to me if you are contemplating scratch building a Yorkshire is to get hold of a RIKO card kit and use the parts as templates for metal or plastic construction. I haven't measured the RIKO kit but it looks right against my other models. Barry

If you don't already have it I would recommend Iain Rice's book "Locomotive Chassis Construction in 4mm". Like all his books it is very readable and has a chapter on compensation. It certainly helped me to understand what i had previously thought to be a dark art! Barry

Keith Yes it did. I did a web search and found a colour photo of 2538 at Welshpool. The plates are definitely red! Larger locos had red plates as well and there is a well known photograph of 2934 " Butleigh Court" at Swindon in lined black livery with red backed number and name plates. I did the same with my model version. Barry

I have the Dean Goods finished now apart from the tender works plate, which is on order. I made the rolled up storm sheet from thin foil from a wine bottle. I am not sure that I really like the early BR fashion for red backed number plates but as the prototype had them I thought that I had better follow suit. Ah well, the next project beckons.... Barry

Jon Yorkshires are a gap in my collection as well. Many years ago Rowland Miniatures were rumored to be adding some Yorkshire wagons to their range of cast kits but nothing ever came to fruition. As you say, the otherwise excellent Matchbox Yorkshire wagons are modelled to a strange scale and are too big for 4mm. To the best of my knowledge the only Yorkshire kit that has been produced was a cardboard one by RIKO in the 1970's and examples can still be found on E-Bay. Here is my model which I built a very long time ago. The kit is very basic but captures the essence of the prototype. If I was going to build another one though I think that I would add a lot more extra detail . Hope this helps! Barry

Whilst waiting for the arrival of a couple of bits to finish my Dean Goods I tackled some recent E-Bay purchases in the form of 3 road steam vehicles. The Foden 3 Way tipper is built from an EAMES kit and the Wallis & Stevens Advance road roller is built from a Springside Models kit. The green Aveling & Porter road roller is an ancient Lesney model which has been re-painted and titivated. It scrubs up very well. Road steam models is a secondary interest of mine and I have a very large collection of mostly kit built examples. Does anyone else share my interest? I am relatively new to the forum but despite a couple of searches I have not been able to find any other references. Apologies if I am posting in the wrong place! Barry

I have now finished detailing the Dean Goods apart from the smokebox door handle, which is on order. Replacement Dean buffers are fitted together with lamp irons, vacuum pipe and a reversing lever in the cab. So far as the tender is concerned I have corrected the water scoop, and fitted a buffer beam. The latter item was not present with the Hornby underframe and I suspect that it was an integral part of the original tender drive unit. I thought that the original handrails on both loco and tender were far too chunky so I replaced them. The original boiler handrail knobs were countersunk and their removal exposed large holes which were much too big for fine scale knobs. I therefore found it necessary to fill the holes with Milliput , sand down when dry, and re-drill for the smaller knobs. I fretted out the unrealistically large plastic coal heap (which was designed to hide the tender mechanism) and fitted a plasticard "floor" which I covered with black plasticine as a base for the crushed coal that will follow in due course. The final job is the repainting which I hope to do in the next week or so. Barry

Thanks folks, I will make the necessary correction. Just shows the value of this forum! Barry

I worked from the drawing in Russell's GWR locomotives book as shown. It's a Branchlines casting which is described as a GWR scoop but is not an exact copy of the type shown in the drawing. Perhaps I need to turn it around. What do you think? Barry

I now have the tender chassis completed as shown in the photos. The Hornby plastic underframe needed hacking around to make the Comet internal frames fit and I added a plasticard floor to enable me to attach the frames with a couple of self tapping screws. I also compensated the tender chassis as Comet made provision for it. I now have to sort out the loco body fixing and tender coupling before moving on to body detailing. I will have to do something about that monstrous coal heap in the tender! Barry

Thanks 5050, your Dean is rather more sophisticated than my humble effort and lots of good tips there. I thought that there had been a previous thread but I couldn't locate it. Barry

No, I was tempted but opted instead for a Comet internal frame set, Barry

I removed the Hornby weight, sawed off the firebox portion and replaced the rest in the boiler. More lead to be added where I can squeeze it in! Thanks for that . It's a useful tip for the future. That's encouraging to hear! I believe Chris Gibbon went to a lot of effort in developing his new range of motors and I am impressed with the two that I have used to date. Barry

Having completed the LNER J52 loco recently described,I decided to tackle another long standing project, namely a GWR Dean Goods 0-6-0. This is another Hornby upgrade for which I have been slowly accumulating the parts over a period of time. I have always wanted a Dean Goods although I didn't see any in service as the class had become extinct long before I started spotting. I did however see the preserved example 2516 in store at Swindon works awaiting restoration, so perhaps that counts ! Regarding the project, some years ago I was fortunate in being able to purchase at a very reasonable price loco and tender bodies on E-bay. Both items were in as new condition and would cost me considerably more these days. As this is a fairly common conversion I won't dwell too much on the construction details but the photos show progress to date. I am using Comet chassis kits for both loco and tender. The loco chassis is complete using Markits wheels (which I had in stock) a High Level Road Runner compact 60:1 ratio gearbox together with their 1015 motor. This is the second of the High Level "cost effective" motors that I have used and by mounting it vertically I have managed to fit it nicely in the firebox. I suspect haulage capability will be modest though. As I model in OO I seldom bother with compensation, but decided on this occasion to do so just for the hell of it! I used the excellent High Level hornblocks .The tender chassis has been assembled but is awaiting brake gear. Barry

I've now finished the J52 apart from it's shed plate, which is on order. I normally try to model engines that I saw in service, but as I didn't see any J52's I have chosen 68838 as my subject on the basis that it appeared to be a fairly standard class member without some of the subsequent modifications. It was a KX engine and withdrawn about 1956. After this rare foray into things LNER my next project will be a Dean Goods. I have spare Hornby loco and tender bodies and intend to do a similar upgrade. Barry

I have now managed to complete the detailing of the J52 body. Most of the parts came from the very comprehensive Mainly Trains detailing pack but I also added some extras including lamp and fire iron brackets, sand box operating lever and RH bunker steps. In this connection Allan Sibley's article in MRJ 35 ("Plastic Surgery on a J52") was extremely useful in identifying the differences to be found on this long lived class. I do take the point made by 31A about the smokebox door, but as I have nothing better to replace it with I have decided to live with it. The old girl is just about ready for the paint shop now! Barry

A quick progress report on the J52 with more body work done. The splashers have been replaced in their amended positions and handrails fitted. The chimney and dome have both been reduced in height to suit my BR era model and the under tank balance pipe fitted. Etched overlays have been added to the buffer beams and the new body fixing points have been made and glued in place. It shouldn't take much to finish it now but the next update will be after the festivities. Happy Christmas everybody! Barry

Thanks for your kind comments. The injectors have been removed as they will be replaced in due course by some nice brass castings which are included with the detailing kit. Are the plastic ones of interest to you? Barry

I seldom build LNER locomotives and I have to admit that my knowledge of them is far from extensive, to say the least. However there are some things that you have to build in order to get it out of your system, and, in my case, the J52 falls into this category. I have always thought the J52's to be splendidly archaic looking locos and I took a liking to them from the time I first came across a photograph in my newly acquired Ian Allan combined volume many Christmases ago. Unfortunately, I never saw any of the class in BR service but was pleased to see the preserved example in use on the NYMR in the 1970's. The Hornby model of the same era using the ubiquitous Tri-ang derived 0-6-0T chassis left me somewhat underwhelmed at the time, but the advent of the Mainly Trains replacement chassis and body detailing kits for the Hornby body fired my interest. Eventually I acquired the bits needed and the build has at last commenced. The photos show progress to date and are largely self explanatory. Both kits are designed by Iain Rice and ,as you would expect, offer clear instructions and sensible advice. I have used Gibson driving wheels and a High Level Road Runner Plus with 60:1 reduction. After talking with Chris Gibbon I decided to try one of his economically priced small motors and it seems to perform well. I also managed to fit it into the firebox area without having to intrude into the back head and cab. I have made a start on the body butchery by fretting out the blanking plates under the saddle tank and removing the splashers for subsequent re-attachment in the correct position. So far as I can see what now needs to be done is a lot of detailing work! Barry

I can recall that John Charman had a couple of these finished in Southern livery on early versions of his famous Charford branch. In his locomotive list he described them as G6 class (nearly!) Barry

This is my Airfix prairie tank kit motorisation which I originally completed in 1997. it has just been given a heart transplant with a replacement Comet chassis kit together with a High Level RR+ gearbox and a Mashima 1420 motor. Needless to say it both looks and runs better than the previous mechanism which, in more impecunious modelling times, I cobbled together from an old K's chassis and a tri-ang XT60 motor. This was very much a locomotive on the cheap and I didn't even use a complete kit. Instead I put together a collection of parts from my scrapbox, a couple of which were original Kitmaster bits, and begged the rest from a friend. I can remember spending an enormous amount of time carefully scraping off the raised lining from the tank sides whilst at the same time trying to preserve the rivet detail. The plastic handrails also had to be shaved off and the surface gently smoothed down with fine flour paper. I am not sure I have the same patience for all that these days! I fitted wire handrails , replacement chimney, safety valve bonnet and whistles together with other extra details including lamp brackets and bunker steps. Looking at the model now I can see that there is more that I could have done but with these upgrades you have to draw the line somewhere. You can't really make a silk purse out of a sow's ear! Barry