steverabone

For this next project I am attempting to build a much more complex electric locomotive - the BR E44 (later renumbered BR144) Bo-Bo. The photo shows one of the locos at Stuttgart in the 1980s. Note that this loco has different side grills to the loco I have modelled. Once again I'm going to use some of the parts from Albrecht Pirling's pdf card kits which he has made available free on the Internet. To power the model I am using two Airfix Royal Scot tender drive units which have exactly the correct wheel base for the E44. As usual I've replaced the OO gauge axles with S Scale ones, kept the original Airfix wheels and gears and added Alan Gibson S Scale spoked tender wheels. Simple metal strip brackets have been bent to a U shape and secured to the dive unit using self tapping screws in the original holes that secured the cast weight in the tender. A small BA bolt has been passed through a hole in the metal strip and soldered in place. I did a mock up of the bar that will locate the bogie pivot points and also the sides of the loco's main footplate on which the original loco's body was constructed. To make the basic chassis I fabricated this card structure which.... .....as can be seen will fit inside the locomotive's body.The bogie bolts are passed through holes in top of the frame which have washers superglued to both top and lower surfaces of the card. The motor bogies are connected electrically so there is 8 wheel pick up and running is extremely smooth. The pdf kit has the sides of the footplate and the underframe for the non-working model drawn in three parts at 1:38 scale. For my purposes I resized, cropped and rejoined them to S Scale and then used this as a template for the part I needed for the main footplate. The main footplate assembly above shows the holes for the motor bogies and the lower sections at the end where the loco's bonnets sit. The next task to be tackled was turning the tender drive units into something that resembles a bogie. The pdf comes with parts that can give a realistic representation but they need to be secured to the mechanism securely. The method I have chosen is to have an internal bogie side frame out of sheet brass onto which the card parts will be attached. The brass is hung from pieces of wire that are soldered onto the metal strip that is used for the bogie pivot point. The card bogie side frame has been glued to the brass - the M stands for Mitte (middle) and the V for Vorne (front) so I've marked these to avoid any confusion during construction. The inside of the bogie will be strengthened with additional layers of card and a thick coating of epoxy resin. The footplate has now been secured with bolts to the internal structure, the motor bogies wired together and the E44 now has a working chassis ready for the addition of the loco's body. Most of the detailing work on the bogies will be left until the basic body has been constructed to avoid damaging relatively delicate parts. I'm now moving on to construct the loco body. This will need to be detachable from the chassis so cannot be assembled in the way it was designed for a card static model. The sides are handed with different numbers of grills on each side. The first step was to cut out all the windows and the spaces for the ventilation grills. On the real locos some have the grills recessed inside the body shell whilst others have them added to the outside. I chose the former. The grills are made from pieces of card scored heavily with a sharp biro; these are then glued to the inside of the openings. The cab ends have had slots cut in them to clear the chassis frame. The ends and sides were glued together and a piece of mounting card was cut to the exact size needed to hold the sides correctly and glued in place. The body is placed loosely on the chassis. The body will be secured to the footplate part of the chassis by bolts passed through the footplate. Two bolts are in the centre of the main section of the body and are secured to nuts soldered to thin brass sheet. These are secured to the longitudinal strengthening strips that run along each side of the body. The photograph also shows the various pieces of card that are inside the body to strengthen it and hold everything at right angles. There are certain compromises necessary to accommodate the mechanism, the principal one being that the cab space at each end has had to be severely restricted by placing a piece of card about 10mm back from the windscreen in order to hide the internal frame. The bonnets at either end of the loco are made from a fold up assembly glue onto a base. I have had to modify these considerably to allow them to be joined to the main body and also to be fitted around the internal chassis structure. This involves multiple layers of mounting card within the bonnets. I've now added one of the bolts at the bonnet end. A piece of card is secured inside of the bonnet. The nut will be trapped in place with small pieces of card. Both of the bonnets have now been completed and the body is now bolted to the chassis in four places. The bufferbeams are made from a fold-up cuboid which I strengthened by gluing several layers of mounting card inside to make a solid block. These were then glued to a piece of card secured to the outer ends of the bogies. The buffer beams stand out from the front of the footplate and on the real loco are mounted on the bogies. The buffers are 4mm scale BR heavy duty freight wagon buffers that are a reasonable representation of those on the DB E44s. To strengthen the bufferbeam assembly and also provide the coupling bar I've used a U shaped length of brass wire soldered to the cross wires within the chassis. The wire was passed through slots in the card front of the bogie and secured with epoxy resin to the underside of the bufferbeam. The roof is a separate structure made out of layers of mounting card filed to shape and covered with several overlays of thin paper to obtain the correct profile.... ... as can be seen in this photo. The basic structure of the loco is now complete with lots of detail parts still to be added. The model has two pantographs soldered from nickel silver wire with card discs for insulators - these were later changed. The pantographs are rigid and built to the same height as the BR E69 I made earlier so that if I ever build a layout with overhead wires they can be set at a height just above the pantograph contact strip. Further details such as the axleboxes, springs, sandboxes, the raised central area on the roof and window light shields are all from card and from the parts in the pdf kit. One of the problems modelling pantographs is the need to produce the numerous insulators. On my BR E69 I used card discs but this method didn't produce quite the effect I wanted. I repeated the method for the BR E44 (as can be seen in the previous image) but with numerous insulators needed on the BR E44 I wanted a better method. The solution was to coil some thin solder around a length of brass wire and then cut the coil into the lengths needed. The result can be seen above - not quite right but consistent. Also in place are the brass strips that will form the supports for the walkways on the roof. The strips are lengths cut from a strip of etchings. They are bent at the end s and then secured in slots cut in the card roof at each end. I've now added the complex layout of switch gear, insulators and wiring on the top of the roof. The insulators are coils of solder wrapped around short lengths of 1 mm diameter wire with fine brass wire connecting them . The timber walkways are represented by strips of card glued to the brass strip supports. I decided later to make some alterations to the pantographs - repositioning the lower legs to give a more realistic spacing at the bottom of the diamond shape and also adding the linkages between the legs. Whilst not perfect the pantogarphs are reasonably close in appearance to the real thing and importantly are strong and rigid. A large number of details have been added: handrails, cab steps, air brake hoses, electric train heating cables, beading along the body side and cantrail, hinges, brake pull rods, roof walk supports, headlights as well as the curious arrangement of cooling pipes on the side of one of the bonnets. The model in grey primer. The finished model viewed from cab 1 end. The lettering is from various transfer sheets by Modellbahn Decals Viewed from cab 2 end. Now I really need to find space for another layout so I can add the overhead catenary!!

TRACTION 276 will be on sale in the shops on 26th May with digital copies available a few days earlier. It is often fascinating to be able to hear about events which were not generally public knowledge at the time. David Clough has been looking at the often complex decision making when procuring new locomotives. Using original source material he reveals how BR decided to build the Class 90s and 91s during the 1980s. Andrew K Overton returns with the second part of his photographic adventues on the East Coast Main Line near Doncaster, this time concentrating on freight operations. Colin Boocock, a former senior BR manager, describes the recovery of two Class 31s that crashed down onto the North Circular Road in London. It’s a hair raising tale! Jonathan King looks at the final years of mail trains in Devon and Cornwall. We have two features about sand traffic: David Hayes describes the operation of traffic from Holmethorpe in Surrey, whilst David Ratcliffe gives us the details of the wagons used on these trains. In this issue’s photographic feature we concentrate on the Basingstoke to Salisbury line using a selection of photos by Gavin Morrison. Roy Kethro continues the story of the early years of his career when he was a lowly apprentice at Bristol Bath Road depot. In TRACTION MODELLING we showcase Oldshaw, an EM Gauge layout with a West of England flavour. Purchased ready built by three friends, they modified it and assembled sufficient rolling stock to exhibit the layout.

I spray everything with grey car primer and then brush paint with Humbol enamels. The correct colour is RAL 6020 (chromdiogydgrun) green used on DB electrics and green coaches - Humbrol 195 The transfers for the lettering have been specially produced (resized from HO to S Scale) for me by a small German firm https://www.modellbahndecals.de/ . They come as a complete set of lettering for one coach. The body is sprayed with gloss varnish before the waterslide transfers are added and then several coats of matt varnish are sprayed to fix them in place. The bogies are spray painted with matt black (weathering still to be applied).

If you having been following my various posts about constructing rolling stock for my German S Scale layout you may have noticed the absence of pre WW2 rolling stock. So now I have a range of post war carriages available it seems a logical step to build some pre-WW2 carriages for my German layout. Many of these vehicles were in service until the 1980s and on several occasions I found myself travelling in one. This is a type Byge667 which was built in the late 1930s and was included in the formation of a Norden to Wilhelmshaven local train in 1980. This type is interesting visually as two of the windows in the centre are spaced closer together than the rest of the windows. There were several different types of various lengths whilst some had double doors and others single doors. Interiors also varied. with 2 plus 2 seating as well as 2 plus 3. There are two types that I intend to build. The diagram below is of the Byge667. This has a slightly unusual appearance as two of the windows at the centre are spaced much closer together than the rest. A slightly longer version is the Byge655 which has evenly spaced windows Byge637 I've decided to build a Byge655 first and have used some parts from one of Herrn Pirling's pdf kits (available on one of the German card model forums) to assist construction slightly. The carriage he designed is one of the longer versions of these 1930s built coaches. By selecting the shorter Byge655 it means I can use the carriage with two of my DB Umbauwagen and still be able to run round the train in Niederwangen station. The coach base is made out of three layers of greyboard glued together and with the upper layer having the seat plan glued in place on the top. Unfortunately, in S Scale the ends and body sides are too long to fit on a single length of A4 card so they are made from three separate pieces of card. The coach sides and recessed doors were printed out on 220 gsm card and then glued in place to the top edge of the base. The inward sloping body sides and door ends overlap and are glued together. These pre-war coaches didn't have many cross walls to break up the interior so I've adopted a slightly different method of construction for the saloons compared to my other carriages. After cutting a layer of card in a comb-like shaped into which the glazing will slot (as above)...... .....the inner layer is made out of a strip of 2mm mounting board that fits along the inside of the saloon and has holes cut in it very slightly larger than the outer window. Both layers are glued to the outer wall of the carriage and now form a really rigid side. This will be made even stronger after the seats are added and the roof structure slotted in place. The thin card needs considerable reinforcement especially at the ends so I've added an internal layer of 2mm thick mounting board on the inside of the vestibule ends. Space has been left behind the door windows for a piece of glazing strip to be added later. All the seats and toilet walls are now in place. The seat backs are out of strips of mounting board and thin card is used for the seats which are supported on more strips of mounting board running along the the sides just below window level.. The roof is built as a separate unit. The base is a 2mm thick piece of mounting board cut to fit tightly inside the ends of the carriage and about 2mm narrower than width of the body. On to this is glued a vertical central spine of mounting board which is cut to overlap the ends and provide support for the domed end of the roof. Layers of mounting board of reducing width are glued to the base to give support to the curved roof covering. The domed ends were more complex to produce than I expected so I decided to remove the curved top of the ends and glue this to the roof substructure, The section removed is inside the red outline. The central section of the roof is a layer of thin card coated on its underside with two part epoxy resin. The card is also wrapped around under the roof substructure and secured to its underside. The domed ends were made by curving and gluing two thin strips of card to the tapered ends of the roof sub base. These overlapped the ends and met in the centre line of the roof. As the epoxy sets the card was curved into shape with finger pressure. Any gaps were filled with epoxy. The rain strips along the length of the roof have been added as well as the strips across the roof using 10 thou microstrip. The ventilator panels for the toilet are thick rectangles of card. The gap between the end of the carriage and the curved end to the roof . This will be filled in after the roof is finally secured to the body. I've used a different method to constructing the bogies making these as a one piece structure, rather in the manner of those found in some etched bogie kits. The bogie sides and the centre pivot stretcher are cut from one piece of brass sheet as in the diagram above. Holes for the bearings are drilled out and then a heavy duty knife is used to score the brass around the central pivot stretcher. The two rectangles (in red above) are then removed by first cutting along the long edges and then bending the brass repeatedly until they come loose. The bogie sides can then be folded along the scored lines to give the basic bogie frame. Top hat bearings are then fitted, the side frames are then trimmed roughly to the correct shape using scissors. After inserting the wheels the end stretcher bars (brass wire) are soldered in place. The two bogies with the basic frame overlays added from card. Details will be built up on these from different layers of card and wire. The press studs used as bogie pivots and the strips of brass wire used to prevent the body of the coach rocking can also be seen. The male part of the press studs are soldered to a rectangle of brass glued under the carriage floor. One of the problems I faced with this model was the roof ventilators. These were an unusual shape which is difficult to reproduce in model form and obviously there are no suitable castings available. I've used 1mm diameter wire bent into a U shape with a short and long leg. The long leg goes into a hole drilled into the roof whilst the short leg just touches the curve of the roof. Another vertical length of brass is soldered to the short leg and this is then covered with some epoxy. The aim is for it to look something like the small image of the roof of a HO scale model. The buffers (BR heavy duty wagon white metal castings) and the end steps (from nickel silver wire and strip) have been added. A Hornby coupling has been added at one end and a Kadee at the other end. I intend to run the coach with either one or two bogie Umbauwagen which have Kadee couplings at the inner ends. I've now added the long metal handrails at the doors as well as the various longitudinal and vertical beading strips that can be found on the coach sides. The detailing on the bogies is from the pdf kit and is simply a series of multiple layers of card to represent the springs and axleboxes. The completed model: glazing has been inserted in the window slot, corridor connections added and lettering as usual from Andreas Nothaft. The roof is permamently glued in place.

In TRACTION issue 275 we start two new series of articles and conclude two others. Andrew Overton photographed trains around the Doncaster area in the 1980s venturing out into the surrounding countryside in search of new photographic locations. In the first part he looks at passenger traffic whilst in the next issue he will concentrate on freight operations. Roy Kethro begins a major series of articles about his time working on the Western Region and especially at Bristol Bath Road depot. David Hayes concludes his article about the rundown of CO2 traffic in the 1990s, whilst the wagons used are portrayed in the accompanying feature by David Ratcliffe. Martin Axford was one of several hundred British railway enthusiasts who crossed the North Sea in June 1986 to take part in the EM2 farewell rail tour in the Netherlands. The former Woodhead Line electrics had found a new home in that country hauling heavy long distance expresses. As well as describing the events of the day, Martin also gives a lot of background information about the motive power of the Nederlandse Spoorwegen. Andrew Holl concludes his article about the use of ‘Deltic’ D 9000 by Virgin Cross Country in 1998 and 1999. A little known interlude in the history of British diesel multiple units is covered by Andy Flowers in his article about the use of ACV Railcars on the Stanmore and St Albans branches in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The South Western main line between Winchester and Southampton is the focus of this issue’s photo feature from Gavin Morrison’s archive. In TRACTION MODELLING our featured layout is In TRACTION MODELLING our featured layout, Jeffrey Lane, is based in the West Midlands. There are lots of scenic details, a TMD and plenty of operational action.

The track at the top is a test length I have made from the S Scale Society's new track system of plastic chairs and laser cut sleepers. Underneath as a typical length of Code 100 16.5mm gauge flexi track (not Peco). Whilst I would recommend joining the society you can build S Scale track without joining the society or using their track. The photo below shows Code 100 rail soldered onto 4mm scale copperclad sleeper strip and gauged with home made roller gauges. For this German outline layout I needed flat bottomed rail rather than bull headed rail.

The latest edition of TRACTION (TRACTION 274) will be on sale in the shops from Friday 27th January. Please be aware that there is still the possibility of delays due to postal disruption. If the magazine is not available in the shop of your choice please ask the staff if there is a reason for the delay. We start this issue with an article by Michael S. Welch about a visit to northern Scotland to photograph trains on the Highland Main Line and the line to Kyle of Lochalsh. All didn’t go quite as planned due to the weather but fortunately another photographer, Martin Axford, has ben able to fill in some of the gaps in Michael’s coverage. David Hayes starts a new series of articles about the transportation of carbon dioxide by rail and in the first part looks at the years before the end of Speedlink services. A hair raising experience is recalled by Stuart Broughton in his article about testing a Class 56 on the main line after maintenance at Toton depot. In the 1970s Tyneside based Trevor Ermel ventured south to photograph East Coast Main Line trains against the backdrop of semaphore signals, shortly before they disappeared. One of the many attractive lines in the north of England is the Hope Valley line between Manchester and Sheffield. Andrew Overton talks about the difficulty of photography in the days before the internet enabled enthusiasts to know what to expect to see. A former Virgin Cross Country manager tells us the story of how preserved ‘Deltic’ No. D9000 came to be used on passenger services for the company. We visit the island of Ynys Mônm (Anglesey) with Gavin Morrison in the years when loco hauled trains were plentiful on passenger services to Holyhead. In TRACTION MODELLING we feature the superb O Scale layout “Alexandra Sidings”. This O Scale layout is crammed full of interesting features and uses DCC control to great effect.

The BR78 has now been completed. The first photo shows the model after all the various pipes have been added to the loco. These two show the completed model after painting, lettering and glazing. The model can be seen in action on my layout. The German section of my layout uses the British section as a fiddle yard so you will see the train running out of Bavaria and into Lancashire to reach the fiddle yard. https://www.steverabone.com/sscalewebsite/BR78 video.3gp

It was published yesterday - 26th November - but it will depend on whether this branch has received their copies and also presumably whether they have had time to put them on the shelves. Perhaps it is worth asking when you visit WHS again if they are still not there.

In TRACTION 273 we start with an article by Jonathan King about the evenings he spent watching trains on Rattery Bank in Devon with a surprising amount of freight action. David Hayes concludes his two part article about milk traffic to London, whilst a related photo feature by David Ratcliffe turns the spotlight on the milk tankers used on these services. The table below was too large to include in the magazine but can be downloaded and printed out by clicking on this link. Table for website Part 2.pdf Adrian Willats recalls his travels using a North Western Rail Rover in 1993 and reminds us just how much has changed in this part of the country with the withdrawal of the ‘Pacers’, the introduction of new rolling stock and widespread electrification. In our European spot Colin Boocock brings us up to date on the variety of locomotives and rolling stock to be seen on the railways of Luxembourg, a system that is easily accessible from London with just one change in Brussels. In the last issue Ian Buck looked at the last days of ‘Heritage’ DMUs in Glasgow. He now turns his attention to the Manchester area where several of those Scottish Metro-Cammells ended their days. The Portsmouth area once had quite a bit of freight activity which Peter Nurse describes in his article about ‘Freight Friendly Fratton’. Finally, Gavin Morrison has looked through his archive of photos of the Class 60s and we see some of the class that have now found a new owner in the form of DC Rail. Sadly, whilst some of these have returned to service, others languish in store. This issue’s featured layout in TRACTION MODELLING is Upham Market. Mark Thatcher drew inspiration from his recollections of East London commuter traf c in the 1970s and 1980s with this urban recreation.

Building a Deutsche Bundesbahn BR78 4-6-4T. Having already built two German tank locos for my Bavarian branch line it seems logical to build a model of the Prussian T18 which later became the BR78. The starting point was these diagrams found on the Internet. They were resized to S Scale and printed out on card. I only saw a few of the BR78s including 078.246 at Tübingen in 1971. Searching for suitable card kits of models of the BR78 I found one of the Polish version of the class which was designed for HO 1:87 scale and can be downloaded in pdf format from the internet. Many of the BR78s that had worked in the parts of Germany that became Poland after WW2 were absorbed into the fleet of the Polish railways. The frames were printed out and glued onto a sheet of 0.16" brass sheet cut roughly to the shape of the paper template with sharp scissors. Using a steel ruler to make sure the axles holes will be in a straight line, I used a sharp compass point to mark the centre point of each hole and then drilled through the brass to make a pilot hole. This shows the next stage. I've removed the paper template and tack soldered the frame side to another piece of brass which will later be marked out and cut to shape for the other frame side. The axle holes have been opened out to just the correct size for moulding pins to be tapped into the piece of chipboard. After the heads of the pins have been removed these act as the jig to solder the coupling rods to the correct length. The rod that is already in place came from an old 4mm scale model which had precisely the correct spacing. The other rods will be made from spare Alan Gibson Crab rods adjusted for length when soldering the two halves together. The frames have had the axle holes opened out ready to accept top hat bearings. The frames have been assembled with my usual method of strengthening the thin brass by soldering double sided copperclad sleeper strip along the top edges. A small number of frame spacers have been added and the bogies have been assembled as below. The bogies are made from one piece of sheet brass with axle holes drilled. The brass was heavily scoredwith a knife where the fold is to be made and bent to shape in a small vice. The pivot point is a slot about 5mm long through which a bolt is screwed into a nut soldered over one of the frame spacers. Thus the bogie frame can move from side to side as well as the axles having several millimetres of side play. This allows the chassis to roll smoothly around the 36" radius curves on the layout. The chassis is now partially complete and is powered. The motor, wheels, brake gear and coupling rods have been fitted and the chassis runs smoothly down to about a scale walking pace. The Romford (or Markits) wheels are from an old 4mm scale LMS Class 5 and unlike my other S Scale locos are only insulated on one side, meaning I only needed to fit one set of nickel silver pickup wires. Some minor modifications to the bogies have also been made - strips of brass have been soldered either side of the pivot slots that had been cut rather roughly through the brass. I've also soldered larger brass washers to the pivot bolt head and added some lead weights to the underside of the bogie frames. These changes allow the bogies to move from side more freely and hence no derailments. The footplate will be a combination of card and metal. The first step is to cut a piece of card with holes to clear the top of the wheels. This has been coated with wood rot fluid to harden The buffer beams have been made out of some scrap etchings which had a right angle bend already etched into them - they came from some jigs used for assembling footplates that were included in some Alan Gibson loco kits. They were cut to size and holes drilled before attaching to the card with epoxy resin. The valances along the underside of the footplate is N scale code 40 flat bottomed rail laid on its side with the wider bottom edge facing outwards. A strip of thin card glued to the underside of the footplate was used to support the narrower head of the rail thus ensuring that the valances would appear to be vertical. The front edges of the valances curve around to meet the front buffer bean. To do this I filed away the head of the rail leaving just a thin strip which was curved to match the curve on the top of the footplate. The valences were secured with more epoxy resin. The footplate is placed in position- a little packing was necessary at the rear to get it to sit absolutely the same height at the front and rear. Obviously, at the moment the footplate assembly is not very strong but will become more rigid as construction proceeds. The buffers and coupling bar have now been fitted as well as the nuts for securing the body to the chassis. As usual the 10BA nuts have been trapped within a block made up of two pieces of thick cardboard. Before constructing the cylinders in metal I decided to construct a mock-up in cardboard to check clearances for the bogie. The construction of the cylinders starts by bending a strip of brass (15mm wide) into the profile shown in the diagram, Bends are made by scoring the inside of the brass with a heavy duty craft knife before folding - this is much the same as bends in an etched kit. The brass is the soldered to the main frame and all edges are tinned with solder ready for the front and back faces of the cylinders to be fixed in place. The valve gear in its raw and rather crude state is made from a mixture of modified Alan Gibson LMS S Scale etchings and various pieces of wire and small diameter top hat bearings. Once painted and weathered all will blend together. The chassis is now largely complete - the front surface of the cylinders have had various parts added to represent what is there on the real loco, such as the piston tail rods which despite the sharp curves on the layout can still be represented by a piece of brass wire soldered into a top hat bearing. The front steps have been mounted on the chassis rather than the footplate - these were made from lengths of brass wire bent into a U shape and soldered into slots filed in the top of the chassis frames. Rungs are simply cross pieces of wire. I've now added the brake gear to both bogies and painted the frames and wheels in a suitable slightly dirty red. After the diagram shown at the top of this page had been re-scaled to S Scale the side and end elevations were printed out on 220 gsm card. The sides were also printed out as mirror images to give both a left and right hand side. The cab and side tanks have been and after cutting out the windows and cab doors have been assembled. The fit of the parts was extremely accurate confirming again that this method of construction produces models with relatively little effort. The boiler, as far most of my models, has a 20mm diameter plastic water pipe as a core with the required number of turns of thin card wrapped around it and secured with two part epoxy resin spread over the whole of the underside of the card. The BR78 has a much larger diameter smoke box than boiler barrel so this required further layers. I glued a Swiss coin, which has a tight fit in the plastic tube, to the front of the cab. This acts as a secure fixing point for one end of the boiler. The smoke box rests on a very large saddle which has been fabricated out of various layers of thin card and mounting board. I've also replaced the wheels on the front bogie with slightly smaller ones (and also much deeper flanges) as the bogie kept derailing on the sharp curves. Clearances behind the cylinders are very tight so this is hardly surprising. The new arrangement has eliminated that problem. A little more progress with the chimney and two domes in place. The chimney is made from plastic tube which has had four vertical slots cut in it at right angles and some microstrip solvented in place. This slightly broadens the tube to given the correct tapering from the top of the chimney down to the top of the smokebox. The rear dome is an Alan Gibson Stanier dome modified by adding low melt solder to the top and then filing to the required profile. The front, and much larger dome, is a length of aluminium tube taken from an old Pilot gold marker pen. The inside of the tube was filled with epoxy resin and once set a further "dollop" of resin was added to the top and as it was setting teased into the approximate shape needed. Once set hard the epoxy was filed to the correct profile. A length of brass wire was secured vertically inside the dome and then located in a hole drilled in the centre line of the boiler to give a precise and secure fixing point. AS CONSTRUCTION PROCEEDS I WILL UPDATE THIS THREAD

I felt that the thread of my previous postings was getting too long so it was time to begin a new one. The model of the small centre cab BR169 used on the Murnau to Oberamergau line is now virtually complete and is awaiting painting. If you have read my earlier postings you may remember that the model uses a re-gauged Airfix Royal Scot tender drive unit. The pantograph is non functioning but replicates the original fairly closely. Should I build another layout with overhead catenary I will set the contact wire to give a few millimetres clearance above the contact strip on the pantograph.

I believe Traction isn't stocked in most supermarkets although it is in most WH Smiths. I suggest you ask somebody in the store if they normally stock it.

TRACTION issue 272 is now available in digital format at the Pocket Mags website. The printed issue will be published on 30th September, We start a two part series by David Hayes about the once vibrant traffic that brought milk from all over Britain to London. In the first part we concentrate on the 1960s and 1970s. Some additional material to accompany this article is available on this page on RMweb. Click here to download a timetable of Milk Traffic at Kensington Olympia in 1968 and also a route map of a milk train to the West Country. One of the more demanding tasks that any heritage group is undertaking at the moment is the re-creation of the former LMS designed Co-Co diesel No. 10000. Andrew Hoseason describes the background to the first British main line diesel and brings us up to date on progress using parts from a variety of sources. In ‘Devon Scots’ Steve Carter presents a selection of photographs of the Class 47/7s when they moved from Scotland to work trains between London Waterloo and Exeter. Ian Buck was involved in the gradual run down of the Metro-Cammell multiple units in the Glasgow and Manchester areas. He recalls their final days in traffic around Glasgow. David Ratcliffe’s feature looks back at the variety of privately owned Mark 1 coaches on the main line after they had finished working on BR services. In our last issue we covered the run down of loco haulage on Virgin Cross Country’s service. Richard Giles sent us some photos of the final weekend of summer Saturday trains to the West Country and we couldn’t resist a follow up feature! Colin Boocock returns with a study of the rather overlooked, but fascinating, railway network in one of the smallest countries in Europe: Luxembourg. In the first part of this article he concentrates on the 1960s and 1970s. The Aberdeen area freight scene is the focus of the images from Gavin Morrison’s collection. In TRACTION MODELLING our featured layout is the superb TT gauge ‘Portsea’, inspired by Portsmouth Harbour, with green Southern Region electric multiple units and freight traffic to the naval yard.

The timetable for Milk Traffic at Kensington Olympia has now been added to a new thread. Click here to go to that page

As promised as a follow up to David J. Hayes' article about London Milk Traffic we present a detailed timetable of workings at Kensington Olympia in October 1968. You can download this and print it out and add to the article in TRACTION 272. Part 2 of the article will appear in TRACTION 273 Kensington Olympia Milk Traffic 1968.pdf Below is a route map of one of the milk trains returning to St Erth which shows the complexity of working the empties back to the West Country.

TRACTION 272 is published on 30th September and I expect to upload the table and route map a few days before that. Stephen Rabone

As a foretaste of a major article about milk traffic to London in the 1960s and 1970s, written by David J. Hayes, which will be in the next issue of TRACTION (issue 272) we will be presenting here a table of train workings at Kensington Olympia in 1968. The first part of the article will cover the 1970s with the second part in TRACTION 273 will look at later developments and the tank wagons used. Keep an eye on this post which will be updated when the magazine is published with a pdf which you can download and print out as a supplement to the article. There will also be an additional train route map of one of the milk trains that you can also download.

I thought a thread I've put on the S Scale section of RMWeb might be of interest to German modellers. Everything has to be scratchbuilt as there is no commercial support. I mainly use card and bits of brass. The link to the page says it all. Stephen Rabone

As it says in the text: David Hayes concludes his account of the T42 trip freight working in the West Midlands, looking at the period until its demise in the mid 1990s. Part 1 last issue part 2 in the current issue.

This thread is definitely in the wrong place. It should be in the model section of the forum and not in a section about a magazine!!

Welcome to this special larger issue of TRACTION which focuses largely, but not exclusively, on the rail freight scene. We start with the long standing Greater Manchester Council’s ‘Binliner’ containerised refuse trains which have been operating for just over forty years. David Ratcliffe’s photos highlight the variety of locos that have hauled these trains. David Hayes concludes his account of the T42 trip freight working in the West Midlands, looking at the period until its demise in the mid 1990s. In ‘Medway Meanderings’, Keith Widdowson, a former BR manager, reveals some of the loco hauled workings he was involved with in this area dominated by electric multiple units. From Gavin Morrison’s photo archive we have selected a variety of freight workings on the Highland lines between Perth and Georgemas Junction. David Ratcliffe returns with another selection of industrial locomotives, this time from the Leeds based rm of John Fowler & Co. Renowned for its heavy freight traffic, the line between Severn Tunnel Junction and Cardiff attracted the attention of John Dedman’s camera in the 1980s when there was considerable variety in what could be seen in this part of South Wales. Another line that still carries much freight is the line between Chesterfield and Rotherham; Peter Rose recorded the scene throughout the 1970s and 1980s. Moving north to Scotland, Colin Howat describes freight in Ayrshire with particular emphasis on coal and iron ore traffic. Returning to the passenger scene, Glen Batten takes a look at the final years of Cross Country loco haulage. It is hard to believe that it is now two decades since the ‘Voyagers’ replaced Class 47s and 86s on these trains. Martin Axford was attracted to East Anglia on several occasions in 1985 to witness the mixture of loco hauled and multiple unit operations and in this issue we look at his first visit, a day trip that he made in April of that year. In TRACTION MODELLING the featured layout is the superb N Gauge Titheridge Junction layout which is set in the West Country in BR Blue days.

What a lovely model and beautifully finished. I must look into the High Level Models motors and gearboxes.

I've now completed my BR86 2-8-2T which I've been building for the past few months. The chassis is scratchbuilt and has been built as a rigid chassis with Markit wheels and a Mashima motor. The body is almost completely out of cardboard. The number plate is a temporary one until I obtain suitable transfers. The link below is to a short film clip of the loco in action on my layout. https://www.steverabone.com/sscalewebsite/VID_20220617_152150.3gp